May 2018 Playthrough - Rhapsody: A Musical Adventure

[GrayGhost81]

Rhapsody: A Musical Adventure is a musical comedy RPG developed by Nippon Ichi and first published by Atlus on the PS1 in 2000 in North America. Eight years later a modified version of the game was released on the Nintendo DS.

Rhapsody is one of my favorite games of all time and I am honored to have it agreed upon for the game which will be featured in our 50th episode of the PlayCast!

Rhapsody is a relaxing, cute, laugh-out-loud little adventure with actual musical numbers. That's right, Rhapsody is a musical! The characters in this heartwarming adventure will frequently break out in song, complete with beautiful singing.

Our main character Cornet plays the trumpet and has the ability to talk to puppets, who will join her as party members with individual skills. In a reversal of the "damsel in distress" cliche, Cornet must save the prince of the Kingdom of Marl!

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Version differences:


-Strategy RPG battle style
-Adjustable difficulty
-English or Japanese voices (singing)
-No mini-map



-Turn-based battle style
-EXTREMELY useful mini-map
-Japanese voices (singing) only
-Game-breaking bugs*

*Your mileage may vary as far these bugs/crashes go. I have read of players who had no problems whatsoever, but I myself hit a crash about two hours into the game which I cannot progress past, and for that I will be playing the PS1 version and have to recommend you do the same.

Checkpoints:
Chapter 1
Chapter 2-3
Chapter 4-5
Chapter 6 & Epilogue

Participants:
grayghost81
singlebanana
pam
Disposed Hero
douglie007

[Pam]

Well that's a nice coincidence. I just picked this game up last month and was considering making it the first review of an RPG on my channel (since I heard it's not too long). I guess I'll play it this month

[GrayGhost81]

Well that's a nice coincidence. I just picked this game up last month and was considering making it the first review of an RPG on my channel (since I heard it's not too long). I guess I'll play it this month

AWESOME! Indeed it is only about ten hours long. I can't wait to hear what you think!

[Disposed Hero]

Can't say no to the RPGs.  I'm in!

[douglie007]

Of course I'm in

[singlebanana]

I'm getting started tonight. Mondays and Wednesdays are always good gaming nights due to no soccer practice. I plan on playing this one with my older kids, since it seems appropriate and they are still mad at me for not letting them watch Conkers......

[douglie007]

This is so much better then last month, lol anyone doing Karaoke with the songs.

[GrayGhost81]

This is so much better then last month, lol anyone doing Karaoke with the songs.

I'm so happy to see this message, and I'm playing the game on my phone, so I really should break out singing when I'm in the lounge at work playing it!

[douglie007]

Does the game say what chapter you are on? I just found the Waterstone but it has never had a chapter scene.

[GrayGhost81]

Does the game say what chapter you are on? I just found the Waterstone but it has never had a chapter scene.

Let me get back to you on that. It definitely shows a title card for each chapter in the DS version. If they aren't on the PS1 version, that's an error on my part and I'll have to update the checkpoints.

[Pam]

I started Rhapsody today. I’m playing on PS1 and I also haven’t seen any chapters. I’m about 2 hours in so far and I just got my ‘dress’ for the competition.

It’s very cute so far. I especially enjoy Kururu’s character and can’t wait for Etoile to fall in a mud pit or something. There have been less musical numbers than I expected (or hoped).

The addition of the movement squares is a neat addition to combat though playing on normal so far the difficulty is extremely low.

[douglie007]

The addition of the movement squares is a neat addition to combat though playing on normal so far the difficulty is extremely low.

I agree I find myself hitting the auto battle button for most of the random battles.  I also powered Corset up way too much trying to get all my monsters and puppets to the same level.  She is at level 35 and the enemies are around 10 to 20, where my puppets are.

[Pam]

I didn’t even notice there was an auto battle button!

[GrayGhost81]

I didn’t even notice there was an auto battle button!

Oh yeah! It isn't made obvious but if playing on easy or medium, you might as well pound the circle button for every battle.

I also agree with you that I wish there were even more musical numbers in the game!

As for the checkpoints, I definitely goofed as there are no chapter stops in the PS1 game. I'll try to get more specific checkpoints up, but in reality there is only one major spoiler, and you'll know it when you see it.

One thing that I love about this game is the humor, and it really has me laughing out loud constantly. It is a refreshing contrast to Conker's over the top, try-hard approach. What do y'all think about the comedy element of the writing and localization?

[douglie007]

I like the humor, the way the henchman make fun of the witch for being old.  Good times