For all two of you that probably wanted to see the extras, here they are. The artbook is probably the best of the goodies. I doubt I’ll ever use the keychain or buttons, but you never know. These little trinkets are like a badge of honor for collectors.

After diving into the game yesterday, I have one thing to say. The prologue is damn long. I played it for about 2-3 hours and I still haven’t gotten to the main part of the game yet. Don’t let that detract you though, because it’s still a fun game. Let’s have a brief overview of the nitty gritty.

Battle System: The real-time active battles are back in full swing. You can directly control your main character in a grid-free environment similar to what you can find in Star Ocean 3. Your party members can be assigned to an auto AI setup of your choosing or you can direct them yourselves by pausing to issue commands to them. If you played a Growlanser game before, you should know what to expect.

Skill Tree: You earn new skills via a tree setup that sort of levels up skills when you defeat enemies to earn KP points. You set up skills from the left and work your way to right as you branch your skills out. Think something similar to FFX’s Grid Sphere system. I’m not sure if putting too many skills in bad spots will stunt or otherwise hurt your skill progression, so don’t go too crazy with the new skills.

Hot Chicks: Yep. Lots of eye candy.

Extras: I’ll take a few pictures of the extra goodies later in the day. Believe it.

Currently listening to: Lia – Natsukage ~Cornwall summer mix~

Today’s article will cover Growlanser V, set for an NA release on 9/11/07. Growlanser is a long running Japanese Strategy RPG series developed by Career Soft. The original game was released in 1999, and the series has come a long way since then.

Growlanser remained unknown to North American audicences until Working Designs brought Growlanser II and III in a special collection entitled Growlanser Generations. While we didn’t get the first game, Growlanser II is a direct sequel with a different main character like the first two Suikoden games. For the uniniated, the series is well known for interactive branching storylines, diverse characters, a fun battle system, and a romance system via conversations like a bishoujo game. However, Growlanser Generations was to ultimately be the final swan song from Working Designs, who had always been a niche company by localizing obscure Japanese games for American audiences. The dream to see future Growlanser games was hazy until just recently…

Atlus has picked up the reins to this series by announcing the release date for Growlanser V. What happened to Growlanser IV: Wayfarer of Time? Maybe it will be skipped, or maybe it will get a domestic release if Growlanser V sells well. Atlus USA is kooky like that. There is actually a bit of confusion surrounding this game’s title.

Growlanser V was originally called Growlanser V: Generations, but because of the localized name for the US release of numbers II and III, Atlus had to rename the subtitle to Heritage of War. It’s not a major thing, but it’s a fun bit of trivia. Heritage of War will be released as a Limited Edition package with a 100 page artbook, a CD-Rom packed with extras, a keychain, 2 linticular cards, and 3 pins. A collector’s dream if there ever was one. Be sure to pick it up when it comes out because it might become rare.

Sources:
Gamestop