You knew it was coming. Better games have been raked over the coals, so Jeanne D’Arc
got a lot of flaws that will need to be fixed if Level-5 ever plans to dip into the tactical RPG well again. Some of the things other people complain about like turn limits and long cutscenes didn’t bother me, but plenty of other things did.
1. Jeanne is annoying. Seriously. Yell, whine, mope, yell, whine, mope, yell, whine, mope, doesn’t she get tired? Even that fetching piece of black “armor” that shows off her oh-so-nice shoulders as she angsts yet again didn’t help.
2. Characters die or leave your party at inopportune times. That’s okay with me. No, really. I’m not mad or anything that I had to raise Jean several levels after Gilles up and took off or anything. But I am mad that Roger left my party for like 15 chapters, came back and then I was forced to put him in my party and keep him alive right before the final boss battle. That was not funny.
3. The story was stupid. I’ve said it before, but one more time won’t hurt: the story was stupid. Either you’re making a history-based tactical RPG or you’re doing a demons-ate-my-baby thing. Pick one. Btw, did I miss something or did characters like Charles VI and Richemont just vanish from the story after a certain point? I was really looking forward to Charles’ reaction after I wasted his precious mommy too. Tch.
4. Battles get too repetitive. Repetitive battles in a tactical RPG? Say it ain’t so! Yeah, it’s kind of a staple of the genre, but Jeanne d’Arc takes it too far. When you’re using the same party, the same skills and fighting the same bosses on top of it (four, five times in a row), it’s hard to stay excited. Exactly how are we beating these guys anyway, if they can turn around and show up again the very next stage with nary a scratch?
4. Limited party was limited. 15 playable characters (that I got) and you could use between 5 and 7 at a time. 5 for most of the game. A lot of my characters went completely unused as a result (Rufus, Bertrand, Rose, Bartolemeo, etc). Lack of class or job changes also meant that Marcel at level 5 is the same Marcel at level 50, only with better gear. Ho-hum.
5. Limited skillset is limited. There are lots of skills, but most of them are useless given the limited number of slots, so I was using the same practical ones over and over again. This goes especially for the stronger magic spells, which I almost never used because my Richard also doubled as my healer. I could heal my entire party twice for the price of a single Thor’s Hammer. I don’t have a problem with MP starting at 0 though, since I’m used to it from FFTA2.
6. Navigation could be a bit iffy. Especially in oddly-shaped stages like Alrond Wood, the cursor can go flying all over the place when you’re just trying to select an enemy close by you.
7. The game was sluggish. First there was all the loading, even when doing simple things like opening the menu. Then some enemies would take several seconds thinking about their next moves. And then in the last third of the game a skill called HP Recovery appeared which meant both enemies and allies would waste time at the beginning of every turn just healing themselves. The cumulative effect of these things was to make the game feel like a massive slogfest by the end.
8. It’s rather easy. I never once got caught by the turn limit, and I only failed two missions once each. Just by doing each Free Combat mission exactly once, my party rapidly became overpowered, overequipped and overleveled, and anything after chapter 25-ish was a complete cakewalk. TBH, I forgot to transform in more than a few battles, and I still won easily.
9. Replay value is zero. I replay SRPGs I really, really like (Fire Emblem games, Luminous Arc 3), especially if I failed to get something in the first playthrough. In this case I’m clearly missing a few stones in some of the bracelets, but I don’t care. Neither the story nor the characters endeared themselves to me, and the battle system is nothing that hasn’t been seen before. Post-game content shmost-game content, I’m done.
10. Seriously, WTF was Talbot’s problem? What’s his stake in this? If he’s mad because the war is a family feud, what’s that got to do with us? What’s behind his sudden change of heart at the end? Why isn’t he dead? And why did I have to fight him five times in a row? WHAT AM I FIGHTING YOU FOOOOOAAAAAARRRRRGGGHH!
And a bunch of other niggling complaints that are too petty to mention here. My final, final assessment is that Jeanne d’Arc is a good, but not a great game. 35 hours of entertainment is nothing to scoff at, though, so I can freely recommend it to fans of the SPRG genre.
You didn’t use Rufus? He is THE best character in the game.
And the game wasn’t sluggish for me. Infact it was very smooth. Maybe that’s because my PSP is overclocked and I was also playing of the MS.
Agree with the rest though.
I didn’t use Rufus! I was shocked to learn later that he’s the best character in the game. He was so goofy, and he missed so often at the start that I benched him almost immediately. Still the game was simple enough without him, so it’s okay.
The loading times definitely did bother me, though I played off a memory stick as well. I knew I should have sprung for a better quality one.