chrispy294
BACKER
Scarlet Nexus 2021
Log Status
Completed
Playing
Backlog
Wishlist
Rating
Time Played
40h 11m
Days in Journal
1 day
Last played
January 31, 2022
Platforms Played
I feel like I have so much to say about this game that honestly just didn't impress me much but also wasn't like a huge letdown? I don't know, let's just get into it.
To start with the good, the combat here is quite excellent. I loved mixing and matching abilities from your teammates while also duking it out with foes hack n slash style. The game starts out slow, only letting you activate a couple abilities at a time, but as you upgrade to turn on 4 at a time, things get very spicy! Enemies introduced later on require specific strategies, and it's very fun when different types are grouped together, forcing you to swap through all your skills on the fly. The last level especially has some awesome encounters that really make you feel like a badass while giving a decent challenge. The psychokinesis stuff is nice too, not only allowing you to toss objects at foes but interact in special ways with certain items as well. Add to that special character Combo Visions and Assault Visions, and you have a dynamic, stylish, and fun to play combat system.
Those Combat Visions and Assault Visions specifically come from another system I liked here. Building a Bond Level with partymates in between levels allows you to unlock boosts to their power when you use it as well as the aforementioned extra goodies that add even further depth to the combat. Bonding is done in two ways: giving gifts and watching Bond episodes. Gifts were easily my favorite as anything you give a character, they display in the hideout. By the end of your second playthrough, there's all sorts of crazy shit scattered about, giving the once sparse, grey area a lot of fun character. The Bond episodes aren't too bad as well. These are done new Fire Emblem style with your protagonist and the character in questions talking through all sorts of topics and situations, furthering their relationship along the way. Nothing romantic here, but it's entertaining enough. The characters are pretty much all anime stereotypes and most don't really progress much further than that, but there's enough detail to each to make them enjoyable to get to know. Needless to say, while I liked this system it had its issues.
Speaking of issues, man the visuals could have been so much better! The game itself has a fine cel-shaded style with well done textures (outside a few wonky exceptions) and good lighting. The character designs are pretty fun too. However, the art style and color palette really let the game down. There are a few areas that really pop, the vibrant blues of Hieno Mountain were a favorite of mine, but most areas are so dull, gritty, and grey. It just becomes monotonous over 40 hours, and makes the game look very bland.
This just adds to the fact that most of these levels are not really memorable. Even the few that do pop, don't do much gameplay wise to go alongside it. Every level is basically one or more interconnected corridors with bland visuals and combat encounters sprinkled throughout. Most have a couple short offshoots for extra fights and goodies, but we're talking incredibly basic turn around a corner to find it stuff. The Research Station and Abandoned Hospital probably had the most interesting design, but they weren't anything special. Playing this game just ends up feeling like you're walking down endless corridors going from fight to fight, and it really ends up dragging after a bit.
It's not just the level design that does this either, the game has SO MUCH padding. Later levels are unnecessarily long and a lot of the Phases (name for the missions/sections in the game) have weird pseudo gameplay moments that just add time for no actual gain. This could be either walking down a short hallway to trigger another cutscene, hopping from table to table in a single room to watch multiple cutscenes, walking slowly between every single character to get a piece of exposition from each of them before you move on, and so forth. It's incredibly poor design, and I'm just left thinking what the hell were the developers on?
Whatever it was, it must not have been too crazy because maybe then the story for this game would be fun. It's not. It's not even so bad it's entertaining, just bland, convoluted, and forgettable. You have a pretty standard urban scifi/fantasy anime setup with all the requisite twists and turns. The twists themselves were alright I guess, but they weren't anything to write home about. What doesn't help either is the awful way most cutscenes are delivered. I understand animating full cutscenes takes a lot of time and budget, but man at least make sure your substitute is good. This game kind of goes the same route as Namco Bandai's famed Tales series. Except here with have still images, floating in an ugly empty space, with horribly distracting transitions, and to top it all off, the game consistently layers on and focuses on bland, lifeless headshots of the characters. It just comes across as vapid and uninvested which makes me uninvested in the story. It's a shame as the handful of fully animated cutscenes looked really nice.
I think that about covers it. There was a lot about this game that just bugged me, but it's telling that the combat and Bond systems were strong enough for this to actual squeak into a 3 star rating for me. While there were aggravations, I still generally had a solid time playing the game. In a review though, it doesn't make sense for me to ignore these aspects.
One last thing before I go, DO NOT DO A SECOND PLAYTHROUGH WITH THE OTHER CHARACTER. It is not worth it, unless you just absolutely LOVE the game after your first playthrough. You really don't get anything new from the other character outside a slightly different perspective and a couple of exclusive missions (mostly in areas the other character goes to as well anyway). Event the beginning has so much overlap to the point where the different characters are doing the same thing in the opening chapters despite having wildly different origins and motivations. I get the developers probably wanted to save on resources but it's laughably bad at times. Really, it seems like this game was not given the time and budget it really needed. It's sad, but at least I can walk away from this saying it wasn't a complete waste of my time.
To start with the good, the combat here is quite excellent. I loved mixing and matching abilities from your teammates while also duking it out with foes hack n slash style. The game starts out slow, only letting you activate a couple abilities at a time, but as you upgrade to turn on 4 at a time, things get very spicy! Enemies introduced later on require specific strategies, and it's very fun when different types are grouped together, forcing you to swap through all your skills on the fly. The last level especially has some awesome encounters that really make you feel like a badass while giving a decent challenge. The psychokinesis stuff is nice too, not only allowing you to toss objects at foes but interact in special ways with certain items as well. Add to that special character Combo Visions and Assault Visions, and you have a dynamic, stylish, and fun to play combat system.
Those Combat Visions and Assault Visions specifically come from another system I liked here. Building a Bond Level with partymates in between levels allows you to unlock boosts to their power when you use it as well as the aforementioned extra goodies that add even further depth to the combat. Bonding is done in two ways: giving gifts and watching Bond episodes. Gifts were easily my favorite as anything you give a character, they display in the hideout. By the end of your second playthrough, there's all sorts of crazy shit scattered about, giving the once sparse, grey area a lot of fun character. The Bond episodes aren't too bad as well. These are done new Fire Emblem style with your protagonist and the character in questions talking through all sorts of topics and situations, furthering their relationship along the way. Nothing romantic here, but it's entertaining enough. The characters are pretty much all anime stereotypes and most don't really progress much further than that, but there's enough detail to each to make them enjoyable to get to know. Needless to say, while I liked this system it had its issues.
Speaking of issues, man the visuals could have been so much better! The game itself has a fine cel-shaded style with well done textures (outside a few wonky exceptions) and good lighting. The character designs are pretty fun too. However, the art style and color palette really let the game down. There are a few areas that really pop, the vibrant blues of Hieno Mountain were a favorite of mine, but most areas are so dull, gritty, and grey. It just becomes monotonous over 40 hours, and makes the game look very bland.
This just adds to the fact that most of these levels are not really memorable. Even the few that do pop, don't do much gameplay wise to go alongside it. Every level is basically one or more interconnected corridors with bland visuals and combat encounters sprinkled throughout. Most have a couple short offshoots for extra fights and goodies, but we're talking incredibly basic turn around a corner to find it stuff. The Research Station and Abandoned Hospital probably had the most interesting design, but they weren't anything special. Playing this game just ends up feeling like you're walking down endless corridors going from fight to fight, and it really ends up dragging after a bit.
It's not just the level design that does this either, the game has SO MUCH padding. Later levels are unnecessarily long and a lot of the Phases (name for the missions/sections in the game) have weird pseudo gameplay moments that just add time for no actual gain. This could be either walking down a short hallway to trigger another cutscene, hopping from table to table in a single room to watch multiple cutscenes, walking slowly between every single character to get a piece of exposition from each of them before you move on, and so forth. It's incredibly poor design, and I'm just left thinking what the hell were the developers on?
Whatever it was, it must not have been too crazy because maybe then the story for this game would be fun. It's not. It's not even so bad it's entertaining, just bland, convoluted, and forgettable. You have a pretty standard urban scifi/fantasy anime setup with all the requisite twists and turns. The twists themselves were alright I guess, but they weren't anything to write home about. What doesn't help either is the awful way most cutscenes are delivered. I understand animating full cutscenes takes a lot of time and budget, but man at least make sure your substitute is good. This game kind of goes the same route as Namco Bandai's famed Tales series. Except here with have still images, floating in an ugly empty space, with horribly distracting transitions, and to top it all off, the game consistently layers on and focuses on bland, lifeless headshots of the characters. It just comes across as vapid and uninvested which makes me uninvested in the story. It's a shame as the handful of fully animated cutscenes looked really nice.
I think that about covers it. There was a lot about this game that just bugged me, but it's telling that the combat and Bond systems were strong enough for this to actual squeak into a 3 star rating for me. While there were aggravations, I still generally had a solid time playing the game. In a review though, it doesn't make sense for me to ignore these aspects.
One last thing before I go, DO NOT DO A SECOND PLAYTHROUGH WITH THE OTHER CHARACTER. It is not worth it, unless you just absolutely LOVE the game after your first playthrough. You really don't get anything new from the other character outside a slightly different perspective and a couple of exclusive missions (mostly in areas the other character goes to as well anyway). Event the beginning has so much overlap to the point where the different characters are doing the same thing in the opening chapters despite having wildly different origins and motivations. I get the developers probably wanted to save on resources but it's laughably bad at times. Really, it seems like this game was not given the time and budget it really needed. It's sad, but at least I can walk away from this saying it wasn't a complete waste of my time.