Rhapsody ~A Musical Adventure~

HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE! Last week was Winter Break, and so of course I was rather busy. I got a scanner/printer for my comp, and I'm very excited about that. How were your holidays? Mine was wonderful. Along with that present, I recieved many others, but one of my favorites was a game called Rhapsody ~A musical Adventure~ for the DS. This is a review.
Here's some background info concerning this wonderous game:
Rhapsody ~A Musical Adventure~ is a DS game made by Nippon Ichi America, NIS for short. It was originally a playstation game sold around 1980 in japan and 1990 in America. In 2008 they chose to make a DS version of it for America, the date for Japan I dunno lol
Rhapsody is a musical RPG with english vocals on the playstation and japanese vocals for the DS. Don't be mistaken! Seriously, I beat the game this week, and the credits had english names for the vocals, and I was so angry because I wanted english vocals throughout this entire game lol The japanese was ok, it had subtitles of course, but I noticed while humming along that the english translations could be substituted. so. . .yeah. I sang haha
Main story kids!
This is a cute musical rpg about a main character Cornet and her adventure to save her Prince Ferdinand. Cornet is considered a normal orphan girl, but also odd because she can talk to puppets. The main puppet is Kururu, and she can also talk to people. Cornet always had a dream where she falls in love with a prince, and one day in the forest she is saved by such a prince. It was Ferdinand, who she had not seen before, and as she saw him she realized it was the prince in her dream. She then goes out to try and steal his heart through various means, such as cooking and entering the Miss Marl Competition. He is soon captured by a somewhat evil witch called Marjoly, and suddenly Cornet is on a quest to save the prince. That's the jist of it
My Review kids! and more details of course <3
Rhapsody is a pretty cool game by incoperating musical numbers within cutscenes. There are only around 5 to 8 songs though, so I wish there could have been more. There is fighting in this, with the party consisting of Cornet and the puppets that join along the way. She uses a horn, which her mother gave to her a logn time ago. It was said that when the horn is played, wishes can come true, and when she uses the horn she can have puppets join her party so as to help make their wishes come true. When a puppet has their wish come true, which is implied to be their true happiness, their souls can go to heaven. There's also a mini game in the middle of each city or village where Cornet can play the horn when the gamer blows on the DS microphone, and you can get money from it.
The game incorporates a lot of different ways of fighting. magic/special is pretty great, you can even use pancakes against enemies!!! Cornet uses her horn to give support, and that increases her power with music notes. It's really cute. However, the game is more story oriented rather than fight oriented, and is pretty easy to complete. it only took me a week. But as this is an RPG. and it is Nippon Ichi we're talkin about here, there are choices that can effect how parts of the story plays out. In order to help the prince you have to get these stones together so they can take you to Marjoly, so you have to go around and find them. But everybody wants these stones for some reason or another. Sometimes you meet people who want the stone and have to choose to help them or not, or if taking the stone is the right thing to do. It can really effect how people see you. I took the stone once when I really didn't want to, and it turned out the village didn't want me too either! Nobody would talk to me! I went back to my save file and did something different, and the people's reactions were so much better. I think it's really inventive to have actions effect the story.
In the game, you can touch different objects with the stylus, like desks and oranges, and sometimes items are there. This game is really humorous and adorable though, cuz sometimes there are sarcastic remarks! I touched this bookshelf with the stylus one time, and a text box came up saying "You found books in a bookshelf! go figure, I mean what were expecting in a bookshelf. . ." I laughed at this. I found it funny to see text like this. It kept happening too. "You found another bookshelf! This one was really hard to find!" "Look! it's the super-dee-duper-mega-ultra-cool-magnificent-strong horn! Just kidding!" It was really refreshing to see the gamers have fun like that haha
Rhapsody made me happy because it was sweet, innocent, but also gave a few life lessons. I also have sentimental attachment to it because it's in Marl Kingdom, where La Pucelle Tactics takes place as well. La Pucelle Tactics is a game I have for the PS2 that I loved, but the disc doesn't work anymore and I never finished the game. It's why I look for Nippon Ichi games whenever I can (I don't have Disgaea just so you know :P) But I looked Rhapsody up, and it turns out it has a vague connection to La Pucelle.
There is a sequel to this game that isn't out in America, and that game also has a sequel with some secret chapters from the two previous games and etc. The three games together make up the Marl Kingdom Series, all musical RPGs, and very much interwoven into each other and La Pucelle tactics a lil as well. I didn't know this before, but it made me happy to know that.
Overall, the game is cute and light, and I recommend picking it up whenever you have a chance. It's the the greatest fighting game, but the story will keep you going all the way, and the choices you get to make really give you interaction in the game. It's anime style, and wonderful, so yay for Rhapsody ~A Musical Adventure~ !!!