I've got my hands on the title and thought I could share my thoughts, and those that also have it can share theirs.

First let me say the game is damn good looking. The 3d character models not so much, they are less detailed than the models from FF IV, but the backgrounds and scenery is just fantastic looking. Everything is basically prerendered except for the world map and your characters.

The gameplay seems like pretty typical JRPG fare. You do turnbased combat with 4 characters up against a maximum of 4 enemies (so far as I've seen). Formation takes precedence as the priemere method of strategy in the game. There are two rows of three, and you arrange your four characters strategically along those two rows. It seems certain enemies cannot reach the back row, so it's good for a healer to sit back during tough battles and pop out healing for the front row attackers. Thus far nothing from my hour of playing has resulted in me having to do anything but mash on the attack button, but I'll reserve any harsher judgement until later in the game if this continues. It's too early to tell thus far.

The cutscenes are all straight anime style and very well done, with full voice overs. The game itself is chalk full of voice overs also, as much as most console RPGs seem to have. This is no surprise seeing as how this game comes on the DS's largest card, the 256MB one. To compare, FF IV comes on a 128MB card and only Personal Trainer: Cooking I believe shares such a large card to house it, but I can't be totally sure about that. The in game audio is completely hit or miss. The music is very good and will probably contain many memorable tunes for fans of that type of composed music. However, the voiceovers are abysmal. Some characters' voices are sped up to the equivalent of watching a movie on 1.5 speed audio on your DVD player. They just talk unaturally fast and it's irritating. Other characters don't seem to be afflicted with this problem. I'm still looking for a way to turn them off entirely, but haven't had any luck thus far.

When you talk to people, a stillshot pops up of their character, which is a nice touch overall. However, townsfolk just regurgitate the few pictures over and over to represent each person. Anyone without any storyline context and merely referred to as a townsperson basically has one avatar for females and one for males. I'm hoping this doesnt continue from village to village, but I've already noted that both shopkeepers at the general store where you start out at both use the exact same old lady avatar, and one is actually your grandmother, so it's a bit lazy of the developers to not invest in more portraits.

Overall I'm only a little over an hour in and will plug more away this weekend and update this. I'm hoping some of my gripes are ironed out and more is presented that makes this a better experience, but thus far I'm a little underwhelmed. Ask any questions if you wish, or add your own thoughts if you also have a copy.

Thanks Onyx.

Thanks Onyxmeth. :D

You're welcome answerers.

That's it though guys? I figured this was a pretty wanted release on DS and more people would be hyped to hear about it and have some questions. Anyhoos, I'm gonna pop it in for a bit and give it another go. Wish me luck.

Have you played any of the other Suikoden games before Onyx?

Not at all. I did however read up slightly on this game before I started playing it, so I know it does not take place in the same world as the Suikoden series, but in one of the alternate universes or such the series has lighty explored in past games. The name of the place you reside at, Salsaville is a little silly. I feel like they're going to sell me tequila at the inn or something and guys are going to start dancing unexpectedly with my women party members. It seems to be horribly lost in translation from the original Japanese.

How is progression ? Mission based ?
Are battles quick like DQs ones ?

My problem with this game is that I already played the two DQs remakes on DS and those satisfied my need of good old RPG and there are so many promising games coming out in the following weeks/months that I must carefully chose what pick up.

I'm a few hours (5) in this.. it's ok/good.. not great.. dislike the town "menu's" but why doesn't HQ (castle) don't have "menu's"? Running through HQ is annoying... and waaaaay too many characters.. don't need them, don't use them.. Still a nice game... missions are fun..

I'm going to download it and play it aaaaaaall night long.

The story starts pretty linear and fast but at some point, 3+hours, you can go on missions... busy playing a few of them cause they all seem to connect to the story.. or at least give you more background information...

Battles are quick.. love that automatic "all party use normal attack" button....