Brief hands on with Rhapsody: A Musical Adventure on the DS

I got a chance to check out the DS build of Rhapsody: A Musical Adventure and two things instantly grabbed my attention. The first was I had to start the game from the title screen with no saved exploration points. The second was the build was all ready in English. Rhapsody: A Musical Adventure is coming out sooner rather than later. It’s on track to be in North American stores in September, around a month after it comes out in Japan.

Since I started the game in the beginning I couldn’t get very far into it. I did get to check out combat and the menus have a completely different interface. Instead of the lengthy list of commands in the PsOne version, Rhapsody streamlines the interface with big buttons on the touch screen that say “fight”, “run”, and “auto”. After you select fight you’re taken to another set of menus where you can attack or scroll through a list of spells.

Kururu, who wasn’t playable at all in the PsOne release, is playable from the very start of the game. Since you have an extra character, I’m guessing the game might be easier in the beginning unless Nippon Ichi went back to rebalance the game. Kururu starts out with two spells Naniwabrac, and a lighting spell. After I selected Naniwabrac on the touch screen I watched as stars slammed enemies on the top screen.

There were a handful of features mentioned like a navigation map, playable characters, and new stages. I would like to believe the “s” in characters means the cast will grow beyond Kururu, but no other specific characters were mentioned.

Here’s a question for the Rhapsody initiated, who would you like to see become a playable character in the DS remake?

Images courtesy of NIS America.