The hero of the game is Fron, a sixteen-year old boy who lives on the island of Monstania. One day, strolling in the forest, he notices a strange light. The light lead him to a clearing, and then suddenly disappeared. But Fron realized what was the meaning of that light - it was a fairy! Of course, everybody knew that fairies had been long extinct, but Fron never believed in that. All his life he wanted to meet a real fairy, and now, when the opportunity has come, he firmly decides to find her. His girlfriend Tia helps him on the dangerous journey, during which they meet a mysterious little girl named Chitta, and get involved in a grand adventure, that will ultimately lead them to the battle against the dark force that threatens the whole Monstania! "Monstania" has a somewhat unusual gameplay within the frames of console RPGs. You don't explore the world in the game: it is entirely linear and takes you to the next destination by itself (only at a few points you can choose where to go next by selecting an appropriate answer). Once within the location, you cannot leave it until you complete all your objectives there, which then take you to the next location. The objective is usually a large strategic battle. You navigate your party members on the battle field, attack with melee and long-ranged weapons, and use special technique which require action points. Unlike most other turn-based strategy games, an enemy makes a move immediately after you did the same with one of your characters, without waiting for the "enemy turn". The RPG element is not very significant: your characters level up automatically after each battle. There are also some puzzles to solve in certain locations.
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The battle system in a way reminds me of Mystery Dungeon where you move from tile to tile and things only move when you do. Probably not the best comparison but it’s what came to mind. You have to either defeat every enemy, get to an objective, or something special like defend a place. If you were wanting any challenge with this one then you aren’t getting it here as the battle system is very easy to abuse the poor AI which has many moments of gimmicking them and making the level a breeze. Even if you do game over, you can retry immediately and don’t even need to load a save.
Sadly the game’s idea of RPG mechanics is basically just leveling up after each section is completed. There’s no actual EXP and this is also how you get items, magic/skills, and equipment. There’s not even a currency system. Going from area to area is also done automatically and there’s no actual overworld or towns to explore. You could probably argue it’s not even an RPG but I’ll be generous and say it still is. I’m not trying to say it’s a bad thing just don’t go into this expecting an actual in depth RPG. The game is also only about 4-5 hours long so you’ll barely be playing the game anyway.
The story is a little interesting though nothing about it really excited me and it left me with a few questions by the end. It also just kind of ends in a boring way imo. Idk, it left very little impact for me. This does have a fan translation but I do wonder how much of it is actually accurate. I’m going to be nice and assume it is fine but some of it is very strange but not necessarily bad. Just be aware that it might not be your thing.
It visually looks fine but nothing stands out about it. The only notable thing about them is the art used for the characters when inputting names or viewing the statuses. I would probably be more positive if it was an earlier game on the system but there are much better looking games by this point. The music is also nothing amazing but it works. I actually really like how this game sometimes does a minimalist approach with the audio and sometimes has the sounds of the environment only play. Still, I don’t know if I’ll listen to it outside of the game.
You know, actually writing this review I realized something. What did I say earlier? “you may find a good game lurking in this one.” I think after writing my thoughts, I don’t think I like it as much as I think. While the game has some fun ideas, I think the game just isn’t the most interesting in the world. It works, and at its worst it's decent. While I do wish it had more RPG stuff going on in it, for what it tries to be, it does it decently. It did however have the unfortunate part of being a couple of months before the next RPG which was the remake of Dragon Quest III. With all that said, you should still at least try it as it’s quite short. Sadly Bits Laboratory would never make another game like this and would shut down a few years later. What a sad fate for the company.
Monstania is one of those kick-ass games that never got translated. I seriously don't see what the powers that be had against this game, except maybe it's short length. The graphics are impressive, the sound is great (with music by Lunar and Grandia god Noriyuki Iwadare), the story is pretty entertaining, and the gameplay is certainly there.
Anyway, the game revolves around young Fron, who with the help of his sweetheart, Tia, is in search of the whereabouts of the thought-to-be-extinct fairies. You pretty much sit back and enjoy the story as it unfolds, until you encounter the enemy, where you fight them in a semi-realtime strategy environment (i.e., the monsters only attack while you move). In many ways, the battle system is somewhat similar to Azure Dream's battle system for PSX.
A gameplay do jogo é uma especie de rpg com uma grid onde sempre que você faz uma ação todos os inimigos do mapa também fazem uma seja andar, atacar, etc.
Porem o jogo não se aprofunda muito nisso e a gameplay acaba se resumindo a ataque e tente evitar dano, o fato da inteligência artificial as vezes simplesmente ficar presa ou não saber oque fazer faz o jogo ficar bem fácil em certos mapas.
Veredito Final:
Monstania é um jogo bem simples e charmoso do Snes, ele tem tradução de fãs para o inglês e português, por ser um jogo linear e sem grinding ele acaba sendo bem direto ao ponto, vale a pena dá uma olhada mas não recomendaria jogar até zerar.