Name: Castle Fantasia - Seimadaisen (74.87% in 39 votes)
Type: RPG
Platform: WINDOWS
Company: Studio Ego!
Release date: 1998
Reviewed by: Lamuness
Contrary to the popular belief that Seimadaisen is the sequel to Castle Fantasia, this game is actually a prequel.
The game takes place 500 years before what happened in the first Castle Fantasia, and it is about a legendary war between 2 rival religious empires. The Inshiera Empire worships the god of Light. In the eyes of the Inshiera Empire, their rival Ruushiera Republic is a cult kingdom and calls them The Evil Army. Anyways, this legendary war lasted 200 years between the 2 opposing countries, hence the name Seimadaisen meaning "the big war between the holy and the darkness." The Inshiera Empire consists of 7 holy knight squad and you play the leader of one of the squads - Hyuui, who is one of the great heros who ended the 200-year war.
Seimadaisen is a much much better improvement than the previous Castle Fantasia, which is nothing but a nuisance. Although the sprites still needs more work, it's drawn much better. Each character has the opportunity to learn new skills and magic, which is not seen in the first Castle Fantasia. In battles, like the previous game you defeat enemies and pick up heart to raise the girl's impression towards you as well as attributes. However, in Seimadaisen all your stats will increase if you get enough hearts, as supposed to letting you choose which attribute to raise in Castle Fantasia. What's added from the previous game is the elemental conflicts, which means that certain people can inflict more damage depending on element. Also added is the game is response choices in the AVG part between battles, which obviously can affect each girl's impression towards you. Overall, the engine is much much improved, but I would like to see a better battle engine. Even though more features are added, it's still **slightly** too simplistic, mainly because most attributes are not shown in the game. Adetailed status/attribute screen would be nice.
Although they change the style a bit, the CGs are still gorgeously done with the Farland Saga style still in it. The AVG part between battles in Seimadaisen is now more vivid than the To-Heart like plain text reading as seen in Castle Fantasia. The music is better than Castle Fantasia, and the opening song is very nicely done. What's incorporated into Seimadaisen is voices. You will hear people speaking during battles, as well as Hyuui's narration at the beginning of most chapters. And there are voices during Hscenes as well. However, that's pretty much it for voices. If voices are incorporated into the normal AVG dialogues it will be superb.
Overall, Seimadaisen is a very successful improvement from the first Castle Fantasia. As stated in my Castle Fantasia review, if you like TGL's Farland Saga but complain that the girls are wearing too much clothes, then you have no reason to miss this game. Unlike the previous game, I am more satisfied this time with Seimadaiken with the improvement and added features.
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