I love the Like a Dragon (nee Yakuza) games. Like, a lot. I started playing them with the PS2 original and have adored following Kiryu’s journey all these years. So, of course a side story starring the Dragon of Dojima was right up my alley, and considering it’s a between-quel (interquel?) of Yakuza: Like a Dragon (also known as Yakuza 7) and Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth, I had to see what our favorite Fourth Chairman was up to. His cameo in Yakuza 7 was a standout moment in a game I thoroughly enjoyed, so getting the full rundown on his activities leading up to that moment was something I absolutely needed to see for myself.

As noted, Like a Dragon Gaiden: The Man Who Erased His Name is a side story that plays out concurrently to the events of Y7, so if you’ve played that game, you know how this story is going to end, at least in broad strokes. If you were coming into this looking for high stakes, you aren’t really going to find them. What you will find is a surprisingly interpersonal drama exploring the ramifications of giving up one’s identity and grappling with the losses that come with it. When you’ve spent your entire adult life trying to remove the yoke of institutions from around your neck, how do you come to terms with submitting to a shadowy cabal that strips you of everything you’ve ever held dear – all so you can protect the ones you love the most?

Unlike Y7‘s turn-based RPG battle system, Like a Dragon Gaiden returns to the real-time brawler style the Yakuza games were known for. This time around, Kiryu has two fighting forms he can swap between: Agent and Yakuza. Yakuza style is a pared down version of Kiryu’s Dragon of Dojima style – heavy hitting, strong counters, will grab you by the head and slam you into his knee types of moves. It excels in one-on-one fights or against blocking opponents, since his basic moveset includes a stance break attack. Agent is new to Gaiden and gives Kiryu an assortment of fun gadgets to use during combat. Spider uses wires to bind enemies in place or fling them around the arena; Hornet gives Kiryu control of autonomous drones; Serpent lets Kiryu zip around the arena on rocket shoes; and Firefly is an explosive cigarette that’s great for clearing out crowds. Honestly, Agent is best for crowd control until you level it up enough to wreak havoc in EX Heat mode, at which point I was using it on single bosses as well. I found no end of delight in grabbing five or six guys with Spider and flinging them willy-nilly around a fight. Great stuff.

The battle arena returns here as well with the Coliseum, and it comes with a fun twist: Hell Team Rumbles. Throughout the story, Kiryu will have the opportunity to recruit several characters to join his Coliseum team for group matches. Unlike large scale battle content in previous games, such as Yakuza 6 and Kiwami 2, the Hell Team Rumbles here are real-time slug fests where Kiryu will fight alongside up to 10 NPCs against groups of enemies. You can also play as any of the characters in your roster, not just Kiryu. Characters are broken into three categories: fighter, tank, and healer. Each character can perform a special attack – raising everyone’s attack and defense, healing the whole party, etc. – but so too can enemies. You can raise teammate’s levels to 20 and their bond to three, with a higher bond leading to special effects lasting longer. Hell Team Rumbles can get pretty difficult in the Platinum tiers, so having a solid team of attackers, defenders and healers is a must, and I found Agent style really excelled here thanks to its stronger crowd control. Kiryu can also take part in standard solo fights, and you’re going to need to do a mix of everything if you want to see the Coliseum’s story play out in full.

Of course, it wouldn’t be a Like a Dragon game without a ton of side content, and despite being a side story itself, Gaiden does not slack in the mini-game department. Returning are the gambling staples, mahjong, karaoke and golf, as well as Pocket Circuit, everyone’s favorite miniature car racer. While the story isn’t nearly as involved this time as it was in Yakuza 0 or Kiwami, it’s still a fun way to spend a couple hours. The new Pocket Circuit spokeswoman is Ran, a bubbly girl with adorable twin tails who recruits Kiryu to join CourStar, a Pocket Circuit location catering to adults who played during their youth. As with several of the substories in this game, there’s a strong through-line of reminiscence and handing over the torch, and I found it really well done. Nothing about the actual mini-game has changed from previous games, so it’s easy to jump right in if you’re at all familiar with Pocket Circuit. As for karaoke, this time around it’s basically all old-man hits, including Baka Mitai, TONIGHT -restart from this night-, hands, and the new song, Sayonara Silent Night, a catchy little diddy with just enough melancholy to really hit you in the feels. It felt very fitting.

Also returning are cabaret clubs, though this time around all the cabarets are a new “immersive” experience, with full motion video of women performing the hostess roles rather than in-game models based on those women. You have five girls to choose from, including streamer Kson. The cabaret plays out exactly the same as in previous games, with the girls answering Kiryu’s questions and chatting with him until you raise their affection level sufficiently to earn some alone time with them. I found the experience mildly novel, though felt there was too much delay in the video playback of each woman, giving every encounter a bit of an uncanny feel. It’s nothing insurmountable and didn’t distract that much, but if you’re used to the more seamless experience of previous games, it might take some getting used to. It was neat to see the women be themselves, though, and I always appreciate Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio’s commitment to using real industry members, considering how often the stories in their games attempt to dispel negative stereotypes around red light district work.

But Leah, you’re asking, how is the story? Honestly, it’s fantastic, though I feel that should go without saying. It’s a Like a Dragon game, of course the story is good. But like I mentioned earlier, the stakes here are not particularly high by Yakuza standards. Since Like a Dragon Gaiden takes place concurrent to Y7, we ultimately know where Kiryu will end up. This story isn’t about that, though. It’s focused entirely on Kiryu’s relationship with Hanawa, his Daidoji Faction handler, and the tight line Kiryu has to walk in order to keep his identity secret. It’s all about how Kiryu struggles to keep his part of an unfair bargain in which he gave up everything – even his name – to protect Haruka, Haruto and the Morning Glory Orphanage kids’ health and happiness. As a puppet of the Daidoji group, Kiryu – now going by Joryu – has no freedom, though Hanawa seems to do his best to give the former Dragon of Dojima leeway. That can’t last forever though, and when an unknown group stages an attack against the Daidoji, Kiryu’s conviction and morals are put to the test.

The basic setup is simple enough. The Daidoji are hired to assist the CIA in helping some unnamed terrorist group from another country. They’re supposed to provide cover for a gold bullion hand-off, but it turns out to be a front and the Daidoji group are blindsided by a surprise attack. Hanawa tasks Kiryu with looking into a possible connection between the attackers and the Seiryu Clan in Yokohama, which goes nowhere, but does give us a concrete time period in which this side story takes place. What Kiryu does find in Yokohama are the Omi Alliance, who are up to no good, and after some back and forth with Tsuruno, the Watase Family lieutenant, Kiryu is given a red dragon and a single clue: Akame.

Back in Sotenbori, Kiryu ends up under the wing of Akame, an information peddler. Akame acts as both a big story player, as well as Kiryu’s base of operations throughout the game, taking on an assortment of odd jobs from the city’s “jack of all trades” to help keep the streets safe for the homeless. Despite her ties to the Omi Alliance and other underworld entities, Akame has nothing but the best interests of Sotenbori in mind. She’s a fantastic addition to the pantheon of Yakuza characters and I love her. She’s fiery and a bit of a smart ass, but she’s savvy and resourceful as well. She’s also incredibly cute. The entire cast in Like a Dragon Gaiden is fantastic, though, and you’ll be hard-pressed to not find someone here who isn’t at the very least interesting.

For all my love of this side story, there were a few issues. I played on the PlayStation 5, and performance was overall quite stellar, but I did notice a lot of pop-in when running around Sotenbori, and on occasion when I loaded back into the street from an instanced area (Stilj, CourStar, some substories) the game would hang on the gray loading screen for an uncomfortably long time. There were also some really noticeable typos throughout the game and a very unfortunate open font tag during the climactic cutscene. It will likely be fixed in a future patch, but felt out of step with how clean previous titles have been regarding the text. And this is admittedly a “me” problem, but there were so many menus when doing Pocket Circuit that I felt really didn’t need to be that excessive. There’s no reason the main races and rivals at the very least couldn’t be nested under the same menu instead of having to exit out of the mini-game entirely every time.

Overall, Like a Dragon Gaiden: The Man Who Erased His Name is a standout entry in this storied franchise. Agent is a fun new addition to Kiryu’s fighting styles, and I really loved the Coliseum this time around, especially the Hell Team Rumbles. Playing dress-up with Kiryu was a ton of fun, and every game should give him the opportunity to walk down a runway. Akame is a wonderful character, and her integration in both the main story and the substories made her feel integral to this snippet of Kiryu’s life. I found the interpersonal drama with Hanawa compelling, as well as everything involving the Omi Alliance. This game also packs a serious emotional gut-punch and features perhaps the best acting I’ve seen from Takaya Kuroda to date. If you’re really craving that old school Yakuza combat and storytelling, Gaiden is a solid experience. It took me a little over 30 hours to complete all substories, finish the Coliseum, complete the main races in CourStar and defeat the lion’s share of rivals. It’s well worth your $49.99 USD.

Review Score
Overall

Review copy was provided by the publisher.

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I have made no secret of how much I’ve been looking forward to Final Fantasy XVI since it was first announced. As a lifelong fan of the franchise, I was eager to see what new story was in store for this vaunted series; and as an avid Final Fantasy XIV player, I was stoked to see some of my favorite devs creating a new, standalone title. Would it live up to expectations or flounder under the weight of its own name? Read on to find out!

Clive Rosfield is the first son of the Archduke Elwin Rosfield, of the Dutchy of Rosaria. His younger brother, Joshua, a frail and sickly boy, was born the Dominant of Phoenix – basically this world’s version of a summoner. Clive, himself, is blessed with the Phoenix’ power, allowing him to use fire-based magic and attacks, and so he acts as Joshua’s First Shield, protecting his younger brother from danger at all costs. With war looming on the horizon, Elwin and Joshua head to Phoenix Gate to pray for the fire bird’s protection in the coming battles. Clive takes a detour to clean out a nearby swamp of encroaching goblins. Not long after he rendezvous with his father and brother at the Gate, it’s attacked by those who would see Elwin and Joshua dead. While desperately searching for his brother in the commotion, a hooded figure intercepts Clive. When he wakes up, it’s to the Phoenix battling another fire Eikon, Ifrit – a creature that should not even exist. As Clive watches helplessly, the world around him is forever changed, leading him down a path of vengeance, anger, and – ultimately – redemption and self-determination.

First and foremost, the game is not shy about showing pretty brutal acts of violence. There is a lot of blood, dead bodies and cutting people down in the middle of battle. Producer Naoki Yoshida has been vocal about his influences when creating this game, including Game of Thrones and the previous works of Yasumi Matsuno, including Final Fantasy Tactics and FFXII. These influences are readily apparent, but the game doesn’t really deal with anything darker than previous titles – it’s just more up front about their presentation. I don’t think it detracts at all from an ultimately uplifting story about living life on your own terms and the power of friendship, but just know what you’re getting into if you pick it up.

This is also a stylish action RPG in the vein of Dragon’s Dogma, with that game’s Ryota Suzuki taking the helm as combat director. I will be the first to admit that I am not exactly the best at action games, but the combat here feels fantastic. You have a basic melee attack mapped to the square button, as well as a single-target magic spell mapped to the triangle button. Your melee attack can chain to a three-hit combo, and if you time your spell immediately after, you’ll perform a magic burst for extra damage. The circle button is mapped to the feat of whatever Eikon you’re currently equipped with – Phoenix Shift for Phoenix, which launches you toward an enemy; Deadly Embrace for Garuda, which pulls enemies toward you and can also drag larger ones to their knees; Titanic Block for Titan, which puts up a shield that, when paired with a perfect block, executes a blistering counter attack; etc. Holding R2 changes the square and triangle buttons to one of several Eikonic abilities you choose to map to them, allowing for a surprising amount of customization. For instance, for Phoenix I have Rising Flame mapped to R2 + square and Flames of Rebirth mapped to R2 + triangle because they fit my preferred play style, and I genuinely like how they look and feel. Mixing and matching which Eikonic abilities you assign provides a lot of depth to an otherwise pretty simple system, and also gives you options for when fights aren’t going your way. During battle, every action Clive does will also naturally fill up his Limit Break (LB) bar. Using the LB will increase his attack power and speed while also replenishing a bit of his health.

Regular enemies are simple enough to take down using your standard combo and magic burst (though why wouldn’t you use your fun moves to finish battles faster), but bigger enemies have a stagger bar that needs to be whittled down before you can do any major damage to them. Parrying an attack will leave them open for higher stagger damage, as will certain Eikonic abilities. Knocking a stagger bar to the halfway mark will momentarily incapacitate the enemy, so you can wail on them and burn their stagger bar down to nothing faster. Once fully staggered, unleashing multi-hit Eikonic abilities while activating your LB and maximizing your combo + magic burst will deal the most damage. If the enemy isn’t dead by the end of their stagger, their bar replenishes and you start the process over again. If you’re only using basic combo attacks, this process can feel really grueling. But, smart use of Eikonic abilities, Clive’s LB gauge, parries and precision dodges ended up making most of these battles a lot of fun for me, especially later on when I leveled up more of my Eikonic abilities and unlocked new Eikons to mess around with.

Clive does not just fight with a sword, though. Periodically throughout the game, you will engage in kaiju battles with other Eikons, and these are over-the-top, flashy, bombastic battle sequences. Dominants can “semi-prime,” meaning they take on some characteristics of their Eikon without fully becoming them; and they fully “prime” to become the Eikon itself. Clive will engage in fights with both during his journey, and the scale of these battles feels suitably epic. During Eikon fights, you have access to a much more limited but powerful set of skills, and everything feels weighty and impactful. They’re really fun. Eikon battles are also where you will see the majority of the game’s “cinematic” quick-time events. Pressing square when the screen glows blue will do a “Cinematic Strike,” a stylish and hard-hitting attack. Pressing triangle when the screen glows red will perform a “Cinematic Dodge,” propelling Clive out of danger. And mashing the square button when the screen flashes will cause a “Cinematic Clash” where Clive and his opponent vie for dominance. These “Cinematic” events can happen during regular boss fights, but they’re most often used against Eikons, and they look really cool.

In terms of combat, Torgal is a bit of a mixed bag for me. You control him using the D-pad, though he will do regular damage to enemies whether or not you command him. Timing his “Sic” command with your attacks deals extra damage; his “Heal” ability is a short regen that generally feels useless; and his “Ravage” command will launch most smaller enemies into the air to set them up for air combos. Getting his “Sic” command timing down should be one of the first things you do, since you’ll be using it frequently, but for the most part, I never felt like having Torgal with me in combat made that much of a difference. He’s still the best, most perfect good boy ever, and I love him, but he doesn’t add much to fights outside keeping the riff-raff occupied when I’m focused on a bigger mob. This might change on higher difficulties, but on a normal difficulty, action-focused run through, he felt like an afterthought.

One of XVI‘s most hyped up features was its accessibility items. Rather than offer difficulty levels (easy, hard, etc.), the game opts to provide players with customizable difficulty through the use of special gear. These “Rings of Timely ____” change the flow of combat drastically, slowing down time to give players a chance to evade (Ring of Timely Focus), letting Clive automatically dodge attacks that can be evaded (Ring of Timely Evasion), auto-use potions (Ring of Timely Healing), and turning the square button into an auto-combo that weaves attacks and Eikonic abilities together on the fly (Ring of Timely Strikes). They make the game eminently approachable for even the most novice action game player while allowing the developers to design more challenging fights in general. When it comes to addressing difficulty in games, I think this is a good compromise between the “git gud” mentality and asking devs to expend more time on crafting the game around varying difficulty levels, or (as is usually the case) only tailoring fights to one difficulty level and having all others be an unbalanced mess. That being said, I only used these items briefly to try them out because I felt the game was already a little on the easy side, and wearing the rings ruined the balance entirely for me.

Final Fantasy XVI does not have a traditional skill tree. Rather, Clive has a base set of actions he can use. Initially, Clive can only access things like his downward slash, jumping off enemies, taunting, and his Phoenix abilities. As he acquires more Eikons he can learn specific skills from each of those, expanding his tool kit. Every action can be leveled using AP, increasing various aspects such as strength and duration. Clive can equip up to three Eikons at a time, and each of those Eikons can use its specific feat as well as two abilities. Mastering an Eikonic ability will let you assign it to a different Eikon’s kit – so if you really want to use, say, three of Garuda’s abilities, you could assign a Mastered one to Phoenix. You can also earn AP back by resetting all Eikon in order to respec to something more suitable to your style, which was a boon later in the game when I just did not want to grind for AP anymore.

While combat is fun, frantic and addicting, outside of fighting there isn’t much to do that isn’t the main story or sidequests. Unlike other Final Fantasy titles, XVI is woefully lacking in mini-games and other distractions. This isn’t a deal breaker by any means, but it does feel a bit barren. A card or dice type game would have fit this world really well. The regions of Valisthea themselves, while stunningly beautiful, are also mostly just set paths you cannot stray from, or open areas that offer little of interest outside of Hunt mark locations or derelict towns that provide some environmental storytelling. Dungeons are also frustratingly samey and suffer the same hallway-cutscene-hallway design as Final Fantasy XIII and FFVII Remake do. There is also no overworld map, and instead you pick locations and teleport to them, similar to how FFX and Grandia worked. Once in a locale, you can unlock waypoints for fast travel, which you can access at any time by using the map screen in the start menu. Occasionally, the story will lock you into a specific area, but otherwise you can travel at will between waypoints, and I often found myself using them just to get around faster, since Clive runs very, very slowly, and you don’t unlock your chocobo until several hours into the game.

Final Fantasy XVI also lacks several quality of life features I would expect from a game this size and by the same team that worked on Final Fantasy XIV. There’s no mini-map or compass, so I often found myself needing to open the map while out in the wild since I’d get turned around while fighting. You can place markers on the map to help you navigate, but they don’t really make up for the lack of either. You cannot interact with objects while on your chocobo. There is no manual dash button, so you’re at the mercy of whenever Clive ramps up speed while out in the field before you can sprint, and there is absolutely no hoofing it while in towns – even when those towns are abandoned combat arenas. In general, Clive just moves very slowly and more often than not feels like he’s lumbering around, especially in the Hideaway. There’s also no in-game clock, which is baffling to me considering how standard that feature has been in RPGs over the years.

I’m torn on how I feel about the item limit. At the beginning of the game, Clive can carry no more than four potions or three hi-potions. You can increase this amount through sidequests later on, but there’s no stockpiling 99 of every healing item here. On the one hand, this means you can’t beat hard fights by simply out-healing your opponent; managing your health and your resources is as important as executing precision dodges and parries. On the other hand, it feels arbitrarily restrictive, since if you die, you’re fully restocked for both potions and hi-potions anyway, even if you went into the fight with less than the maximum amount. You’re also similarly limited in how many elixirs and tonics you can carry. It just feels like if the game is going to replenish your healing items to full upon death anyway, they might as well have let me stockpile more than four potions at a time. You access potions, hi-potions and tonics in battle using the D-pad (same as Torgal), or through the pause menu, so maybe they could have had it slowly refill with the potions you had in stock once you’ve depleted what’s immediately available. (Also as an aside, the amount of times I’ve wasted my potions because I thought I was on Torgal’s menu and using “Sic” are innumerable and infuriating.)

Read on for the lowdown on XVI’s characters and worldbuilding ->

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Nostalgia has been an undeniable force in gaming over the last decade, if not longer, with a slew of remakes, remasters, and re-releases gracing modern consoles and PC. Few have captured what it was like to actually be a gamer back in the early days of the medium, however. Enter Pixel Ripped, and more specifically its latest entry, 1978, which lets players immerse themselves not only in the shoes of someone playing games back in the old days, but also being in the game.

Back in 2020, I got to play a bit of Pixel Ripped 1995, and the premise of 1978 is more of the same and then some. Where in 1995 you simply had to contend with distractions from those around you, in 1978 you get to both play the game and be inside it. Let’s run it down. You play as Barbara “Bug” Rivers, the creator of Pixel Ripped. The villain of the series, Cyblin Lord, is once again causing havoc, and this time he’s targeting Bug herself by traveling through time to steal her “inspiration” so that she makes a video game with him as the hero instead of the actual hero, Dot. It’s your job as Dot to chase him through time and rescue the “inspiration crystals” so that Bug creates Pixel Ripped and not whatever it is Cyblin Lord wants.

As the player, you control Bug while she literally sits and plays the game that you’re playing (i.e.: if you move the analogue stick on your controller, Dot will move in the corresponding direction inside the game). Using the PSVR2 controllers, you “hold” the Atari joystick in Bug’s hands – and also let it go in order to deal with the assortment of distractions Bug deals with throughout her day. As a game developer, she has to contend with her coworkers asking her questions; fielding phone calls from a “who’s who” list of developers, reviewers and notable persons of video game history; debug games for her colleagues; and swap between external programs that affect the game you’re currently playing. For instance, you’re given a floppy disk that turns your “shoot” mechanic into a “dance” mechanic while playing through Fast Freddie, and part of the level has you needing to let go of the joystick in order to insert and remove the floppy from Bug’s development computer. The game you’re playing does not stop, however, so you need to time releasing the joystick to moments when Dot isn’t in danger of dying. (This is surprisingly difficult to explain in text, but incredibly intuitive and easy to pick up in execution.)

Separate but related to this are “in-game” sequences where you actually play as Dot. These are presented as first-person shooter sections where you traverse the game world to handle obstacles and open paths that were blocked while playing during the “real world” sequences. The FPS sections are complete 3D worlds you roam around freely, shooting enemies, whacking open treasure chests, finding secret items, and solving relatively simple puzzles, such as shooting three targets to open a door. During these FPS sequences, you’ll learn new abilities that help you navigate the world, which in turn open new paths for Bug to explore while she’s playing the game. Swapping between the “real world” and “in-game” sequences are required to complete each level, so that you can battle Cyblin Lord in extravagant boss battle sequences that are inventive takes on classic games from Atari’s library.

Using Atari’s library is one of Pixel Ripped 1978’s most brilliant aspects. I mentioned nostalgia before, and part of what gives this game the leg up on the competition is that you get to play around in actual Atari IPs through the majority of your time. The three main levels are based on Crystal Castles, Fast Freddie, and Yar’s Revenge, but you’ll also see an assortment of other classics. It’s really neat to get to be in classic games, or to see the actual layout of Atari’s offices. The way 1978 recreates distinct time periods for parts of the game are also a massive nostalgia hit, but the game doesn’t rely on that nostalgia to be good, either. It’s a genuinely fun romp through video game history with solid mechanics and level design, as well as a memorable soundtrack to keep you company as you explore.

As with most VR games, you may have to contend with VR sickness or tracking issues. Whenever the game wanted me to throw something, it was hit or miss if it actually registered me moving my arm, and I unfortunately got VR sickness and was forced to play shorter sessions. Thankfully, the game clocks in around 10 hours, so shorter sessions didn’t hamper my overall enjoyment of the game. My favorite sequences were definitely the “real world” ones, particularly when I had to debug a game for a colleague. This meant playing the game, “slapping” the monitor, and then swiping at the bugs that literally flew out of it. You have to let go of the Atari controller to either swat them out of the sky or throw something at them, and doing that while also playing the game you’re debugging is just a lot of hectic fun. Having that sort of dual play is something I cannot see being done as effectively outside of a VR setup, and is one of the strengths of Pixel Ripped being a VR title. Having that sense of immersion – of playing a game and also being hassled, much like I remember when I was a kid and even now that I’m a grown ass adult with my own child – traditional gaming has yet to capture that feeling the way VR does, and nothing does it better in my experience than Pixel Ripped.

Pixel Ripped 1978 is technically the third game in the series, but can easily be played without having played the other games. It’s fun, intuitive and a nice trip down memory lane, especially for those of us who grew up in the early days of gaming. It’s available on PSVR2, Meta Quest 2, and SteamVR, and well worth the $24.99 USD.

Review Score
Overall

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Before we begin I have to get something out of the way. I love action RPGs. Games from series such as Ys, Tales of, and Star Ocean tend to grab my interest, and I usually have a blast playing them. That mix of fast-paced combat, an interesting setting, and a memorable cast of characters come together to make something that’s just fun to experience. Now enters Trinity Trigger, a brand new game unconnected to any established franchise. It has a fantastical setting, interesting character designs, that fast combat I look forward to, and different weapon styles to try. Trinity Trigger, at a glance, seems like a title I would love. But, was it able to join my list of loved titles in the genre, or did it become just another face in the crowd?

Trinity Trigger takes place in the land of Trinitia. Many centuries ago, the God of Chaos faction waged war against the God of Order faction. The war ended with no victor, and a treaty was made to prevent further fighting between the gods. However, the fighting actually continued with the use of proxies known as the Warrior of Order and the Warrior of Chaos. Whoever would win between these two warriors would decide which side is the victor. Fast forward to the present time, and a new Warrior of Chaos has been chosen, a young Scavenger from Woodroost named Cyan. After returning home from the local Arma (god weapons that fell to Trinitia), Cyan is visited by a young woman, Elise. Elise warns Cyan of assassins coming after him, those who wish to kill the Warrior of Chaos. She also wishes for Cyan to find and talk to the current Warrior of Order, hoping to bring a peaceful end to this centuries long conflict. Thus, Cyan leaves his hometown of Woodroost in hopes of finding a way to change his destiny.

The main story was ok. A boy (Cyan) leaves his hometown to save the world while meeting new allies along the way. That’s the gist of the story, nothing too crazy. There were probably three big revelations that came out of this. The first one involving Cyan you can see coming a mile away. The second one involves one of the villains and was more of an “oh, okay” moment. The third revelation comes near the end and was actually pretty surprising, but it also made me question “why?” I felt there was no need for it. The general flow of the story was to visit a new location, power up your Trigger at the local Arma, solve some situation at that location, and then leave. It was simple and easy to understand, which is not necessarily a bad thing. I wish certain things brought up during the story got more explanation. Who are the other Nine Lights of Solius? Who are the other members of Stahl’s Guardians? Who was Cyan and Firn’s mother? The father was brought up but she got no mention. What really happened in the God War of the past? There were some interesting things in this story that were never really expanded upon.

While I had some gripes with the main story, I did like the main cast and some of the supporting characters. Cyan is just a good guy with a good head on his shoulders, I can’t say anything bad about him. Elise keeps the party on the straight and narrow, or at least tries to. She also has this adorable fear of ghosts, it just ups her charm. Zantis is the life of the party and one hell of a fighter too. If there’s a bar, Zantis will be there drinking. The trio’s Triggers (their summoned familiars) are great too. Flamme, Cyan’s Trigger, is a loveable companion despite his amnesia, and he always has Cyan’s back. Oise, Elise’s Trigger, is the brains of the three Triggers, and she’s quick to lecture Flamme on things he should know about. Rai is as energetic as Zantis, and he has no problem making fun of Zantis when the situation calls for it. 

When it comes to the supporting cast, I definitely have to bring up Lime. Lime is a loveable Manafacturer for the Verte Workshop and an acquaintance of Elise. She is super energetic and helps the party by crafting Manatite for them. I was a bit disappointed that she became an afterthought soon after meeting her. She appears again for some sidequests, but didn’t have much impact on the main story. I would have loved to see more of her. There is also the knowledgeable Know-It-All who you can find in each town. This old gentleman provides information on the local Arma in each new area you visit. He gives a rundown on what the Arma is, how it affected the local environment, and how it affected the town. This was very helpful in building the world of Trinity Trigger, and I highly recommend seeking him out whenever you visit a new town. You’re also treated to a beautiful illustration of the Arma whenever you talk to him, another incentive to go talk to him. Speaking of towns, I like how each town has their own specific culture and climate. It helped each location feel unique, and no town felt the same as the other. I do wish the townspeople’s dialogue changed as the story progressed, especially in the capital of Stahl. Some big events occur there and the townspeople just continue saying the same thing they said when you first met them, which is pretty jarring. There is also an unwinnable boss fight that you can actually end by getting the boss to half health. I was disappointed there was no alternative dialogue when finishing the boss this way, as the dialogue was the same as if you got completely thrashed.

Trinity Trigger’s gameplay is simple and straightforward. You can perform a Trigger attack with the X button, which is basically your normal weapon attack. Repeated Trigger attacks will deplete your Synchro Gauge. If the Synchro Gauge is completely drained, your attack decreases significantly. You can regain your Synchro by not attacking or perfectly dodging an enemy’s attack. The square button activates your selected weapon’s Weapon Aura. This gives you a temporary buff. For example, the Fist Aura temporarily stops the Synchro Gauge from depleting, so you can wail on enemies with reckless abandon. The triangle button activates your Trigger Strike, which is your weapon’s special attack. It’s good for causing massive damage to multiple enemies, or to a boss once their Armor gauge is broken. Once you have all three members of your party, you can activate the Trinity Impact. Holding down the X button will activate this very powerful AOE attack that can clear an area of enemies almost instantly and also cause a hurting to bosses. This was a godsend in some of the later areas of the game. The L1 button opens up your item menu and the R1 button opens up your Trigger menu. From the Trigger menu you can change your weapon form and also change your weapon’s normal attacks. You can also set up to four weapon changes to shortcuts, one to each directional button. This helps keep the combat going without having to pause gameplay when opening the Trigger menu. 

Different enemies are weak to certain weapons, so it’s important to switch as the situation demands. There are eight different weapons your Trigger can change into: Sword, Bow, Lance, Axe, Fist, Magi Revolver, Dual Swords, and Staff. I, personally, liked the Fist the best for its fast paced attacks that could overwhelm foes. The L2 button lets you switch between characters. Each character specializes in certain weapon types, so switching between them can help take advantage of this. If a character specializes with a certain weapon, they get a damage boost. For example, Cyan would get a damage boost when using a sword, Elise would get one while using a bow, and Zantis would get one while using an axe. You can power up each weapon by equipping Manatite or leveling up attacks at a Shrine. Shrines act as save points and fast travel locations. You can level up attacks by utilizing TP, which you get by defeating enemies. If you travel through each map while defeating all enemies, you can gather a good amount of TP.

I liked Trinity Trigger’s combat. It was simple, but not simple enough that you could just wail on enemies with a single weapon and hope to win. You really needed to switch your weapon based on the enemy, and you had to be smart when using your items too, lest you run out of them when you most needed them. I found mob enemies tended to be more difficult than actual boss fights, at least the early bosses. Early bosses had easy to dodge attacks and were simple to beat down. Regular enemies, however, could swarm you if you’re not careful. And certain enemies, like Trap Chests, can really cause you problems. The most difficult enemy I faced wasn’t a monster, but a human boss. This was because they could change their weapon resistance on the fly, and they hit like a truck. I used so many items facing them. My biggest problem with the combat was the party AI. They usually helped, but there are times where they’d have brain farts and just run straight into enemy attacks without dodging. This was especially prevalent in the final boss fight where they kept running into stationary AOE attacks. Please, just run around the damage zones. There were also weird instances where we were traveling in a dungeon and we’d have a fight near a staircase. If you don’t go fully into the room, your party will dodge an attack into the staircase, forcing you back into the floor below. When you go back up, you will have to restart the fight with the enemy. It was frustrating, but you can get around it. I feel the party AI can be circumvented with the multiplayer option, but I unfortunately was not able to test it. Overall, the combat was pretty satisfying.

Switch the Trigger and continue on page 2 ->

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I make no secret that ALTDEUS: Beyond Chronos is one of my favorite games in recent years, and probably my favorite VR title ever (sorry, Beat Saber). So when MyDearest announced Dyschronia: Chronos Alternate was coming to PSVR2, I absolutely had to try it for myself. This universe is absolutely fascinating and I wanted to see more of it. Did Episode 1 of this trilogy live up to my expectations? Let’s find out.

Far into the future, one of the last bastions of humanity is a secluded city by the sea called Astrum Close, where the populace are kept calm and content through a shared dream state called Augmented Dreaming, or AD. The city is run by an Artificial Intelligence named Justicius, as well as their founder, Professor Albert Rumford. Life here is effectively free of strife thanks to the AD, and the crime rate is all but nonexistent. So it comes as an understandable shock when the Professor is found murdered in his study – an event that should be theoretically impossible.

In steps Hal Scion, one of the newest Supervisors in Astrum Close. Supervisors are meant to keep the peace and handle the few instances of unrest among the populace by offering counseling to those in the AD. But as his very first assignment, Hal is tasked with solving the Professor’s murder. After all, Hal is a Variant – a human with supernatural abilities – who is capable of not only seeing the past by interacting with objects using his left hand, but of changing it, as well. With his Memory Dive ability, can he solve this locked room murder mystery? When the clock tower bell tolls, what will fate have in store for Hal and the city? Is the end really coming in seven days? And what does the Professor’s death have to do with it all?

I’m a big fan of murder mysteries, so right off the bat Dyschronia had me hooked, but what kept me coming back was the time travel aspect of this futuristic detective story. During his investigation of the Professor’s murder, Hal comes across a suspicious woman who unceremoniously shoots him dead. Yet somehow, he awakens inside the clock tower – which has been sealed closed for 12 years – where he meets an equally mysterious young girl who tells him to go back in time and save the city. The next thing Hal knows, he’s returned to the beginning of the day, only this time he remembers everything that happened and can change the course of events. Not only does this give the Professor’s murder a lot more layers, it also dovetails nicely with Hal’s Variant ability to gently nudge other people’s memories to create new outcomes. Are the clock tower and his ability somehow related? Who is the young girl? And does saving the city mean saving the Professor, or is it something else?

While Hal might be the only one who can travel through time, he isn’t the only one trying to solve this mystery. His childhood friend and fellow Supervisor, Ash, has been assigned as his partner in this investigation, though more often than not he’s off doing his own thing. Instead, you spend most of your time with Lily, an AI construct originally created as a companion for your childhood best friend Maia. Unfortunately, Maia has been in a coma for the last three years after an experiment involving herself, Hal, and the Professor went horribly wrong. Since then, Lily has been in the care of Maia’s younger brother Noel, but for this investigation she’s here to help. Lily is perfect, I love her and I want my own.

Actually, all the characters in Dyschronia are really interesting and engaging. As the POV character, Hal is actually an amnesiac thanks to the botched experiment from three years ago, but that doesn’t mean he lacks a personality. He doesn’t remember growing up with Maia and Noel, and he doesn’t remember how his life with the Professor was before the accident, so he’s piecing it all together alongside the player without falling into the trap of being a blank slate. He has a strong sense of justice and the need to discover the truth, but he’s also just a genuinely curious person, especially when it comes to the people he interacts with during his investigation. His ability to dive into and manipulate memories could make him come off as creepy, but he’s way too pure for that. I really like Hal, and I was rooting for him to solve the mysteries surrounding his own life as much as I was the murdered Professor.

Lily is, as I mentioned, perfect. She’s chipper without being annoying, and her penchant to ask for head pats was honestly adorable. She also genuinely cares for Hal and the other Variant children, especially Noel, whom she worries over. She clearly has history with the three of them and the Professor, and the fact Hal can’t remember a lot of it seems to sadden her in ways you wouldn’t expect an AI to feel.

Maia and Noel are both a bit more of a mystery. They grew up with Hal after he arrived in Astrum Close nine years ago, but because Hal can’t remember his time with them, we as the player only learn bits and pieces. We know Noel used to be a lot more cheerful before his sister’s coma, and that the three of them spent a lot of time with the Professor. Nowadays, Noel is a bitter recluse who blames Hal for not taking enough care of Maia. Maybe if Hal were around more, his sister would wake up. I really liked Noel. I found him compelling despite his limited screen time, and the gaping hole Maia’s lack of presence leaves is palpable. As Variants, both Maia and Noel also have special abilities. Maia can see the future through Foresight Dreaming. Her predictions always come true, and she saw the end of Astrum Close. Noel can share his dreams with others, and his power is the basis of the city’s Augmented Dreaming.

Read on about this fantastic VR world on page 2 ->

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I’ve been waiting to get my hands on Neptunia: Sisters Vs. Sisters for what feels like an eternity. It’s been a long time since we have seen our favorite candidates in action, and this new fully action based combat system looked like a lot of fun. I heard the story of this one was pretty dark going into it, and I was really hoping it was not going back to Conquest Ending levels of dark but only time would tell. I’ve put about 40 hours into this one and it’s time to share my thoughts. Did our favorite sisters have an amazingly fun outing or was this all just gloom and doom? Let’s find out!

The story begins as Neptune and the other Goddesses receive a distress call from the PC Continent. They depart to handle this emergency while the CPU Candidates are sent to a nearby abandoned lab to investigate its contents. There they discover a sleeping Goddess, the Ashen Goddess, and as she awakens she traps the sisters in capsules for two years! When they are awakened, they find the world is not how they left it. The latest smartphone, “rPhone” dominates all of Gamindustri markets, and Planeptune was lost due to Trendi attacks while both Neptune and Nepgear have been away. Nepgear finds herself in a state of depression having lost both her sister and her home; however, new friends Maho and Anri help Nepgear get back on her feet, and they begin to try to get things back in order. Nepgear’s struggle will be great in the face of this new enemy. Can she overcome it and take back her home and save Gamindustri?

Overall, I enjoyed the story of Neptunia: Sisters Vs. Sisters. The story tone can get very dark at times, but like with all games in the franchise, there are plenty of light moments as well. This does what all great games in the franchise do: it takes a hard look at the industry in spoof style fashion while bringing up some important topics of discussion. This is what makes the Neptunia franchise so unique and that is not lost here. The new characters are great and add a lot of flavor to the mix here. Maho is really adorable and you fall in love with her almost instantly. Higurashi is exactly who you would expect her to be if you’ve ever read the visual novel or watched the anime. You will get a lot more out of her skits if you know a bit about either, and they did a great job with her personality. Lastly there is Reimu. I mean Shanghai Alice, and if you’re a Touhou fan you know exactly where this is going and it’s fantastic.

Graphically, Neptunia: Sisters Vs. Sisters looks great. I reviewed the PlayStation 4 version and the character models and environments are all top quality. The girls have tons of details on their models and the animations are all really smooth as well. While there are only a few dungeon types in the game, they are done with a lot of care as well. These mostly consist of forests and caves, but the graveyard looks amazing and is probably some of the best work they have ever done. I hope the next game features more dungeon types than this one, maybe bring back some of the whimsical dungeons in Lowee or come up with something new altogether. The only graphical issues I noticed on the PlayStation 4 version were some of the textures shimmered a bit and there was something popping in every now and then. There are some load times, but I didn’t think these were unreasonable.

The audio in Neptunia: Sisters Vs. Sisters is nicely done as well. The game opens with one of the best opening songs the series has seen in a long time, and everything else is great from there. This soundtrack features some tracks series fans will be familiar with, and some new tracks as well. The older tracks have been remixed, which is nice since it still makes us old fans feel at home, while putting a new flavor on some of our favorites. The game is voiced in both Japanese and English this time around, but I don’t know if the English side got as much dubbing as the Japanese game had, since I played in Japanese this time around. Both casts are wonderful as always, and I did check out the English dub for a few minutes; it’s the quality you would expect from IFI.

Now let’s dig into the gameplay. Some of this is exactly what you would expect from a Neptunia title. You will go from place to place on the very familiar Gamindustri map, completing story missions to move the story forward. There are plenty of sidequests that come up as well through the ever-popular Chirper app. You can take on quests, claim rewards and like Chirps from the various residents of Gamindustri. These quests are what you would expect: hunt X monster, gather X item, or sometimes you have to find lost residents. You will not only gain rewards from this, but also unlock new scouts to use in Disc Development. Making these discs will give you a ton of different buffs that are very useful in battle. First you will select a Genre, then a scout to develop the disc and finally an item to speed up the process. The more discs you make in a Genre the more likely you are to unlock a second, more powerful buff.

Combat here is all action based. The girls will move around the battlefield in real time, and you can attack enemies with combos you set up for each. These are the standard power, rush and break combos we are used to in these titles. Each move will consume some AP points, so you will need to keep this in mind as you set these up. Each girl will start off with one combo and gain a second after they level up a few times. You can gain the Combo Striping ability from disc creation that will allow you to mix these combos together as well. This is great since it gives you a ton of different combat combinations to choose from for each character. You can freely switch to any character during combat, and when the time is right you can chain combos together this way as well. The girls have Tactical Skills at their disposal as well. These are moves like Ex Multi Blaster, Cross Combination and other fan favorites in the series. When the Tactical Gauge is full, just press triangle to pull these off and you can set up two additional skills on the directional pad + triangle for easy access. Though it is good to keep in mind that the Tactical Gauge will also have to be full if you use an item. But sometimes using it for an item rather than a skill, may give you a better benefit.

Overall, I found the combat here a lot of fun. The combos are easy to setup and pull off, and being able to switch to any character easily to make bigger combos was satisfying as well. The AI does a decent job attacking and using items for the girls you are not controlling at the moment, but I feel like this could use a little refinement going forward. I was very skeptical about them taking the series in more of an action based direction, but this seems to have worked out pretty well.

Overall, I think Neptunia: Sisters Vs. Sisters is a fine entry in the franchise. The new characters are a lot of fun, the story is well written and feels like a Nep game, and combat is really fun as well. I got some help from a friend on Twitter, so I was able to get the true ending during my playthrough. There is the endless tower you could challenge and an awesome photo mode here to play around with for hours as well. I feel like this one is well worth the $49.99 asking price. I think it’s pretty insane that IFI has decided folks who want the swimsuit DLC should have to buy the Digital Deluxe Edition at $69.99 with no way for anyone buying a physical copy to obtain these, and I probably wouldn’t be as pissed about this if there were any alternate costumes in the game, but that’s not the case. I hope something they do in the next entry is bring those back. Doing that and adding some more CGs to unlock would go a long way to making this an even more solid Neptunia title. That being said, fans shouldn’t miss this one, the sisters are still as cute as you remember, and this a fantastic adventure.

Review Score
Overall

Game was provided by the publisher for review.

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I’ve been meaning to get into the Shantae series for a long time now. I liked the aesthetic of the series and found the character designs to be very appealing; however, I am very green when it comes to Metroidvania games, so I always put the series on the backburner. Fast forward to now, and I was given the opportunity to try out the PS5 port of Shantae and the Seven Sirens. This was the perfect chance for me to finally try out this series. Did the Seven Sirens open my eyes to the wonderful world of Shantae, or did I swear off Metroidvania games for good? Read on and find out!

Shantae and the Seven Sirens starts off with Shantae heading to an island to participate in the Half-Genie Festival and take a well-deserved vacation. Accompanying her are Sky, Bolo, and Uncle Mimic. Unfortunately, tragedy strikes Armor Town and the rest of the half-genies suddenly vanish. It is up to Shantae to find the rest of her fellow half-genies and determine who is behind their disappearances. What will Shantae uncover as she traverses this mysterious island?

I liked the cast of characters and their interactions; however, the game was very short. It took me around nine hours to complete the main story. This means that there was not much time to develop each of the characters introduced in the game, especially the other half genies. The only character I could really get attached to was Shantae, and that is because you play as her the entire game. I really loved her energetic personality and her penchant for dancing.

Shantae and the Seven Sirens is a Metroidvania, so the gameplay is a good mix of action and platforming. Shantae starts off with the ability to whip enemies with her hair and she can dance. Dancing can attract gems if they’re hard to reach. As you progress in the story, you can unlock Fusion Magic and transformations that will allow you traverse more of the game’s map. For example, you can unlock the Seer Dance fusion magic early in the game. This magic can locate hidden objects, platforms, and even invisible enemies. An example of one of the transformations is the Newt. The Newt can be utilized to cross wide gaps and also climb up walls. In addition to these techniques, you can also purchase other magic abilities and upgrades using the gems you collect from enemies and the environment.

When you start a new game, you can choose from four different game modes. I chose to play the game in Definitive Mode, which rebalances the original game experience and supposedly adds new challenges. Even in this mode, I never found the game to be too difficult. Certain enemies gave a sufficient challenge and I never found the platforming to be too frustrating. The majority of enemies could be defeated by just wailing on them with Shantae’s hair, which some may find too easy. This also includes boss fights, which may be disappointing to some of the more hardcore Metroidvania fans. Progression in the Seven Sirens is pretty much the same through every chapter. You search for one of the missing half-genies, gain a new ability, traverse through a dungeon, defeat a boss, and then the chapter is finished. I kind of wish there was more variety to progression, but it didn’t bother me too much.

Graphically, Shantae and the Seven Sirens looks fantastic. Shantae and the rest of the cast are drawn and animated beautifully. The enemies are varied, ranging from cute to terrifying. The boss enemies are huge and each one looks unique. And honestly, some of them are kind of hot, too. It almost made me feel a little bad taking them out. I really have nothing negative to say about the visuals in this game, they look really nice.

The music in Seven Sirens is nothing to turn your nose up at either. There are a lot of upbeat tracks that’ll make you feel like dancing with Shantae. I especially like the tracks that play in the different towns; they’re very catchy. I also appreciate how the main cast is voiced. Each voice actor is perfect for their character, especially Shantae. Her voice actress captured her upbeat personality perfectly. I do wish all of the lines were fully voiced, but the game being partially voiced isn’t a deal breaker.

Seven Sirens runs very smoothly on PS5. There were no dips in performance whatsoever. It took me around nine hours to complete the main story. You can add on some more playtime by trying to collect all of the Monster Cards, trying out the other game modes, and also by unlocking the other ending CGs. The game is short and sweet, but some may be thrown off by the length and lack of post game content.

Shantae and the Seven Sirens was a fun ride for as long as it lasted. The visuals are beautiful, the music is catchy, and the gameplay mechanics are well executed. However, some may be put off by its ease and short length. I think you’ll have fun if you’re a fan of Shantae or are a relatively green Metroidvania player. For those looking for a more challenging game, you may want to look elsewhere. Seven Sirens is $29.99 on the PlayStation Store, and gives you both the PS5 and PS4 versions with purchase. I think you may want to wait on a sale if you want this game considering its short length. But, I do think you’ll have a fun time with it if you decide to take the plunge.

Review Score
Overall

Review copy provided by the publisher.

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I’m always up to check out a good strategy title, so when I got the chance to check out Absolute Tactics: Daughters Of Mercy for the PlayStation 4, I jumped on it. At first glance I liked the art style and the gameplay looked pretty solid, so I expected this to be a pretty decent indie title. Let’s see if this held up to my expectations.

The story here follows a young man named Huxley, who aspires to be a great hero. The chance for this arrives when dark forces have taken over his land. Our hero and his band of friends set out to free their home. In order to do this you will have to defeat Father Eldritch and his Daughters of Mercy. They will stop at nothing to find the Fallen Daughter, the ultimate source of Adenine, which will give them the power to rule this world forever.

I have to say, this may be one of the most basic and badly written stories I’ve seen in a video game in a long time. The writing doesn’t fit the tone of the game in the least. The characters speak at times like reject valley girls, and this is consistent through the entire game. I think the writers were going for some sort of humor with this, but it fell flat and just hurt the overall experience of the story. That aside, this story is very one dimensional with predictable character growth, which for a very linear SRPG is already not great.

Now that we have that out of the way let’s talk about what Absolute Tactics: Daughters Of Mercy does right: the gameplay. The game features a very traditional Japanese style SRPG system. I was pleased to see this, since this style is one of my favorites. They kept things pretty simple with your party of usually six heroes battling enemies with their own strengths and weaknesses. Players move around on grid-based maps dispatching enemies with a variety of attacks and skills, as you would expect. I like that you could equip each of your heroes with two different jobs via the skill books. This lets you customize each character to your liking with very little restrictions. I liked trying out different combinations to see which ones worked the best.

In between battles there is a camp menu. From here you can choose to purchase wares from the various shops, take on optional missions or progress the story. Optional missions have some hidden goodies on the maps, and you can replay them as much as you want until you find the secret within each one of them. This makes things not feel repetitive if you have to run one a few times to be leveled up enough for the next story battle.

In the graphics and sound departments, this one is pretty good as well. The artwork is detailed, the environments look great, and the character models look great as well. Attacks from both your heroes and enemies have some good animations, making the game feel like a smooth experience overall. The soundtrack fits the theme of the game very well, having that classic fantasy vibe to it. The only real issue I had with the sound was that some of the effects sounded a bit out of place, but this was nothing too distracting.

Overall, Absolute Tactics: Daughters Of Mercy is a good SRPG that is dragged down by its subpar story. The gameplay here is good and fans of the this genre will find a lot to love here. The story being the way it is really hurts this, since most of these games you are driven to complete the story maps to see how it progresses. The bad writing here makes you not really care halfway through, so it begins to feel tedious. I spent right around 17 hours with this one on normal difficulty, but this will vary depending on the level of difficulty you choose to play on. It’s hard for me to fully recommend this one at the $24.99 price tag, unless you are just a hardcore Strategy RPG fan. That being said, if you snag this one up on sale down the line you will probably find things you enjoy about it.

Review Score
Overall

Game was provided by the publisher.

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Star Ocean has been a pretty important part of my gaming life for more than 20 years now. Growing up, the Nintendo and Sega belonged to my older brother, and we played the games he bought. When he went off to college, my parents got my sister and I our own PlayStation, and the first game I ever bought was Star Ocean: The Second Story. I’d rented it endlessly from Blockbuster, and owning it meant I could play at my leisure, could do all the Private Actions, could play through the game multiple times. I went out of my way to make the final boss harder by grinding for hours to buy an early game item that removed his inhibitor. No Star Ocean has ever quite lived up to that moment, though not for want of trying. I enjoyed Till the End of Time quite a bit, The Last Hope slightly less so, and I couldn’t bother finishing Integrity and Faithlessness. So I approached The Divine Force with a mix of hope and trepidation. Would it be good? Would I even be able to finish it? Could it recapture the love that SO2 had sparked decades ago? The free demo left a very good impression, but would the full game stick the landing? Well dear reader, let’s find out together.

The most important thing to note is that SO6 returns to Second Story’s dual protagonist setup. You can play as either Raymond Lawrence, a space-faring merchant and captain of the Ydas; or Princess Laeticia Aucerius, who is on a mission to save her kingdom from the brink of war. Depending on who you choose, you’ll get to see different aspects of the main story, and build unique friendships with the cast. For this review, I played through the game as Laeticia, and so the story revolved pretty significantly around the war between her home and the neighboring Vey’l Empire. Eventually, I’ll play through Raymond’s version of events as well. Regardless of who you choose, the game begins the same way: the Ydas is attacked by the Federation ship, Astoria, and Ray is separated from his crew during the evacuation. He crash lands on Aster IV, where he meets up with Laeticia and her knight, Albaird Bergholm. The three of them travel to some nearby ruins after watching an Ydas escape pod land there, only to find the cargo Ray had been hauling shoved inside the vessel. This cargo is called D.U.M.A., an advanced AI robot that can help in the field and in battle. With D.U.M.A. in tow, the group head back out into the world to find a semiomancer named Midas Felgreed whom Laeticia has been looking for. Along the way, they befriend a young latrimancer named Nina Deforges, whose father was close friends with Midas, and even find Ray’s first mate, Elena, who crash landed near Midas’ village. An old friend of Midas, Malkya Trathen, joins the ranks in order to protect her home from imperial invasion, and Marielle Kenny, a crew member of the Astoria and descendant in a long line of Kennys, throws her lot in with Laeticia and Ray. Together, they tackle the brewing war and unrest within the kingdom while also contending with threats from beyond the stars.

I would not call The Divine Force’s story particularly novel. Like its predecessors, it blends fantasy and science-fiction together to create intricate, interesting worlds, and uses the genre’s tropes to its advantage, but it also doesn’t really go beyond them, either. SO6 has quite a bit to say about empire, self-governance, and the strengths and weaknesses of individualism versus collectivism, and for the most part, I think it does a good job of creating parallels and analogs for both Ray’s and Laeticia’s conflicts. I just don’t think it says anything particularly new, either. I did like the way it handled the concepts of humanity and consciousness, but that gets into spoiler territory so I’ll just leave it there. I did have several issues with cutscene direction and pacing, however. There were often jarring cuts between pure gameplay and story sequences, as well as confusing editing choices that made following the flow of some story beats difficult. Some of it I’m willing to chalk up to accommodating two narrative perspectives, but there were too many of them, too often, to give them a free pass.

What the game does excel at, more than its overarching story, are the characters. This cast is the best of any Star Ocean I’ve played, filled with lovable, interesting characters I had no trouble spending 80-plus hours with. Laeticia is an earnest, inquisitive, and kind princess who lacks confidence in herself, but not her subjects; Raymond is an affable, cocky, good-hearted free spirit who takes his responsibilities very seriously; Albaird is a prickly, overly serious, and overprotective knight who cares deeply for Laeticia and his duty; Nina is cheerful, energetic and intelligent, and driven to save others; Midas is a recluse with a grudge, who can’t turn his back on learning more about the unknown; Elena is calm, polite and a voice of reason when Ray gets too agitated; Malkya is a font of wisdom, but also enjoys teasing Laeticia and Midas at every opportunity; and Marielle struggles with the weight of her family name while striving to always do what’s right. They are a phenomenal cast who play off each other naturally, expertly wielding genre tropes to give players a shorthand understanding of their base characteristics, so the game can focus on what makes each of them unique. The voice cast here does amazing work bringing everyone to life, with particular kudos going to Natsuki Hanae and Rie Takahashi for their roles as Albaird and Nina, respectively. I love them all so much, especially Albaird, who by the end of the game had cemented himself as my second favorite character in the entire series, unseating Ashton and Albel from their vaunted positions.

Private Actions return here, and they were a joy. This is my favorite series staple, and I thought the team used them excellently to flesh out the cast. I can’t remember how many of them had me bursting out laughing or getting the warm fuzzies from how wholesome they were. Laeticia is absolutely precious, and I adored how she interacted with everyone. Her innocent naivete and curiosity were in full force. Another series staple to make an appearance is the ever-precocious Welch Vineyard, through whom you unlock your various Item Creation abilities. Her sidestory was charming if repetitive, but worth it to gain access to Compounding, Crafting, Smithing, Alchemy, Authoring and Synthesis. Unfortunately, her sidestory is one of the only ones worth doing, as the vast majority are relegated to boring fetch quests.

The only other major sidequest of note is the one that unlocks Es’owa, SO6‘s robust mini-game, and it is exceptional. You play on grids of various sizes (4×4, 8×8, etc.), placing an assortment of pawns on the intersections of each square, not unlike Go or Othello. Pawns are split into eight roles: Soldier, Wizard, Elite, Assassin, Gunner, Commander, Berserker and Hero, with each having its own special ability. For instance, if you place three Soldiers, you get to place an extra pawn in your round; Wizards increase the attack power of your adjacent pawns; Assassins will remove a random adjacent enemy pawn from the board. Placing a pawn on the board allows you to attack your opponent, dealing equivalent damage to your pawn’s attack power. The more pawns on the board, the more damage you’ll do. Surrounding pawns will send them to the Graveyard and remove them from play, and you cannot place a pawn in a surrounded spot. There are also special moves you can execute using MP. The rules are honestly pretty simple, but there’s a lot of depth to the game, especially against stronger opponents. Finding a balance between using your pawn’s abilities and crowding out the board is integral to winning, and I had a ton of fun working out strategies while playing. Almost every NPC in the game plays Es’owa, which gets a bit tedious when you’re trying to find sidequests, but you will definitely not want for opponents.

As for Aster IV, tri-Ace and the team really put their all into making expansive fields that are satisfying to explore. The maps are big and spacious, but not so much that they overstay their welcome, and each area has two or three distinct environments. There are forests and rocky outcrops, lush fields and hilly passes. Enemies populate the area in decent numbers, and combat is in real time. You can have up to four active characters at a time between whom you can freely rotate, and you can rotate out reserve characters through the pause menu. You can assign character skills to combos on specific buttons, and you can set a maximum of 12 skills – three each per combo and a fourth that triggers by holding its corresponding button. Each attack requires a set amount of AP, but it replenishes when you stop attacking, so you need to be a bit strategic in how you use it. You can unlock more skills using SP to expand your kit, mixing and matching offensive and defensive skills, buffs, and status ailments, as well as passive abilities such as auto-healing. Each skill can be leveled up to 10, which is integral to beating some fights. Unlocking skills and leveling them up pulls from the same SP pool for each character, though, so you need to be careful how you allocate. Every character has a nice feel to them, with Laeticia being light on her feet and Ray wielding slower, heavier attacks. I played the game almost exclusively as Albaird because I enjoyed the way he combined throwing weapons and semiomancy. Midas is a glass cannon, who you need to play as a turret in order to give him enough time to cast. Malkya is acrobatic with both physical attacks and semiomancy. Elena can swap between multiple weapon styles on the fly, and Marielle is a dedicated long-distance gun wielder. Nina stands out because she cannot target enemies. As the dedicated healer, she focuses solely on your team, though she does have some defensive moves to push enemies away. She was probably the trickiest character to play manually, but thankfully, the AI isn’t completely atrocious in this game, so letting her do her own thing wasn’t a problem for the majority of my playthrough.

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I grew up playing side-scrolling action games, so when I was asked if I wanted to try one out that featured Southeast Asian mythology, I was all for it. The game looked interesting, and as we have established before, I am a sucker for mythology, so it seemed like a good fit. Unfortunately, it ended up being a mostly mediocre experience, but let’s break it down, shall we?

Krut: The Mythic Wings is based off the 2018 CGI movie Krut: The Himmaphan Warriors, which I tried to find to watch for this review, but sadly it wasn’t available for streaming in my region. In the game, you play as a Krut warrior named Veera, who washes up on the mythical Himmaphan Island after losing a battle against invading rock ogres. Long ago, his ancestors had turned to Himmaphan Island to help repel a similar invasion, and he hopes to harness the power of the island’s Silver Wings to do the same. It’s just too bad the locals don’t remember the previous war the same way, and are hostile to his intentions. Veera will need to battle across six regions and collect the elemental powers of their leaders, in order to power up his Wings to hopefully win the battle for his homeland.

It’s here where the game begins to falter for me. First things first, it’s visually quite nice. The environments are varied and colorful, and both your character model and enemies look good. Movement feels fine if a little weighty, and I liked the animations for your combos. For the most part, boss designs were interesting, and I enjoyed seeing mythological creatures that weren’t your standard Greek/Egyptian/Japanese that gaming tends to over-represent. The story itself is pretty standard good vs. evil with a couple twists, but that’s not a bad thing. It’s just a shame the gameplay is repetitive and tedious, and the music forgettable.

In classic 2D side-scrolling action tradition, each level is a combination of fighting and platforming. Veera starts off with some simple light/heavy attack combos, and you can unlock three additions using the game’s currency system, spirit (let’s call it SP for short). Using heavy attacks eats up your blue energy bar, but if you let it fill up, you can use your Silver Wings, which gives you an automatic ranged attack and ups your strength for as long as it lasts. You’ve also got a double-jump for both attack and traversal. Each region has its own take on the same enemy types, so there is a decent variety. Unfortunately, enemy placement leaves a lot to be desired. I would spend long swaths of each level without any encounters, or would be inundated with flying enemies during platforming sections. The water level was particularly bad for this. Each enemy hits like a truck and takes forever to kill, often proving more difficult than the actual bosses. I like zippy action games where you’ve got a lot of enemies, but they aren’t that hard to take down. Krut opts for a more methodical approach, where even the mooks are trouble and you can’t just run in guns blazing. This wouldn’t be a problem in and of itself, except SP comes from killing enemies, and it’s used for everything.

Let’s talk about the upgrade system real quick. In each level, there are three save points: at the beginning, before the mid-boss, and before the final boss. You have to use SP to unlock the save point. You cannot upgrade abilities without doing this. So once you’ve unlocked the save point, you can buy three upgrades each for max health, attack power, critical attack, extra combos, wing power, charge power, and extra lives, with each upgrade costing considerably more. Upgrades are thankfully permanent, except the extra lives, which replenish once you’ve used all yours up. I hated this system. Even if enemies weren’t a slog to kill, there are so few of them per level that you’re constantly low on SP. If you want to upgrade new abilities, you have to automatically subtract 1,000 SP from your total because that’s what it costs just to unlock the save point. What would have been a simple risk-reward system becomes an interminable grind because of this. You can absolutely beat the game without upgrading, but even with upgrades, fights take forever and just aren’t super engaging. Add to this the limited lives and Krut just ended up being not very fun to play.

Krut: The Mythic Wings isn’t a bad game, but it also isn’t great. It’s mechanically sound, just incredibly tedious. I liked the Southeast Asian mythology and character designs, but the poor enemy placement and grindy nature of the upgrade system dragged down the actual gameplay aspects to the point where I wasn’t having any fun. For $9.99 USD it’s not the worst investment, however, with little replay value, you’re probably better off trying a different side-scroller.

Review Score
Overall

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It’s been a while since I got my hands on a good 3D Beat-em-Up, so when a chance to review Dusk Diver 2 came along I jumped on it. I played most of the previous release, and had a great time with its great cast of characters. I was expecting the gameplay to be even better this time around, and the graphics looked like they had gotten a bit of a touch up as well. At any rate, let’s dive in and see how this crazy adventure turned out.

The story here takes place a few years after the first game. Yumo is now in college and working a part time job at Tumaz Mart for the boss. However, while she is trying to live a normal life there is still the matter of fending off Chaos Beasts to keep the world safe. The team thought they had contained all these beasts safely outside of the human realm, but this security is destroyed when they begin to appear in the human realm once again. Yumo and her friends are now investigating how this happened, and this will lead to another battle of epic proportions!

Overall I thought the story here was pretty good. The character interactions are great, and the sidequests add a lot more flavor to the story overall. The story is pretty cliché and plays out just how you expect it to, but I felt it threw enough curves in there to keep you entertained for the 15 hours it lasts. If you have played the first game you will get some of the early references right off the bat, but if you haven’t you might feel a bit lost when you start this one out. There is a log that gives you an overview of the first game if you want to catch up quickly, and after the story picks up here the game is pretty much self contained anyway.

The gameplay in Dusk Diver 2 doesn’t do anything especially new or innovative, but that doesn’t mean its not a solid experience. Players will take control of Yuno and her friends and battle tons of baddies in hand-to-hand combat. This is done just like many other games before it with light and heavy attacks. There are a range of special moves for each character that will consume the SP gauge, which replenishes over time or as you use items. There is also a Burst Gauge that when full, allows characters to enter Burst Mode which increases their SP recovery and Attack power. You also will gain access to an ultra powerful Burst Ultimate in this mode if you can do enough damage before your meter is depleted. This gauge is increased by performing a break move on an enemy. These are pretty easy to pull off: just slam your foes into a wall or simply break their gauge. Doing this while in Burst Mode will allow it to go on longer since it refills your depleting meter.

While the combat here is pretty fun, there are other things that go into it as well. You can level up your characters as you gain EXP from battles or sidequests. Eating food had many advantages as well, such as giving you handy buffs and a ton of EXP for eating things the first time around. Early on you will be given a collection quest for May’s Gourmet Card, and I highly suggest you run around the city doing this. It’s one of the quickest ways to level up your characters, making life a lot easier for you in combat. Other sidequests will give you helpful items such as equipment and even some clothing items to change the look of your characters. I did feel that doing some of these things was kind of tedious, but none of it really overstayed its welcome. I really enjoyed doing most of the sidequests, and putting all the photos from the in-game gallery around the city, made it fun to run around and collect them to see what unlocked next.

Graphically, Dusk Diver 2 looks great. The character models have a good amount of detail and I liked that there were other costumes to unlock for different looks. The enemies look great as well, especially the boss monsters, which are huge and very nicely designed. The environments look nice as well, though I feel like some of these could’ve used a bit more style to separate them from each other. The game ran at a very smooth framerate with very few dips. None of these affected gameplay in any way when they rarely happened. The game has a pretty great soundtrack as well. There are many great upbeat tunes to get your blood pumping for combat, and some great vocal tracks that really heighten the mood. The Japanese voice cast does a great job giving these characters a lot of personality. There is also a Mandarin dub for those who would prefer it.

Overall, I feel like Dusk Diver 2 is a solid title. There is plenty of great fighting action, the story is entertaining and the game looks great. The only real complaint I have with this one is even if you’re leveled and upgraded properly, some enemies feel like damage sponges. This makes some random encounters drag out a bit too long for my tastes. If you’re a fan of 3D Beat-em-Ups with some good world exploration and fun characters, this one is well worth the $49.99 price tag.

Review Score
Overall

Game was provided by the publisher for review.

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Stray is one of those games I’ve wanted since I saw the very first reveal at the PlayStation Future of Gaming event in 2020. You can play as a cat? And explore a cyberpunk city full of robots? Sign me up! But how did the actual game play out against my expectations? Was it all it was cracked up to be, or did the cat catch my tongue?

First, the premise. You play as an unnamed stray (I named mine Gingersnaps) living with its colony inside the walls of a giant city. While spending the day out doing cat things, you’re unceremoniously flung down a sloped wall and into the trash-strewn city below. As you recover from your fall, a door suddenly opens, and an assortment of cryptic computer screen messages and environmental signs lead you through a Dead City filled with cute, but deadly, creatures to an old abandoned flat, where you awaken B-12, the entity in the computer that was leading you. He gives you a backpack, which you respond to as any cat would, and eventually the two of you make your way to the Slums. It’s inhabited entirely by sentient robots, and it’s here you really begin your journey not only to escape this giant city to return to your family, but also uncover exactly what happened to everyone else inside the walls.

As far as stories go, Stray has an inventive hook – explore this cyberpunk dystopia as a cat. You can do cat things like scratch surfaces, meow on command, climb almost anything, knock stuff off shelves, and sleep. B-12 acts as your translator and guide, but you’re always just a cat swept up in events beyond your understanding. It’s a neat concept that works really well for a puzzle-platformer. Not only is the level design built entirely around your smaller frame and athleticism, but the puzzles play into a cat’s penchant for causing mischief. An early example is the requirement to knock an item off a ledge. The narrative, as well, is well told and uses the environment to its advantage for a lot of diegetic storytelling. It reminds me a lot of Journey and The Last Guardian, and that isn’t a bad thing.

Visually, the city is gorgeous. The Dead City is cold and empty, with little lighting and a dark, grey palette. It’s the first place you encounter the Zurks, which are fat, quadrupedal, one-eyed squeakers that can, and will, eat you if they catch you. They are terrifying. Once you reach the Slums, you’re inundated with a much more vibrant, dirty, lived-in community awash in oranges and blues, filled with an assortment of shops and flats, many of which are uninhabited but still reek of personality. The Rooftops are a nightmare hellscape bathed in reds that could give most horror games a run for their money. It’s just a varied, beautiful world with distinct color palettes and level designs that absolutely popped on the PlayStation 5. The Slums especially looked amazing, and the verticality of the area lent itself well to the stray’s ability to climb, slink, and squeeze into an assortment of places.

You’ll encounter a handful of characters throughout your journey, but your constant companion is B-12, the little drone you saved in the Dead City. He will translate text and robot speech for you, as well as act as a flashlight. In an otherwise immersive world, he’s definitely there as a gameplay feature first and foremost, though he’s integral to the story as well. He’s adorable from a character perspective, but I also really liked his sound design. All of the robots have really interesting sounds, and it was one of my favorite aspects of the game. The music, as well, was really really good. Most of the tracks aren’t what I’d go to for easy listening outside the game, but they are incredibly well-placed inside it and help the world of Stray feel alive. There’s a synthetic, slightly off-tune aspect to a lot of the diegetic songs, and the moody, ambient pieces help immerse you in the moment. The music reminded me a lot of Echo the Dolphin actually, and for me that’s high praise.

That isn’t to say Stray is perfect. Button prompts are finicky and imprecise, especially when climbing vertically. Sometimes the prompt would show up, but greyed out for me when trying to talk to NPCs, and I’d have to dance around them to find the exact spot to stand to interact with them. The camera would often get in the way while climbing, or B-12 would literally fly out of frame while talking, and I’d need to swing the camera around just to read the dialogue. During my playthrough, I encountered two consistent bugs – there’s a bucket in the Slums that if you hit it, it will get stuck in the floor and the sound of it rolling around will echo through the alleyways until you reload or go into a cutscene. There’s another one where a bunch of Zurks get stuck in a wall. Neither of these are game-breaking, but the bucket one is particularly annoying. And while I didn’t personally experience them, there have been numerous reports of actual game-breaking bugs, including NPCs who stop interacting with your cat or the environment, areas where your cat can stray out-of-bounds and soft-lock the game, platforming sequences where your cat gets stuck on an item and can’t move, etc. Usually, I wouldn’t let bugs I don’t personally experience color my judgment of a game, but with how numerous the complaints are and with how short the game is (I finished it in roughly seven hours), it wouldn’t feel right to not at least mention them.

Even with these issues, though, Stray is undoubtedly one of my favorite gaming experiences of the year. The freedom of exploration offered by the novel protagonist, the dense world-building, and the atmospheric sound design all coalesced to provide an emotionally-moving and poignant game that I still can’t stop thinking about. I have a couple trophies left to get, but even if I didn’t, I’d still boot up the game just to walk around the city, drink in the sights and sounds, and find a comfortable place to catnap so I could listen to the stray purr contentedly. Despite its short length and some technical issues, Stray is definitely going into my list of impactful games and I’m really happy I had the chance to play it.

Stray is available on Steam, PlayStation 4 and PlayStation 5 for $29.99 USD, and it’s well worth your time.

Review Score
Overall

Reviewer obtained game through PlayStation Plus subscription service.

The post REVIEW: Stray appeared first on oprainfall.

I’m not usually one for zombie games, but when I saw XSEED Games release Deadcraft I thought I would give it a go. I like games with a good crafting system and the top down Diablo style gameplay is something I usually enjoy as well. Let’s see if the game is a finely crafted zombie slaying adventure or just a pile of rotting flesh!

The gameplay here is a pretty simple affair: you go out into the zombie-infested world and slay the dead for materials needed for survival. You will also gain experience points you can spend on a skills tree that will unlock access to new crafting items and upgrades to your abilities. You will need to craft every item you can in order to survive the crazy humans and zombie hordes that await you.

At your home base you will place all of the facilities for your crafting and your garden. You will use these to craft all of the gear you will need to survive as well and grow your food and other things. Players can rest and recover HP and Stamina. These two things will recover when you sleep and the amount you get back will depend on how much food and water you have consumed.

Combat will seem really simple here at first since you only have a few zombie skills with some light and heavy attacks with your equipped weapon. There is, however, quite a bit of variety here. Each of the different weapons you craft will fight very differently. Crafting a knife, for example, provides quick, low-powered attacks, while using something like a weed whacker will change things very quickly. You can craft some guns as well, but I wasn’t very good with aiming mechanics here I stuck to the melee aspects of combat.

One of the more interesting things they did with the combat here is how you can craft your very own zombies to fight by your side. These are called “Frankies” and you will grow them in your garden along with your fruits and veggies. Now there is something I never thought I’d type in a review, but anyways. These are made as you slay the many wild humans that dare to cross your path. You can harvest their corpse and grow your very own little army. You can also use these to craft other placeables that will attack enemies automatically. Nothing like a turret cannon made with a zombie, right? I felt the team were very creative here, and I hope they look at different ways to incorporate this in future titles.

One more aspect of combat I would like to touch on is the zombie skills. As the game progresses, Reid will gain the ability to use some powerful zombie skills. These can be used to do things such as make a shield or eat random folks to recover some health. Doing these skills will consume some of your zombie power meter. This can easily be regained by eating or drinking food that is contaminated with the virus. There is a face meter at the top of the screen that shows Reid’s human to zombie ratio. If you drift toward the human side you will gain some max health and you will not be able to do any zombie skills. Going full zombie will cause you to stagger around and people will treat you as they would any other zombie found in the world.

While farming the dead is probably the most effective way to get materials, you can also take on missions from the various NPCs you find in the towns. These quests are usually pretty simple things like slay X number enemies or go from point A to B. These quests will pay out not only materials but some coin you can use in the various shops as well. Another means of gathering up items is to simply hustle it from the towns folks. Sometimes they will give up their goods and this will raise your wanted level only a little bit, but if they fight and you start slaughtering them there will be soldiers all over you for a period of time. You can always hang out back at your base until things cool off, and you will need to do this to complete some missions. Overall the gameplay is pretty fun for a while since there are a ton of different facilities, weapons and other items you can craft, but once you’re getting toward the end of the game this all feels a bit tedious. There aren’t a lot of different enemy types here and the game tries to make up for this by giving out some unique missions, but this makes you have to craft more of the same type of items to complete them, leading to a vicious cycle of grinding.

Deadcraft is a classic example of a game that is a good idea but it just needed a bit more fleshing out. Graphically everything looks great. The NPCs and enemy models have a lot of style and detail. The music really isn’t anything to write home about but it gets the job done, and the voice cast gives these characters a lot of personality. The crafting system is pretty fun and the combat is very seamless with a ton of different ways of dispatching your undead foes. The biggest problem here is there just isn’t enough mission and enemy variety and it seems to drag things out longer than it should’ve. The additional DLC content may take care of some of these issues, but I’m looking at the base game here on its own merits. That said, as it stands Deadcraft is a mediocre experience that could’ve been a lot better with just a few tweaks. If you’re a fan of Diablo style games and enjoy a bit of crafting, you’ll get your money’s worth at the $24.99 price tag.

Review Score
Overall

Game was provided by the publisher for review.

The post REVIEW: Deadcraft appeared first on oprainfall.

Here we are, after many long years since the cliffhanger that was Shadow Warrior 2. Lo Wang is back with a new adventure in tow; however, the formula once again changed from looter shooter to a more linear, arena-based encounter set up. More specifically, the level design and combat echoes Doom Eternal, the biggest hit in modern FPS history. This actually befuddled me, as I played parts of classic Shadow Warrior and the first two reboot games. While not perfect, those games have a certain direction and flow that was distinctive. Even when Shadow Warrior 2 went for these open areas with Diablo-esque elements to its progression, the flow of combat was very much in line to the other games. After my playthrough, I can say with confidence that the new title feels much less like a Shadow Warrior game. As a disclaimer, unless specified, when I mention Shadow Warrior, I’m specifically referring to the reboot, not the classic game.

To summarize the story, Lo Wang accidentally unleashed a dragon of extraordinary power and proportions. The first thing it did was eliminate all of the ancients, leaving essentially Wang himself the only one at the time to take it down. However, his quest fails unceremoniously as he stabs the eyelid of the dragon and is then flung right off. Months later, he is lamenting that he lost his mojo. As he recounts his failure to the mask of Hoji, Orochi Zilla arrives to begrudgingly team up with Wang. Thereafter, the two go off to find Motoko, who has the power to allow the team to defeat the evil-doing dragon.

Once there, as Motoko is unleashing her power upon Hoji’s mask, the ancient being himself actually comes back in a fragmented existence. Sensing that the ritual would kill his long lost “friend,” Wang decides to steal back the mask and runs off, hoping to find a new solution. Thus, the story of Shadow Warrior 3 kicks off proper. I’m going to be blunt here, the narrative and writing in this game feels exceptionally hollow. Zilla and Motoko essentially disappear from the plot entirely once Wang decides to do his own thing until the end of the game. Hoji is practically shoehorned in presumably because he was well-liked. He supposedly died in the first game, why is he here? Even Wang himself is a shell of his former self, even when considering his doubts in himself. The dragon doesn’t even do much towards the protagonists. It destroys a gate, takes a chi laser to the face like a champ, then proceeds to freeze over a forest; however, it is not like it is a sapient antagonist. The dragon sort of just flies around and looks intimidating half of the time.

Of course, the plot is not the main focus of these games. At the same time, in previous games there was this attempt to flesh out this world of demons, humans, and ancient gods without being too ridiculous. Despite being a selfish and thickheaded protagonist, I could at least support Wang in his endeavors during his previous adventures. In this game, he has a really bad habit of insulting characters completely unprovoked. Meanwhile in Shadow Warrior, many of his direct insults are far more reactionary. Everyone is a jerk, therefore he shall be too. Shadow Warrior 2 was like this, too. Sure he had his snide remarks with characters such as Gozu, but at the very least much of it is because they had an encounter with each other already. By the end of the game, everyone was supposed to undergo character development. Despite this, the character development has to be one of the most shallow examples I’ve ever seen.

Unfortunately, this carries over to the humor of the game. It should be noted that this is regardless of what kind of humor one enjoys. The delivery for comedy is what truly is important. This is where the game fumbles, as most cases are along the lines of “hey, look, we did a funny! Laugh!” Snappy humor can be done well, but when it boils down to swearing, pop-culture reference after pop-culture reference, and practical toilet humor, it gets jarring and emotionless after awhile. There is nothing akin to “pull yourself together, man!” after you diced up an enemy, or “hello new ammo friends!” They aren’t exactly funny, either, but at least there is delivery and reason. Instead we get dialogue that go along the lines of “Dwango! *pause* Nothing? Anybody? You all need to watch more American movies…” I triggered it once but have no idea how it came about. To be honest, I am not sure how accurate I quoted the line to begin with, as I forced myself to remember it. That is the main issue, you can’t just make a reference for the sake of a reference, especially dated ones. There is even a line about Wang hating puzzles, preferring action. This would at least have merit if there was a puzzle at all.

The gameplay, meanwhile, is just okay. A lot of it feels like a more watered down, if not diet, Doom Eternal, partially because it is explicitly trying to emulate that game’s formula. There is one big difference between the two, which are the finishers. As you kill enemies, you get finisher orbs filling up a gauge. Using a certain amount of this very gauge allows you to perform a finisher on an enemy. The amount changes between fodder and sturdier foes, but each enemy allows a unique benefit upon using a finisher. This can range from a health buff, a cryo bomb, a hammer, and more. In addition, all of your health is restored in the process. I actually find finishers more interesting than glory kills, but it gets repetitive after awhile since Wang plays the same animation per enemy every time. Many of these actually take a significant amount of time to do, whereas glory kills for the most part are extremely quick. It doesn’t help that the default command to do it, on console, are both shoulder buttons on a controller. Wang’s katana is mapped to the right shoulder button. As such, it’s bizarrely easy to kill a fodder enemy you might’ve wanted to do a finisher on for its buff, especially since you have to look dead on at the enemy.

Bridging off that, the feeling of using the katana is perhaps the weakest out of every Shadow Warrior game out there. It feels almost weightless, as if you are swinging a blade made out of air, even when your sword is going through an enemy. Curiously, it is perhaps still the best weapon in the game once upgraded. At full power, you can charge up attacks with elemental attributes. The elemental application is actually extremely high, essentially instantly applying the effects of the element onto enemies. However, despite being based on the sword techniques from the previous two games, the satisfaction of using them is borderline soulless. It is not the same feeling of taking out your katana and instantly doing a 360 sword swing, killing enemies all around you. The equivalent technique is here, but there’s no satisfying swing of the camera itself and game slowing down per hit. Just a casual swing and everything around you is struck by lightning.

The gunplay suffers from the same issues as well. Taking note from Doom Eternal, you are intended to quickswap between weapons to achieve optimal DPS. Despite this, you only cycle between the Basilisk, which is the game’s equivalent to a charge up gauss cannon, and the grenade launcher much of the time. Combined with the sword to incapacitate enemies and refill ammo, you can solve most situations with just these three weapons. When upgraded, the shotgun is also kind of fun, but it doesn’t hit the same as just pointing at a grouping of enemies and massacring them with a handful of shotgun blasts. Unfortunately, the dual SMGs feel like peashooters, the crossbow shuriken launcher is particularly lacking, and the revolver is the normal Shadow Warrior revolver. Not the best, but you could do worse. It doesn’t help that the only chi power to return is chi blast. You no longer can go invisible and force enemies up into the air, so it becomes hard to vary up your gameplan.

Consequently, the arena based style causes encounters in the game to blend in together, especially since the only thing I am concerned about is basic enemy prioritization. A lot of the time I can just circle around the arena and be relatively fine. The grand irony is that when you restrict the player’s movement capabilities, fights become extremely distinctive despite a more limited roster. It’s why Doom 2 stood the test of time in the mapping scene. The same goes for Hexen, Blood, Quake and even classic Shadow Warrior. You can place towers as sniping points. Use enemies to body block. Force the player to bob and weave in pockets of a horde of monsters just to survive. All of these wonderful encounter ideas suddenly vanish when you allow both the player and enemies to essentially go anywhere in the arena. Much of this is in spite of the enemy variety in the game, as it’s actually pretty okay. You have both melee and ranged fodder that serve as small pockets of health and ammo for you to snag in the heat of the moment. Then there are many actually threatening enemies that employ different strategies that aren’t just claw at or snipe the player; however, since they are thrown at the player as a collective whole, fights lose their luster fast.

Conversely, despite the technical attention to give players pathways to navigate arenas, the level design that serves as a transition to these arenas is rather slap dash. These practical hallways are essentially just basic FPS platforming where you run on walls, grab ledges, hook onto green rings from one spot to the next. Along the way, there are upgrade orbs conveniently placed for the player to pick up and use for their weapons and abilities. Bizarrely, there are secrets that also contain upgrade orbs but they just happen to be right next to the pathway that doesn’t really lend itself towards finding secrets in the first place. There is not even a chime that tells you that a secret has been found. In terms of anything to collect, upgrade orbs are the only thing to find. Karma and money are gone, so these orbs are the only way to continue to strengthen Wang. Even Doom Eternal had lore documents, power ups, and more to find.

It’s odd since I would think at the very least the developers would make the environments and set pieces interesting to look at. However, while the game is technically graphically well done, the presentation and art direction is rather lacking. For instance, the UI is strangely bland compared to the previous two games, where the menus are just not as interesting. In the first game, you have a dedicated menu with Lo Wang kneeling down where – as you unlock and build upon your chi powers – he would get tattoos to represent those very powers. It wasn’t the best model but it added a visual sense of progression. Same with another menu where you would fill in wood-block art as you unlock perks. The second game didn’t have this but you would get a close up of weapons and gems, where the UI itself was smooth but nice to look at. Even perks in the second game used much of the visual art made to represent the world of Shadow Warrior as their own visual card. Here, while not poorly done and easy on the eyes, the UI lacks that Shadow Warrior flair.

Technically, environments are nice to look at. Yet, I feel myself gravitating towards the environments in Shadow Warrior more as it was more grounded, making the grander environments have more of an impact. This was combined with the fact that the world of the first and second games had a sense of artistic drive that made me appreciate them all the more. Despite being a product of its time, classic Shadow Warrior still took advantage of aspects of the Build engine. The engine contributed quite well to interaction with the world and environmental design. Here, most of the environments are grand in scale but don’t have the same substance. There’s nothing to balance them out. There was one level that had like a cosmic backdrop with a large chi laser cannon as the main set piece. It was actually gorgeous in its own way, so I wish there was more like that. This logic carries over to the enemy design as I find some to be cool, others to be zany for the sake of it.

Then there is the technical aspects of the game on console. There is no mincing this, the game loves to drop frames when any remotely intense scenario happens. It doesn’t matter how intense it is, the game will drop to frames that is independent of what is going on. While I haven’t died because of this problem, the game almost went to the single digits at the end of the first boss fight, which involves platforming. All there is going on is the boss firing lasers to destroy the platforms you are traversing. What is baffling is that there are instances similar to this but the game runs much better. The game loses frames even in certain cutscenes. Yet, in two levels that are all about running along on the dragon’s back with snow flying everywhere with detail practically everywhere? Runs like a marathon runner in the Olympics. This is Unreal Engine 4, what is going on? Even when Shadow Warrior was just 30 FPS on console, it was extremely consistent and that was an in-house engine. This is unacceptable as Doom Eternal, a game with better graphical fidelity, runs at a perfect 60 FPS where I do not remember a single moment of it ever dropping. All of this on a base PS4. I understand id Software has some of the best programmers in the industry, but surely it is not hard to ask for consistent FPS in this day and age from an experienced developer.

For other issues, I haven’t encountered any actual glitches but there are oddities with the platforming. All but one of my deaths was thanks to platforming and a large chunk of them was because Wang decided to not grab the ledge or hang against the wall despite literally hugging it. He would just stare at it and fall to his doom. What is particularly strange about falling down is that you instantly die during platform segments; however, in actual combat, you just lose health. Not sure why the developers couldn’t just design it where it was like Doom Eternal where you lose a small amount of health no matter what.

To wrap all of this up, the amount of content is severely lacking. There are three difficulties where there are, at base, four in every preceeding Shadow Warrior game. Despite it being a single player game that is linear but still has upgrades, there are no additional modes like a horde mode or even new game+. The only content in the game are literally the levels. How long did it take me to beat the game? Five hours. Five hours for a $49.99 game with little to no replay value. This is almost insulting. You can’t even level select with any of your previous upgrades just to play through a single level if you want, nor is there a results screen. It should be noted that the game itself, on its own, is okay. It doesn’t do anything particularly crude or ill-thought out. Most of my criticisms were more or less along the lines on how the title feels weaker compared to other games in the franchise. It’s strange since I know Flying Wild Hog can do better. Unfortunately, with how the game ended, this is more than likely going to be the last Shadow Warrior game. That is the true disappointment considering my criticisms.

Review Score
Overall

Review copy provided by the publisher.

The post REVIEW: Shadow Warrior 3 appeared first on oprainfall.

Considering the state of the world the last couple of years, games about depression, despair, revenge, and coming to terms with one’s faults have been particularly striking to me (see my top three games of 2021 here, here, and here). So it came as absolutely no surprise that Monark resonated so strongly with me when I got a chance to check the game out. Not only does it have a healthy dose of all the above, it’s also got a really interesting world and lore that feels highly reminiscent of its Shin Megami Tensei spiritual roots.

Set in the prestigious Shin Mikado Academy, the game opens with a student being unceremoniously murdered by creepy skeletal monsters, with a mysterious voice asking the boy to show it his Ego. Immediately after, we’re thrown into the introductory cutscene, where we meet the school dean and are given a pop quiz (as you do). Your answers determine your opening stats, and then you’re spit out into the game proper. The school has been cut off from the rest of the world, and covered in something called Mist that turns anyone trapped inside it too long, insane. You awake within the Mist to the calls of upperclassman Nozomi Hinata, the school doctor Kakeru Hasegawa, and your little sister Chiyo Aikawa. You’ve completely lost your memory (as you do), but that doesn’t dissuade your companions from helping you escape the Mist. Before you can, however, Chiyo receives a call on her cellphone, and when she answers it, the group is whisked into the same quasi-dimension from the opening, surrounded by the same skeletal creatures. Chiyo is unconscious, Dr. Kakeru is injured, and neither you nor Nozomi can fight. But as things look bleak, a creature that resembles a stitched-together stuffed rabbit appears. He calls himself Vanitas, and offers you the power to protect your loved ones, bestowing upon you Imagigear and the ability to fight the daemonic Legion in this Otherworld. You prevail, and everyone escapes to the safety of the third-year building first floor.

Whatever is happening at Shin Mikado, it’s unleashed daemons called Monarks who form pacts with humans. Monarks control Legions, which roam the Otherworld, and the Mist is a physical representation of where our world and the Otherworld begin to overlap. By accepting Vanitas’ help, you’ve now become the Pactbearer of Vanity and can wield Authorities – special abilities granted by a Monark to their human, that allow them to control Legions and perform magic. Using your Authority creates Mist, however, and causes more distortions in the world that allows the Otherworld to exert its influence. There are seven other Pactbearers in the school, each aligned with one of the Seven Deadly Sins, and by using their Authorities they’ve caused this calamity to occur. Dean Sora Jingu requests your aid in hunting down and defeating your fellow Pactbearers, to stop the spread of the Mist and save the world from chaos. But when defeating a Pactbearer means they lose a part of their soul, is her request so easy to accept?

As far as plots go, Monark isn’t the most original, but the philosophical questions it asks, and the psychological repercussions it explores, are incredibly compelling. Humans accept pacts from Monarks to fulfill fervent desires, and pitting their deepest wish against the world allows for several avenues to explore worldview, experience, and the ways in which we cope with trauma. It also creates some intriguing lore that mixes religion, philosophy, faith and education in a way I haven’t seen in many other games, and I found it the most enthralling aspect of the game. I wanted to understand each Pactbearer, to see why they would accept daemonic power to attain their goals. Even when the gameplay began to frustrate me, I powered through to find the next lore tidbit, to flesh out the world this game has created.

Speaking of gameplay, the general loop remains pretty consistent from the moment you become a Pactbearer. The Academy is split into several distinct buildings, and each of them has three Mist sections you need to explore and disperse. While you pick up a variety of human companions throughout the story, your constant companions are customizable Legion aspected to one of the seven Monarks – Pride, Wrath, Envy, Greed, Gluttony, Sloth, and Lust. Fights are turn-based and focus on strategy. Units have varied movement and can take advantage of the terrain for back attacks, counters, or environmental hazards to damage opponents. Attacking an enemy within range of an ally will cause those allies to also attack as an Assist. And much like Shin Megami titles, any rule a player character can use, the enemy can as well, so thoughtful placement is important to increase your damage, or protect yourself from excessive attacks. Along with attack options, units can also Defer their turn to one that’s already gone, giving a unit a second chance to attack, but also increasing their Madness. Linking Deferrals can provide a massive movement boon to one character, or let you lean into a strong attack over and over to complete fights faster. Units can also Wait and skip their turn in exchange for a self-heal.

After each fight, you gain a certain amount of Spirit, which you expend on buying abilities for characters and Legion, and is also the only way to level, since every purchase grants you a level and corresponding stat boost. Abilities include straight damage, buffs, debuffs, heals, and specials split between Arts and Authorities. Arts expend the user’s HP, while Abilities increase the user’s Madness, so you’re constantly weighing whether you want to damage yourself, or raise your Madness gauge with every action. If your Madness gauge reaches 100 percent, your unit goes berserk and will attack friend and foe alike, gaining a damage buff but significantly lowering defense. Human characters also have an Awake gauge, which unlocks special abilities once it hits 100 percent and the unit Awakens. Pactbearers can Resonate with allies and enemies to share buffs, debuffs and stat changes. If an Awakened character Resonates with a Maddened one, both attain Enlightenment, which significantly increases stats, removes the Madness berserker debuff, and unlocks one-time use abilities. Juggling all of these aspects can create a really engaging fight. They can also be the difference between winning, and losing, when going against stronger enemies, since matching levels is almost a requirement in order to win most fights.

For the most part, I really liked this battle system. It rewards creative and thoughtful engagement while discouraging brute force. There are an assortment of optional fights you can use for farming Spirit, some better than others, and getting a high score requires you to take advantage of Assists, Deferrals, Awakenings and as few turns to complete a battle as possible. The higher your score, the higher your Spirit bonus. What I didn’t really like was the inability to see what level fight you were entering before you entered it. You can review unit stats once you’ve initiated the fight, but if you have, say, taken on a level 95 fight when you’re level 35, the only way to back out is to engage in battle and then quit. This also goes for story fights, which can jump in level drastically between areas. There’s a lot of grinding in Monark, which isn’t bad in and of itself (though this reviewer personally hates grinding), I just wish I could see what I was getting into before wasting time picking units and initiating battle.

One thing that does not bother me at all, however, is the music. Monark‘s soundtrack is phenomenal, with a ton of catchy earworms and moody pieces alike. The boss fights are some of the most energetic I’ve heard since ALTDEUS, and make having to try over and over again, when I get crit’d on the final mob and have to restart the fight from scratch, much more bearable. Not only that, but there’s a music player in the start menu, so you can go back and listen to any song you’ve unlocked whenever you want. More games need this option, it’s fantastic.

At about 40 hours, I’ve completed one ending in Monark with at least two more paths to explore, but what I’ve played has been an engaging, thoughtful experience that I constantly want to return to. The characters are relatable and varied, raising questions about humanity, faith, love, and remorse that I found really resonated with me. Learning more about them kept me going, even when I got frustrated at yet another grinding session, and that’s a pretty impressive accomplishment for someone who haaaaaaaaates grinding. I have loved my Monark experience through and through, bumps be damned, and I would absolutely recommend this title to anyone who likes Shin Megami-style RPGs – and even those who might not, because I think the world and characters are that interesting.

Monark is available on the PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Steam, and Nintendo Switch, and retails for $59.99 USD.

Review Score
Overall

The post REVIEW: Monark appeared first on oprainfall.

Our Half-Genie Hero is back and on another adventure to save Sequin Land from the nefarious Risky Boots. Our Queen of the Seven Seas is out to harm the Genie Realm, and it’s up to Shantae to stop her by using her own genie magic and some help from her friends – not to mention a ton of transformations. Much like the games that came before, Shantae: Half-Genie Hero – Ultimate Edition is a fun, colorful romp through an assortment of danger-laden worlds. As she gains new genie powers and upgrades, Shantae can dive deep beneath the waves as a crab or mermaid, fly through the air as a bat or harpy, climb walls as a monkey, hang from ceilings as a spider, and stomp on enemies as an elephant.

As Shantae’s first real HD adventure, Half-Genie Hero is absolutely gorgeous. While I still, personally, prefer the sprites from the older games for Shantae and pals, there is no denying how fluid and smooth their animations are here, or how vibrant the palette is. The colors absolutely popped on my PS5, and everything ran smooth as butter to boot. Each region has distinct looks and environments, and I love the verticality of every level. I wish the level design had embraced a more Metroidvania-esque connectedness between zones, but there are still plenty of chances for exploration and backtracking as you gain more upgrades, so it’s not really a knock against the game itself.

In terms of story, it’s pretty simple, but charming. The Genie Realm is in danger, and an unnamed genie calls out to Shantae in her dreams to warn her of the coming disaster. Her Uncle Mimic, in his attempt to alleviate some of Shantae’s duties to Scuttle Town, creates a machine called the Dynamo that Risky steals in order to rip open the rift between the human and genie realms, thereby bringing about the disaster Shantae was warned about. As a result of Risky’s raid, Shantae is once again fired as the town’s genie, but that won’t stop her from doing everything she can to protect Sequin Land and her fellow townsfolk. The usual cast of characters make their appearances, with Sky and Bolo giving Shantae a hand, Rottytops being a nebulous friend, and Risky and the Barons getting in our Half-Genie’s way throughout her adventures. The writing remains witty and pun-filled. It’s comfy, fun and familiar, and I’m all for it in my wacky and charming adventure game.

One of my favorite things to return in this title is the hot spring in town. It’s a free heal and I love it. You’re once again spending money to upgrade your abilities, but gold is easy to come by, so I never felt like I was really missing out on skills. Sky’s bird, Wrench, can now grow to gargantuan sizes and fly Shantae all around Sequin Land, ferrying her back and forth at whim to each level. His whistle works similarly to the pirate’s flare from Pirate’s Curse, allowing players to back out of a level immediately whenever they want. New this time around is an art gallery, which showcases tons of art assets from the game’s development. I love galleries like this, and it felt like a great addition.

Half-Genie Hero – Ultimate Edition also includes all previously released DLC, including the Pirate Queen’s Quest, which adds a bit of story as we play from Risky’s point of view as she gathers items to power up the Dynamo in order to take over the Genie Realm. It retreads all the areas we already played as Shantae with a couple twists on boss encounters, but it’s fun to get in the pirate queen’s big boots, and I love her personality. She’s fun, plus her adventure adds a bit of difficulty that was lacking in the main game. Other DLC included is Friends to the End, where you get the chance to play as Sky, Bolo, and Rottytops; and the Costume Pack, which includes Ninja Mode, Officer Mode, and Beach Mode. Ninja and Officer provide alternate uniforms with unique skill sets, and Beach Mode has you rushing through each level looking for sunscreen before Shantae gets burned. There’s also the self-explanatory Jammies Mode, where Shantae engages in pillow fights as she traipses across the world.

I mentioned difficulty, and Half-Genie Hero is around the same level as previous titles (except the first). It’s absolutely a beginner-friendly action-adventure game, and that’s not bad. Challenge is few and far between, though that’s what Hard Mode is for. Without even trying, I completed the game with more than 80 percent of all collectibles found, because Half-Genie Hero doesn’t really try to make the discovery process frustrating. Every time I got an upgrade, I knew exactly where I needed to go back to in previous levels. Point in favor of WayForward for well-designed and telegraphed levels, I suppose, but it did take away from the wonder of exploration a bit. I applaud them for consistently making games that are friendly and welcoming to newcomers to the genre, though.

I can’t talk about a Shantae game without at least touching on the music, which is always stellar and a highlight of every title. That does not change here, and I often found myself bopping my head to the music or humming a tune long after I’d put the game down for the night.

Shantae: Half-Genie Hero – Ultimate Edition has a lot of fun to offer beginners and veteran adventure players, with adorable characters, vibrant levels, a great score, and plenty of replayability. While it isn’t particularly difficult, the various modes and DLC adventures offer a bit more challenge than the main adventure, and we can always use more Shantae in our lives. It took me just short of seven hours to beat the base game, and each DLC story is around two to three hours, so it’s the perfect length for someone who can’t dump too much time into a single game. For $15 USD, you can’t go wrong picking this one up.

Review Score
Overall

Review copy provided by the publisher.

The post REVIEW: Shantae: Half-Genie Hero – Ultimate Edition appeared first on oprainfall.

When it comes to games I’ve had in my backlog since forever, the Shantae series is at the top of the list. My husband has been asking me to play them for years and I’ve always had something else that took precedence. Well, not today, and I’m really kicking myself for not putting those other games to the side and listening to him earlier. What a fun, charming experience it’s been.

Scuttle Town is once again under attack from the feared pirate Risky Boots, who steals a magic lamp from Shantae’s uncle, Mimic. Now it’s up to our intrepid Half-Genie Hero to retrieve the relic and save Sequin Land from whatever the perilous pirate has planned. Along the way we get to interact with a zany cast of characters: a falconer named Sky; weapons master Bolo; a zombie named Rottytops who wants to eat Shantae’s brains; the hungry Squid Baron; the militant Ammo Baron; and the ghostly Hypno Baron.

I played the original Shantae just to get a taste for the series, and I’ve got to say, the changes in Risky’s Revenge were a bit of a mixed bag, though overall positive. Gone are the free heal hot springs and dancing minigame (I missed it dearly). Dancing itself is significantly different, where instead of pressing inputs in time to metronome, now you just hold the dance button down for a certain amount of time in order to transform. You also only have three forms to change into: Monkey, Elephant, and Mermaid. I found the dance mechanics of the original Shantae finicky at best and infuriating at worst, but the changes to dancing in Risky felt a bit too simplified. The animations were fantastic, though. All the animations in the games are great, and watching Shantae and the other characters move is a joy. Shantae’s hair whip also felt way more responsive, and I enjoyed the speed upgrades. It made snappy combat feel even snappier.

Money felt entirely superfluous after the first dungeon, especially since the best upgrades were from Magic Jam. It was a never-ending struggle for money in the original Shantae, and I spent way more time than I probably should have in the dancing minigame trying to earn my keep so I could buy items and upgrades. While I enjoyed the physical attacks Shantae could acquire in the first game, I preferred the magic spells in Risky. I found them much more useful in combat, especially the Pike Ball, which I used with abandon. And if you bought the replenishing MP skill (again with Magic Jam), it made using her spells even easier. That being said, I can only think of maybe two instances where magic was mandatory, so I think the system definitely could have been more fleshed out. Then again, I don’t really consider Risky’s Revenge a remotely difficult game, especially compared to its predecessor. It feels like an entry-level action-adventure game, and I’m perfectly happy with that, because the world and characters ooze charm and are a great stepping stone into the genre.

I’ve touched on it a bit here, but visually this game is amazing, especially for what was originally a DSiWare title. The Director’s Cut offers four screen mode options: Original, Square (4:3) with Border, Square (4:3), and Wide (16:9). While the 4:3 options aren’t awful, I spent my entire playthrough in Original mode. It just looked crisper. The 4:3 modes are muddier, and I don’t know why anyone would ever play in 16:9. On the other hand, the DC includes super high-res character portraits and they’re gorgeous. Other Director’s Cut inclusions are new illustrations, achievements, emoticons, fully configurable controls, and unlockable Magic Mode with an alternate costume. Character animation is fluid, backgrounds are bright and colorful, and every zone has a distinct palette and feel. The score also deserves some applause, because the music in this game is just fantastic. More often than not I would find myself bopping my head to the tunes, and Scuttle Town’s theme got stuck in my head on more than one occasion.

I really enjoyed my time with Shantae: Risky’s Revenge – Director’s Cut. It’s by no means a long game – I only clocked about six-and-a-half hours – and it’s not particularly difficult, but it oozes charm from every pore, with cute characters, witty dialogue and head-bopping music. Considering this is like the fourth time WayForward has released this game, $10 USD is a decent price. If you’ve never played the Shantae series, it’s not a bad entry to grab, and if you’re new to the genre, it’s a great place to start.

Want to see what oprainfall thought about other ports of Risky’s Revenge? Check out the Switch edition here and the PlayStation 4 edition here.

Review Score
Overall

Review copy provided by the publisher.

The post RE-REVIEW: Shantae: Risky’s Revenge – Director’s Cut (PS5) appeared first on oprainfall.

I remember when I played Blue Reflection a few years ago and I was very surprised at how good it actually was. I often call it one of the most underrated games of the last generation for its amazing story and fantastic style. Needless to say, I was pretty excited when new Blue Reflection projects were announced. I enjoyed the Blue Reflection: Ray anime, and was very excited to get my hands on Blue Reflection: Second Light. I wasn’t sure if this entry in the series could meet my expectations after I was so blown away by the first game, but it’s time we find out.

The story here begins with a girl named Ao Hoshizaki waking up in a very strange world. This world appears to be a school surrounded completely by water. There are three other girls there as well. Their names are Kokoro Utsubo, Rena Miyauchi and Yuki Kinjou. The three girls have lost all of their memories and have just been living day to day at this school until you arrive. Through some events, Kokoro begins to remember a bit about her past, and a strange new place appears in the world. This strange new area is filled with monsters called “Demons” and everything here relates to Kokoro’s past. They decide to travel all the way to end of it in the hopes of regaining her lost memories. She does regain some of her memories, but there are many questions about this world yet unanswered. The girls will have to press forward if they want to uncover the secrets of this world and get back to the real world.

Much like the first game, Blue Reflection: Second Light’s story is about the emotions we all have. As the story unfolds you will get to know a lot about each of the girls and all of their past experiences. Some of these will really tug at your heart strings because the game does a great job making you care about every character in this game. The series of character interactions between dungeons, of the girls hanging out and going on dates, gets you really attached to them quickly and seeing some of their past struggles hit me pretty hard at times, especially with Yuki. I don’t want to go into anymore detail because of spoilers, but you will understand once you see it. I could gush about how great I think every detail of this story is, but I feel like this is something folks really need to experience for themselves. While I think everyone should play the original Blue Reflection, you could probably skip it and still get everything you need out of this title story wise, but watching the Blue Reflection: Ray anime is a must. I feel like folks would have a hard time keeping up with the second half of the story without knowing what happened there.

Graphically, Blue Reflection: Second Light looks great. The Heartscapes (dungeons) are greatly detailed and fit the character’s story it represents to a tee. The team has put a lot of love into these, and it really shows because I felt very immersed in the character and story being told in one. The girls themselves look fantastic as well. Much like the first game, the DLC costumes will add a lot of spice to their looks, but even their standard models are great. There aren’t a lot of normal enemy models in the game, so you will see a lot of recolors during your playthrough, but the boss monsters are all very impressive and highly detailed. They aren’t quite as good as the multiform bosses in the previous game, but they still look beefy and terrifying.

Something I am almost always a fan of in Gust titles is the soundtrack, and this game is no exception. The tracks here still have that electronica sound while mixing in softer beats for the more emotional moments. Some of the battle themes you know and love from the previous game make a return, but there are slew of new ones that are wonderful as well. The music in the Heartscapes, just like the amazing graphics, really pull you into each character’s story. The game is voiced in Japanese and this cast does a wonderful job bringing these characters to life. There is no English dub for this one, which is not an issue for me, but for some it might be.

The gameplay here is divided up into two parts. The first one being, exploring the girls’ Heartscapes. These dungeons are usually pretty straightforward, but you will have to navigate a few puzzles in order to reach the end of some of them. As they are traversed you will collect memory shards along the way that will give you a much better understanding of each girl’s past. There are also plenty of other collectibles along the way such as crafting items and blueprints. Items used for crafting or fulfilling requests made by the other girls, may be obtained from enemy drops as well.

The second major part of the gameplay, is building up your relationships with all of the other characters in the game. This is done in a few different ways: fulfilling their requests, going on dates with them and through random story events. The girls’ requests are things like, make a certain item, build a certain school facility, defeating certain demons and even some sneaking missions. Completing these tasks will earn you Talent Points with each girl, which you can spend on new skills and unlock new events for you to view with them as well. Some events will unlock as you build the facilities they request too. The girl that requested it will usually ask you out on a date. Some of these events are pretty wild since you are building things like beds, shrines, giant teddy bears and festival stalls. Each facility you build will also give you some effects during combat. Some of these are just straight up buffs, but others you may have a trade off, such as giving up 15% defense for 15% more attack power. These have to be activated, so you don’t have to worry about the effect being present just for having it placed in your school.

More Reflecting on Page 2 ->

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Lost Judgment follows the vein of its predecessors in delving deep into relevant topics that affect especially, but not exclusively, Japanese society today. One of these subjects is suicide, and it is an inextricable part of the game’s story and world. If you or someone you know has dealt with or is dealing with suicide, please reach out for help. I’ve included links to some sites that offer support, hotlines, and information.
Suicide Prevention Lifeline
National Institute of Mental Health
Suicide Prevention, Awareness, and Support

Story
The Yakuza games have never shied away from tackling real-world issues and Lost Judgment is only the latest in this storied tradition. But whereas previous games often delved into issues involving the underworld, Lost Judgment sets its sights squarely on issues of bullying, suicide, and where the line between justice and vengeance resides. Bullying in Japanese schools is an oft-researched topic that is still relevant today, much like Judgment’s exploration of the pharmaceutical industry, but unlike that story, Lost Judgment’s felt far more intimate and impactful.

Once again we join Takayuki Yagami as his status quo job of hunting down cheaters is interrupted by a call from old friends Makoto Tsukumo and Fumiya Sugiura. They’ve opened up a detective agency in Ijincho, Yokohama, and need Yagami’s help tackling a bullying case at local Seiryo High School. Happening concurrently to this, Saori Shirosaki of Genda Law Firm is defending an active-duty police officer accused of sexually assaulting a woman on the subway. Akihiro Ehara claims he’s innocent, but during his sentencing, he says a peculiar thing: Hiro Mikoshiba, the man he claims bullied his son to suicide four years ago, is dead, and his body should have been found that morning in Yokohama. Seeing as Ehara was arrested months prior and spent the entire time in jail, how could he know something the police hadn’t yet released? The mystery only deepens when Yagami and Co. find connections between Ehara, Mikoshiba, and Seiryo High – the very school they’re investigating for bullying. What exactly is going on in Ijincho?

One of my favorite things about Judgment was how its overarching story delved into the morality of “the ends justifies the means.” Was killing criminals and thugs worth it if it meant creating a drug that could potentially save millions? Where did personal stakes and professional conduct meet and diverge, and which needed to take precedence in the face of tragedy? What was justice’s role in all of this, if exposing the conspiracy saved a handful of lives but keeping it under wraps could support a breakthrough in medical engineering? It was weighty and thoughtful, and that same care is given to Lost Judgment‘s story, as well. What are the limits when it comes to protecting others, and where does your responsibility end? What do you do when justice fails you? Is vengeance ever the right course of action? How far must one go to atone for past sins? Can justice ever be served if the innocent have to pay? I don’t want to go too deep into it because this is a story worth experiencing, but it definitely left me with a lot of thoughts and no clear answer by the end of my playthrough. I absolutely love a story that can craft an antagonist who is sympathetic and whose reasoning, while perhaps indefensible, is still understandable, and Lost Judgment definitely delivered in that department.

Gameplay
Combat in the Yakuza series and its off-shoots has always been versatile and fun, but the team at Ryu Ga Gotoku really outdid themselves this time around. Tiger and Crane return, along with newcomer Snake. One of my major gripes with the original Judgment was that Crane was basically irrelevant, since only Tiger received any decent upgrades. That is not the case here. Both styles, as well as the new Snake style, have a ton of upgrade options, making the flow of battle ridiculously fun as you mix and match the styles to fit the fight. Like in Judgment, Crane is best against large groups and Tiger is best for one-on-one, but the additional Snake is great against heavy-hitting characters and blockers. It’s also canonically used against the unruly students from Seiryo High who will frequently pick fights with Yagami. It wouldn’t do for our protagonist to beat up actual children, after all!

Upgrades include your typical HP and EX Actions, as well as some around-the-town goodies like a gluttonous stomach and easier trailing. Some of my favorites have always been the ones that let you attack from the ground, as well as crowd control. Several actions return from previous titles, so there’s nothing really new here with the exception of Snake, which prioritizes displacing people and using their momentum against them. As I mentioned above, you also learn EX Actions to use against opponents who are scared, which instantly knocks them out by scaring them shitless. The first time I did one I laughed out loud, it was great. I also really love the point system the game added to battles. After every fight, you earn a certain amount of SP, but by performing specific actions during battle (defeating someone in the three styles, using EX Actions, performing wall jumps, etc.), you earn bonus SP. Not only was this really helpful for leveling my skills, it also encouraged me to swap fighting styles on the fly, making for a significantly more fun experience.

When it comes to random battles, fighting isn’t particularly difficult. You never have enough enemies to swarm you and I don’t recall any especially annoying moves. Enemies guard more than they did in Judgment, but that’s what Snake is for. Boss fights also felt overall easier with two exceptions, but they all flowed incredibly well. Each boss fight also felt very different than each other, which was a welcome change from the usual. Often, Yakuza games have mostly samey boss fights with a couple standout exceptions, but I really loved the boss fights in Lost Judgment.

Trailing suspects makes a return, though with some nice quality of life changes. Yagami will now naturally hug walls and hide behind corners in order to avoid detection, and can now also perform “Act Casual” actions if he’s caught, such as tying his shoe or checking his phone. These are great for if you’re caught out in the open. You only have a limited amount of time you can use these actions in, though, so you have to use them sparingly if you don’t want to get caught red-handed. That being said, the trailing sections are significantly streamlined from Judgment and happen much less frequently, which I was perfectly okay with and welcomed. Instead, the game added some stealth sections, where Yagami has to sneak through a building or around thugs in order to get to his goal. I found these sections a bit boring, but I’ll go into detail on that later. Lock picking also returns and is also pared down to the point that I’m not sure why they included it outside aesthetics, but it also was never more than a fiddly waste of time in Judgment, so, I’m not too chuffed over it.

Yagami can now climb walls as part of his parkour skills in order to get into places he probably shouldn’t be in. Parkour is easy enough: Approach a climbable object and press “O,” then use the directional buttons and O to direct Yagami up and along grippable items. Keep track of Yagami’s grip, though, because if it runs out he will fall. Yagami can also run along walls to cover large gaps and swing from hanging objects. You cannot parkour freely and it’s used pretty sparingly throughout the game, much like stealth, but unlike stealth I enjoyed the parkour sections. They expand on Yagami’s wall-jumping abilities from Judgment and felt like a natural progression of his skillset.

You can also now use Observation Mode on the fly, unlike in Judgment where it occurred at specific points in the story. Yagami will often need to observe his surroundings as part of a quest, but he has also added a repertoire of other gadgets to his sleuthing kit. Along with his drone and camera, Yagami also has a listening device and receiver, as well as his Detective Dog. The listening device allows him to hear far away sounds, the receiver lets him pick up electronic noise, and the Detective Dog can track scents. I cannot stress enough how good it feels to use Observation Mode and not have the camera reduced to a crawl when you’re examining something. It makes these sequences so much less tedious. Yagami also has access to Buzz Researcher, which uses the in-game Chatter app to narrow in on keywords for Yagami to discover cases. It’s basically an expanded version of the Chatter sequences with Tsukumo from Judgment and adds a lot of liveliness to the world. It’s also integral to one of the game’s longer sidequests.

Lost Judgment also adds skateboarding to Yagami’s movement repertoire and oh my God is it wonderful. No more just hoofing it around town, now you can jump on your skateboard and zoom about city streets. You unlock the skateboard pretty early on in the game, and can collect coins as you ride to exchange at the skate park (part of the School Stories, which I mention below). You can’t ride your skateboard on sidewalks, and it’s all but impossible to navigate through Kamurocho, but I spent the vast majority of my time in Ijincho skating about. It’s fluid and fun and very responsive, plus Tiger style gets an upgrade that lets you use the skateboard to smash people in the face, and I appreciate that a lot.

Let the investigation continue on page 2 ->

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It’s time once again to dig into a spin-off title in the Hyperdimension Neptunia franchise. This time we have a crossover with the amazing leaders of the Senran Kagura series, Neptunia X SENRAN KAGURA: Ninja Wars. I wasn’t sure which way Idea Factory would go with this title, but when I saw Tamsoft was on board, I figured it would have some great action at the very least. Let’s see if Nep’s latest adventure is a fun one!

The story here takes place in the world of Gamninjustri. The allied nations of Heartland are locked in a ninja war with the great nation of Marveland. Though they fight constantly, the girls have a mostly friendly rivalry. They will soon have to put aside their differences and join forces to face a threat greater than either has ever known. The Steeme Legion with their leader, Yoh Gamer, has invaded Gamninjustri. They conquered all of the smaller schools with ease and have now declared a “Super NINJA War” to see which school is the strongest of all time!

The story here is pretty much what you would expect from a typical Neptunia outing. The Senran Kagura leaders add a lot of flavor to the mix here, and seeing the two groups interact with each other is a lot of fun. The new characters are a joy to see in action as well, and Vert even finds herself another little sister candidate. The writing team at Idea Factory International did a great job here. The banter between our favorite Goddesses is as great as it has ever been, and I haven’t had a good laugh like this in a long time.

Graphically, Neptunia X SENRAN KAGURA: Ninja Wars looks wonderful. The character models are all highly detailed and animated well. The special moves are very flashy with a lot of great effects to give them weight. There aren’t a lot of different environments, but what is here has plenty of detail so you feel immersed in the action. The only real issue I have during the visual novel scenes is that the mouth flaps don’t match the dialogue at all. This usually doesn’t bother me too badly, since most of the time it’s at least pretty close to accurate. However, this looks like a poorly dubbed kung fu movie at times, which given the theme here is ninjas, maybe that’s what they were going for. Even so, it’s very off putting.

The soundtrack here is very fitting for this title. I can hear a lot of inspiration from both the Neptunia franchise and Senran Kagura throughout. The upbeat battle themes get you pumped for action while there are some more whimsical tunes for the game’s lighter moments. The game is fully voiced in Japanese and the cast we know and love is back to reprise all of their roles. There is no English audio option for this one, which isn’t a big deal for me, but for some it could be.

Now let’s dig into the heart of Neptunia X SENRAN KAGURA: Ninja Wars, the gameplay. In each stage, you will basically move from one area to the next slaying all the foes in your path. The main story missions are really straightforward, but some of the requests you take on may have you gathering items, hitting switches or the stage could be timed. Before you set out on these missions, you will need to make sure the girls have proper equipment. You can equip two types of ranged weapons: Kunai and Shuriken. There are tons of different ones you can obtain along your journey, and each one will have its own attack power and possibly give your enemies negative status effects. Making use of the Spirit Grid system in the game will help you on your journey as well. You can equip a variety of Spirit Gems that give many perks to the girls during combat. These include greater damage, better defense, more EXP and others. Placing like gems on the board in rows or columns will boost their effects.

Combat here is done in the third person action style you would expect from Tamsoft. Characters have one normal combo attack, but, you have access to various Ninja Arts. These powerful moves can target a single foe or maybe even a group of enemies. You can chain up to four of these arts together, and doing so will unleash a Ninja Art Trigger. This will boost the effects of all the arts in the combo, but you will have to plan this out since each art will consume a bit of stamina. The Shinobi Extreme attacks are the girls’ ultimate skills. These can be pulled off as soon as the EX Meter at the bottom of the screen is filled.

The other main aspect of combat here is the Fuurinkazan Drive. This is an awakened mode you can activate five times on each stage. It comes in four different flavors: Mountain, Forest, Fire and Wind. Each one will give you a set of buffs to help you in your quest of eliminating all of the baddies in your path, but while these buffs are good, some of them have some drawbacks as well. Fire is the best example of this. It gives you a major attack boost but your defense is lowered greatly. I used this to beat many bosses very quickly, but I paid a great price if they actually connected with an attack.

The last thing I would like to cover is the Peaches & Cream Meditation Mini-Game. Here you will have to use the motion controls in the PlayStation 4 controller, or L2 and R2, to keep the girls balanced on a giant floating peach. This sounds easy to do, but it can be quite challenging, especially on hard difficulty when the guide disappears for a short time. I found this much easier to do with motion controls over the buttons, which honestly came as a shock to me. Completing this mini-game will give you some stat boosts for your next mission and some helpful items. You do earn some tickets during gameplay that will allow you to skip the mini-game altogether, while still getting the perks as well.

While Neptunia X Senran Kagura: Ninja Wars is one of the shorter spin-off titles, clocking in at around 12 hours to complete the main quest, I still had a lot of fun. The combat is easy to pick up, but has a enough depth to keep you coming back for more. The story and writing are very entertaining, and the soundtrack is pretty nice as well. I do think the mouth flaps during the visual novel sections are pretty rough, but that’s not really enough to keep this from being one of the better spin-off games in the franchise. If you’re a fan of Neptunia or Senran Kagura, this one is a no brainer at the $49.99 price tag. If you’re not a fan of either of those, this one would be good to pick up down the line once you’ve played some of the other games in the respected franchises.

Review Score
Overall

Game was provided by the publisher.

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