The twilight years of the PlayStation Portable were a strange time. After a fairly explosive start that saw a minor challenge to the monolith that is the Nintendo DS in the handheld market, by the late 2000s things were slowing down, and by 2011, it was mostly niche titles that populated the tail-end of a console life cycle as Sony was gearing up for the PlayStation Vita.
It is always a treat to revisit that time, as some of the more niche, experimental games tend to come out in the final stages of a console's life. One such game is Gungnir, the latest installment in Japanese developer Sting's Dept. Heaven series, which includes PSP stalwarts Knights in the Nightmare and Yggdra Union, as well as the underrated Riviera: The Promised Land. The Dept. Heaven series is basically a more underground version of the cult classic Ogre Battle series, and for the hardcore roleplaying fans in the room, that is a mark of quality that diehard fans still clamor for.
A strategy RPG at its core, Gungnir is such an obscure title that it's hard not to appreciate its equally unique lineage that frankly deserves more recognition. Gungnir stars Giulio, the plucky, teenage rebel of the Esperanza, a revolutionary faction led by Giulio's half-brother Ragnus. Because of an incident fifteen years prior known as the Espada Massacre, Giulio and many like him, a racial group known as Leoncians, are treated as second-class citizens by the ruling empire. Of course, after rescuing a mysterious girl named Alyssa from slavery by the empire, Giulio and his allies are thrown right into the conflict, only to be saved by the magic of the heavens and the mysterious power of the spear of Gungnir.
The overall plot is of the run-of-the-mill variety, presenting key themes of racial discrimination, political disillusionment, and economic disparity. It is hard not to draw a line to the direct parallels to Ogre Battle, which often creates intricate plotlines involving the plight of the poor and the racial tensions of their fantasy worlds. Gungnir is fairly mixed in the telling of this story, though; while the hero characters follow several different ideals and beliefs, the villains are almost cartoonish in their hatred for “lesser” beings. One area lost is the more nuanced take that Ogre Battle often presents, where the right course of action is often not the best course. Yes, the empire is completely evil, while the heroes are a ragtag lot filled with different ideals that cause conflict within the group.
It is a trope we see in many games, but it is one that really needs to be told well to stand out, and Gungnir does a lot right here, but stumbles with the other side. Sting has played with these narratives before; Yggdra Union, for example, followed a straightforward story about a princess fighting to reclaim her kingdom from a conquering empire. Gungnir is a complete parallel of this: conquering the kingdom for the downtrodden, but much of what made Yggdra Union complex- the morally ambiguous motivations, a large cast of unique characters, impressive plot-twists, is absent from Gungnir, which is more straightforward in its narrative. Gungnir struggles to stand out and offer the complexity that most players may crave.
Thankfully, some hallmarks of Sting’s previous games still come through. The heaven of Asgard makes a return appearance, as does Sting’s mascot, the purple witch Pamela. Of course, knowing nothing about the Dept. Heaven series will not be a detriment to your experience of Gungnir or its storyline, as the four games in the series are loosely connected by the existence of Asgard as their heaven. If there is one thing that can be praised is the sheer amount of options during the game’s battle mode.
Sting once again tries to innovate the strategy RPG by making battles more about micromanagement of time, versus the value of individual units. Other than your “Ace” character on the field who takes the lead, you can have up to five characters joining you in the thick of the fight against insurmountable odds. Each character doesn’t have a movement turn, but rather shares one turn through a time mechanic and the tactics gauge. The gauge fills up by taking control of marked points around a battlefield, so the higher the tactics gauge is, the more movement points, attack power, and special moves a character can take.
So, battles become a management of what is important in the long run versus the short term. Moving a character and waiting a turn will allow you to act faster, while causing a huge hit on an enemy may drain the entire tactics gauge in one shot. Unlike other games in its ilk, such as Final Fantasy Tactics, being a bruiser and cannibalizing on one-two units at a time will usually fail as a tactic. The system rewards tactical innovation, so it becomes a constant balancing act that will be refreshing for strategy fans due to the complexity of the system, but daunting for casual players for that same reason.
Other aspects of battle are also manipulated through the tactics gauge. Scrambling, which is an extra move action, can have units take an extra move action before their turn ends, while casting attack spells also takes several turns before a spell is released, allowing you time to box in or remove casters before they do major damage. Other aspects of combat, from changing equipment at checkpoints, using cooperative attacks known as “beat” and “boost” on the battlefield, and even replacing weaker units with fresh troops from retreat points, add more wrinkles into the tactical system. Oh, and you also have ring outs, although they are rare and only come into play if you really screw up tactically.
Sting can make such a complex tactical game that Gungnir has a reputation of being notoriously difficult. Even by the standards of the genre it represents, that is an impressive feat. This does lead to a minor flaw of complex combat mechanics found in the game; at times it becomes an exercise in tedium as to what the correct strategy really is. One example would be during a siege mission, where my small group was bombarded by a ballista weapon on top of a castle I had to overrun. Without the proper timing of both scrambling towards capture points on the field to boost the number of turns I have, it was almost impossible to beat. Thankfully, Gungnir is forgiving of failure, having you retry with all experience earned through combat intact if you lose, although this can become a cheap way of exploiting the game in the long run as well.
Gungnir also suffers from a rather unintuitive menu system. The screen is filled with gauges, lines, health bars, and menus to pay attention to, and that is just during combat. Outside of combat, things are a bit neater, but it becomes a chore to categorize and prioritize your squad with good equipment and abilities. The equipment menu is a travesty to navigate, while changing, moving, and removing equipment on characters becomes as time-consuming as battles at times to deal with. With so much going on in menus to deal with, it becomes distracting from the task at hand at times.
The visual style of the game leaves a solid impression. The soft, pencil-like illustrations that take the form of character portraits provide a smooth contrast to the 3-D-rendered world maps, allowing for a casual aesthetic that is visually distinct and stylized without being overly obnoxious. The animation is fairly vibrant, using gestures and speech bubbles to express different emotions, making the sprites dynamic instead of being static on the battlefield. The menus are brightly colored, and the game's twenty-six missions have varied terrain to offer some really good fighting scenarios. The game's music is standard stock for Sting, with sweeping and somber orchestral scores for battles, event scenes, serious scenes, and its menus have enough pop to be noticeable and, in some cases, catchy.
Gungnir is the victim of several small potholes that prevent it from standing out against big-time releases, but it’s definitely a hidden gem of a game worth playing. Hardcore strategy fans will appreciate the tactical challenge, while folks looking for a solid tactical-RPG can do much worse than this. While many of its ideas are promising, the overall package is somewhat daunting if you don't know what you're doing, and, with only 26 missions, it is on the short side for a tactical game. Still, there is easily 40+ hours of tactical goodness here to enjoy, and if nothing else, an excuse to turn your PSP on one more time.
Author's Note: This review was originally written for Blistered Thumbs back in 2013. It has been edited from its original form and posted here for preservation.