Jonny takes a look at a Japanese-style RPG adventure developed in the Japanese RPG-hotbed of Hampshire…

To say action-RPG Sudeki has stepped into the arena armed with a healthy dose of bluster is something of an understatement. Microsoft and Climax have for years been talking up this colourful adventure, arguably somewhat cynically engineered to tempt the Japanese market, as if it were The Second Coming.

All of which means it's easier to be harsh on the final product. It's not a bad game by any means but is it what we were promised?

RPGs by nature are not easy to get into, so the best ones tend to ease you in, as well as providing you some gripping action to get you in to the adventure from the offset. Inexperienced players can start off knowing nothing of the genre, and several hours later be pulling off huge magical attacks and mucking around with statistics with consummate ease because they've been taught step-by-step.

Many great RPGs have also started slowly however and this is the camp in which Sudeki has pitched its tent. The first couple of hours are interminably dull and it's a chore to keep playing, but it does get drastically better the more you get into it. It's also a shame that the closest it comes to providing any kind of tuition is by hitting you with huge and confusing infodumps during the load screens - this is not an RPG for newcomers to the genre. People learn to play by doing, not by reading reams of information, and I would have hoped most designers should have picked up on this fact by now.

Sudeki's other big failure is unfortunately at dealing with those areas that make up the meat of any good RPG. Characters, dialogue, plot and voice acting is uniformly dull and uninspired - the voice acting in particular is atrocious - possibly the worst I've ever encountered. After a while I found myself walking around towns not bothering to talk to people as I knew that a) they wouldn't say anything of any interest and b) that I would probably want to put my fist through TV if I heard another ridiculous voice.

Where Sudeki can stand proud is when it comes to the combat engine and the power-up system, both of which are interesting, enticing and in the case of combat, lots of fun. The combat works in realtime, in a way that's reminiscent of Phantasy Star Online - slashing opponents with your weapon in a rhythm to unleash devastating combos, and utilising a fair number of ranged, special and magical attacks. It works well as a four-person party system too, offering a wide range of playing experiences, although occasionally the slightly dumb AI of your team can get them into trouble when you are not controlling them personally.

If you're a fan of riotous, tactical squad combat, then this confidently makes up for the game's shortcomings in other areas and ensures that Sudeki is a title that needs to be checked out - you can coast through the story without paying too much attention and just indulge yourself in massive battles against huge ugly fiends instead!

Advancements use a pretty standard "level up" system, where you get to choose which attributes to build up as you progress, as well as combining items with your weapons for some interesting effects. It's not up there, with say, Final Fantasy VII's Materia system but it is sturdy and performs its task well.

Let's face it, if you're going to say silly things about how your new game is going to blow a hole straight through the Japanese RPG genre you'd better make sure that your product is up to scratch first. We're talking about the big guns here - games like Final Fantasy VII, Skies of Arcadia and Chrono Trigger - games you just don't mess with unless you're packing some serious firepower.

Sudeki however ends up being a merely average game saved by a fantastic combat system. If you're an Xbox-owning RPG fiend and you've played Knights of the Old Republic, Beyond Good & Evil and Morrowind then Sudeki will provide you with many hours of entertainment. Just don't believe the hype, and you'll be ok.