In 1995, based on his love for one of the Four Great Classical Novels of Chinese literature, “The Water Margin”, Yosh*taka Murayama created his debut work Suikoden at KONAMI. This groundbreaking Japanese role-playing game (JRPG) combined Western fantasy backgrounds with the plot of classic literary works, presenting a noble protagonist who gathered 108 heroes under the guidance of destiny to form a rebel army. Together, they embarked on an adventure to overthrow tyranny for the sake of the people and the country.
Because of its epic world-building and intriguing characters, countless players were drawn to it and regarded it as their first JRPG. Not to exaggerate, almost every JRPG enthusiast had heard of Suikoden during that era. In 1998, amidst the rise of 3D graphics, Murayama’s insistence on 2D RPGs and the comprehensive evolution of game systems made the sequel, Suikoden II regarded as the most memorable instalment in the series for fans. However, during the development of Suikoden III, due to ideological differences, Murayama left KONAMI halfway through. Although subsequent entries in the series received mixed reviews, the absence of its creator and the change in game style remained a regrettable fact, often tinged with melancholy. It wasn’t until 2012, after the less-than-ideal reception of Suikoden: Tierkreis, that this IP was permanently shelved.
The unique setting of Suikoden made it irreplaceable by other JRPGs. Perhaps it was for this reason that when Yosh*taka Murayama, in 2020, led the original development team of Suikoden to establish Rabbit and Bear Studios and develop a spiritual successor, Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes, the game surpassed its crowdfunding goal within four hours.
With the spin-off title Eiyuden Chronicle: Rising released first as a kind of prologue to Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes in May 2022, longtime fans welcomed many familiar elements, including the 108 companions symbolizing the stars of destiny, the rune-lens replacing the runes, classic 2D illustrations, and most importantly, Murayama’s game design. After several delays, nearly two years after the initial release of Rising, fans’ long-awaited true sequel, Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes finally launched on April 23rd. Sadly, the original creator of the Suikoden series, Yosh*taka Murayama, passed away unexpectedly in February of this year, unable to witness the release of Hundred Heroes, making this work his legacy. It’s a poignant moment, and here, I’d like to pay tribute to this legendary game creator.
This game, which fans had been waiting for 26 years, was not only highly anticipated but also reached its crowdfunding goal on the first day, making it a significant game release in 2024. As a nostalgic yet fresh addition to the world of JRPGs, it undoubtedly stirred up excitement within the fan community. Now, let us dive into a review of this legacy work by Yosh*taka Murayama, approaching it purely from a gaming perspective, albeit with a tinge of sorrow.
※ If you just want to get a quick idea of whether this retro classic JRPG is suitable for you, here are the 5 major features of Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes
※ This review is based on the Steam version of the game
Game Title: Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes
Developer: Rabbit & Bear Studios
Publisher: 505 Games
Platforms: PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, PC
Genre: Classic retro, 2.5D art style, JRPG
Before the title screen of Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes appears, the development team expressed gratitude to all JRPG fans with a message: “With our appreciation to all JRPG fans.” It’s clear that the team aims to reignite our love for classic JRPGs, especially the nostalgia for Suikoden II, through Hundred Heroes.
In fact, the similarities between this game and Suikoden II are astonishing. It almost entirely inherits various classic elements from Suikoden II, including over a hundred hero characters, six-person party turn-based battles, team-up attacks for your Heroes, and more for all of you with a love for classic JRPGs in your heart.
In short, Hundred Heroes is a modern interpretation of the classic Suikoden series by former team members, presenting art design that blends modern 2D pixel art with 3D scenes, creating a new rendition of the beloved series with a new protagonist and world view. It’s like new wine in an old bottle, and for players who have experienced the classic Suikoden games in the past, entering Hundred Heroes will undoubtedly feel like coming home.
Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes tells a very classic and yet sufficiently passionate grand story
Let’s first take a look at the story structure of this game, as I believe many players are curious about whether this spiritual successor lives up to the captivating story structures of its predecessors. Personally, it feels like the overall world building of Hundred Heroes is expansive and epic, but the storytelling structure here is not as memorable as that of Suikoden II. However, the story structure presented in this game is still quite engaging, and players can even find many nostalgic elements reminiscent of Suikoden within it.
Briefly: As a member of the Guardian Corps, Nowa forms a deep friendship with the Imperial officer Seign during a mission to search for ruins. However, when the Empire discovers the Magic Prism in the ruins, Duke Aldric, the greedy ruler, decides to invade the major kingdoms to seize the Prism. Nowa’s hometown, Kyshiri Village, falls into the flames of war, and the Guardian Corps are falsely accused of arson. Nowa is forced to part ways with Seign, becoming enemies on the battlefield.
The game primarily unfolds from Nowa’s perspective. With the assistance of Lady Perielle, Nowa manages to escape the Empire’s siege. With the help of a trio of thieves they met during a previous mission, Nowa receives information about a ruin and together they establish a rebel base there (basically an ungrade version of “Liang Shan Po” from Suikoden, while here players can choose one of three names given). As they travel across various kingdoms, they form alliances and recruit heroes to expand the strength of the rebel army.
On the other hand, players also have the opportunity to switch to Seign’s perspective midway through the game. After witnessing the Duke’s atrocities, Seign begins to doubt him and eventually betrays him. He infiltrates the underground of the imperial city to investigate the Duke’s true plans and fights his way out of enemy obstacles to deliver information to the rebel army. As Seign’s and Nowa’s storylines intertwine, the epic tale of fantasy and camaraderie unfolds.
All of this sounds quite familiar, doesn’t it? Honestly, I think it’s a great world-building setup. With each chapter advancing and involving more and more countries and characters, the story becomes increasingly grand. However, as a game, the major ups and downs of the story take some time to truly feel, which is a drawback. As I journey across the map, trying to unite the alliance in different regions, I can’t help but feel that the pacing of the story is a bit chaotic.
Sometimes, many things happen suddenly, requiring me to pause the plot progression. The extensive cast of characters leads to numerous side stories, while at other times, the plot develops too quickly, leaving me unable to keep up for a while. Mainly, I feel that Hundred Heroes fails to fully integrate the important moments brought about by these characters into epic moments at once, resulting in a fragmented feel and a relatively low completion level of the story structure.
I’d say the overall story of Hundred Heroes is acceptable. I wouldn’t go and say the story structure is terrible; at most, it’s a bit cliché with not many unique features. However, the classic epic moments presented in the game are still quite exhilarating. Especially for players willing to persist for a sufficient amount of time, the initially slow-burning of Hundred Heroes will eventually ignite into an impressive blaze. This is how I’d like to describe: I’ve always believed that the story is the “soul” of the Suikoden series, while the gameplay is the “body,” I feel that Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes lacks the complete “soul” compared to its predecessors. Fortunately, despite its incomplete “soul,” Hundred Heroes possesses a “body” that matches its Suikoden predecessors perfectly, if not exceeding them and becomes 120%.
Over 100 heroes await your search and recruitment in Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes
Since it inherits the spirit of Suikoden, the mechanism of recruiting hundreds of characters naturally isn’t absent in this game! You thought “Hundred Heroes” was just for flavor?Not a chance. As the name “Hundred Heroes” implies, the number of recruitable characters is literally in the triple digits, even surpassing the 108 “Stars of Destiny” in Suikoden. Although the title of “Stars of Destiny” is no longer used, in Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes, players will still gradually encounter a total of 120 “heroes” from different races and cultural backgrounds, many of whom are characterized by distinct personalities and charm.
Of course, not every one of these 120 heroes is recruited for frontline combat. Many characters serve as “town-based” support characters behind the scenes, providing various effects to the combat team. For example, Cassandra, the inn’s hostess, allows the team to organize through save points even in the wilderness, Martha, the village farm’s matron, increases the amount of points gained from food, and Rody, the appraiser aiming to become a watchmaker, can use the power of the magic pocket watch to significantly increase the speed of all allies’ actions, and so on.
Although not all 120 heroes will be used in the game’s completion, the gameplay of how to find and recruit all these heroes is arguably the most important highlight of this game! The way to collect these heroes seems simple at first glance—explore every corner of the world, talk to unique-looking characters, complete some small tasks they request, and then recruit them. But this process is actually not simple at all.
It’s not just having them that’s fun, it’s also the exact process of finding them. A few heroes will join our team as the story progresses, it can be said that it’s quite difficult to gather all 120 heroes in this game without referring to detailed guides (the need for guides is indeed very retro and classic). It feels like the development team considered that modern players might feel uncomfortable with blindly searching the game without any clues, so the game introduced the Divination Parlor system. Through this mid-game unlocked feature, players can obtain vague information about the whereabouts of a certain character. However, these pieces of information are not specific directions but rather presented in abstract forms, such as vague hints like “someone is on that mountain”. Players need to explore the game world based on these hints and solve small puzzles to find the target character.
Moreover, in this game, some characters require players to encounter and recruit them at specific times. Many heroes will refresh and appear in places you’ve previously visited at certain time points, so returning to places you’ve travelled to in the past during gameplay may bring some surprises awaiting you.
With all that said, finding the characters is just the first step; many of them require players to fulfil specific conditions before choosing to join the team. They have various requirements that need to be met, such as helping them defeat monsters, assisting in finding items, solving puzzles, catching rare fish, or battling and defeating them themselves. Some of these requirements can be frustrating, while others can bring a smile to my face, making it quite interesting. This aspect adds to the enjoyment of recruiting heroes in the game, and every time I successfully find and recruit a new hero, I feel the same excitement as I did many years ago when playing Suikoden 2. It can be said that during my gameplay of Hundred Heroes, much of the enjoyment comes from “collecting heroes,” similar to the enjoyment felt when playing Pokémon. This is because in the game, almost all systems are related to collecting heroes in some way.
The performance of the companions’ storylines in Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes is somewhat similar to Suikoden. Several key companions will have recurring appearances, while most of the companions will only have a brief solo story when recruited. Similar to the Suikoden series, there are simply too many optional characters in Eiyuden Chronicle, to the point where most characters can be completely ignored. From a game mechanics perspective, this is an interesting design, but it also means that some characters have very little involvement in the storyline, feeling like temporary actors.
That doesn’t necessarily turn it into Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Cardboard Cutouts, though. Thanks to the Divination Parlor feature, even the most irrelevant party members can have at least a little bit of a backstory. These character background stories are gradually unlocked.
For example, let’s take the protagonist, Nowa. Initially, players only know that Nowa enjoys eating meat dishes, especially the hamburger steak with fried egg that his mother often makes. After unlocking his background, players will learn that Nowa learned many household skills from Marsha and is keen on cleaning the floor. Finally, memories of Nowa’s parents are also unlocked, providing further insight into his meddlesome protagonist personality inherited from his father. These small stories complement character development, providing a deeper understanding of their personalities, motives, and decisions behind the main plot. Even less important companions become more dimensional, and the charm of each character becomes more prominent.
The problem with characters backstories being locked away by all this is that it doesn’t feel like it’s part of the main story. While it’s great to have the option to flesh out these characters, having to take time away from the main story to do so makes it feel like “You’d totally understand why C3PO has a red arm if you read the comics”. It’s great that it’s there, I just wish the joy and wonder of getting to know these characters was a part of the experience of being a part of this world.
In the end, it’s not really a big deal, considering each hero has their own voice actor in the game, and most characters have their background stories and personalities thoroughly explained, some heroes even have captivating side stories, all of which add color to Nowa’s encounters with them throughout the adventure.
What’s more interesting to all these characters? The roster of heroes in this game. Since most heroes are not directly related to the main storyline, so there are many interesting character designs and over-the-top plot developments (both expected and unexpected). For example, there are characters like magical girl squads, delinquents, which don’t seem like they belong in this era, not to mention non-human races like werewolves, shark people, and even a backpack that you can recruit to increase your inventory space. From here, you can see how the development team let their imagination run wild.
If this were done in another game, I might find it out of place. However, considering Hundred Heroes is a game that emphasizes diversity in heroes, these unconventional characters not only don’t feel out of place but also serve as a way to lighten the mood amidst the weighty main storyline.
Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes features a growing base and various recreational mini-games
One of the smartest things Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes does is tying its base building to its star hero collection gimmick. Like Suikoden before it, this game grants you a town that serves as your main base, since walking around with 100 adventurers, some of which are shark-men, might raise suspicion. It’s a neat system that builds on Suikoden with the addition of talent trees for further customization.
Like in a lot of other games, the benefits your base provides is tied to its infrastructure- you’ll want appropriate buildings for certain effects, as well as party members to run them with the proper skills.
Constructing these functional facilities usually requires a certain amount of various resources and the use of headquarters funds, recruiting characters with corresponding professional skills into the team is also necessary. For example, recruiting a hero with a blacksmith profession allows weapon forging in the town, while hiring a merchant hero can establish a trading post in the base for buying and selling goods (a side note, each town sells goods with fluctuating prices that change over time, so the game strongly encourages you to have your own merchant in your base in order to earn funds through trade). Furthermore, the appraisal shop can identify various treasures, armor shop and jewelry shop can provide various equipment, the rune shop can change rune-lens to acquire more combat skills, and the magic bag shop can increase the player’s backpack capacity, etc. Clearly, town construction in this game is closely linked to characters.
Now, just like recruiting heroes, base building isn’t a mandatory checkpoint for Eiyuden Chronicle Hundred Heroes. However, it greatly affects the convenience of gameplay. It’s kind of clever that base building and Hero Recruitment are so intimately tied together- you’ll find that many blocked grid spaces when expanding your base are due to the absence of a hero you haven’t found yet. Therefore, the number of heroes you recruit also determines the extent to which your base can be developed.
Moreover, as facilities are built and upgraded, the base transforms from a desolate ruin into a bustling main city, and the interior of the castle changes from a scene of ruin to a magnificent spectacle. Collecting, building, growing, and exploring form a closed-loop gameplay, and the sense of achievement from expanding your influence becomes the driving force for players to collect resources and characters.
Oh, right, did I mention that we have “leisure and entertainment” facilities? Yes, players can enjoy various mini-games prepared in this busy adventure journey of seeking heroes. You know, mini-games, whether they are classic retro JRPGs or modern ones, are essential!
The game offers a wide variety of mini-games, including Beigoma battle tops, fishing, pet races, card battles, and many more. Even the cooking contest and sandboat racing from Suikoden II return in 3D! They guarantee that players can engage in various recreational activities besides battles to adjust their mindset, adding excitement to their adventure. As for whether they are fun or not, that’s subjective and depends on individual preferences.
But basically, they won’t affect the main storyline though, so you can play them whenever you feel like it; there’s no pressure to engage if you’re not interested. Plus, most mini-games are unlocked through town construction and recruiting key heroes, once again connecting game mechanics to the hero recruitment gameplay.
Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes features a Classic Suikoden battle system
It’s honestly interesting just how much of Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes is going for the authentic JRPG feel, even despite modern strides in the genre. Dungeons in this game are literal “labyrinths,” neither purely linear nor sandboxes. It’s kind of refreshing to see such a throwback experience- dungeon switches, limited save points, et cetera.
In terms of battles, the similarities between Hundred Heroes and Suikoden are astonishing—aside from the 6 heroes required to be on the battlefield, other team slots can be freely chosen from recruitable heroes, while support characters are limited to a few heroes who aren’t proficient in combat but possess support skills, providing buffs or adding certain advantageous abilities for the entire team (such as increased gathering or experience gain, etc.).
Additionally, due to plot requirements, players can have up to 3 “companions” in their team, positions reserved for necessary characters for each stage of the story. Sometimes, the characters needed for the plot may not be the ones the player has trained, so these characters can be placed in the companion slots, sparing the need to force untrained characters into battle.
Of course, like a true JRPG experience, there’s also positioning to take care of. Ranged heroes don’t exactly respond well to being punched in the face, while you can’t swing a battle axe if you’ve got your bestest friends standing in a row in front of you.
In various boss battles throughout the game, there may also be some environment mechanisms to utilize. These mechanisms are typically located on the left and right sides of the team and may be used to evade the boss’s powerful attacks or interrupt its moves. Consequently, characters in the middle row often have to endure some attacks due to their positioning. Due to the differences in characters’ physical and magical defenses and attack ranges, and because when a vanguard character dies, a rear guard character is forced into the vanguard position, careful consideration of your own strategy is needed when forming teams.
Just like in Suikoden, Hundred Heroes adopts a system where commands are issued directly to all 6 characters first, followed by the execution based on the speed of both our side and the enemy’s. It’s really interesting here because it essentially makes the start of each turn a strategy session- rather than responding to the situation as each character activates, your’e essentially telling them what to do when they do. It makes offense feel very involved, since you need to know the speed values of your units by heart if you want to be truly effective, and set up your strikes accordingly.
It does also have an effect on defense, too- your healing is basically proactive now, since you have to be able to anticipate when your buddies are going to be low on health and queue up a heal, while resurrected characters are also going to have a whole turn of standing around chewing scenery since you can’t boss a corpse around.
As a friendly reminder, characters of the mage class can be very useful in certain situations because they can directly learn healing magic using Water rune-lenses, using MP to replenish HP can compensate for the lack of recovery items. Even without MP, they can choose to use SP skills that automatically replenish each turn to support the team too, providing another layer of enjoyment in team composition.
Let’s talk about the growth aspect of the characters, it’s RPG after all. Of course, with such a large roster, you might wonder how you’re supposed to level them up. Characters not in the active party won’t gain experience points, but Eiyuden Chronicle Hundred Heroes allows characters to gain more XP when they take part in fights against higher-level enemies. Combine that with an accessory that increases experience gain rate, characters can quickly catch up to higher-level characters by participating in only a few battles, even if they were initially much lower leveled than their teammates. This is indeed a puzzling design, but it’s still a thoughtful one, making it easier to experiment with new characters and combinations.
In addition to levels, the growth factors for characters include upgrading weapons, equipment, and runes through forging. Forging weapons is definitely one of the most costly aspects in the mid to late game of Hundred Heroes. Weapon upgrades are straightforward; each character’s specific weapon is upgraded directly, so there’s no need to make any choices. However, blacksmiths only appear in a few major towns, so after certain points in the story, you may temporarily be unable to upgrade weapons. Therefore, if you’re a player who likes to switch hero compositions frequently, you need to pay attention to the location of blacksmiths and the progression of the game’s storyline.
The game also features a rune system, which is essentially an evolved version of the rune system from Suikoden. It’s a significant presence in the game because it’s related to the use of the rune-lens skills and spells. In Hundred Heroes, each character comes with several specific rune slots, and as they level up, some slots may be forced to equip the character’s unique skills, while others can equip passive or active skills. Active skills can be chosen from the six elemental magics. Therefore, in a way, whoever equips a rune with healing skills can serve as the healer in the team.
Thankfully, you won’t have to manually control every battle. If you’re just in the mood to grind, the game’s Battle Plan feature lets you essentially Gambit-style program your party to act under certain conditions. This does lock you out of the Hero Combos, but if you’re auto-battling you probably weren’t going to use them on trash mobs anyways.
After enabling auto-battle, although players lose most of their control, they can fully enjoy watching the characters’ heroic battle moves. Speaking of this, I have to mention the game’s battle cinematography, which I personally find outstanding. It’s not a rigid, zoom-in-on-each-character-and-play-out kind of presentation; instead, it seamlessly transitions between characters and enemies based on their action order, creating a cinematic feel. It’s worth noting that while the game features auto-battle, it lacks the speed-up function, a truly nostalgic and classic approach. Perhaps this is to allow players to fully appreciate the battle scene. Although the game’s pace may seem slower, newcomers might find it challenging to adapt, but for veteran fans, I personally feel that this ability to immerse oneself in the game at a slow pace is just right.
Speaking of battle cinematography, that brings me to the dazzling performances of various character-exclusive skills, they’re absolutely stunning! Many melee characters’ slashing skills, combined with sound effects, provide a satisfying visual effect and impact. This includes, one of the most common features in classic JRPGs, the character combination skill – the iconic Hero Combos from Suikoden, which are also present here! As long as you include two heroes with a strong bond in your team, you can spend SP during battles to enjoy these delightful combination skills called “Hero Combo”. They are glamorous, funny, cool, and extremely powerful, letting you style on your enemies with the power of friendship. They are everything you’d have imagined your party members doing together when you were a kid playing classic JRPGs. Believe me, when watching them in action, you’ll never feel this combination skill system is outdated. There’s plenty of combinations to choose from, so you’ll want to collect as many heroes as you can if you want to see them all.
When it comes to the most stunning battle scenes in the game, we have to mention the one-on-one duels and simulated warfare systems retained from the Suikoden series too. These two battle systems have seen significant improvements in visuals compared to the past of course. When entering the one-on-one duel, the scene switches to a side-view angle similar to a 2D fighting game, allowing the main character to engage in a one-on-one duel between the characters. The experience is also somewhat different, as the operation of the duel is relatively simple. It involves determining whether to defend or attack based on the opponent’s emotions and dialogue, and the goal is to deplete the opponent’s health bar first to win. In this iteration, the “sacrifice attack” has been replaced by a “powerful attack,” which requires accumulating gauges through attacking and defending to execute, and it’s a guaranteed critical hit.
However, the one-on-one duel system typically serves the narrative and thus these scenes are not triggered frequently throughout the game. Yet, you cannot deny the continuous sense of excitement and the hot-blooded feeling these scenes evoke. Although the one-on-one duels may seem simple and somewhat cliche, the sense of passion is always present in such scenes.
As for the simulation warfare system, it benefits greatly from the 2.5D visual style of this game, delivering stunning performance. In terms of the gameplay, the interplay of legion battles remains, with each character possessing corresponding battlefield skills. With the charge of soldiers and the rolling of casualty information, the atmosphere on the battlefield is further intensified. However, due to the game’s lengthy duration, and the warfare system is never deeply explored, the overall experience becomes quite similar after the first few battles. Additionally, the inability to fast-forward in this game makes the warfare system feel a bit monotonous after prolonged play, which is somewhat regrettable.
The beautiful 2.5D visual effects and outstanding voice-act and music in Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes
Ever since Octopath Traveler introduced the HD-2D style, this presentation method has become the preferred choice for modern gamers to experience classic JRPG. Hundred Heroes is an excellent example of this 2.5D artistic imagery trend, combining gorgeous 2D pixel art with 3D backgrounds, evoking nostalgia for old-school pixel games while maintaining a modern aesthetic. This design undoubtedly draws inspiration from Square Enix’s innovative HD-2D design in Octopath Traveler, but Hundred Heroes aims to revisit the 32-bit 2D style rather than the 16-bit style.
As an indie game, Hundred Heroes’ attempt to blend 2D pixels with 3D backgrounds may not achieve the seamless and dimensional quality of Octopath Traveler’s HD-2D, as most backgrounds are presented in a fixed 2.5D style without the ability to rotate the camera angle. However, despite this, the game still looks beautiful and captivating, coupled with the game’s excellent lighting and depth-of-field effects, I found myself able to focus on the adventurers’ journey from a more dramatic perspective during gameplay.
The game really shines during battles, with the cool and stylish character skill animations, eye-catching character combination attack sequences, and extremely impressive one-on-one duel scenes. It’s hard not to love these aspects thanks to the game’s outstanding visual design! Admittedly, it can seem like the sprites are infinitely less expressive outside of battle, but at the same time it’s that limitation that keeps it feeling like the JRPGs we grew up with.
If, like me, you’re a nostalgic modern gamer who can’t resist the combination of 2D pixel characters and 3D background scenes, then the artistic performance of this game is absolutely satisfactory and somewhat beyond expectations. Whether it’s the transitions between towns, the details of lighting and shadows, or the cinematography, coupled with the meticulously designed splendid battle animations and special effects, the visual experience is thoroughly satisfying.
The voice acting and music in Hundred Heroes are particularly commendable, in my opinion. Throughout most areas of the game, the background music consists of a highly replayable set of tracks that vary widely, adding emotional depth to these adventurous locations. In a game that may require over a hundred hours of playtime, such varied background music is indeed necessary, and the game strikes a good balance in this regard. What I personally find most important is the presence of competent and exhilarating background music during the game’s most crucial and epic moments, and Hundred Heroes definitely achieves this. The background music during various highlights plays a significant role in elevating the atmosphere to its climax, driving some important parts of the game. Renowned game music composer Hitoshi Sakimoto successfully brings out the “heroic” essence of this game through the background music, and effectively evokes memories of Suikoden.
Furthermore, the main voice acting in the game is also outstanding (based on my experience with Japanese voice games). Each main character has voice acting that highlights their distinct personality traits. Clearly, the audio quality of this game matches its visual excellence. The key point here is that the game is fully voiced! You might wonder if full voice acting is still a selling point nowadays. Yes, indeed. Considering that this game is made in the style of classic JRPGs, I didn’t expect it to have full voice acting. Just imagine, this game features a total of 120 playable characters, each with their own story, and all of them are fully voiced. This level of commitment shows the developers’ love for the various characters in the game and their understanding of how much players appreciate voice actors.
The game also boasts a rich amount of text, complemented by excellent character voice acting. However, if we were to point out a drawback in this aspect, it would be the quality of the translation. After all, the game text is translated from Japanese to English and then to Traditional Chinese. While the Traditional Chinese translation may seem a bit awkward in some places, it doesn’t significantly affect comprehension. However, because it undergoes two translations, it loses some of its original flavor. To make matters worse, the game uses a font that can be difficult to read, which adds to the challenge. Hopefully, this can be improved through updates in the future.
I am able to collect 75 out of Hundred of Suikoden experiences in Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes
Actually, I have always believed that Suikoden are not just reconstructions of The Water Margin, but rather, they contain more of the original stories that Yosh*taka Murayama wanted to depict. Perhaps, the brand new fantasy adventure portrayed by Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes is the complete sequel he envisioned.
For me, playing Hundred Heroes is like rediscovering a lost time: the game forces you through long and winding mazes. From puzzles to mini-games and scarce save points, it can feel like the game is padding itself out. But here’s the secret: All of these were the “traditions” of JRPGs at the time, things that today’s JRPGs may have lost, but aren’t necessarily bad.
Allow me to conclude with what I said at the beginning: Before the title screen of Hundred Heroes appears, the development team expressed gratitude to all JRPG fans with a message: “With our appreciation to all JRPG fans.” So, it’s easy to see that the development team wanted to reignite our love for classic JRPGs through Hundred Heroes, especially for those who long for Suikoden II. In fact, the similarities between this game and Suikoden II are surprising; it almost completely inherits various classic elements from Suikoden II, including over a hundred hero characters, six-member formation turn-based battles, hero cooperative attack systems, base construction and upgrades, slow-paced dungeon exploration, rich character designs based on text backgrounds, and many elements that undoubtedly pay homage to past enjoyment for old fans, and so on. Simply put, Hundred Heroes is a modern 2D pixel fused with 3D scene art design by former Suikoden team members, presenting a Suikoden with a new protagonist and worldview, a truly new wine in old bottles.
While at first the game’s comparisons to Suikoden can make it feel derivative, it’s when you really sink your teeth into the game that you start to see the truth: Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes builds on the Suikoden formula in new and exciting ways, while also keeping the same charms you remember from your childhood. It’s not just Suikoden repackaged, it’s got a bold new recipe that even classic fans would fall in love with.
This retro classic JRPG title Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes is available now, and is a must-play if you’ve ever had any love for the Suikoden series. It’s available on PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, Nintendo Switch and PC (Steam, GOG, Epic), including both digital and physical editions. The physical edition of the game in the Asian region is distributed by Soft Source Publishing.
Game reviewed on Steam. Review access provided by Soft Source, the game’s distributor for the Physical Edition
Nmia Gaming – Editor W. Amirul Adlan
