Dual Heart's treasure hunter, Rumble, arrives at scenic and quiescent Sonno Island in search of the priceless Dream Stone, his latest endeavor to shake an awful case of wanderlust, boredom, and loneliness, which camped in him after he attained the rank of "Ruinseeker", the highest class of signifiable erudition for treasure hunters. (He must also be moonlighting as a male model since, just like every other RPG character out there now, he's ludicrously attired in what can only be the latest of queer and flossy fashion designer clothes.) Rumble arrives at a recently excavated ruin which is rumored to cloister the Dream Stone, where a Baku (it's not quite a pig, it's not quite a rabbit, and it's not quite a Sega Saturn puzzle game) named Tumble has been ordered by the Queen of the Dream World to open the nine doors of the ruins and gather the Holy Instruments that will prove to be pernicious against the battle with nightmares. Tumble loses the keys to the doors and they fly off into the dreams of Sonno's inhabitants, and Rumble discovers he has the ability to enter them and wield the Holy Instruments. It's like walking onto the set of a Woody Allen piece: Things go wrong and people that shouldn't have met, do meet, and inexplicitly turns out well for them.

Tumble trundles alongside you as a factotum: You can ride on his back for speedy movement, use him offensively, or explore areas that would be otherwise inaccessible. Most of his maneuvers use up food in his stomach, which can be replenished by eating Esamons, colorful living baubles with wings that float around which appear from cut grass. These Esamons each have elemental attributes (lightning, fire, water, and void) and can be utilized by absorbing them into an oversized card you find at one point in the game and can be thrown as a boomerang. However, the cards are mostly underutilized, usually used in puzzles to extinguish fires or light lamps or fight a boss here and there. Quite curious considering how iniquitous the puzzles in Alundra were, the puzzles in this one are downright innocuous, almost insulting, and nowhere near enough of the sliding ice block challenges to appease a masochist like myself. Instead, most gray matter is reserved for boss battles, where, even after reading clue-bearing obelisks and monuments, it can often become a challenge figuring out how to even begin damaging some of the wretches.

Hearts' gameplay much like how anyone would imagine a three-dimensional Alundra; that is, something conventional and lacking in charge or risk, but still entirely satisfying. So it's to my surprise that this turned out to be the weakest aspect of the game since most battles are borderline superfluous because there is little compensation or reward for your troubles. Fallen enemies drop Esamon, which can be found in 99% of all the grass and of which there is always a ready supply. Had they dropped something of fiduciary value, enjoyment of the game could've tripled by my calculations, but alas, it's far easier and, in the long run, smarter to skedaddle on by them.

Dream exploring is much more versatile and moves beyond Alundra's color diet of brown, gray, and more brown, which is an ineluctable luxury since dreams are taken to a more vivid extreme and most of the game is wandering and exploring dreams. Unavoidably and unfortunately, this substitutes itself in for actual exploration of Sonno Island, and of which there can never be a proper and fully capable replacement, and the dreams are far too radically different from each other, creating an uneven visual journey, one that is too strange or ridiculous to be inviting. Obviously, Matrix Software has opted for a more bizarre experience than a truly exhilarating one. Furthermore, the dreams are intended to be the link between Rumble, taciturn and cruel by nature, and the citizens but there's little emotional investment on either part as character growth has been stunted in the real world, a blind hope that the dreams would make up for the egregious lack of focused character interaction. Though it does create a unique parable (which is somewhat explored in the game's ending), that despite Rumble's efforts and actions, it doesn't mollify his overpowering isolation as the people have no recollection of Rumble in their dreams. To know their thoughts is nothing compared to human friendship and bonding.

The greatest strength of Dual Hearts is its ability to perfectly tack down the fascinating staples of the genre, namely the addiction of finding new items and backtracking to find what areas are now accessible. The anticipation thereof and the rush of discovering new land gives me a giddy little thrill that no other genre can, and it's still the same feeling from the Zelda titles on the NES all those years ago. There's something to be said that even with a dubious combat reward system, complacency and late-night sessions are easy to perform.

Highly inventive and sophisticated, it is also often very funny with another spectacular translation by Atlus. Despite numerous dints in gameplay and atmosphere, there's enough to pull in even fair-weather fans of the genre. The fact of the matter is, Dual Hearts may only be an above average action/RPG but that's already enough to consider it a great game.

· · · Sqoon