Astria Ascending is a JRPG with a rich legacy baked into its DNA. Although a Western-developed title, the role-playing game featured a pair of JRPG veterans (Kazushige Nojima and Hitoshi Sakimoto) who had hands in its development. Those notable creators were responsible for genre classics, such as Final Fantasy X, Kingdom Hearts, and Vagrant Story, giving Astria Ascending an immediate air of legitimacy. However, legacy isn’t enough to make Astria Ascending stand out in a crowded field. Although the $34.99 PC game is a serviceable JRPG, it doesn’t do much to distinguish itself from other titles in the genre.
The Gods Shall Fall
Astria Ascending takes place in a land called Orcanon. You control a party of demigods who defend the world from monsters called Noises. Though powerful, the demigods only have a three-year lifespan after being chosen to become demigods. The eight available demigods in your party only have a few months to live at the beginning of the game. They don’t get a chance to relax, however, as Noises are spreading across the land at an unprecedented rate.
Turn-based battles unfold as they do in most JRPGs. You’re free to select normal attacks, magic spells, and use recovery and buff items during your turn. The Focus system adds a strategic layer to combat. Exploiting a monster’s weakness gives you focus points (up to three in the demo). You can then spend one or all of your focus points on your next turn to unleash stronger attacks and spells, depending on how many points you use. Conversely, you’ll lose Focus points if foes are resistant to your attacks. For example, you’ll lose Focus points when using an ice-based attack on an ice monster. Figuring out enemies’ strengths and weaknesses is vital to winning encounters.
A Role to Play
The demigods consist of JRPG staples, such as warriors, mages, brutes, and thieves. You’ll learn about each of the characters’ respective background stories as you progress. You can swap characters during combat, which proves useful since some are better suited to handling specific enemy types than others. You’ll want magic users to deal with large enemy mobs, or a beefy tank character to handle strong bosses. If a party member dies, you can replace them, too. Not many JRPGs let you swap party members on the fly so this mechanic is much appreciated.
Like Final Fantasy III and V, Astria Ascending features a Job system. We weren’t able to delve too deeply into the Job system with this demo. From the little we saw, you can change character classes to gain unique stats and abilities. For example, you can give a warrior magical abilities or enhance the strength of inherently weaker character. We’re not sure how much grinding you’ll need to do to get the most out of the different classes. Hopefully, it will be merciful.
Can Your PC Run Astria Ascending?
Astria Ascending is a gorgeous title. Characters and environments have a watercolor-like aesthetic that gives the world a dream-like quality. Underwater cities, dark forests, and cavernous caves brim with detail that makes the world come alive. On top of that, the character animations are fluid and vibrant. The visuals are one of the game’s main highlights.
To play Astria Ascending on PC, you’ll need a gaming rig with at least an AMD FX 4350 or Intel Core i5-4690 CPU, a Nvidia GeForce GTX 950 GPU, 8GB of RAM, and 25GB of storage. The recommended specs demand that your PC have at least an AMD Ryzen 5 1600X or Intel Core i5-7600K CPU, an AMD Radeon RX 5700 GPU or Nvidia GeForce GTX 1070Ti GPU, and 16GB of RAM.
My gaming PC, with its Intel i7-4790 CPU and Nvidia GeForce GTX 1080 GPU, pushed Astria Ascending’s frame rate into 120-144 frames-per-second range. The game demo ran without a hitch, though it’s tough to say if this will be the case with the finished game.
A Familiar Legend Begins
If you’re a JRPG fan, you no doubt have Astria Ascending on your radar. It’s the RPG equivalent of comfort food, thanks to its familiar gameplay loop and anime-style graphics. If you’re new to the genre, Astria Ascending may prove a good jumping on point. Astria Ascending’s available now on PC, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch, so we’ll soon discover if it does anything to distinguish itself from competing games in the genre.
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