Disgaea 4: A Promise Unforgotten

Disgaea 4: A Promise Unforgotten is a tactical RPG from Nippon Ichi Software, and on PlayStation 3 it was the first entry in the series to use higher resolution to redraw its characters as sharp, highly detailed sprites. The player follows the vampire Valvatorez, once a feared tyrant who, because of a long-ago promise, now stays away from power and lives off sardines, and his rebellion against the corrupt netherworld government. The story is typically zany, self-aware, and yet surprisingly touching, since beneath the layer of exaggerated humor lies a fairly serious tale about keeping one's word.

Battles take place on grid-based maps where units are summoned from a portal, can be lifted and thrown across the field, stacked into towers, and combined into group attacks. The Geo Panel system alters the properties of individual tiles, and chaining their destruction can wipe out an entire map at once, turning every mission into a small puzzle. On top of that, the Item World returns, endless randomly generated floors inside items where equipment gets upgraded, and there's a parliament where voting pushes through game rules. Damage numbers climb to absurd magnitudes, and the level cap is set so high that the game practically has no end.

Technically it's a purely two-dimensional game with careful animation and a colorful palette that looks genuinely good on PS3, since it doesn't rely on raw power but on craftsmanship. Tenpei Sato's music mixes rock and orchestral motifs and holds up well both the comedic and more serious tones of the story, which also includes deliberately over-the-top voice acting. Reception at the time was very good, with reviews praising the depth of its systems and considering the fourth entry the best entry point into the series. Anyone who just wants the story can finish it in a few dozen hours; anyone who wants more can dive into challenges that even the highest ordinary character level won't be enough to beat. Disgaea 4 remains to this day one of the most content-rich tactical RPGs of all, and for players who enjoy breaking a system's rules, it offers hundreds of hours.