Thoughts on WKC

I was able to finally get through White Knight Chronicles over the weekend, and I can't help but feel utterly disappointed with that game. It had some neat ideas and the online mode offers alot of replaybility, but all in all it feels pretty underdeveloped, which is amazing because the game was conceptually announced in '06. The game does offer some deep gameplay (which is of course the hallmark of any good JRPG) but it all seems too focused on the Online mode. Since the online mode carries over the exhaustive combat system, skills, and rather bland quests, the game just falls short of delivering any kind of solid positive experience.


The true heart of any decent RPG is having likeable characters that interact in an engrossing story. Kinda like a Reading Rainbow vibe. Unfortunately, the character you create doesnt talk at all, Leonard (the main character) felt more like a tool to move the story along rather than an actual dude, Eldore was just too much of a fake Auron for me to pay attention to, and Yulie kinda revolved around Leonard which didn't really offer anything for me. What does this all mean to you? If you enjoy a good RPG story and characters, move along. Another gripe with the game is the combat system.


At first, I really liked the real-time combat but throughout the entire game, I only ever used 2-3 different attacks, maybe a Combo if I wanted to see some Devil May Cry action, and spamming the White Knight transformation. For having so many different types of attacks, none of them really felt as useful as just finding the one that dealt the most damage possible. Status ailments, debuffs, buffs all were kinda short lasting and not really needed.


I have to say that the online mode is probably the only portion of the game really worth taking a look at. There's a unique Georama Hub that you can create which is essentially a small Town for others to connect to and queue up Quests, gather materials, sell/buy items, and just act as a central lobby. There's a crafting system to go along with the harvesting, recruiting NPC's into your town to add beneficial attributes, and I'm sure other crazy stuff for the online mode that I haven't even seen yet. If you enjoy a pretty deep online experience from an RPG, then by all means take a look at this game, but beware of the shoddy singleplayer mode and non-varying combat mechanics.