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chuckroAll around the world, revenants--demons inhabiting human corpses—are causing mayhem. Albert’s parents died of a plague; and then his best friend’s parents caught the plague as well. The mysterious scientist Dr. Moreau claims that he has a cure, if Albert will volunteer for his experiments. Unfortunately, the plague is a front and Dr. Moreau was actually creating the revenants the whole time. When Albert wakes up with a demon named Magnus in his soul, he decides try using his newfound powers for good.
The story starts off trying to be Wild ARMS 2 but mellows into "the power of friendship conquers all, even a demon bound into your soul". Several darker twists the story could have taken are avoided, and it stays remarkably light-hearted given the subject matter.
(Also, credit to them that the title is totally appropriate. This is, in fact, a saga about revenants.)
The equipment system is totally breakable and feels like a hodgepodge of different systems. You find new weapons that have various properties and you can upgrade in every town; but you can also use various "ore" items to upgrade your weapons from the menu at any time. So the theory is that you find a weapon with a special ability set that you like, and just upgrade that rather than replacing it. But that means you end up with an inventory full of weapons you never use. I ended up with two characters using hit-all weapons, one using a weapon that healed the whole party when it hit, and one dealing game-breakingly massive damage.
To whit, the Megaton Scythe (3x damage in exchange for a speed penalty), combined with a Berserk Gem (mega stat increases but auto-rage) turns Julie into a killing machine who eventually was dealing ten times more damage than my other characters. Throw a few strength boosters on top of that, and she can wipe out bosses in a few hits.
The Humble Bundle version of this gives you a couple of free accessories via the in-app store, and then you can earn RSP as random drops from enemies. (I had about 140 points by the end of the game, never having spent any.) I suppose you could grind them and get the experience or gold doublers early on, but it’s never necessary. Even without turning Julie into a killing machine, the game isn’t that hard. There’s also a gimmick when you can earn trophies for dealing lots of damage or taking lots of steps, and characters in various towns will give you rare accessories as rewards for doing so.
The "transformation" battle system is kinda poorly implemented, because the big downside to transforming (which increases your stats and gives you access to more skills) is that you can't heal. (There's also the "synchro gauge" which fills randomly and increases your attack power but also increases chances of you just randomly attacking instead of acting as directed; I basically ignored this mechanic because I spent so much of my time just attacking and so little transformed.) There are all-party healing spells that can only be used when transformed…which means that the user can never actually benefit from them.
There's no minimap, but you can zoom out in dungeons, which is a reasonable tradeoff. There are also several really annoying arrow-floor puzzles, but they all come after you can acquire the accessory that makes you immune to those floors. The dungeons are not particularly puzzle-heavy, but they’re decently designed.
There’s a post-game chapter accessible after you beat the final boss, that consists of an epilogue and one more final dungeon. There aren’t any new stories or NPCs, it’s literally just a second final-er dungeon. Which isn’t so bad, actually, as it means the events of both the “normal end” and the “true end” are both “true” in the game world.
Overall: For all my complaints, I rather liked this one. It didn't outstay its welcome; it tried a bunch of inventive things and some of them worked; and I had a lot of fun snapping it in half.
The story starts off trying to be Wild ARMS 2 but mellows into "the power of friendship conquers all, even a demon bound into your soul". Several darker twists the story could have taken are avoided, and it stays remarkably light-hearted given the subject matter.
(Also, credit to them that the title is totally appropriate. This is, in fact, a saga about revenants.)
The equipment system is totally breakable and feels like a hodgepodge of different systems. You find new weapons that have various properties and you can upgrade in every town; but you can also use various "ore" items to upgrade your weapons from the menu at any time. So the theory is that you find a weapon with a special ability set that you like, and just upgrade that rather than replacing it. But that means you end up with an inventory full of weapons you never use. I ended up with two characters using hit-all weapons, one using a weapon that healed the whole party when it hit, and one dealing game-breakingly massive damage.
To whit, the Megaton Scythe (3x damage in exchange for a speed penalty), combined with a Berserk Gem (mega stat increases but auto-rage) turns Julie into a killing machine who eventually was dealing ten times more damage than my other characters. Throw a few strength boosters on top of that, and she can wipe out bosses in a few hits.
The Humble Bundle version of this gives you a couple of free accessories via the in-app store, and then you can earn RSP as random drops from enemies. (I had about 140 points by the end of the game, never having spent any.) I suppose you could grind them and get the experience or gold doublers early on, but it’s never necessary. Even without turning Julie into a killing machine, the game isn’t that hard. There’s also a gimmick when you can earn trophies for dealing lots of damage or taking lots of steps, and characters in various towns will give you rare accessories as rewards for doing so.
The "transformation" battle system is kinda poorly implemented, because the big downside to transforming (which increases your stats and gives you access to more skills) is that you can't heal. (There's also the "synchro gauge" which fills randomly and increases your attack power but also increases chances of you just randomly attacking instead of acting as directed; I basically ignored this mechanic because I spent so much of my time just attacking and so little transformed.) There are all-party healing spells that can only be used when transformed…which means that the user can never actually benefit from them.
There's no minimap, but you can zoom out in dungeons, which is a reasonable tradeoff. There are also several really annoying arrow-floor puzzles, but they all come after you can acquire the accessory that makes you immune to those floors. The dungeons are not particularly puzzle-heavy, but they’re decently designed.
There’s a post-game chapter accessible after you beat the final boss, that consists of an epilogue and one more final dungeon. There aren’t any new stories or NPCs, it’s literally just a second final-er dungeon. Which isn’t so bad, actually, as it means the events of both the “normal end” and the “true end” are both “true” in the game world.
Overall: For all my complaints, I rather liked this one. It didn't outstay its welcome; it tried a bunch of inventive things and some of them worked; and I had a lot of fun snapping it in half.
