''Unchained Blades'', titled in Japan, is a dungeon crawler

role-playing video game A role-playing video game (commonly referred to as simply a role-playing game or RPG, as well as a computer role-playing game or CRPG) is a video game genre where the player controls the actions of a character (or several party members) immers ...

developed by Japanese developer FuRyu for the

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and

PlayStation Portable The PlayStation Portable (PSP) is a handheld game console developed and marketed by Sony Computer Entertainment. It was first released in Japan on December 12, 2004, in North America on March 24, 2005, and in PAL regions on September 1, 2005, ...

video game consoles. It was released in Japan on July 14, 2011, and in

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exclusively as a digital download on June 26, 2012 for the PlayStation Portable, and on January 3, 2013 for the Nintendo 3DS.

Gameplay

The game is played as a dungeon crawler

, similar to '' Wizardry'', but with a greater emphasis on story. The purpose of the game is to direct the game's party through

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s and

labyrinth In Greek mythology, the Labyrinth (, ) was an elaborate, confusing structure designed and built by the legendary artificer Daedalus for King Minos of Crete at Knossos. Its function was to hold the Minotaur, the monster eventually killed by the ...

s while defeating opposing monster parties. A party can contain up to four characters. Additionally, it is possible to recruit enemy monsters into the player's party to assist them, and each character is allowed to have four monsters support them, allowing for a party size of up to twenty characters.

Development

Creation

Many veterans in Japanese video game design contributed to the original development of the game. The game's director is Toshio Akashi, who previously worked on ''

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'', and the scenario designer is Takashi Hino, who previously worked on '' Grandia''. Longtime ''

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'' musical contributor

Nobuo Uematsu is a Japanese composer and keyboardist best known for his contributions to the ''Final Fantasy'' video game series by Square Enix. A self-taught musician, he began playing the piano at the age of twelve, with English singer-songwriter Elton Jo ...

also contributed music for the game, although most of the game's music was done by upcoming, Tsutomu Narita, who works with Uematsu. Additionally, each of the game's main thirteen characters were each drawn by different artists from different

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and

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background. The Japanese release was originally intended to be June 23, 2011, but in April, it was delayed to July 14, 2011. The

and

versions are almost identical, the differences being mainly visual. The 3DS version is the only one that features stereoscopic 3D graphics. Additionally, the placement of the overhead map of the levels is different platforms; for the 3DS, it's on the second, bottom screen, where on the PSP, which lacks a second screen, it is merely layered over the main screen, with the option to toggle it on or off.

Localization

Xseed Games Xseed Games is an American video game company founded by former members of Square Enix USA. It later became a subsidiary of the Japanese game company Marvelous, providing the localization and publishing services for video games and related mat ...

originally teased the localization of the video game through a guessing game through its

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. Three pictures were released as hints to the game's title; a Tyrannosaurus rex, a blade of

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, and a still from the movie '' Ghost's'' famous pottery wheel scene. This was in reference to the three words, in reverse order, of the game's Japanese title ''Unchained Blade Rexx''. The game's localization was officially confirmed through the April 2012 issue of ''

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''.

Reception and sales

The game received "mixed" reviews on both platforms according to the

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website

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. In Japan, ''

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'' gave it a score of three eights and one seven for a total of 31 out of 40. Both versions of the game charted in their first week of release in Japan; the PlayStation Portable version charted at seventh place with 18,256 copies sold, while the Nintendo 3DS version charted at twentieth place with 5,592 copies sold.

Sequel

A sequel titled ''Unchained Blades Exiv'' was developed and released on November 29, 2012 in Japan for the PlayStation Portable and Nintendo 3DS. Xseed Games, who localized the original into English, stated that it was "not likely" that they would pursue translating the sequel.

References

External links

* {{Actas 2011 video games Dungeon crawler video games FuRyu games Nintendo 3DS games Nintendo 3DS eShop games PlayStation Portable games Video games developed in Japan Xseed Games games Single-player video games