Spiritual successor to Suikoden promises an grand adventure
There are several ways I could introduce Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes. I could tell you that it’s a spiritual successor to the Suikoden series of JRPGs, which involve recruiting dozens of colourful adventurers to build the ultimate JRPG party. I could tell you that its developer funded the game’s creation through the most successful videogame Kickstarter of 2020. I could tell you that it’s been in development for four years. I could even tell you that it’s finally coming out.
But I think the best way to introduce it is to say that, two hours into playing, I unlocked an ability that let my party punch a warthog into space.
As someone who is only passingly familiar with Suikoden, I was surprised by just how quickly Eiyuden Chroniclewon me over. Its opening hours deliver a breezy, exciting adventure while sowing the seeds for grander, more dramatic events farther down the line. Its fundamentally traditional RPG mechanics, meanwhile, are refreshed and renewed by slick presentation and the presence of its affable characters. Also, it lets your new friends work together to sock enemies into the stratosphere, which is a good way to get me on board.
ITS VAST ROSTER OF CHARACTERS CAN BE MIXED AND MATCHED FOR COMBAT
SETTING OFF
EiyudenChroniclestarted out as the passion project of Suikoden’s creator, Yoshitaka Murayama, a beloved and influential figure in the JRPG scene who tragically passed away earlier this year. The project emerged from Murayama meeting up with friends he’d worked with at Konami for drinks, and reminiscing about his time designing the Suikoden games. “Murayama-san had been wanting to create an RPG that he had created back in his Konami days, and bringing this back with current technology,” says game director Osamu Komuta. “The reason we started doing this project was to achieve what he wanted to achieve.”
The game takes place in Allraan, a typical sword and sorcery world with rolling fields, walled cities and chocolatebox villages at its centre, and more extreme environments like deserts and mountains farther out toward the fringes.
Like Suikoden, EiyudenChronicle distinguishes itself from JRPGs through its vast roster of characters, all of whom can be mixed and matched in your party for combat. Unlike Suikoden, which drew its characters from the classic Chinese novel Water Margin, EiyudenChronicleis based in an original world, with 100 new characters conceived for the game’s story by Murayama. Tracking down all these characters is a key part of the game’s appeal, and how they all interrelate is crucial to Eiyuden Chronicle’s storytelling and combat. Regarding
