Description
Y'all probably didn't expect to see this game again... 20+ odd years after the PSP release of one of South Korea's premium RPGs, Sonnori's "Astonishia Story" is back, and it just won't die! AS was originally released way back in 1994 for ol' MS-DOS by Sonnori Co., Ltd, one of the premier creators of Korean games. While it was rough around the edges and (visually) behind the output from games in most other parts of the world at the time, it was an ORIGINAL work with inspirations from Western and JRPGs of the time, most prominently titles like "Pool of Radiance", "Traysia" and "Shining Force", and enjoyed much success as their first game. I can't stress ORIGINAL enough here, as Korea, China and Taiwan made quite a reputation for themselves back in the day for taking or modifying other companies' source code and graphics to make knock-offs of various games, especially prolific ones (Street Fighter, Fatal Fury, Maan "borrowing" aspects from Chrono Trigger, etc.).
This game, however, does not exactly bring good tidings... as something of a stealth release towards the end of 2025 by Daewon Media and Waycoder, this remake of AS (given the updated "Refine" moniker) was cursed even before it officially launched. Promos for the game initially stated the game would release for the Nintendo Switch and Steam, but early testing was rough, constructive feedback was not addressed swiftly and early reviews from the press were overwhelmingly negative with comments covering everything from the game's graphics (which struggle on a NS1 and is still sub 30FPS in spots on the NS2, it's 60FPS~ on PC), poor optimization, high price tag, controversy over the physical media (with the Switch and PC version having separate contents but being priced the same), high degree of bugs in handheld or docked (crashes, terminations in certain towns, constant sound bugs, slow motion FPS bugs, frequent graphics glitches, garbled text, increased latency, basically unacceptable stuff in a modern and unassuming 2D game), almost total absence of QoL features and sluggish gameplay... etc.
While the game used "Astonishia R / PSP" as a base, it lacks animated cutscenes and actually removed almost all the "unique" items you could find through the world, and attempted to replicate the HD-2D style of games like Octopath, DQ/DW, etc., but did it so poorly that the game had to get multiple patches after launch for alternate graphics settings as things were blown out and over-saturated. The game switched from Steam to Purple prior to release (through a deal with NC Corporation but also to avoid review bombing and easier refunds). In spite of ALL THESE THINGS, the game was playable by the time I got my hands on my L.E. (it was borderline unplayable without those 4+ patches)... while it's "exclusive" to Korea, it has a better English localization than the game we got 20~ years ago from Ubisoft too and is delightfully self-aware with numerous weird references (Kenshiro from FotNS, Solid Snake and Big Boss from MGS, Kratos from GoW, etc.)! The game is unapologetically old-school, which is fine by me, but the issue is that its systems were a bit unpolished even in 1994 (this game DOES attempt to fix some fundamental things). If you want to know the basic gist, check out my PSP video as this game is about 80% the same (Ordinary knight goes on quest to save land from twisted elves). I'll talk about what's different here.
There's no more MP or hidden skills; characters get all skills from leveling and have SP now which charges by one bar through phases and starting SP increases by 1 every 10 levels (all MP items are gone, this is a WAY better system for this game). Experience is equalized here, so no best fighter bonus but a HUGE CARDINAL SIN this game commits is make battles give the same experience and cash based on the area, so if a fight gives 500 EXP in an area, it doesn't matter if there's one enemy or eight, making fights more of a chore than anything. The game changed a few events and added mercenaries that you can hire with different requirements, making the early game a little easier (they have lower stats than the mains, but have some unique skills). Hataik is also a permanent character in this game, whereas he was temporary in the others (he doesn't appear in the story after his initial departure though). "Play Score" is calculated differently now and there's a New Game + (Money, Lvl.1 Mercs and "Hella Gear" transfers over, enemies seem stronger and have about 30% more HP... don't know yet if there's a reward, but the main game was already a slog). The game mimics the "Break / Kill" system if you hit multiple enemy weaknesses straight from Octopath. "Super Moves" around the LVL25/26 mark seem to be removed, so all main abilities are learned at LVL20, which is a much more realistic cut-off. Game is short if you know what to do and the 1st loop can be cleared in about 7-9hrs.
~4hrs of assorted ENGLISH gameplay... make an informed decision folks! Enjoy.