With the advent of downloadable games on all major consoles, it is not surprising that some games are rebooting their franchises. One such game is “Vandal Hearts,” a cult classic off the Sony Playstation that was released in 1997 in the U.S. The original “Vandal Hearts” was a simple, watered down version of tactical RPG’s like “Final Fantasy Tactics” with only seven classes, a small group of named fighters, and a short yet deep enough storyline. Suffice to say, it was a cult hit that spawned a sequel for the same system, and then, hibernates for ten years.

Welcome to Tactical RPG 101.

Fast forward to 2010. “Vandal Hearts: Flames of Judgment” is released on the Playstation Network and X-Box Live Arcade by Konami, and acts as a prequel to the original game on the Playstation. This go around your primary protagonist is Tobias Martin, a war orphan in the land of Balastrade. After a large bandit clan attacks his hometown and murders people close to him, Tobias and his friends, along with other acquaintances he meets along the way, to uncover a fiendish plot that could destroy his homeland, and the continent, forever.

As far as tactical games go, “Vandal Hearts: FoJ” is probably going to be seen as a diversion type game for most people. One of the reasons for this is the streamlined style that attempts to eliminate any complexity into the game. The controls are fine, and isometric grid based combat is tired and true, and battles can last up to an hour if it is a major conflict. One major change though is that there is no lock for character classes. Instead of one character being a mage type, everyone can become mages, for example. There is no level up system per-se, instead skills used are leveled up through battle and osmosis, as the game put’s it, “by watching others in combat.” These skills, from sword attacks to magic using to dodging, can be used by everyone in your party.

And what this basically means is that in theory, everyone can become a juggernaut in some way. Now obviously some characters are more suited for this than others, you will notice who should be the mage and who should be the thief early on in the game. But, the customization does offer some interesting incentive to mix and match styles, especially if you are new to these types of games. Veterans of tactical RPGs however will likely look at this as a simplistic design choice for an arcade game off of live, especially if you played a game like “Final Fantasy Tactics” before.

Character building is overly simplistic here.

There is also a limited amount of what you can actually do with your characters too. Each can carry two weapons, armor, and two items. There are four schools of spells in the game with six spells a school, combat skills and weaponry skills for each weapon type found in the game. So for anyone who has grinded before countless hours on end to level up skills and spells will know that it will take a rather short time until all members of your party learn or level up pretty much everything to “Dragon Ball” levels of absurdity. Perhaps it was designed to be minimalist like this, but it makes the game a lot less challenging in the long run. These become issues of balance, and not an issue of tactics. Simply put, you can waste enemies if you level up high enough quickly without maneuvering much after a while.

I also had a lot of problems with the simplicity of the story. You pretty much can see the by the numbers plot points coming as time went on, and normally this wouldn’t be a problem in any way, if there was a major lack of character development with it. There are moments where you get to choose your line of dialogue for Tobias, but with the exception of a few instances, these moments are fluff at best. Otherwise, everything else is told with simple speech bubbles and terrible exposition. Every party member, enemy, and ally pretty much has a telegraphed motive that never really changes. There is no development, no real characterization, and honestly, no point to care for the party team. Other tactical games, be it “Tactics Ogre” or “Spectral Force,” at least give character moments to your primary protagonists, no matter how clichéd it may be. Here it just feels shallow and uninspired.

The faces that only mothers could love.

The art style is also a bit disturbing. Now I normally don’t hate on graphics or graphical style much, but I feel that Konami attempted to blend a pseudo anime-kid friendly graphical tinge to the game, which makes the polygons look like updated versions of “Final Fantasy VII” characters. Most of them are just flat out ugly, and I feel like the style was wasted frankly, as the portraits could have been a lot more mainstream. It would especially help in the story overall, since the friendly looks don’t mesh with the rather adult subject matter, along with fountains of blood that quite literally spurt when you attack or kill an enemy in combat. It just doesn’t look right, and if you play the game you will see what I mean. The environments are nicely detailed however, and they are also surprisingly varied enough to be fresh every time. Plus the games sound design is not bad either, with some decent music and sound effect bits, plus a nice touch with character quips in combat, which honestly give them more personality over the novels worth of text you have to read through before and after each battle.

When it is all said and done, “Vandal Hearts: FoJ” will not likely make the Konami cult classic a household name, but it will serve the purpose of “My first tactical RPG” to many gamers out there. The controls are fine and the rather streamlined skill trees won’t scare off new players, but hardcore junkies might scoff at the simplicity of everything else. Even still, I can’t exactly recommend the game for it’s full 1200 points price tag, but it is definitely a game to look out for when on sale, and if your still not sure play the demo to get your bearings first.