Does a decent job at capturing the feeling of a classic JRPG with the charming characters and basic plot. The story is there to serve as a reason to gather the three protagonists, but it's clear it wasn't really the main focus. The twists were predictable and even the main villain seemed like such an afterthought. Instead, I was enjoying doing the small sidequests and meeting all these NPCs with their unique personalities and fun dialogue. After a while they get really tiresome and repetitive, however.

The ones asking to gather materials are fine (it's the sort of thing you'd expect), but when they ask you to just find another NPC I'm like... okay, there's no reason not to do it since the game tells you where to go, but is it really the best they could've done? And you can't simply find the NPC, no, you also have to go back to the person who asked you so you can get your stamp. It's the back and forth that really gets on my nerves. And sometimes the person you're supposed to find is only a few meters away! Is the game mocking me?

The combat is... inoffensive. The character switch mechanic is a cool idea and it'd be pretty boring without it. The small portions of platforming were fun as well. Yes, the game is very easy, but I think it'd be really annoying gathering materials for quests if the enemies were too much of a hassle. After beating the final boss you unlock the hard difficulty, which makes some enemies more dangerous than usual, at least to the point of forcing me to use potions. It's a much better experience and I wish that was the standard difficulty.

I never played Suikoden before, but I love character focused RPGs, so I'm eager to play Hundred Heroes after it's released. Until then, Rising served as a good appetizer for what's to come.

Gameplay: C
Story: D
Characters: C
Visuals: A
Music: C
Difficulty: Easy