Eternal Sonata is a Japanese RPG where you play the composer Frederic Chopin who is on his death bed. He has fallen into a dream world where everything has a musical influence. In this world, Chopin must help a girl name Polka who has a terminal disease that grants her magical powers.

In true Japanese RPG plot fashion, the world is at war between two sides and Chopin and Polka get into the midst of it. There's magic, a love story, and a boat load of crazy looking characters. The combat system uses music as a weapon and has those time-based gameplay found in so many other RPGs. The world of Eternal Sonata features a few minigames involving searching for treasure or taking photos during combat.

The cast of characters is extemely young so you can expect the teenage angst corny dialogue dominant in these types of RPGs. Every major character is named after a style of music. There's ten characters that you'll have to rotate for combat and to gain experience. A few sidequests are added to flesh out some of these characters.

In terms of graphics, the game is very bright colors and cartoonish style. The faces are very good with characters having a range of expressions, but the textures are not up to 360 standards. The combat graphics are not very good. And of course, with music by Chopin, the audio is wonderful.

As you would expect from a Japanese RPG, the game is only for single player. It's a good 40 hours and features enough complexity even with the childish like appearance of the characters. It does try to pull on the heart strings, but most Japanese RPGS do that. If you're looking for a Japanese RPG for the 360, this is certainly better than Blue Dragon in terms of story, artwork, and gameplay. We recommend it for fans of the genre.