Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance [GC]

The menu systems themselves are brilliantly simple and well-organized and the optional tutorial makes getting to grips with both menus and gameplay features a cinch. Character management in between missions is likewise intuitive and fast. It'll only take a minute to understand how to trade items or weapons between characters, assign bonus experience points, use the inter-character support system, use upgrades, buy equipment, and even have custom weapons created from scratch (for a pretty penny, of course).

The only playability issue with regards to menus and presentation lies with the new 3D map displays. In most cases, the 2D map view from the predecessors actually presented a clearer view of the battlefield. In some stages, ship masts or different terrain levels can get in the way of easily being able to plan your attack or retreat. You can adjust the camera up and down, cycle through three zoom settings, or rotate the map slightly to get an isometric viewpoint, but there are a handful of missions where more control could have really helped. Here's hoping Intelligent Systems will address this with the next iteration and add full rotation control and a more developed way to quickly see the entire map at once while planning character moves.

Which leads us to overall presentation. As nice as the opening cinema is, there are far too few of these beautifully rendered cutscenes for a game so focused on story and character interaction. Yes, you've heard the rant before: voices, animated scenes, narration -- these are story telling elements that have become so commonplace in modern roleplaying games, going back to the spartan, text-only days of yesteryear doesn't do much to broaden the appeal of this great franchise. The quality of the music is actually a nice step forward, however. While the classic tunes from the older console titles are still more memorable, there's no denying that the synthesized orchestral tunings of Path of Radiance sound great. Graphics, on the other hand, could use a serious upgrade. The battle maps are often very sparse looking and the polygonal characters are so stiffly animated in the polygonal combat scenes, they had us yearning for the far more dramatic hand-drawn attacks from the older games. But no matter -- once you've seen each attack a few times, you're likely to turn animations off and crank up the game speed to do less repetitious watching and more strategizing, rejoicing, cursing, and reset hitting.

The game runs in progressive scan, features Dolby Pro-Logic II audio, and offers a Game Boy Advance link-up option for owners of the two GBA Fire Emblem titles that unlocks special art work.

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