Took me about 22 hours to complete the first playthrough. Because NG+ starts on chapter 2 and lets you skip already read dialogue and warns if there's actual new dialogue so you don't skip it took only 8 hours to get complete again and get the other two endings by keeping a save at the right time.
Very brief explanation of what Fate is for those who don't know, there's a magical war for a wish granting macguffin where 7 human mages each summon a powerful mythological/historical hero who they fight with to get their wish granted.
It's a fairly solid game giving the kind of anime bullshit you know and expect from the Fate series. Saber clones, one or two gender swapped mythological/historical characters, several familiar servants etc. If this is already your thing do go play this since its basically a new good Fate series that actually has fun gameplay. For new comers, it doesn't have the baggage of needing to have previous series knowledge.
Gameplay is good. It's familiar enough if you played any musou but usually you don't face quite as many enemies and the main character, who's not a servant, is appropriately made not as strong as characters in those games normally are to illustrate the difference between humans and the servants. The main character, Iori's, gameplay is given depth with various combat styles you can switch between and spells you learn to use as you progress. He does get stronger and will start to deal with fodder easily however most groups have one or more larger enemies who he can only damage during small opening after they attack or when they're stunned. This captures the difference between masters and servants as well as it can without leaving you with an MC who can't do anything at all. You can at times play as servants for sections or summon them temporarily in battle and they are more overpowered in comparison as you'd expect.
The problem with the gameplay is that having to mostly play as Iori with his handicaps versus larger monsters causes some battles to be more dragged out then I'd like and the non boss battles started to feel repetitive towards the end. It feels like it needed at least a few more enemy types or a few more sections playing as a servant just enjoying the power fantasy of them mowing down weak monsters to break things up.
Overall I came away surprised by the quality of this game. I would be interested in seeing them take another crack at this style of game, maybe in a different setting to mix things up.
Very brief explanation of what Fate is for those who don't know, there's a magical war for a wish granting macguffin where 7 human mages each summon a powerful mythological/historical hero who they fight with to get their wish granted.
It's a fairly solid game giving the kind of anime bullshit you know and expect from the Fate series. Saber clones, one or two gender swapped mythological/historical characters, several familiar servants etc. If this is already your thing do go play this since its basically a new good Fate series that actually has fun gameplay. For new comers, it doesn't have the baggage of needing to have previous series knowledge.
Gameplay is good. It's familiar enough if you played any musou but usually you don't face quite as many enemies and the main character, who's not a servant, is appropriately made not as strong as characters in those games normally are to illustrate the difference between humans and the servants. The main character, Iori's, gameplay is given depth with various combat styles you can switch between and spells you learn to use as you progress. He does get stronger and will start to deal with fodder easily however most groups have one or more larger enemies who he can only damage during small opening after they attack or when they're stunned. This captures the difference between masters and servants as well as it can without leaving you with an MC who can't do anything at all. You can at times play as servants for sections or summon them temporarily in battle and they are more overpowered in comparison as you'd expect.
The problem with the gameplay is that having to mostly play as Iori with his handicaps versus larger monsters causes some battles to be more dragged out then I'd like and the non boss battles started to feel repetitive towards the end. It feels like it needed at least a few more enemy types or a few more sections playing as a servant just enjoying the power fantasy of them mowing down weak monsters to break things up.
Overall I came away surprised by the quality of this game. I would be interested in seeing them take another crack at this style of game, maybe in a different setting to mix things up.