It marked the start of a massive franchise that would define Idea Factory for many years (both good & bad), & in 2004 would be given a label to call its own: IF Neverland.
Now one might wonder why I'd bother to do something like cover the IF Neverland franchise like this. Ask some people online, both in Japan & abroad, and you might get a common response that winds up being similar to how some felt about Idea Factory in general, especially during the 00s: They're all (or at least most of them are) "kusoge", i.e. abjectly terrible games. However, aside from the simple curiosity factor (& a feeling that their "crap factor" is likely overblown to varying extents due to online echo chambering, as I've played good & fun Idea Factory games, mainly from pre-2010), there's also just the sheer size & scale of this franchise. From 1996 to 2009, Idea Factory released 35 different games (plus another 10, if you include the various ports to other consoles with altered titles that included some sort of new content!) that took place in the fantasy world of Neverland, creating a massive timeline of events with over 1,000+ years of in-universe lore & an utterly enormous cast of characters, many of which would debut in one game or another, only to become recurring characters in various other games, sometimes as supporting cast & sometimes as major players in the plot. To just cast this franchise away as nothing special & not even try to understand even a basic level of everything that was put into this 13-year stretch of releases (most of which were only ever released in Japan) would be a disservice, I feel. Also, I don't think it'd be an exaggeration to say that, without IF Neverland, the Idea Factory that exists today (IF, IF International, Design Factory, Otomate, Compile Heart, etc.) would likely not even be around, especially since there were a couple of years in which IF released nothing but IF Neverland games.
Obviously, with so many titles to cover here, this won't be a series of traditional "reviews" but rather more of a general overview, though I'll still include my personal feelings on them when possible, & I can't guarantee any sort of consistency as to when all five parts of this series will come out; they'll come out when they're ready, essentially. Still, we might as well start with the easiest place there is: The Beginning.
It all begins with the third game Idea Factory ever released for the PS1, & the first one developed in-house by IF, Spectral Tower. Released on October 4, 1996 (it'd later be released for PS3 & PSP in Japan as part of the PSOne Archives on May 31, 2007), the game actually doesn't really introduce much of anything when it comes to the overall worldview of the IF Neverland franchise, outside of taking place in Neverland itself; eventually, it'd be retconned as taking place in "Magic Era 994". Also, some of the character classes you can use here would become the bases for various recurring characters seen in the franchise, with some being explained later on as having made their own respective treks up the titular tower itself during this time, all in search of some sort of power. Therefore, it's best to just go straight into the gameplay itself, which is essentially a basic dungeon crawler, though in this case the dungeons are towers of varying heights. At the start of the game, after creating a character based on a series of eight "favorite numbers" you input, you initially have three towers to choose from: The Goblin Tower (10 floors), The Robber Tower (20 floors), & The Queenrose Tower (100 floors). The first two are essentially just a tutorial & easy mode, respectively, & after getting through the Queenrose Tower you get access to the Spectral Tower itself, a 1,000-floor tower, and if you actually manage to conquer that you unlock the Last Tower... which is made up of 10,000 floors!
Yes, Idea Factory seemingly decided that "overkill" was the best way to start things off, though you can find items (like Jump & Warp Rods) that allow you to skip various degrees of floors; still, "overwhelming" might actually be an understatement here. Anyway, once you enter a tower, you initially see a game that actually resembles something akin to a roguelike, such as Shiren the Wanderer, only with pre-rendered sprites being the norm. However, this is more of a roguelite, as everything moves on its own time, instead in sync with the player, & your stat upgrades carry over from one tower to another. Still, enemies are all on screen & can be avoided when needed, while there are floor tiles that can do things like slow you down while traversing it, reverse your directions while on it, inflict a temporary effect on you (shrinking, confusion, & the like) for a few seconds after crossing it, etc. Combat, however, is where the game will likely lose many people, as it's literally all done with the roll of a d6 die, with each number's result (critical, hit, or miss) being dependent on your stats in comparison to the enemy's level, and the same is even true for unlocking treasure chests. However, if your stats are high enough you insta-kill foes by walking into them (as you essentially can't roll a miss) & you open chests instantly. Yes, combat in Spectral Tower is literally based on luck of the roll, and while you can equip weapons, it's hard to tell how much of a difference it makes, since while you have numerical HP, your enemies only have 1 to 3 hearts for their health. There are also spells & special techniques, depending on the class you're given, but are tough to figure out without proper Japanese knowledge, so rolling the dice is often the most consistent option you have. Also, you don't level up in the standard way (i.e. EXP), but rather find various "medals" while traversing the towers that increase specific stats, while combat can occasionally reward you with maybe a point or two for just one stat. You can also save in the middle of a tower, but it's only via seemingly random save statues that can be found on various floors, and they're one-time-use (as in "even if you tell it 'No', it counts as being used"), so it's usually best to just use them sooner rather than later. Finally, you can also come across Yuu-san the "Bread Fairy" at random, who gives you free bread that can heal you... or turn you into a pig for that floor, because you're eating too much.
Overall, while Spectral Tower is one of those IF games that has a reputation as a "kusoge", I don't really see it like that (it's really quirky, but not really "crap"), though I guess I can see why others feel that way; still, this isn't anywhere near the unplayable mess that is Death Crimson. It is, however, a game that doesn't really have a lot of meat to it, as even after finishing the Goblin Tower you've kind of experienced everything that the game offers, in terms of gameplay; the remaining towers are just more & more (& more & more & more....) of the same. While getting through individual floors can be brisk enough, so the Goblin & Robber Towers aren't much of a cumulative drag, it becomes quickly obvious that the Queenrose, Spectral, & Last Towers will be highly repetitive & too reliant on luck to advance through, especially considering how long they'll take to climb; instead of a "kusoge", I simply call it "overindulgent". Still, the basic idea behind it is there, and if it had received some tweaks & improvements I think it actually would be pretty good, though I will admit that I did have a bit of legit fun playing through the Goblin, Robber, & some of the Queenrose Towers.
A year later, following a sequel to Yaku, Idea Factory returned to the world of Neverland with something much more grand... and a loooooooot of real world baggage. You see, prior to Idea Factory's founding, Shingo Kuwana was working with developer J-Force as a planner for a game on the Sega Saturn called Dragon Force under a "personal contract", i.e. he was working freelance. However, during development, J-Force founder (& ex-Wolf Team producer) Masahiro Akishino suddenly disappeared & was never seen again, putting the already financially-strained developer into even more trouble, which later resulted in J-Force going into bankruptcy around late 1994... during the development of Dragon Force. In the end, Sega took command over Dragon Force & had its Kansai branch finish development, though that department had its own trouble after many staff lost their homes due to the Great Hanshin Earthquake at the start of 1995. The game would finally see release in 1996 (March in Japan & November in North America, followed by mid-1997 in Europe), where it became one of the Saturn's most cherished titles; it even got a Japan-only sequel in 1998 & a PS2 remaster in 2005. To be perfectly honest, considering the development hell it went through, it's a miracle Dragon Force even got finished, let alone wound up becoming a beloved classic.
However, J-Force's bankruptcy resulted in staff there, even after Sega took over, not only working on the game for several months without being paid, but also wound up having to foot their own individual bills after their insurance premiums didn't get paid! Shingo Kuwana then offered the J-Force staff jobs over at Idea Factory, with the idea being to let them make the game that they had been screwed out of, though because of this most of the original J-Force team, including Kuwana, never actually got credited for their work on Dragon Force when it finally came out, a practice still done to this very day at some game studios. Anyway, the end result of all of this is Spectral Force, which came out on October 9, 1997 for the PS1. In short, it's "Dragon Force for the PS1, but on an even bigger scale than that game". Namely, while the general Romance of the Three Kingdoms-esque strategizing, administrating, & map traversing is more or less the same, where Dragon Force only has 8 different armies to choose from & allows battles of up to 100 vs. 100, Spectral Force has 40 different armies to choose from & allows battles of up to 1,000 vs. 1,000! Once again, IF's motto at this point seemed to be "No Kill Like Overkill", and there's definitely an argument to be made that going in this direction results in a case of there being too much to do; replayability is nice, especially since you only start with access to four armies, but you can also go too far. Also, increasing the unit limit to 1,000 results in much smaller sprite work, in comparison to Dragon Force's celebrated ability to just fill the screen with units; that said, the PS1 wasn't known to be a 2D powerhouse like the Saturn was, so fair play. Spectral Force also features character designs by Shinnosuke Hino, who stayed with Sega until Dragon Force finished development (& got credited for his work) before joining up with Idea Factory & getting his start there designing the character classes for Spectral Tower. Sadly, I can't really say much about the gameplay, as it's very menu-driven & requires a lot of knowledge of Japanese to really enjoy, but from what I tried out seemed to be decent enough, though seemingly nowhere on the same level as Dragon Force; I'm sure those with better knowledge of Japanese can point out any real flaws.
However, it's with Spectral Force that the world & lore of Neverland truly starts getting defined, & I can definitely focus on that. To start, the whole "Magic Era" thing is defined by the moment that "Demon King" Janus (a.k.a. Janess, depending on the source) descended down from the heavens & conquered the Main Neverland Continent, subjugating humanity under control of the demons. This all changes in Magic Era 997, when he's killed by a young warrior named Chiffon with a powerful magic sword called the Tenmaken. Later lore would explain that Chiffon was given the Tenmaken by Gray, one of the "Five Heroes" of the prior war against Janus during the 980s, after his own trek into the Spectral Tower; Grey himself is based on one of Spectral Tower's character classes. Janus' death, in turn, results in continental conflict, as now everyone wishes to rule over the land, resulting in what was originally called the "Great Neverland War", before eventually being known as "The First Neverland War". This is where the 40 different selectable armies comes into play, with each one having its own leader, though the "main character" is Hiro (a.k.a. Hillo), the half-demon daughter of Janus who forms the New Demon Army with her mercenary guardians Sato, Zakifon, & Chic (a.k.a. Chick) after seeing her father & older sister Prana (a.k.a. Plana) killed by Chiffon & his friends, Chris & Langeais (a.k.a. Ranje).
While I obviously won't go over all 40 armies, others leaders of note that make their debut here include Orochimaru of Muromachi, Greeza (a.k.a. Guriza) of Shilineeg, Radui of Epsiloia (another of the "Five Heroes" who Chiffon, Chris, & Langeais learned from & work with during this war), Azalea of the Elf Alliance, Gaizan of Doum, Malimar of the Malimar Knights (who are all anthropomorphic cats), & Byard XIII & his daughter Meimi of the vampires, who originally worked for Janus, but left Hiro after her father's death. However, most important outside of Hiro is Jadou (a.k.a. Jadore), Janus' demon son (& Hiro's older half-brother) who had been sealed away after the prior war until his father's passing. In an effort for more power, Jadou summons a being from another world named "Earth", which winds up being Little Snow, a powerful sorceress (originally a high school girl named Koyuki Saito) who he makes Queen of the country of Runeige that he took advantage of to summon her; in the overall story, Jadou & Little Snow would eventually fall in love with each other. Yes, Idea Factory was doing isekai long before it became popular, arguably doing it in a more interesting fashion than today's usual style, and this wouldn't even be the only time IF went down that route, either.
The following year, Idea Factory worked with NEC Interchannel to port the game to Windows PCs as Spectral Force: Aira Kourin/Aira Descends, which aside from the usual upgrades (higher resolution visuals, improved performance, a slightly modified intro animation, etc.) also added in a new element to the plot, mainly in regards to Hiro. Her human mother, Maria, was now revived by the Goddess Coleia & imbued with the spirit of an angel, becoming the titular Aira, who mainly acts as a foe to go against, until Hiro finally helps her recover her memories from when she was human. Not just that, but Idea Factory also entered the multimedia world by self-producing a two-episode OVA adaptation for Spectral Force, based around the start of Hiro's story, that came out on November 25, 1998 & March 25, 1999, respectively. The OVA even got licensed for North American release by ADV Films, marking Idea Factory's first penetration abroad; this would be Idea Factory's only self-produced anime to ever get licensed outside of Japan. However, despite initial plans for the OVA to be part of a larger licensing blitz back in 2001, which included Studio Ironcat licensing Shinnosuke Hino's five-chapter manga tie-in & possibly even the game itself seeing English release, ADV wound up being the only company to actually come through, releasing the OVA via dual-audio DVD in mid-2003; it's not great, but Idea Factory would self-produce much worse anime over the next few years. Beyond that, Idea Factory would re-release Spectral Force on PS1 in 1999 as part of the "Idea Factory Collection", port the game to Japanese "feature phones" in 2006, & see it added to the PSOne Archives on January 25, 2007, but otherwise this specific game would wind up being supplanted wholesale by its eventual sequel, which we'll get to in a bit... But we have a different sequel to get to first.
Just a few months after Spectral Force's release, Idea Factory would return to Neverland with Spectral Tower II on the PS1, released on January 29, 1998; it'd also get added to the PSOne Archives on June 28, 2007. Despite the roman numeral in the title, this is actually a prequel to the first game (& also Spectral Force), taking place in Magic Era 990. Also, instead of a relatively storyless romp through various towers, Spectral Tower II takes places solely in the Spectral Tower itself (now retconned into being the 10,000-floor tower, instead of the Last Tower) & stars Wave, who decides to climb the tower himself in search of the "Unlimited Power" & "Eternal Life" housed at the top, which is guarded by the godlike being known as Spectral. At the base of the tower he meets Break, who instantly becomes Wave's rival & wants the power for himself, with the two encountering each other at various points during the trek up. That being said, Spectral Tower II is rather light on plot, as it truly is about nothing more than the player controlling Wave as he makes his way up the Spectral Tower, finding keys to unlock paths to each new floor & defeating enemies that get in his way, while occasionally encountering some NPCs that have made residence in various points of the Tower. In terms of IF Neverland lore, however, Wave & Break's journey up the Tower is an important one, as when they both reach the top they have one last fight, which Wave wins & claims the power. Upon doing so, 25% of Neverland's nature is lost due to Wave taking control of the magic that supported it, while Break winds up dying with regret, where he's taken in by Mugen, King of the Underworld, & turned into one of his "Soul Sinners" that helps lead the Underworld Army, unable to ever truly find rest after death.
However, while being labeled as a prequel to the original game, Spectral Tower II isn't simply a rehash or expansion of the first. There are still similar elements, including being a real-time roguelite, various items & weapons, on-screen enemies that can be avoided, a lack of traditional leveling up, the utterly absurd amount of floors (though at least it's just one tower now), & even the various character classes (now called "Roots") that are accessed through 8-digit codes (which now also can be generated by adding & subtracting, amusingly enough). However, Spectral Tower II plays notably different from the original, mainly in that it now feels more like a standard RPG than a straight dungeon crawler. Environments are now pre-rendered backgrounds (ala Final Fantasy VII) that can scroll around but otherwise lead into series of rooms, and each floor even has a map that you can find. Combat is now more traditional with a variety of options (as you learn them over time) and attacking is now your standard percentage-based fare instead of up to a literal dice roll, though instead of showing any sort of numerical damage, you instead are shown one of three face icons above a foe before hitting them, which simply indicate the effectiveness of the attack. Some foes even get a neat little CG intro before battle, and Wave gets a CG scene when doing a last-ditch attack when at low health. You can also choose to either stay in place after attacking, or jump back a little, which may affect attacking & defending values. This isn't a solo journey, either, as you can find & recruit up to two monsters to your party at points. Each floor of the Spectral Tower also has its own types of hazards activated by floor buttons, like explosions or even dropping giant boulders on you that do damage outside of battle, as well as the old "turn you into a pig" thing from last time; there's also a wandering priest named Kuku that can heal your party. Thing like treasure chests, boxes, & certain jewels also now work off of a damage meter, in which you have to figure out how much force to do at a time so that the damage meter hits green within five hits; blue means you can keep going, green means success, & red means failure. Most interestingly enough, though, is that the game ranks you after exiting each floor based on how many enemies you defeat, how many chests & boxes you open, how many jars on the field you break, if you manage to finish a floor within 60 in-game seconds (measured by an on-screen meter), & a penalty if you get any status effects. The end result of this is "bonus points" & for every 100 points you earn 1 HP to your max total. Finally, you are allowed to create a temp save between floors by pressing R1 between each & every floor, but there's only one "regular" save point outside the Tower itself, meaning this is a little more rougelike than the first game was.
In all honesty, Spectral Tower II is actually a really interesting & cool little roguelite, as in some ways it almost feels more like a stage-based action game (only with turn-based combat), one that rewards you to essentially speedrun through each floor so as to earn HP as fast as possible, before using items to return to base so you can save your increased stats for future runs. It does still have its weird little quirks & oddities to it, and being a literal 10,000-floor tower once again is just overindulgence to an absurd amount (though there are items that can warp you up various amounts of floors, just like last time), but this is actually a game that I think is worth checking out, if you're curious; actually beating it, though, is admittedly too much. Much like the first game, I'm going against the grain by not feeling that Spectral Tower II is a "kusoge", though I guess I can see where that feeling comes from in others, especially if you were to dig deeper into the mechanics. As for the Spectral Tower itself, over time more people other than Wave & Break would reach the 10,000th floor (like Jadou, Little Snow, & Blazing Souls' final boss Gustavinus), while the Tower itself would reappear as a bonus dungeon in some IF Neverland games, though understandably stopping at just the 100th floor in those instances.
The year 1998 would feature nothing but two IF Neverland games from Idea Factory, with the second one, Spectral Force 2, not appearing until just over a year after the original game on October 15, 1998. Despite the number, this is more of an expanded redo of the original Spectral Force, starting from the same point in time, Magic Era 997, & showcasing 40 different armies wanting to conquer all of the Main Neverland Continent following Janus' death. However, instead of Hiro being the de facto main character, this time around Little Snow takes that role, with Hiro's New Demon Army even needing to be unlocked, just like how Little Snow & Runeige needed to be unlocked in the first game. There are also some new characters added, like the return of a Spectral Tower-supercharged Wave, who now leads the "Nameless Army" that has no actual home country, as well as a demon named Mayura, who's treated as a rival-of-sorts to Hiro & even initially wields fire in this game, while future games switch her over to ice, giving her the nickname "The Ice Witch"; even Aira/Maria from the PC version of the first game got added to this game. Spectral Force 2 is also the first game to feature Yuko Miyamura (Asuka in Neon Genesis Evangelion, Chun-Li in Street Fighter Alpha & EX) as Hiro, a role which Miyamura would reprise for nearly the entire remainder of the IF Neverland franchise, as well as a few other games, like crossover RPG Chaos Wars for the PS2. This game also features little bits & pieces from the Spectral Force OVA, like Jadou summoning Little Snow to Neverland, that was released not long later in Japan, which would likely explain the confusion ADV's Matt Greenfield had about the OVA being just a collection of video game cutscenes, though in reality it's more a case of both the game & OVA being in production simultaneously.
Beyond all that, however, Spectral Force 2 is more or less the same game as the first, only now with a dash bit of extra polish & maybe a slightly easier to understand user interface; from what I can tell, it does carry over some of the same flaws due to a shared framework, but still a better game. If the first game was more or less the original Dragon Force team (or at least a portion of it) wanting to create the game that they maybe didn't feel that they could actually finish back with J-Force, then the sequel is pretty much the more cohesive & slightly shinier game, though the fact that Little Snow is made into the de facto lead rather than Hiro at least keeps it from feeling like a straight-up redo, instead feeling more like a remix. Much like the first game, there would be a Windows PC port by NEC Interchannel, 2000's Spectral Force 2: Eien-naru Kiseki/The Eternal Miracle, though in this case it looks to be nothing more than a high-resolution port, with nothing new added to the actual game itself, unlike Aira Kourin before it. To be perfectly honest, even with the flaws they does look to have, had these original Spectral Force games actually seen release outside of Japan, I think they would have managed to find an audience & fanbase, filling in a niche that Working Designs' English release of Dragon Force created, or at least appealing to fans of Romance of the Three Kingdoms, to some extent. But, hey, we're not here to talk about "what ifs", but rather to go over what actually did happen, so let's move on to the following year.
Idea Factory would start off the year 1999 with Oasis Road, which is apparently the spiritual sequel to an early Gust game from 1996 called Meru Prana (the planner for that game left Gust & moved to IF), but after that would come a small deluge of games (five, to be exact) in the IF Neverland franchise, starting with Monster Complete World, released on the PS1 on May 27, 1999. By this point in time, the "Mon" sensation started by Pokémon was in effect, so seemingly every video game publisher worth its salt was releasing its own video game take on the whole "raise monsters & become the best" concept; Tecmo had Monster Farm/Rancher, Bandai had Digimon, Jaleco had Dragonseeds, etc. What IF did with "MonCon" (as it's shortened to in Japan) was essentially fuse together aspects of various other "Mon" games to create something that's actually conceptually neat. Taking place in Magic Era 989, making it the earliest entry in the IF Neverland timeline so far, the game stars Chiffon, who at this point is nowhere near the legendary hero who killed Janus. Instead, he's simply a young boy who finds that he can befriend & command monsters, so with his trusted Hiyokomushi (IF Neverland's equivalent to Dragon Quest's Slime) given to him by previous tournament winner Kyle (who aged out of controlling monsters) he decides to try & become the best of them all. Along the way he meets friends & rivals like Tina (who'd later become ruler of the Kingdom of Meimai), Rato (who'd later become one of the Meimai Knights), Karasumaru, & even a young Break & Mayura, with Break seemingly becoming Chiffon's primary rival, while Mayura simply is looking out for Break's well being. While I'm not fully sure if this is the case, I do wonder if Break's reason for heading up the Spectral Tower was because he resented not being able to surpass Chiffon, so he wanted more power, while Mayura was unable to stop Break from doing so, resulting in his death & afterlife as Mugen's loyal servant. If so, then Monster Complete World winds up having a bit of a surprisingly dark legacy to it.
Like, just imagine if Ash Ketchum wound up being the person who set a literal world war into motion years after becoming a Pokémon Master, while Gary Oak searched for ultimate power so that he could surpass Ash, only to wind up dying & becoming a commander for the Lord of the Underworld; yeah, that'd be really messed up for Pokémon, but it's just another day in IF Neverland.
As for the game itself, "MonCon" is probably best described as "Pokémon, but with Monster Rancher's gimmick... but not in the way you think". By that I mean that it plays more like a standard RPG, complete with turn-based combat (ala Pokémon), but instead of one-on-one battles you instead have a standard party of monsters that battle all at once, and the primary focus is on journeying through dungeons to power them up, with every 100 points giving a level up; dungeons also utilize a roguelike movement system, where all on-screen characters move with you. This is where Monster Rancher's gimmick comes into play, as "MonCon" uses the same exact concept of "using audio tracks on CDs to generate content", but instead of generating new monsters from CDs, you instead generate new dungeons. While you won't have access to this at first, as the game also has pre-made dungeons to explore, after doing a handful of starter dungeons & accumulating a party for yourself you'll gain access to create dungeons via CDs. For example, I tried the soundtrack to PuLiRuLa I got recently at Anime Boston & created a Level 15 beach dungeon, which was bit too high for most of my party, but I managed to capture the first monster I fought, which was Lv 16. As for capturing, while you have an unlimited use jar to capture monsters with, you only get one attempt per encounter, & that counts for all monsters in an enemy party, so weakening them is vital; you can also bribe them with food, too, if you know what they like! As for the battle system, it's actually rather neat, as while one monster takes point per turn, the two taking rear back it up with passive skills, like minor healing, buffing defense, boosting speed, or even simply giving you more money after winning a fight; you also have three in reserve that you can swap active monsters out with during a fight. Combined with a point-based system where stronger skills require more points to use, & if you don't have enough you have to wait to accumulate more each turn until your monster can finally act (giving a bit of risk vs. reward), it's actually a very neat little battle system, & it helps give the game something unique for the genre it's in. Not just that, but you also have to remember to keep your monsters happy by feeding them, playing with them, & encouraging them while out in dungeons, or else they'll start to disobey your orders & do whatever they want during battle.
And that's really the main gameplay loop of Monster Complete World, outside of leaving monsters at a gym to power up slowly (which is where PocketStation support also comes in) & eventually being able to challenge rivals & their monster parties at the arena, with the main goal being to become the #1 ranked MonCon competitor. While it's certainly not a game that would ever give Pokémon a run for its money, & I can certainly see the repetition of it all, Monster Complete World is honestly a rather neat little take on the monster raising/combat genre, sticking to more of a direct RPG formula than what Game Freak & Nintendo did, and I think it actually could have found a bit of a cult following if it had received release outside of Japan. Also, its spot in the IF Neverland timeline, in terms of lore, is just really amusing, considering what Chiffon would go on to do just eight years later, including changing the very lives of his fellow MonCon rivals.
Three months later would come the second of the five IF Neverland games released in 1999 alone, and it's here where we'll end this first part of "The IF Neverland Reportage", mainly because this game, Spectral Force: Itoshiki Ja'aku/Lovely Wickedness, is the one that brings a definite end to the (First) Great Neverland War. Released on the PS1 on August 26, 1999, Lovely Wickedness begins at Magic Era 1000, right in the midst of the War itself & after Hiro's New Demon Army has been destroyed by Jadou, who now calls himself "Demon King" & rules over the Neugard region. Much like the prior two games, though, Lovely Wickedness "stars" someone completely different, in this case Simba. With the power of the dragon Gajuu housed within him, Simba becomes the new leader of Muromachi, following Orochimaru's departure, and with his confidant Solty (a.k.a. Salty) he now looks to unite the Main Neverland Continent. Lovely Wickedness also sees the proper introductions of some new sides to the conflict, namely the mostly female Meimai Knights, lead by their Queen Tina, as well as Mugen's Underworld Army, lead by Break; the latter were first seen in Spectral Force 2, but only as a generic faction. We also see a couple of new island regions enter the way, namely the Hornos Government Army (located in the northern island of Fredburn) lead by Ryuhain & the Keith Alliance Army lead by Mayura, while various other regions & armies are now lead by new generals.
In terms of overall gameplay, from the little I could really play, Lovely Wickedness is very much the same thing as the first two games, if maybe a little easier & welcoming. For example, I was actually able to conquer a neighboring land after only 15 minutes or so of starting a playthrough, and while some of that can be chalked up to slowly figuring things out from the first two games, it also just felt easier to start with, in terms of difficulty. However, where Lovely Wickedness really differs the most from the prior two games is in the options you're given from the start. In particular, you only have one army to choose from in your first playthrough, and that's the Muromachi Army lead by Simba. When combined with a stronger focus on character interactions & conversation sequences early on, it's very easy to see that, whereas the first two games were much more open-ended in terms of how the (First) Great Neverland War played out, IF truly wanted this third game to put a definitive end to the War itself, and Muromachi/Simba plays the central figure there. While future playthroughs still allow for the ability to play as other armies & experience the game as it used to be, Spectral Force: Lovely Wickedness is first & foremost about telling a proper story via the standard Spectral Force gameplay loop, and that's neat to see. Not just that, but after unifying the Neverland Continent as Simba the game throws in a twist by having a final battle against the forces of Mugen himself, essentially giving the (First) Great Neverland War a sort of "final battle" to it. However, this "True Ending" against Mugen apparently requires the player to do specific things in order to access, a concept that Idea Factory would eventually become notorious for in later years, especially when the requirements become more & more obtuse and hard to figure out without a guide of some sort.
In the end, we close out this first part of the IF Neverland Reportage with what might be the strongest overall entry in the original Spectral Force series, at least the ones that use this war simulator style of gameplay. Sure, there look to be some little nagging quirks regarding the game itself, but overall Spectral Force: Lovely Wickedness not only looks to be the apex of the game's concept, but is definitively the perfect place to end this era of the IF Neverland franchise, in general.
Without a doubt, the earliest games in the IF Neverland franchise can be evenly split into two halves that alternate with each successive game we've covered. One half is the more experimental games, with mixed results. Spectral Tower is a rather straightforward, if absurdly overindulgent, roguelite that arguably hews a little too close to the pen-&-paper origins of the RPG genre itself, resulting in it becoming known to some as a "kusoge", and while I wouldn't call it that myself I can certainly see where those people are coming from. Spectral Tower II is an interesting mix of genres, feeling like a fusion of roguelite & traditional JRPG, but with a strong emphasis on getting through floors as fast as possible, so as to increase your max HP over time. The end result of it all is actually really neat & interesting, though once again that overindulgence rears its head by still requiring players to climb 10,000 floors in order to reach the end, so I can see why some might be sour on it. Finally, Monster Complete World is an admittedly interesting take on the monster raising/RPG genre, and as long as you're fine with the straightforward gameplay loop you actually have a great amount of content to explore, due to the whole "generating dungeons from CD audio" aspect.
The other half, then, is the trio of games that essentially act as an alternate evolution of J-Force & Sega's Dragon Force. While Sega itself would produce its own sequel to that game that also saw release on the Saturn, a lot of the original J-Force staff found themselves over at Idea Factory, and while Dragon Force 2 wound up being more or less just a slightly modified version of the original, the Spectral Force series aimed to actually expand on things in every way; more factions at war, more possible soldiers in each army, etc. While its heavily menu-based gameplay makes it hard for me to personally judge, it does look like the general consensus is that IF likely went a bit overboard, giving the player too much to look after, while the PS1's comparatively lacking support for 2D spritework resulted in the games looking less impressive than what was found on the Saturn, despite featuring more potential soldiers on screen. Still, where Spectral Force 1, 2, & Lovely Wickedness succeeded was in defining a fantasy world filled with unique & varied characters, all vying for control over one primary continent... but what happens AFTER one side claims victory?
Preview: The (First) Great Neverland War has come to an end, with Muromachi now ruling the land. However, time moves on & seeds of a second conflict start to be sown, before Idea Factory allows players to compete with each other directly through this thing called "the internet". Not just that, but there are also some alternate perspectives to take a look at, both from before this first war as well as during its latter years.
Next time on The IF Neverland Reportage... Episode 2: Prelude to a New War!
Spectral Tower © 1996 Idea Factory Co. Ltd.
Dragon Force © Sega 1996
Spectral Force © 1997 Idea Factory Co. Ltd.
Spectral Force: Aira Kourin © 1998 Idea Factory Co. Ltd. © 1998 NEC Interchannel Inc.
Spectral Tower II © 1998 Idea Factory Co. Ltd.
Spectral Force 2 © 1998 Idea Factory Co. Ltd.
Spectral Force 2: Eien-naru Kiseki © Idea Factory Co. Ltd. © NEC Interchannel Inc.
Monster Complete World © 1999 Idea Factory Co. Ltd.
Spectral Force: Lovely Wickedness © 1999 Idea Factory Co. Ltd.
This was an amazing read, I'm really looking forward for part 2. Thank you so much!
ReplyDeleteThank you. It's definitely a subject you'd never really see anyone tackle, for a variety of reasons, and while I can't guarantee any consistency I do hope to eventually get through all of it. At least the next part will be the shortest one of them all.
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