RPGs have a habit of staring emo guys as the main protagonist, so it's actually refreshing to find a game that flips the formula on its head, this time featuring a young, teen girl helplessly in love with a prince, and who must save her prince if she's to live happily ever after. Rhapsody is a weird musical adventure, and though it's short and easy, it's a sweet little adventure game that will charm the pants off you.

Rhapsody tells the story of Cornet, a young girl who has the ability to talk to puppets, and who dreams of one day meeting the kingdom's prince and falling madly in love with him. She meets her prince through a brief encounter in the forest, which leads to her competing in a contest, where the winner will be the frontrunner for being the prince's bride. Things take a turn for the worst soon after the contest, however, and it's up to Cornet and her merry band of puppets to go out and save the prince.

I'll probably be using this word several times throughout this review, but the simple fact is that Rhapsody is a sweet game. It doesn't try to be anything other than what it is, which is a simple girl's fairy tale about saving the boy she loves, and that's it. She isn't trying to save the world from an evil court jester. There isn't an otherworldly demon getting ready to rise from hell and take over her land. Instead, there's just a boy and a girl, and the obstacles that stand in their way.

Typical Battle Screen

The story is decently told at times, thanks in most part to the humorous dialogue, and the way the game isn't afraid to break the invisible wall between the game and the player holding the DS. During an early search of a house, for instance, you are told there's a Rhapsody strategy guide on the shelf. When you screw up an instance later on in the game, the characters will directly call you out, calling you the person holding the stylus. Whether it's comments that the main characters say or little bits of dialogue from the various NPC characters roaming about, the game is hilarious at times.

The biggest problem with the story is that while the premise is good and there are some emotionally touching moments, the rest of the game is pretty humdrum, boring, and downright light when it comes to the narrative. For example, after being instructed to collect a series of objects, there isn't much in the way of story, instead only a sampling of dialogue meant to compel you forward to your next destination. You'll still experience story narrative, but it's not that interesting, and isn't really tied to the growth of Cornet or her quest to save the prince.

The game also doesn't have much in the way of a really threatening villain, as Marjoly is a dumb witch and her trio of lady companions are almost as equally daft. The villains look nice and have a great humor behind them, but striking and menacing they aren't. The only thing menacing is how Marjoly is kept in her outfit (you've never seen sprites jiggle like this before). Of course, the game does have an ultimate, final boss, and though you can see the "twist" coming from a mile away, there is so little in the way of motivation or reasoning that the Big Bad comes off as an afterthought more than anything else.

Throughout the game – and this is what sets the game apart from other game on the market – you'll experience a selection of songs, which play like a Broadway musical, though without the flashy dancing. The songs aren't presented in the typical Broadway style either for the most part – where people instantly break into song for no reason - as generally the songs fit into place well, where they don't come off as silly in the slightest. There's still a song about mountain men and the greatness of Marjoly, but most of the songs are touching little ditties where the characters express their true feelings for each other. The songs are handled decently, but I often had to use headphones in order to hear all the words. The game has also done away with the comically bad English voice acting, which I wanted to actually hear, and instead you'll only get the Japanese voices singing the songs with subtitles telling you what they are saying.

The original Rhapsody featured a strategy RPG system, but here's it's your standard turn-based RPG system. You'll control a team of up to four characters at a time, consisting of Cornet and three of her puppets (you can find more puppets to use throughout the game if you look hard enough). Each character has a specialty, such as developing more healing powers, stat augmenting powers, or are either heavy attackers with a light emphasis on magic. Chances are you'll find an interesting looking puppet and swap it in, but for almost the entire game (except the ending level) I used the same four characters, which just so happened to be the first four I earned.

While fighting, characters can either choose to attack an enemy, cast a spell, use an item, or try to flee. Yes, it's pretty standard once again, though it features some unique twists, such as letting you use bakery goods as some of your strongest attacks in the game. For the most part, however, the combat (as is the game) is way too easy. Besides using the directional pad and the face buttons, the game can also be completely controlled with the stylus, which works well and only falters occasionally. You drag your stylus around the screen to make your character work, navigate through the battle menus to issue attacks, and scroll through non-battle menus to do everything from equip character to saving your game (an anytime you want feature).

Unlike other RPGs that allow you to upgrade your weapons and armor, Rhapsody only concerns itself with accessories of varying prices, which do things like reduce the cost of spells, increase attack power, or improve defense. I often found the best accessories to focus on were the defensive ones, equip your characters with the best you're able to afford and as many as you can, and then you're basically a walking weapon.

Cake Attack

As if I haven't said so enough, the game is just too easy, and especially in the gameplay department since pressing the attack button over and over is usually enough to get the job done. You walk around, have a random battle every few seconds, rapidly press the attack button, and then repeat until you've crawled through one of the dungeons to the end of that story. Characters level extremely fast and often, meaning there's very little in the way of grind. You'll have to grind just a bit time to time, but mostly you can just move through the game from beginning to end without having to stop.

The final two battles of the game, which would ordinarily be the hardest of any RPG, were a tiny bit tough, but not enough to ever cause me to lose. It's almost like the game was developed to be a gateway game into the world of RPGs, being more for the casual gamers rather than those not already hardcore into the genre. The easiness also leads to a relatively short length, which had me completing the game just a little over seven hours.

Graphically the game is lovely, featuring bright sprites that are surprisingly well animated - such as Marjoly's jiggle factor – and locations that feel unique and have their own graphical styling. You'll visit several kingdoms, visit mountains full of ice, and other such trappings that are bright and cheerful. In the graphics department, the game only really suffers when it comes to the spells, which are pretty lackluster and far from special at all, and the dungeons all pretty much look the same from one square to the next.

The game doesn't feature an abundance of sound effects, but where the game succeeds fantastically is in the music department, which isn't surprising considering the game is a musical adventure. As said earlier, the musical moments are nicely done (though can be hard to hear without headphones), but the everyday, walk through the woods and cruise around town background music is equally well done and lovely. The game knows how to be somber when it needs to do so, but most of the time the songs are upbeat, poppy, and cheerful.

Rhapsody is a hard game to review, because I did really enjoy the game as a whole and quickly worked my way through the adventure and only stopped when I was forced, but I couldn't help noticing the many flaws in the game. Also, the game is an extremely niche title, which will make it hard for the game to ultimately find an audience. It's an RPG that will be too easy for the veterans and diehard fans, and the idea of a musical might throw many others off. It's a quaint darling of a game, but one that is certainly polarizing.

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