Bumpin this cuz I finally managed to become 1 of the 3 people who beat this game and found myself with a lot to say, this one is a special little game! Here are some scattered thoughts and then sort of an essay I guess? First some specific minuses:
-The game’s first difficulty spike at the third boss is tough but fair, it’s Oreshika’s first demand that you really learn the ins and outs of its fusion system and breed some best in class warriors (with nicely balanced job classes!) for yourself. A late boss that prevents the use of skills (but not secret arts) was also a nice test for the player. But the very last boss of the game is a ludicrous joke of a difficulty spike compared to everything the game previously throws at you, and so, just like with Strange Journey’s jerk of a last boss, I in-game cheated my way to a win with cold hard cash by hiring a couple warriors/demons who could withstand multiple waves of status-debilitating high damage attacks. Previously tedium in dungeon exploration and breeding was avoided because you had so many ancillary short term goals along the way, but by the end of the game the prospect of straight up grinding for a year to ensure victory wasn’t really worth it. Not a good way to close things out.
-The main plot and virtually all of the game’s very repetitive pre-boss cutscenes unfortunately never really rose beyond the level of an anime TV show, but the background story elements of gods and demons traveling between the heavens and earth was pitched exactly at my sensibilities. It’s basically impossible for me to avoid being engrossed in any game with such
a loving focus on yokai, japanese festivals, Megaten-ish god fusion and demon parades, which I’ve been fascinated by ever since I saw Pom Poko’s famous parade sequence on VHS as a teenager.
It’s interesting to see how people constantly try to compare this game to other games in various reviews and threads, because we’ve all forgotten the time period when experimental marquis RPGs were the norm, and the experience of the game is so fresh and one of a kind for those of us who never played the original that we don’t know how to talk about it without contextualizing in some way others will find familiar. So you get a lot of things like:
This game is Okami! With its ukiyo-e visuals, shamisen, taiko and bamboo flute filled music, oni enemies and folkloric story references. Or,
this game is Persona 3! With its time and calendar management, tendency to guide party members rather than directly control them, the same kind of roguelike-like fatigue elements that prevent you from grinding endlessly in dungeons, and a traditional Megaten fusion system with mythologically inspired gods and goddesses. Or,
this game is SaGa! With its secret arts learned suddenly in battle from under the hood stat gains, an HP/LP analogue with Stamina and Vigor, and a less awful version of Unlimited’s reels.
The truth is this game has a lot of games in it but it’s very much its own thing, with its uniqueness in the current RPG landscape mirrored funnily enough by efforts to ensure a good deal of uniqueness and special one-time content in each playthrough. There’s a lot of attention to detail in places you expect and places you don’t, from death quotes that are never repeated, to hidden pre-dungeon cutscenes for those that return to dungeons in odd order, to unique in-game heirloom weapon appearances, to dialogue from onigami that changes each time you beat them, to the weasel-girl familiar humming flower related songs in the spring when you leave the screen idle.
Reading through reviews and threads really made me appreciate the
almost staggering number of special activities that can occur in the game. I’ve heard of people who never competed in festivals or tournaments or betrothed/adopted outsiders or visited unique online player dungeons and lands (which all change each season!), but you can also run into restless spirits of former clan members in dungeons, have weapons cursed by specific demons who you need to seek out and destroy, have Nueko offer to sacrifice herself to give your younger dying clan members some extra months of life, and have parts of your city demolished by plagues, famines and hurricanes, none of which happened in my playthrough.
What it comes down to is that
despite the game’s flaws (occasional repetitiveness, the potential for very bad luck in feast of all demons or key placement, overblown but still valid Nueko complaints) there’s something kind of wonderful about a PSX-era game like this being revived with substantial production value and released into the current RPG market. It’s a game too many people will forget or overlook because it doesn’t check the right boxes for today’s RPG fan, but it’s something I’m really happy to have played and will hopefully be remembered by the dozen or so folks who experienced it.
Also the MUSIC you guys, seriously, it's
no joke. Listen to all of it.
