Created by developer tri-Ace, the geniuses behind three (and soon, four) Star Ocean titles, as well as some other well-thought-of one-off titles, have unveiled their latest RPG masterpiece, Infinite Undiscovery, which at least for a while will be an Xbox 360 exclusive title from SquareEnix.

The good news is: it’s a good one! Infinite Undiscovery revolves around the tale of a world where the moon is, for mysterious reasons, chained to the earth and unable to move in rotation around the planet. A lone hero rises up to undo these chains and become the people’s hero and he – is not your main playable character in this game. Instead, in Prince and the Pauper fashion, your hero is someone who just happens to be the spittin’ image of this hero of the people.

Complication matters is the fact that Capell is a bit of a pacifist; he’d rather blow a flute than swing a sword, but fate pretty much won’t allow him the luxury of that option. As the game begins, he’s been imprisoned by some folks who believe Capell is Sigmund the Liberator, and soon he rescued from that cell by Aya, one of Sigmund’s followers. As is usually the case with such games, Capell eventually gets caught up in Sigmund’s mission, like it or not.

The whole affair takes place in a nice-looking world that is somewhat photorealistic, but only if you painted reality over with an airbrush. Think of it more as a very sharp-looking cartoon world … for grown-ups.

Like the Star Ocean games before them, and most other tri-Ace games, Infinite Undiscovery is an action RPG that retains an RPG feel more than an action-game feel, which should be a good fit for all longtime, multiplatform SquareEnix fans. The battle system at its core is rather simple, but is given depth and complexity as the game evolves without ever becoming hard to manage. Quite a feat.

The game also offers up more than the usual dungeon crawl; there are puzzles to solve and mysteries to unwind and secrets to reveal. Some of these are accomplished using a “link system” that allows Cappel to talk with folks he meets with different party members sort of “along for the ride. While it doesn’t work on everyone, each area has at least a couple people who will either tell you something extra, or given you something they’d have held back otherwise, simply because your fellow party-member is with you.

Like most other tri-Ace games, the simple world is a bit deceptive, in that there are loads of new systems introduced as the game progresses. Examples include the aforementioned in-town link system, as well as a battle link-system, an item creation interface, and much more.

In the end, the game is exactly the sort of thing the original Xbox era lacked; a top-notch exclusive RPG release from one of the top names in RPGs: SquareEnix. Infinite Undiscovery could become the basis for SquareEnix’s newest franchise, and based on the high quality on display here, there’s no reason it shouldn’t spawn sequels. 360 fans, rejoice: not only is the 360 “in the mix” of the next-gen RPG market, but as of now, they’re well ahead of Sony and the PS3. That’s because, like a sizable handful of RPGs released to the 360 recently, Infinite Undiscovery is a must-have for any true fan of RPGs.