The Guided Fate Paradox

 PlayStation 3
User Score
7.8

Generally favorable reviews- based on 64 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 38 out of 64
  2. Mixed: 20 out of 64
  3. Negative: 6 out of 64
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  1. Darkjolly
    Apr 22, 2014
    9
    *About 18 hours put in so my score might change if the game gets better or worse.*

    *UPDATE After 60 hours of gameplay 22/04/2014* Being a fan of the Disgaea series, when I saw the guided fate paradox I was instantly intrigued. Similar art style and crazy epic moves. Though being a rougelike game unlike Disgaeas turn based gameplay changes a lot. The problem people end up disliking    *About 18 hours put in so my score might change if the game gets better or worse.*

    *UPDATE After 60 hours of gameplay 22/04/2014*

    Being a fan of the Disgaea series, when I saw the guided fate paradox I was instantly intrigued. Similar art style and crazy epic moves. Though being a rougelike game unlike Disgaeas turn based gameplay changes a lot. The problem people end up disliking this game is that they come in to this game expecting it to be like Disgaea in terms of forgiveness and easiness like fellow reviewer down below ''RileyWRussel''. Though it's looks like Disgaea in terms of art style your better of comparing it to its spiritual predecessor ZHP. This is a ROUGE GAME not an SRPG

    That being said it means, It's harder, a lot harder.

    In the guided fate paradox you never feel safe, no matter how good you think your character is equipped there is always that fear of an enemy doing way more damage than you expect thus killing you and stripping you of all your gear and half your collected gold in the dungeon. Yes it sounds unfair but to me thats where the fun lies.

    The tension, the fear that this new enemy your about to face is either going to outpower you or you will come out victorious and get a nifty drop from it. It's a gamble. But don't get this wrong it's not about luck its about tactical skills. It's about positioning yourself so you can hit as many enemies at once while not getting surrounded. You enter each dungeon with a angel companion each with their different skills meaning you have access to a wide variety of tatics.

    The story is actually very good and intriguing filled with many twists, much to my surprisde. and and the Music is superb, better than any disgaea game soundtrack. Sorry Tenpei Saoto but its true.

    The characters are still 50/50 Renya the main character is awesome, he doesn't follow any generic hero traits like being emo, he acts like any normal person would. He is a very rare breed of RPG protagonists cause he's so damn realistic. Instead of the cliche motive to fight most jrgps heros follow like "I fight for justice or to protect the weak" He's more like "F you guys for dragging me into this, I'll fight so I can just go home"

    Others characters (Not all) did not have too much if any character development so you didn't really care about them.

    Voice acting was very decent , except the Villains. Their voices were superb, True bad ass voice acting their.

    and of course this being a NIS game, post game is where things pick up. With Cameo battles, survival dungeons and a whole lot more.

    This game is amazing and I fully recommend you try out, Its addicting, witty and pure fun

    *UPDATE    … Expand
  2. spencerhctt
    May 29, 2014
    8
    TL;DR version: An original game brought down a peg by petty niggles.
    I make a habit of picking up as many new NIS IP's as I can, as I have enjoyed many Atlus/NIS games in the past. If you have ever played an NIS game, you will immediately recognize many elements, including storyline tropes, static cut scenes, and a difficulty curve that can be called byzantine at best. That being said,    TL;DR version: An original game brought down a peg by petty niggles.
    I make a habit of picking up as many new NIS IP's as I can, as I have enjoyed many Atlus/NIS games in the past. If you have ever played an NIS game, you will immediately recognize many elements, including storyline tropes, static cut scenes, and a difficulty curve that can be called byzantine at best. That being said, The Guided Fate Paradox is a very original game that should be explored on its own merits.
    The game is, put simply, a modified rouge-like. The turn-by-turn walking, the energy attrition, and the "lose everything if you die, so for the love of God (HA!) don't die" features of gameplay are all familiar. The partner system, however, is a nice change. Each partner has fairly varied abilities and uses. I found myself only really using one or two, however, because it became a pain to keep them all well equipped. The abilities system is also really cool. Every piece of equipment you pick up not only boosts your stats, but it also gives you a new special ability to use while it is equipped. The level up system, once you get a hang of it, is great. You reset to level 1 every time you enter a new dungeon, but as you level up in the dungeon you gain "total levels." These, along with the level-ups from your items, turn into stat boosting tiles that can be sued on a large checkerboard. I can't possibly do the system justice, it being very complicated, but it becomes very intuitive and rewarding later on.
    My biggest complaint with this game is how long it takes to actually make any progress. You can attempt a dungeon six times and get to the same floor every time before the enemies just get too hard to deal with. This isn't a big deal when working with the extra dungeons, but it frequently causes the story to come to a complete halt for five hours while you go grind more. It can be a major distraction. The story can also be a little shallow at times, or just underwhelming. Some voice actors are incredible, but others feel very budget. The discrepancy is really distracting, and it can pull you out of the game pretty hard.
    I have plenty of complaints with the game, yes, but I still think it deserves a high score, if for nothing else than for its originality. In a time when most big developers have Madden syndrome and re-release the same game once a year, it's really refreshing to see something new and exciting, especially something that refuses to coddle players.    … Expand
  3. Demonik420
    Nov 5, 2013
    9
    [This review is pending changes if necessary once i complete the game, all material here is impressions of the game SO FAR (over 14 hours in at this point)]

    So far The Guided Fate Paradox is a great gaming experience, as per the norm when NIS rolls up its sleeves. If you are a lover of NIS games there is a lot to love here and IMO its the best take on a Dungeon Crawler Rougelike I've    [This review is pending changes if necessary once i complete the game, all material here is impressions of the game SO FAR (over 14 hours in at this point)]

    So far The Guided Fate Paradox is a great gaming experience, as per the norm when NIS rolls up its sleeves. If you are a lover of NIS games there is a lot to love here and IMO its the best take on a Dungeon Crawler Rougelike I've played in a long time.

    ~Story~
    The story is very intriguing and well written, I found myself drawn in immediately and felt right at home as if it was part of a series i had already played! The main protagonist Renya is comical and I actually really like him! As with most NIS games he is a breath of fresh air compared to the mains in a lot of other Japanese games and media. The Supporting cast are great too especially your fun loving and overly optimistic personal angel Lilliel. The visual novel style segments which are the main driving force for the story, are basically the same as any Disgaea game and show the same humor and excellent writing I'm used to.

    ~Gameplay~
    The game is a Dungeon crawler Rougelike and it plays like one, albeit a REALLY good one. the dungeons are fun, varied and surprisingly have a lot of story segments throughout which really makes for a nice experience. I wont go into detail about how it all works but i really like the system and how you actually have to eat food to survive and how objects can be thrown and moved. The combat is VERY FUN which i find surprising because most rougelike dungeon crawlers consist of walking into enemies. They have really revamped and made this basic mechanic fun, strategic and engaging. with the use of equip-able slots (head, chest, legs, shows, right and left arms) you can put on equipment. Each piece of equipment has a special move attached to it so its pretty awesome and makes finding loots fun! so you have your basic attack witch is hitting with your weapons and then you have a wheel to select your special moves from which range anywhere from skill ups to ranged shots to AOEs and so on. Its wicked fun!
    As usual its a game with an enormous amount of customization and hundreds of hours worth of game play if you choose to play it the way its meant to be played. However if you are more of a casual player then just like most NIS games the game can be beaten in less time, its mostly up to how to play.

    ~Graphics~
    The graphics are great IMO on par with or better than other recent NIS titles such as Disgaea D2. the characters designs (done by the artist of 'shakugan no shana') are fantastic and look great on screen. Its a lot of fun to see what they look like dressed up in different armors. The angel girls are so dam KAWAII especially in army helmets and other funny hats! Where some might complain about the graphics i think for most competent gamers graphics are only important to a certain extent as many of us still play classics and love them more every time we play because they are great games no matter what they look like. After all Final Fantasy 13 has amazing graphics but most Final Fantasy Fans myself included find it FAR inferior to any other FF game. Not to say its unplayable and in fact its not really TOO bad but when compared to other entries in the series it seems terrible.

    ~Audio~
    The Music is good but nothing special for the most part. Compared to the AMAZING music in the Disgaea series the music in this game is just forgettable and bland but it does the job fine and i like most of it if not compared to Disgaea.

    ~Voice Acting~
    The voice acting from most JRPGs and Japanese games in general is VERY questionable and usually is just downright TERRIBLE. Japanese just doesn't translate well into English most of the time. However NIS has found some way of not following that trend. This game is no exception the English voices are actually great however I wouldn't say they Rival anything like Disgaea or Xenoblade Chronicles but they are pretty darn good for a Dub. Thankfully there is also a CHOICE OF JAPANESE AUDIO and I'm very glad that NIS continues to give us this feature for those, Myself included who prefer the original.

    ~interface~
    ITS SO DAM EASY TO USE AND THERE IS A SHORTCUT FOR EVERYTHING I LOVE LOVE LOVE IT!!!!!!

    ~In Closing~
    its awesome that there is still a JRPG developer out there that localizes all most all their titles without question.. when big developers like square enix only want to localize Final Hallway 13 and other garbage.. leaving gems like the dragon quest 7 remake and final fantasy type 0 un-localized and forcing Nintendo to do all the work at localizing bravely default flying fairy. its pretty pathetic and lame of them. Thank GOD NIS is around to scratch that JRPG Itch!

    The Guided Fate Paradox is a great outing and one that NO JRPG fan and ESPECIALLY NO NIS fan can afford to miss!    … Expand
  4. Elegroth
    Sep 6, 2016
    9
    I'm honestly not sure why so many people think that this game is difficult. It's a fairly easy roguelike game considering that you can actually grind in order to get stronger unlike most.

    I also noticed that several people mentioned that the stat boosts you get when leveling in the dungeons doesn't affect much, which is definitely false. Level 1 when you first start the game verses    I'm honestly not sure why so many people think that this game is difficult. It's a fairly easy roguelike game considering that you can actually grind in order to get stronger unlike most.

    I also noticed that several people mentioned that the stat boosts you get when leveling in the dungeons doesn't affect much, which is definitely false. Level 1 when you first start the game verses the end of the game is a HUGE difference. By the end, my total level was 689 and even without my normal gear my main ATK and DEF stats were 315 and 216 respectively.

    The base stats were 135 and 130, so that's over a 2x increase for ATK and almost 2x for DEF. It definitely makes things easier.

    Getting more into the game, the story, character development and gameplay are all superb. This RPG actually had one of the most likeable protagonists I've ever encountered, and the development of both the main protagonist and Lilliel (his assistant) are fantastic. The story slowly unfolds and is much deeper than originally shown, which ends up being on of the most memorable video game stories in a long time.

    The graphics are pretty awesome as well. The sprite art is well detailed all around and transitions between combat and events pretty well. The voice acting and SFX are pretty solid as well. Nothing ground breaking, but it was all good.

    My main gripe with the game is that the middle chapters can feel pretty long. Not very much goes on besides some sprinkles of story. They probably could have cut out two or three chapters and it would have been more enjoyable in my opinion.

    Ratings are as follows:

    Story 4.5/5
    Graphics 5/5
    Gameplay 5/5
    Sound 4/5

    So, overall I give it a 4.5/5. Great gameplay and story, although a little drawn out, but definitely a great time. Any fans of roguelikes and/or JRPGs in general will have fun with it.    … Expand

Awards & Rankings

71
#71 Best PS3 Game of 2013
91
#91 Most Discussed PS3 Game of 2013

Critic Reviews

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Metascore
74

Mixed or average reviews - based on 27 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 17 out of 27
  2. Mixed: 10 out of 27
  3. Negative: 0 out of 27
  1. PlayStation Universe
    Aug 23, 2014
    80
    Lots of depth and replayability, but a few unexpected surprises like unusually poor voice acting dull the shine.
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  2. CD-Action
    Feb 10, 2014
    60
    Nippon Ichi tried to develop a game that would appeal to a wider audience but made it too complicated and therefore wearisome. [02/2014, p.70]
  3. GameCritics
    Feb 6, 2014
    85
    Wearing its weirdness and humour like a badge of honor, Guided Fate Paradox is a fresh take on the Roguelike genre with a quirky tale and dialed-back difficulty that ensures it's accessible to all audiences.
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