Impressions from the Japanese PS2 version:
La Pucelle was developed by Nippon Ichi (Rhapsody, Marl Kingdom series, Disgaea) and released on Jan 31, 2002 for the Japanese PS2. Its story follows the trials of Sister Prier as she fights monsters and purifies lost souls during her attempt to become the Saint of Light. (Note there aren’t any real connections to the Marl Kingdom games other than the artistic style and monsters [more cute mushrooms to fight]). The game is divided into 12 chapters, and some of the 9-member supporting cast will enter or leave your party depending on the situation. Overall, the story focuses on building friendships in the midst of troubles sparked by religious zealots, somewhat like a light-hearted take on anti-god themes presented in other RPGs such as Grandia II or Xenogears.
Graphics & Sound:
Characters are drawn with 2D sprites on 2D backgrounds (in town, story sequences) or simple 3D grids (battles). To be honest, it looks like a crisp PS1 game. Voice acting is plentiful and well-done, although you won’t understand a thing. Songs are usually cheerful but occasionally are spiced with an Eastern Hemisphere flair (in underworld battles). However, no song or BGM was as sugary as anything from Rhapsody.
Gameplay:
At first glance the gameplay looks like the typical turn-based strategic battles on a 3D grid, yet it gets addicting when you add (1) item collection, (2) humorous special attacks, and (3) purification spells.
1) Sometimes you’ll earn special weapons by defeating purified monsters or earning a “good ending” to a chapter. The weapons and armor that you buy and equip can add bonuses to specific parameters as you defeat more monsters. So basically, your characters will level-up mostly in the categories that you have denoted by the type of items you equip.
2) While it doesn’t involve food as in Rhapsody, once again Nippon Ichi doesn’t disappoint with over-the-top ridiculous special attacks. Stampeding mushrooms, farting hippos, church bells, little boys reciting the wrong spells before getting help from their crushes, etc.--cute & funny stuff.
3) La Pucelle best sets itself apart from other S-RPGs with its purification system. When you enter a field, you see randomly placed “geo streams,” starting from a single diamond and flowing until they bump into another stream, an obstruction, or a monster. Judging from the placement of the monsters and obstacles, you sometimes can move your characters onto a stream, change its direction (streams will flow in the same direction as the character is facing), and either encircle or run the streams on top of the monsters. If you can accomplish this in one turn (the monsters will try to escape when you pass your turn), detonating the origin diamond will start a chain reaction and knock off major damage from anything inside or encircled by the stream. In other words, it plays out like Dominoes in the middle of FFTactics.
Other:
La Pucelle is published as a blue back CD-ROM. http://shop.himeya.com still sells it I believe. Japanese requirement is mild. There’s a partial translation and source code (you could read the .txt document if you don’t want to translate the software) posted at http://www.ayashii.com . Even if you don’t have access to either, it’s still easy to progress through the game because areas of interest are highlighted with red dots on the world map. Bonus dungeons and hidden areas can add >50 to the 50 hours required to finish the barebones story. Visit the gamefaqs strategy guide written by alamone to learn more about killing your own characters to go to hell and level-up!
Edit: something went screwy with the text. Hopefully this fixes it.
Screenshots
