Grandia III

The player controls a group of characters who travel in a fully three-dimensional world, communicating with other characters and fighting with opponents. The gameplay in many ways resembles the previous parts of the series, although it has a number of unique features. During the journey, the main character can recruit many other heroes and various creatures called guardians here, so that they would later support him in battle. Moving around the world map, unlike most role-playing games, is carried out not on foot, but by air inside a flying unit.

The battles take place according to the Grandia principle, when the actors take turns depending on the speed of each, and there is a single time scale that is spent not only on performing any attacks or techniques, but also on moving the character from one point of the field. battlefield in another. Every time a character’s turn walks up, events unfolding on the screen stop, and the player gets the opportunity to choose teams for him for an unlimited time. In total there are two types of standard attacks: combinational and critical.

Events Grandia III takes place in a nameless fictional world with well-developed technology and magic. The main character is a young man named Yuki, who manages an air vehicle and dreams of becoming a great pilot, imitating his idol, the legendary captain Schmidt. However, when he meets with his mother the girl Alfina, who is able to interact with the guardians, the spiritual protectors of the world, they find themselves embroiled in a grand adventure, during which they must reveal the mysterious secrets of the past and defeat an evil spirit named Xorn.

For the first time Grandia III was announced in March 2005 on the pages of the Japanese weekly Famitsu , in particular, it was reported that Game Arts and Square Enix are going to release the next game of the series for the PlayStation 2, as well as the Grandia Xtreme preceding it. The project was headed by director Hidenobu Takahashi, former artistic director of Grandia II , he noted that the developers are trying to preserve the traditional concept of “travel, drama and dreams”, to keep the overall optimistic mood of the plot, but to make the game more suitable for an adult audience ^{[1 ]} . The character designs were made by the artist Eou Yoshinari, the script was written by Takahiro Hasebe - both participated in the creation of the original Grandia ^[2] . Story videos that interrupt the gameplay from time to time were developed under the direction of Mikitaka Kurasawa, who is known for the same work for the game Onimusha from Capcom ^[3] . According to representatives of Square Enix, if you add up the length of all the video cut scenes, you’ll get a video series of time corresponding to three full-length movies. The combat system was developed with the thought to be as close as possible to the systems of the previous parts, while Takahashi noted that "it should be very complex and very easy to learn at the same time," adding that "the combination of intriguing history, speed combat system and fascinating the environment should be a guarantee of a truly exciting adventure " ^[4] . In April 2005, the official site of the game opened, which until August reported all the news about all the developments related to the development ^[5] . The music for the soundtrack was composed by the veteran of the series, the composer Noriyuki Ivadare , responsible for the musical accompaniment of all the previous parts.

The English version of the Grandia III was announced in December 2005 in the form of a teaser site from the company Square Enix ^[4] . In January 2006, the final release date was discovered in North America, while it became known also about the creation of the next and currently the last part of the series - Grandia Online ^[6] .

In Japan, the game had mostly positive reviews, following the results of the first week after release, becoming the second best-selling game in this country with 122 thousand copies sold ^[17] , while by the end of 2005 sales amounted to 234 thousand ^[18] . Famitsu magazine gave her 35 points out of 40 possible, awarding the platinum editorial choice award ^[9] .

In North America, the reaction was also moderately positive, in particular, the aggregators of the reviews Metacritic and Game Rankings assigned it 77 and 78% of the rating, respectively ^{[14] [15]} . Most commentators praised the convenient combat system, for example, the American magazine Electronic Gaming Monthly noted on this subject that “semi-step-by-step battles are excellent because they successfully maintain a balance between strategicity and visual effects,” however, for all that, the publication criticized too linear plot. GamePro magazine agreed with the battles, calling them "intriguing", however, with regard to the plot, he came to the conclusion that he was "more crowded with boring cliches and cliches than epic and charm." The characters, in their opinion, are stereotyped, and their motivation does not cause interest ^[11] . The GameSpot portal considered the main drawback of the game to be a short duration and an insufficient number of third-party, optional quests, although Grandia III , following the review, retains the traditional unobtrusiveness of the previous parts and has the right to live among other Japanese role-playing games ^[12] . The 1UP.com review noted a remarkable feature that the two disks on which the content is distributed do not fit together well, and during the gameplay, there is an involuntary feeling that you are playing two completely different games ^[7] . In a review of The New York Times, critic Charles Herold calls the combat system “perhaps the best turn-based combat system for the entire existence of role-playing games” ^[19] .

The “ Country of Games ” notices the incommensurability of the quality of the two discs: “The plot, which started right off the bat, after the twentieth hour, slowly fades away, delighting only with rare truly emotional dialogues. And to be honest, the brightest characters leave the stage on the first DVD, and their successors do not always hold the mark ” ^[16] . Eurogamer calls Grandia III a mediocre role-playing game, but again agrees about a convenient combat system: “This is generally a weak game that forces itself to be respected for its fantastic battles, but the combat system alone is not enough to consider the game worthwhile.” In addition, the publication criticized the introductory composition in the style of J-pop , calling it disgusting ^[8] .

• na.square-enix.com/games/grandia3 - official site of Grandia III (eng.)
• square-enix.co.jp/grandia3 - the official website of Grandia III (Jap.)