Time and Eternity

 PlayStation 3
Metascore
42

Generally unfavorable reviews - based on 40 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 1 out of 40
  2. Mixed: 13 out of 40
  3. Negative: 26 out of 40
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  1. Impulsegamer
    Jul 17, 2013
    70
    Time and Eternity may not be as polished as other Japanese RPG titles but it does give the player a standard experience that for the majority of the time, I enjoyed. It definitely could have been better as it stays in the safe zone, rather than try to challenge the current genre.
  2. Playstation Official Magazine Australia
    Aug 12, 2013
    60
    The good looks of most JRPGs will be in some way anime-influenced, but Time and Eternity is flat-out anime that you play. With that comes the often cringe-worthy plotting of the latterday art form, too.[September 2013, p77]
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  3. LaPS4
    Jul 31, 2013
    60
    Time and Eternity is a roleplaying game focused, mainly, towards the Japanese market. On one hand, its plot is entertaining, but not a very complex one; on the other hand, it offers a wide variety of secondary missions and different unlockable elements that will prolong the game's life. Although visually interesting, the plain and sometimes badly designed scenarios will overshadow the overall impression. And it will be released only in English.
  5. Game Over Online
    Jul 29, 2013
    60
    Considering the fact that there are many more JRPG choices out there (of much greater quality) for the same price, it is virtually impossible to recommend anyone spend their gaming dollars on this twenty-some-odd hour game that will only annoy and disappoint them.
  6. 3DJuegos
    Jul 12, 2013
    58
    A so-so JRPG with neat ideas and a unique graphical conception but it also has lots of technical problems and annoying battles too.
  7. IGN
    Jul 10, 2013
    56
    I can't recommend Time and Eternity, but I’m not sorry I played it either. The whole experience was like looking back through a chipped lens at some of the good, and much of the bad that was anime and RPGs in the 80s.
  8. EGM
    Jul 16, 2013
    55
    ImageEpoch attempts to try something quite different with the Japanese RPG genre, and while a lot of the game suffers from missteps, poor gameplay decisions, and terrible writing, Time and Eternity’s anime-come-to-life visual style makes it an experience that feels unlike anything that’s been released in recent memory.
  9. Riot Pixels
    Sep 19, 2013
    50
    Time equals money, and Time and Eternity is not worth either.
  10. Worth Playing
    Sep 1, 2013
    50
    Even if you're the most die-hard of RPG fans, there's no reason to bother with Time and Eternity.
  11. Everyeye.it
    Aug 27, 2013
    50
    Time and Eternity, despite the promises, it's bland and uninspired. The game lacks everything that an RPG needs.
  12. Playstation Official Magazine UK
    Aug 20, 2013
    50
    Good-looking but with simple repetitive combat, there's not enough on offer here to back up the potential of its two-girls-one-game premise. [Sept 2013, p.89]
  13. PlaySense
    Jul 21, 2013
    50
    We had high hopes for Time and Eternity, but the game was ultimately a disappointing experience. The pros: the soundtrack's great, the gameplay's pretty elaborate, the story s interesting and the 2D-sprites are beautiful. The cons: the combat's rather stupid, the 3D-world is mediocre, the voice-acting's awful and the environments keep repeating themselves. It's a nice attempt at a JRPG, but there are a lot of better alternatives out there.
  14. Vandal
    Jul 1, 2013
    50
    More money and more time would have helped this game to become something better. Still there are some good ideas that a certain audience will indeed enjoy.

Awards & Rankings

70
#70 Most Discussed PS3 Game of 2013
27
#27 Most Shared PS3 Game of 2013

User Reviews

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User Score
5.4

Mixed or average reviews- based on 76 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 29 out of 76
  2. Mixed: 16 out of 76
  3. Negative: 31 out of 76
  1. GMWaffles
    Jul 17, 2013
    3
    So I bought this game without the highest hopes. Although most JRPG's aren't great games, they are usually quite entertaining. This game rightSo I bought this game without the highest hopes. Although most JRPG's aren't great games, they are usually quite entertaining. This game right here was atrocious. I tried to like it it, I really did but I just couldn't.
    The graphics look great, and that's probably the strongest point of the game. Although the animation in itself was jarring and felt awkward, especially when moving through an area, Toki/Towa's running animation was just terrible.

    Another major letdown was the voiceovers, they seemed bland with no emotion. And the lip syncing was way off with the mouth visibly moving even though the voiceovers had finished. The gameplay itself was also very clunky and hard to use, pressing the dodge button didn't work more often then not, leaving it a gamble to try and dodge the attacks.

    The story wasn't great, but I wasn't expecting some grand epic amazing story when I started the game.
    All in all I give this game a three, it's not broken and it works, and I think that's the only thing it has going for it right now, so if your reading this, buy it at your own risk.    … Full Review »
  2. Cerzel
    Jul 16, 2013
    0
    Time and Eternity is not a good game. It is not worth renting, borrowing from a friend, and most of all, it's not worth buying. Time andTime and Eternity is not a good game. It is not worth renting, borrowing from a friend, and most of all, it's not worth buying. Time and Eternity is an example of high ambitions and a complete and utter inability to follow through.

    Let's start with the writing. T&E takes its character archetypes and dialogue from the very worst of any harem anime you'll see. Our "hero", Zack, is your typical perverted, stupid, hot-blooded protagonist who spends most of his time yelling about how much he wants to see the female cast naked. Shortly into the game he's forced into the body of the perverted animal mascot, and this becomes combined with a number of absurd slapstick animations. The heroines, Toki and Towa, are as bland an uninteresting as they get, with Toki being the plucky, hopeful standard heroine and Towa the tough, angry girl. The side characters range from one-dimensional jokes to what coming from any developer other than ImageEpoch I would assume to be satire. The story makes no attempt to be interesting even if the premise is just barely original, and the plot of the game quickly takes a back-seat to your harem's moe-moe antics.

    The "HD animation", the main draw of the game for many people, is quite simply terrible. A screenshot or two will look good, as the images themselves aren't bad quality, but the animations are very poorly done, more resembling an eighth-grade Powerpoint presentation than any anime made in the last several years. Animations are repeated incessantly at rapid-speed; characters folding and unfolding their arms and crossing and uncrossing their legs as though they desperately need a toilet trip or a straightjacket wrapped around them. The animations are also choppy, and there is no attempt at lip-synching made here, with characters simply flapping their mouths endlessly to important lines of spoken dialogue like "Huh?" and "...".

    The soundtrack has a few great tracks, such as the battle themes, but for the most part the music is downright annoying, giving the impression that Yuzo Koshiro simply couldn't be bothered anymore. The voice acting is outright bad; and I'm not even referring to NISA's dub of the game. Despite a great cast, the Japanese voice actors have delivered some of the most painfully uninspired and weak performances of their careers, and this isn't helped by the game's horrible, choppy presentation.

    Now, the gameplay. If anyone played ImageEpoch's earlier Black Rock Shooter on the PSP, T&E's battle system should seem familiar. Much like BRS, you stand in place while enemies move towards you or attack from afar. You can shoot them, jump closer and use a knife, dodge, or guard attacks, and use special skills and items in battle. In BRS, the battles were fast, fluid, and responsive. In T&E however, battles are slow, clunky, tedious and suffer from frequent slowdown and frame drops. Controls are frequently unresponsive, either in your character continuing to shoot after letting go of the button, or not dodging when you hit it. These issues are made even worse by the lack of any kind of cancel function present in the time I played, leaving battles a frustrating mess when most enemies will begin and end an attack animation in the time it takes Towa or Toki to shoot a single bullet. Add onto this a cluttered, ugly battle user interface and every enemy wearing out its welcome with a great deal more HP than any mook has any right to have, and there is nothing enjoyable about the battles.

    To top it off, the game is buggy, and lacks basic features, like a pause button. When in any cutscenes, dialogue advances automatically, and the game cannot be paused. There is no reason for this when the animation merely consists of a few stock scenes repeated over and over, but it's clearly too much for ImageEpoch to handle, as skipping any line of dialogue will cause the characters to start flying across the screen, glitching in and out of different animations while trying to remember where they were supposed to be placed. This is a feat easily achieved over and over with just a single skip, and it leaves one wondering if the game was ever tested at all.

    In closing, there is simply nothing of value to be found anywhere in Time & Eternity. The game is a complete mess, in every aspect, and it's a wonder why NISA ever decided to inflict this travesty upon the west in the first place.    … Full Review »
  3. Mack_si
    Jul 16, 2013
    10
    Well, I thought this game will be REALLY big disappoint For some fans it is. But is it the worst thing? (see Mindjack) No! It's not! I willWell, I thought this game will be REALLY big disappoint For some fans it is. But is it the worst thing? (see Mindjack) No! It's not! I will say one thing. Do you like japanese games? Do you enjoy it? Then, buy it! Now, later, but if you really into these games, you'll enjoy it. Haters, go home, you're drunk.
    PS. I like japanese games.    … Full Review »
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