Dview: Resonance of Fate (Xbox 360)

The Bottom Line:
Resonance of Fate (known as End of Eternity in Japan) is a relatively unknown and under-promoted title developed by Tri-Ace and published by Sega.  This is probably my second favorite RPG on the Xbox 360 despite a kind of weak story. 
Grade: B

Extraneous Explanation:
Unlike the other two Tri-Ace games for the Xbox 360 (Infinite Undiscovery and Star Ocean: The Last Hope), Resonance of Fate is less action oriented.  There is a bit of a learning curve as the game is a bit unusual.  There are two types of damage - one real damage (direct damage dealt by handguns) and scratch damage (machine guns) that essentially weakens the enemies.  Both are necessary to win.   The battle system is kind of hybrid system.  The system does have some intricacies such as bezel shards, hero actions and tri-attacks.  As for weapons, there are only two types in the game handguns and machine guns (but a few variations).  You can sort of customize your weapons - basically for charge time and charge acceleration (one is by adding scopes/sights, the other is by adding barrel parts).  However, the guns must fit in the grid they start in and certain pieces only fit certain ways. You can get some pretty strange looking guns. Hopefully Tri-Ace will release another Xbox 360 RPG using this battle system. 

What to Expect:
* It takes a while to get used to the battle system
* Random Encounters do exist, though their rate is reasonable
* Side quests given at the guild (mostly fetch and battle)
* Lots of hexes to clear (the map starts off kind of closed off, you have to add hexes to open up paths), of course the use of hexes after you clear pathways is another level of complexity altogether (though it yields advantages). 
* A story that is kind of strange: it is mostly how a group of 3 people got together as hunters and a little back story on the characters.  It is broken up into chapters.  It also has an ending that is as strange as the story - i guess it sets things up for a sequel.   
* A game set in kind of a post-apocalyptic tower with 12 levels
* A difficult bonus dungeon (that i haven't explored yet)
* A pretty thorough Arena (hint: do the arena tutorials before starting off in the game, they explain a lot, though you may not realize it at first).
 * Customizable guns (the crafting system in this game is about gun parts) that you really do need to improve
* Leveling: is based off of damage caused with a weapon.  There are 3 weapon types: Handguns, Machine guns and thrown weapons (grenades).  Your level is the sum of the levels of the 3.  Leveling up does give some combat bonuses when using certain weapons. 
* This game is somewhat difficult (but you can level grind)
* To get all gamerscore (1,000), it will probably take around 100 hours.

Achievements:
The achievements for this game seem reasonable.  They are more along the lines of the achievement philosophy i like.  There are achievements for beating levels, doing certain things in combat (this is nothing like Star Ocean 4 battle trohpy stuff), getting to level 100, completing side quests, spending money in the shops, using hexes to clear paths, beating the arena, etc.  Oh, if you want to get 1,000 gamerscore on this game - you will need to replay it an additional time (though at Normal setting you keep your level, guns and some items from your first playthrough)
- i had 715 gamerscore 41/48 achievements after beating my first playthrough (109 hours and 46 minutes).  You do get a 15 point acheivement for starting your second playthrough.