It's September, and near the end of the month GameCube owners will be getting a prequel to one of the few RPGs the system got in its lifetime. The game is Baten Kaitos Origins, and unlike predecessor Baten Kaitos--which was published by Namco--Origins will come our way published by Nintendo themselves. Origins, released as Baten Kaitos II in Japan, is one of the last titles that will be released for the GameCube; many are viewing it as part of the system's send-off by Nintendo as Wii prepares to take center stage later this year.
As interested as I (and other Kaitos fans) am in this title, I can't help but remember that as late as last October, Namco was saying they were working on a title simply known as Baten Kaitos DS. As much as I am even today enjoying Baten Kaitos on the GameCube, having started playing through the game again a few weeks back, I can't help but think that the Nintendo DS is really the place that the franchise belongs.
First, a little background into how Baten Kaitos works: yes, it is card-based--after a fashion. The game mostly plays out like a traditional RPG (without random battles, hooray!), but the tri-Crescendo-based battle system is where things get interesting. Each character in the game possesses a deck of Magnus cards, of which a number are shown on the screen to select from during both offensive and defensive turns. Cards have "spirit numbers" on them that allow you to create straights, pairs, three-of-a-kinds, and the like that will increase your defense or offense.
As you "class up" (separate from levelling), you're allowed to play more cards from a bigger hand, and you must do it faster. Your "initial time" to play your first offensive card, which starts out as infinite when you're just starting out, goes all the way down to five seconds. As your character executes attacks, you must make sure another card is always ready to go next, or your turn will end. Similarly, defensive cards must be played before an enemy's attack manages to hit you. It's a very inventive system that gives the battles a very real-time feel, rewarding speed as you think on your feet and making pulling off that big straight feel like a real accomplishment.
It does have one particularly annoying problem, though--this great battle system must be controlled with the GameCube's controller. You must scroll through the available cards to play with the main analog stick. You can play the card you've selected with the A button, but as you progress cards will come up with multiple spirit numbers on them--to pick the spirit numbers you want to maximize your bonuses, you'll find yourself using the C-stick to pick one of the four numbers instead. When you have ten cards to pick from, many with three or more spirit numbers on their corners, the act of simply scrolling through the cards on the screen as fast attacks play out starts feeling incredibly inefficient.
In truth, the system really does work as well as can be expected given the limitations of the controller, and at the time Baten Kaitos was released, there really was nothing better save the PC platform, with a mouse. But now we do have something clearly better for this type of gameplay: the Nintendo DS.
The premise is incredibly simple. Have the game's battles play out on the top screen, and divide the touch screen between available cards and played cards. Rather than scrolling around, just tap the appropriate spirit number on the card you wish to play. Freed from the constraint of the time it takes even an on-the-ball player to scroll from one end of his hand to the other, the game is free to ramp up battle speed even more, bringing the challenge as close as possible to the mind of the player--well, at least until Nintendo ON arrives with its brainwave-sensing helmet, of course.
Baten Kaitos' game system had a few more tricks up its sleeve in addition to just speeding up the card play: the headache and confusion status effects. Headache was actually pretty lame; spirit numbers were simply relocated to card edges instead of card corners--it presented so little problem to me personally that I never even bothered to use headache cures. Confusion was a far more interesting effect: it made the spirit numbers spin around the edges of the cards. (Having had a few migraines myself, the confusion effect seemed more like a headache to me.)
This is where the DS can shine even more than just making the existing process more efficient. Start out by shifting the effect of the spinning spirit numbers into the new "headache". Now that that's done, create a brand-new confusion effect that has the possibility to truly confuse: have the cards themselves constantly in motion, swapping places and moving up and down. As the game progresses and battles get faster-paced, such an effect could truly create real confusion as players try to keep track of where the next card they wanted to play is.
It seems like a real no-brainer that moving the game to DS would significantly serve the gameplay, but what about the story, visuals, and the like? It is, unfortunately, probably true that Baten Kaitos' well-known and beautiful art and prerendered animated backgrounds would suffer in the transition. Even with the largest DS card size that we know is available, Baten Kaitos DS would have significantly less space to work with to make the beautiful scenery a reality. The reduced resolution of the DS's screens would probably also lead to these taking a hit. Voice acting--while not a strength in the U.S. localization of Baten Kaitos--would almost certainly need to be omitted or greatly reduced.
Players coming from the world of Baten Kaitos on the GameCube would doubtlessly find an entirely different atmosphere on the DS; however, the consideration seems a weak reason to not bring the series over to a system where its gameplay could really shine. Moving RPGs have definitely been done on less powerful platforms than the DS. Bringing us to the obvious question--why isn't it?
I suspect the answer lies in what Baten Kaitos DS was replaced with after it disappeared off Namco Bandai's radar: Tales of the Tempest. And while I'm certainly something of a Tales series fan myself, I can't help but think that if they did truly swap one for the other (after seeing the DS start to become the Japanese phenomenon that it is today), that it was a poor choice for gameplay. Tempest doesn't seem to benefit from being on the DS other than by tapping into DS's mammoth customer base; the DS simply does not make it a better game. But, it seems, Namco Bandai has spoken--the better-selling Tales is best put onto the better-selling platform, just because it can be, not because it should. It's business, after all.
It's telling what Monolith Soft president Hirohide Sugiura said in an interview with Cubed³. "We are strongly willing to develop this," he said. A Namco Bandai producer, responding to this, suggested that the project existed and was stopped and exists in limbo. It's indeed probable that part of Sugiura's willingness stems from being able to take advantage of DS's customer base, just as Tales seems to be doing, but I suspect he also does know that DS holds the key to truly unlocking the game's potential.
In the meantime? I'll be enjoying Baten Kaitos Origins in a couple weeks. It looks like a lot of fun, and I can't wait to try out the new battle system elements. But I do suspect I'll keep thinking how cool it would be... if it was only on the DS.
As interested as I (and other Kaitos fans) am in this title, I can't help but remember that as late as last October, Namco was saying they were working on a title simply known as Baten Kaitos DS. As much as I am even today enjoying Baten Kaitos on the GameCube, having started playing through the game again a few weeks back, I can't help but think that the Nintendo DS is really the place that the franchise belongs.
First, a little background into how Baten Kaitos works: yes, it is card-based--after a fashion. The game mostly plays out like a traditional RPG (without random battles, hooray!), but the tri-Crescendo-based battle system is where things get interesting. Each character in the game possesses a deck of Magnus cards, of which a number are shown on the screen to select from during both offensive and defensive turns. Cards have "spirit numbers" on them that allow you to create straights, pairs, three-of-a-kinds, and the like that will increase your defense or offense.
As you "class up" (separate from levelling), you're allowed to play more cards from a bigger hand, and you must do it faster. Your "initial time" to play your first offensive card, which starts out as infinite when you're just starting out, goes all the way down to five seconds. As your character executes attacks, you must make sure another card is always ready to go next, or your turn will end. Similarly, defensive cards must be played before an enemy's attack manages to hit you. It's a very inventive system that gives the battles a very real-time feel, rewarding speed as you think on your feet and making pulling off that big straight feel like a real accomplishment.
It does have one particularly annoying problem, though--this great battle system must be controlled with the GameCube's controller. You must scroll through the available cards to play with the main analog stick. You can play the card you've selected with the A button, but as you progress cards will come up with multiple spirit numbers on them--to pick the spirit numbers you want to maximize your bonuses, you'll find yourself using the C-stick to pick one of the four numbers instead. When you have ten cards to pick from, many with three or more spirit numbers on their corners, the act of simply scrolling through the cards on the screen as fast attacks play out starts feeling incredibly inefficient.
In truth, the system really does work as well as can be expected given the limitations of the controller, and at the time Baten Kaitos was released, there really was nothing better save the PC platform, with a mouse. But now we do have something clearly better for this type of gameplay: the Nintendo DS.
The premise is incredibly simple. Have the game's battles play out on the top screen, and divide the touch screen between available cards and played cards. Rather than scrolling around, just tap the appropriate spirit number on the card you wish to play. Freed from the constraint of the time it takes even an on-the-ball player to scroll from one end of his hand to the other, the game is free to ramp up battle speed even more, bringing the challenge as close as possible to the mind of the player--well, at least until Nintendo ON arrives with its brainwave-sensing helmet, of course.
Baten Kaitos' game system had a few more tricks up its sleeve in addition to just speeding up the card play: the headache and confusion status effects. Headache was actually pretty lame; spirit numbers were simply relocated to card edges instead of card corners--it presented so little problem to me personally that I never even bothered to use headache cures. Confusion was a far more interesting effect: it made the spirit numbers spin around the edges of the cards. (Having had a few migraines myself, the confusion effect seemed more like a headache to me.)
This is where the DS can shine even more than just making the existing process more efficient. Start out by shifting the effect of the spinning spirit numbers into the new "headache". Now that that's done, create a brand-new confusion effect that has the possibility to truly confuse: have the cards themselves constantly in motion, swapping places and moving up and down. As the game progresses and battles get faster-paced, such an effect could truly create real confusion as players try to keep track of where the next card they wanted to play is.
It seems like a real no-brainer that moving the game to DS would significantly serve the gameplay, but what about the story, visuals, and the like? It is, unfortunately, probably true that Baten Kaitos' well-known and beautiful art and prerendered animated backgrounds would suffer in the transition. Even with the largest DS card size that we know is available, Baten Kaitos DS would have significantly less space to work with to make the beautiful scenery a reality. The reduced resolution of the DS's screens would probably also lead to these taking a hit. Voice acting--while not a strength in the U.S. localization of Baten Kaitos--would almost certainly need to be omitted or greatly reduced.
Players coming from the world of Baten Kaitos on the GameCube would doubtlessly find an entirely different atmosphere on the DS; however, the consideration seems a weak reason to not bring the series over to a system where its gameplay could really shine. Moving RPGs have definitely been done on less powerful platforms than the DS. Bringing us to the obvious question--why isn't it?
I suspect the answer lies in what Baten Kaitos DS was replaced with after it disappeared off Namco Bandai's radar: Tales of the Tempest. And while I'm certainly something of a Tales series fan myself, I can't help but think that if they did truly swap one for the other (after seeing the DS start to become the Japanese phenomenon that it is today), that it was a poor choice for gameplay. Tempest doesn't seem to benefit from being on the DS other than by tapping into DS's mammoth customer base; the DS simply does not make it a better game. But, it seems, Namco Bandai has spoken--the better-selling Tales is best put onto the better-selling platform, just because it can be, not because it should. It's business, after all.
It's telling what Monolith Soft president Hirohide Sugiura said in an interview with Cubed³. "We are strongly willing to develop this," he said. A Namco Bandai producer, responding to this, suggested that the project existed and was stopped and exists in limbo. It's indeed probable that part of Sugiura's willingness stems from being able to take advantage of DS's customer base, just as Tales seems to be doing, but I suspect he also does know that DS holds the key to truly unlocking the game's potential.
In the meantime? I'll be enjoying Baten Kaitos Origins in a couple weeks. It looks like a lot of fun, and I can't wait to try out the new battle system elements. But I do suspect I'll keep thinking how cool it would be... if it was only on the DS.