Lost Odyssey

When the Xbox 360 first released, Microsoft went through a time when they were trying their hand with exclusive JRPG releases. With games like Blue Dragon, and Eternal Sonata, getting decent critical praise but less than impressive sales, Lost Odyssey seemed to stand out the most. Unfortunately, the Xbox 360 didn’t sell well in Japan, and as a result, the sales for Lost Odyssey were not enough to condone a series. However, the sales in the West were a huge improvement selling over 200,000 units in its first month compared to the 110,000 the game sold in three months over in Japan.

With Final Fantasy creator, Hironobu Sakaguchi at the helm, it seemed like that Microsoft and Mistwalker Studios had a hit on their hands, in terms of sales at least. While the majority of the critics rated the game well; IGN with an 8.2/10, Destructoid with a 9/10, and GameZone with a 8.5/10, it was not enough to entice the consumer, which is really too bad.

Lost Odyssey was a deeply emotional story with Final Fantasy like combat elements. Playing as Kaim, an immortal, you are sent on a journey after a meteor wipes out forces from other nations. With Seth and Jansen at your side, Kaim goes to investigate the Grand Staff and the story progresses from there. One of the features within the game are the letters you find along the way that speak of Kaim’s past and his dealing with loss as the years went on.

This game was a beast on the Xbox 360 with a total of four discs at the time, the most for an Xbox game, with Mistwalker’s Blue Dragon not far behind having three discs.

I know that the likelihood of this is probably low just because of the potentially low sales numbers in Japan, but I think that Microsoft had a good franchise with Lost Odyssey, and they shouldn’t have necessarily backed away from it for good. If anything, it proved that the interest in Japanese role playing games is high in America.