Undertale (PC): This Game Broke my Soul

So I had heard a little bit about this game when it came out at the end of last year. I saw a lot of let's players playing it and glanced it a few times when FunHaus' Lawrence Sonntag streamed it, or when it Ross and Barry played it on Steam Train. Then Yahtzee of Zero Punctuation fame quickly did a review of it so he could squeeze it into his top and bottom games of the year.

It looked OK from a retro standpoint. I dig JRPGs and I heard a number of comparisons to the SNES game Earthbound (or Mother 2 for your elitist types). But it wasn't until I tried to watch MatPat's new Game Theory about it, and at the start of the video he straight up said "Pause this video, go buy and play the game, I promise you it will be worth it". Game Theory has been a staple of my youtube watching lately, so that was the last push I needed. I fired up steam, downloaded, and started.....

UNDERTALE (PC)

Let me start with a disclosure that will spoil my entire review: If you were thinking of, even considering in a passing thought of playing this game? Close my review immediately and do so. Its one of those games that give you the best experience the less you know about it. Seriously. Stop reading and play it. You will thank me. For the rest of you, I will TRY to keep it as spoiler free as possible.

Undertale begins with a short cut scene explaining that at some point long ago, humans and monsters used to live together on the surface as equals. But as is with all things in human history, war eventually broke out between the humans and monsters. The monsters were eventually pushed back and forced down underground. The humans then banished the monsters there and sealed them in a barrier. But the barrier was imperfect, as the cut scene continues to see a small child climbing Mt. Ebott. The child trips on a vine and plummets through an open pit down to the ruins underground. 

When the child comes to, they are greeted by a Flower called Flowey. Flowey explains that when you encounter monsters, you can strengthen your Soul (a heart) by raising your LV (or Love) by gaining EXP. He offers to share his love with "Friendship Pellets." He tells you to move your heart to collect them, but if you miss Flowey starts to grow hostile. Exclaiming you are only doing this to hurt his feelings. If you continue to avoid them, he becomes unhinged, violent, and threatens to kill you.

Just before he makes his attempt, he is punted off by a motherly monster called Toriel. She expresses regret for the flower's actions, and offers to guide you through the ruins explaining how puzzles were set up to stop  humans from entering and guides you to her home. She prepares a room for the child's protection and tells them they can be happy here together. Eventually though despite her good intentions, the child wishes to leave and go home.

Undertale can best be described as a JRPG at its core, since a number of the big JRPG core mechanics are in place. However, its not a traditional JRPG in the vein of say a Final Fantasy or a Dragon Quest.  It tends to be more of a hybrid of a turn based style of RPG with a mix of action based sequences for the battles. Its actually pretty interesting and different or at least uncommon.

If you chose to fight, you are presented with a quick time event where you need to press the button when a line passes through a target area. If you have played any kind of arcade style golf game like Hot Shots it should feel familiar. Or an another example would be Squall's Renzokuken from Final Fantasy 8. It will catch you off guard once but after that its breeze if you have decent timing.

When they attempt to make an attack at you, the game turns into a bullet hell minigame. Like a tiny Gradius or Ikaruga. Your little heart will be in a play area and you will have to move it around like you did against Flowey to avoid getting it hit. Every single monster has a different method of doing this and bosses sometimes have multiple ways of doing it. If you are up against more than one enemy, you have to deal with more than one of these at the same time, making it a lot harder to avoid projectiles.

It's pretty much impossible to not-love Toriel from the get go.

But the beauty of Undertale is that you don't have to fight. Some monsters don't want to. There are ways to show compassion during the fight sequences were you can reason with your opponents, compliments, cheer them, flirt and so on. You will still have to avoid attacks, but they might lighten up, or give projectiles that heal you. If you pick the right combination of actions, you can show mercy and spare them. You get no EXP and won't gain LVs, but you still earn gold. It is a pretty interesting mechanic and really gives Undertale an originality to it.

I wouldn't consider Undertale to be a very difficult game but I did play with an analog controller which makes the bullet hell sequences easier to control. I didn't get through the entirety of the game without dying, so I wouldn't say it was a breeze either. I guess its difficulty is based more along the lines of your tendency to play video games. My only real advice for this game is if you can afford to buy healing items, do so. Healing save points appear often, but it's always good to have a few items on you for hairier fights.   

Graphically, it hearkens back to the retro roots of old. Much of the battles and conversations are delivered in a monochromatic style featuring just black and white. The world maps are all done in a simple color pallet in a classic 8 bit style. Everything about Undertale's design choices make it feel like it was designed to be on home an original NES. That said, many of the sprites are very well designed and somehow show an incredible level of detail to the characters while at the same time feel incredibly minimalist. Simply put: World maps are on NES, Fights and Conversations are on Game Boy.

Undertale is engaging because of the duality of its complexity. On the surface of the game, everything for the most part seems straight forward. Go through the maps, complete the puzzles, deal with fights and progress to the end. But a lot of games brag about every choice you make in the game matters but what that really means are you good or evil. Undertale feels like it actually does matter with every little decision you make, because choosing to fight or spare certain things does effect battles later on.

Most of the maps have some kind of puzzle you need to do to unlock the next room and proceed along. Most of these are not truly mind bending, so you won't need an advanced degree to get through them. I wouldn't consider them too easy, but they won't bring your game to stop either. Some of them can be completed in a hilarious fashion. It does just enough to keep each room interesting without it needing to resort to a JRPG random encounter grindfest. On top of that there area handful of hidden and missable areas so its not a linear slog forward either.

Just one of Undertale's may puzzles just breaking my brain.

The music in this game is absolutely exceptional. As you would expect from its visual style, the music features and an impressive arrangement of chiptune style retro music. Each of them clearly designed for their specific locations and characters. I've rambled about this before but one of the best selling experiences for me is a well executed musical score, and not a single song in this whole game feels out of place.

I honestly cant think of an RPG I've played where every single boss got their own specific boss fight music, but that happens in Undertale and the game is better off for it. Each one of them makes each boss fight feel special. Each location's song feels appropriate for the setting and scene its being presented. It all just feels... I dunno, right? I would love to go into it more, but to be fair to you I really shouldn't. I will just say that the music completely nails it on all fronts from introduction to final boss.

Even better is on top of the soundtrack being exceptionally good, people have wasted no time at all picking up their instruments and making equally good covers of the Undertale soundtrack. I would like to give special mention of Youtuber RichaadEB. I recently discovered him for his amazing metal covers of songs from Chrono Trigger and around this time, he was producing a number of covers from Undertale. Which ultimately got produced in collaboration album with Ace Waters in an Undertale cover album called Determination. It's a fantastic album and has been on loop in my car for days.

I fucking love these characters. Almost every single one of them has some hilarious trait that makes them a fantastic character. Toriel paints herself as a sweet motherly type right from the onset. Papyrus is such an innocently goofy tryhard its impossible not to laugh when he talks. Alphys really hits close to home as a socially awkward anime loving shut in. I can go on. Even all of the monsters have a unique charm to them which is what makes actions you take in fights so much more satisfying.

But its strongest selling point, is Undertale's storytelling. Literally from the very first fight of the game, its already got you emotionally invested. From the moment Flowey starts to lose his cool to your initial conversations with Toriel, you become attached. It paints a clear picture that this is character that wants to care for you, wants you to be safe, and happy. I would be lying if I said I didn't hesitate leaving, even though it's what has to happen for the game to progress.

And the game doesn't throw that option to not fight in there for no reason. They couldn't have. So when I started the game I opted to see if I could get through the game without actually fighting. This is certainly not an easy thing to do, and it is kinda cheeky and funny for all the random battles you come across. Some of the reactions of the monsters are downright silly.

You and me both, Moldbugg.

But then there are boss fights. A lot of these characters make multiple appearances as you play through the game. And as you progress through the story you learn about some of their dreams, their conflicts, and how you as a human relate to the story. And as the fights shake out many of them will try to rationalize why you have to fight, and become confused and distraught about having to do so. It's these moments in the game where the game really shines.

During the earlier moments of the game you get into a conflict with a character. They insist that you have to fight to prove you are ready, but if you continue to abstain they being to plead with you about how it isn't the right course of action, begging you to stop making things so difficult. It was heart wrenching and the game had barely started yet.

Some characters know they have to fight you, but have come to find out that they'd rather be your friend, so as you battle them they continue to monologue their conflict about their relationship with you vs the dream they aspire to have, and with each line they spout they just affirm to me that they really aren't bad or evil at all. Which just makes me want to figure out the correct pattern to spare them.

The game can shift from cheeky fun to intense in a flash.

By the end of the game, when all the stakes were at their highest, I was playing the game on a livestream with a couple of very cool random people. And they watched me, trying to laugh off the incredible tense situation of two people very much not wanting to fight one another, and not so subtly wiping tears forming in the corners of my eyes. It was utterly soul cleaving and amazing at the same time. I was constantly being twisted and pulled, and it took real effort to commit to the path I chosen to take.

I don't like to use this Tumblr-esq term that a few people in my chat used, but this is a game that is designed to make you experience "the feels". I did. BOY did I. For nearly 6 hours I streamed that game, unable to put it down. Shifting from hysterical laughter to near open weeping sadness. Playing Undertale was easily the hands down most emotionally exhausting experiences I have ever had playing a video game, and I honestly mean that. I usually reserve that for the endings of big stories like the tragic ending of Final Fantasy X or the satisfyingly happy ending of Infinite Undiscovery. MatPat from Game Theory was right. It is just something you have to experience for yourself.

But if there is anything to seal my opinion on this game its this: when I do a review, just before I close out with my final thoughts I go over the aspects of the game that I didn't like. As I have said a million times, there is no such thing as a perfect game.. But after wracking over it for days, I am incredibly hard pressed to find any major faults with this game. Hell, the best I can do are nitpicks at best.

I didn't care for the sprite of the main character. Striped shirt and bobbed hair looks goofy in 8 bit format, sadly this was the main factor for me taking so long to try it and that is hypocritical of me because I tend to be a huge advocate that graphics don't make a game. As I said above, outside of the main character sprite, I pretty much love the design of everything else.

Perhaps maybe the game length, but I played it for almost 12 hours and I know that there is are two major endings and a bunch of neutral endings to get. It's only 10 dollars AND I got it on sale, so I can't complain about the price to time difference. Maybe there are too few fight encounters, but honestly it felt like the right amount to me for the length of the story. It never felt like a grind.

And maybe some more efficient fast travel system in the game would have been nice, but ultimately unnecessary since the only time I needed to was at the end of the game where you have the option backtrack.

That's it. That is quite literally all I can think of to possibly gripe about with Undertale. It is a practically flawless gaming experience, and that is not something I say lightly. Even the games I froth over ravenously like Dark Souls, Persona 4, or Disgaea I still have no shortage of complaints to make. Undertale just doesn't have them. I went into Undertale not knowing what to expect, and got completely and utterly rocked in the process.

I don't know what else I can say about it. It quite literally delivered to me on any front of gaming critique I could possible make. After 12 hours of play I laughed hysterically, got angry, cried (yes, cried. Fuck you.), was shocked, stunned, and as I've said before was left completely emotionally exhausted yet satisfied. If I had reviewed Undertale closer to when the game came out, I would be hard pressed to not give it the award for game of the year. It was that good.

If you don't like to game on PC? Sack up and fucking deal with it. Download steam, make an account, purchase Undertale for 10 bucks or less, clear some time and play Undertale. It  has the full force of the hype machine completely around it and it deserves every bit of it. If you enjoy video games in any capacity at all, you fucking OWE IT TO YOURSELF to play Undertale. It is absolutely an experience that you shouldn't pass up. You will not regret it. Trust me.

And when you finish it, you can be sure to let me know how right I was.

Undyne, you were killing me at the end of the game.

Senran Kagura: Shinovi Versus (Vita): It's actually about ethics in ninjitsuism.

Right, So then. I bought this Vita because I totally wanted a Vita, and not because I'm not a spineless individual with no willpower who couldn't resist the urge of a new Persona 4 spin off, even if it was a dancing game.  But regardless of what ever sound reasoning I had used to purchase the system, I now own one and needed to buy some games for it.

I kept picking this game up and snerking at it because it looked as fan service-y as the cover made it appear, so I never gave it an honest thought. But I did catch a couple of seconds of the footage of the upcoming PS4 version of the game, and surprisingly I got more interested in the game. Dragon Quest: Heroes let me know I could like the hacky-slashy brawler "warriors" style grind if it was done properly, so why not actually give this game a shot before I spend on a full priced PS4 version of the game. So I wore a long coat, hat, shades, and scarf that covered my face and waited for the store to empty out so I could pick up a copy of......

SENRAN KAGURA: SHINOVI VERSUS(Vita)

So I'm late to the party on this one so I'll try to summarize as best I can. This edition of the game is a sequel to Senran Kagura Burst, which I believe is the 2nd game in the series on 3DS.  The premise of this universe that there are a number of academies that students attend like normal students, but a select few are chosen in secret to be trained as Shinobi.

Each school has their own philosophy as they train their shinobi to follow specific paths, Hanzo Academy representing good (and where you find series protagonist Asuka and her team), and the Hebjio Clandestine Girls Academy which allows their Shinobi to travel a darker path of evil. During the course of the story, the Hebijo team issues a challenge to the girls of Hanzo to a Shinobi Battle Royale, where the winning team earns the right to burn the opposing school to the ground.

But during the early confrontations, a third academy makes themselves known. Gessen Girls academy was founded by a rogue Hanzo instructor who is technically a good ninja, but does so to the extreme of trying to purge the evil shinobi, as opposed to striking a balance and co-existing with them. With all these players in place, it becomes an all out battle royale of ninja girls with individual motivations for fighting to save their school.

Okay, so plots really don't get much more anime than this. Three different schools training ninja girls out of high school students. It's absolutely as ridiculous as it sounds. The stories are somewhat delivered in visual novel style that Japanese developers love. If you think Disgaea you would have an idea of what I am talking about. In a number of scenes you will see the rendered character models with a couple of animations to deliver certain queues home. These are only in the main school story quests where this happens though. The character quests have no rendered models and are just done with text.

There is actually a massive abundance of story in this game. Because when you choose a school to play as, you get to also chose a character. When you go into that schools story mode you then get to opt to play through an individual characters story which helps explains their motivations and character traits {sometimes}, or you can play the school story mode which you could consider to be the main story of the game.

The character stories are typically a lot more tongue and cheek the main story. For example, Katsuragi is Hanzo's heavy hitter using big walloping melee kicks. The problem is, she is also the team's pervert. So in her personal story mode, you find that one of her primary motivations is to be the best at sexual harassment of all the schools. But her teammates have become so used to her groping their tits that they don't react and its not fun for her anymore. So she goes out to find other girls to fondle. It ends with her finding another character as perverted as she is and they have this epic rivalry form to see who can out grope each other. This is an actual story plot line in the game.

But when you play the main school story, while that personality is still there you find out both of her parents are shinobi who are current rogue and on the lam. They have been protecting Katsuragi from the shadows but things have finally caught up with them, so Katsuragi strikes a deal with her pursuers that if her school can be successful in the Shinobi Battle Royale, her parents can go free. It is a lot more serious, and more believable motivation for the characters. Which makes the whole thing feel bizarre that both these angles come from the same character.

Literally the reward for beating Katsuragi's character story. It's deep and meaningful.

The problem with this is there amount of characters in this game are fucking bonkers. Each school has 5 playable characters all of them with different kinds of weapons. So that means for me to get through the entire games story mode, I have to play through 5 characters individual stories (roughly 5 to 6 levels each) AND their schools story more for another 5 or so levels three different times. Not only that but I believe I saw that there is a returning 4th team that also becomes playable as well. How much time do you think I have, Senran Kagura?!

Levels in this game are usually broken down into two specific types. Either A: Get flooded by waves of generic baddies for you to dispatch a la Dynasty Warriors before fighting the specific rival of said level, or B: the level is just the specific rival straight up in a one on one fight. Sometimes after dispatching a wave of baddies I have to run to a new area of the map, but it doesn't feel like there is any real reason for it other than to do it. Platforming as not really been a factor in this game in any real capacity, so to that extent its kind of a let down. It's really just arenas to smash enemies. Dragon Quest Heroes did this same thing.

Thankfully, movement and combat is fast. which is a must for a ninja game.

So when I play an action game of this variety I have a few simple pre-requisites. Is the combat fast and fluid, does it have skillful combos or just button mashing, and is the combat fun to do? The first of these is most important because I'm playing fucking ninja girls, so if the combat is slow then this game is already a dud. Thankfully this game is every bit as fast paced as it should be. Even the slow hard hitting characters still move with a relative speed about them so they aren't so much unplayable. Although they do tend to be my least favorite to use.

The comboing however is more up for debate. When you start as a new level one character, your combos are pretty limited. Basically you mash your light attack to set up a heavy and if you time the heavy right you blast a number of enemies away. But as you begin to level, your attack types change a little and it alters the combo somewhat, landing your heavy in a different part of the lights changes the finishing heavy. You also have an ability to flurry after a heavy which basically lets you dash after an enemy or enemies you knocked away to follow them with another face paced aerial combo. It's a little tricky to get used to but when you figure out how to do it, its fun as hell to keep the nonstop wave of punishment going.

The combos extend as you level, but the core structure doesn't change all that much.

That's not even including the Shinobi Transformations every girl can do. At one point you can tap the L button and your Kunoichi will go into a magical girl style transformation which basically changes them into a slightly different version of their previous outfit. Their health is restored and recovers slightly and the combo attacks change. For someone like Asuka, this can be game breaking. She has dual wielding katanas, and basically the transformation gives her these tornado attacks that rip enemies asunder with a near endless combo. In addition to the changed moves, you can also unload your special attacks for big damage. But be wary because the enemies can do this to.

Here is the problem I have with the combat though. Despite playing with a number of characters each with their own different types of weapons, the combos never really feel like they change all that much. Sure, some characters weapon speed and movements change so you have adjust for that, but ultimately you are spamming your quick attacks until you are ready to blast them off the ground and quickly follow up with your aerial rush. I don't know, the game feels like it is begging for more special type moves to use, something to make the combos feel different with each character. Thankfully keeping your chain alive is fun, and that's ultimately what kept me going.

Dragon Quest: Heroes manged to pull this off by allowing you to use the two buttons to switch up your combos, but you also had special moves you could use for situations that change the pace of the fight. The Bayonetta series gives you different weapons, and using them feels like it changes how the game plays from weapon to weapon forcing you to change your strategy and combo to accommodate for it. Senran Kagura doesn't seem to do either of these and I feel the combat can feel a little samey as a result of it. It doesn't make it bad, but I do think it will affect the game's longevity. 

Alright. So let's just get this out of the way. If Dead or Alive: Extreme Beach Volleyball is considered too fan service-y, then Senran Kagura is pretty much is that level squared. You can beat an opponent by wailing on them till their life bar goes down, but as you fight them parts of their clothes (mainly covering their tits and ass) will continue to fly off in a ridiculously fan service-y close up. If you deal enough damage their clothes blast off of them so they are fighting in their underwear. They will go into a frenzy mode with nonstop chains but now take increased damage. If you can hit a special in that state, it will blast off their remaining undies and leave them character censored but nekkid.

This is also reflected in the following cutscene if one exists, where the defeated kunoichi will continue to banter with their foe as if they were fully clothed with chibi versions of their faces covering the naughty bits. I have to admit that I find it hilarious and creepy at the same time. I can't deny that there is certainly an audience for this kinda thing, but it certainly does make a case for why women might want to be represented better in games.

This is the worst review I've ever done.

It doesn't stop there either. In between missions you can go to the shop to buy unlockables (where the shopkeep also has her own jiggle physics that can be used with the touchscreen) where you can buy alternate costumes of the girls for their ninja transformations. So yes, Asuka ended up dressed like a maid pretty much the moment I had access to it. Shut up, don't judge me. But to push the fan service even further, there is a "Lingerie Lottery" where you can bet an amount, shake for your fortune, and then get a poorly textured new set of undies for your girls to have revealed when they get their clothes blasted off. Ok, so maybe that is a little much.

You have a multitude of costume options as well that you can start changing pretty much from the word go so that also helps. The only thing I can think of that seems to have pretty crappy textures are the undies from the aforementioned lingerie lottery. They just seem poorly textured and look low rez in comparison to the rest of the costumes. but since the goal is usually to stay clothed, it ended up not being a major issue for me. Otherwise the game looks decent visually. There are a number of different environments to fight which each have their own nifty aesthetics, but ultimately where you are fighting doesn't really affect the pace of the battle and the platforming is minimal. The character options are good and they do a pretty good job of making so many characters unique from one another.

There are 98 of these to collect. Because the game really wants to drill home that I'm a creep.

The music I feel kinda of torn on. Usually my reviews break down either A.) an amazingly well complimentary score. or B.) unoriginal lifeless music to fill the dead air that you probably won't remember. Shinovi Versus seems to fall in the middle of these two areas. I couldn't hum a note of the combat music because I'm to focused on the battle to listen. The main theme is pretty anime rock so that was good. There is some wonky character story music that comes up kind of often that you could consider notable I guess, but its not good. Music really isn't this games strongest selling point. 

There are a couple of small issues that I have with the game. First of course is the story. Now I'm not about to sit on here and shit on the game for having a goofy sense of character stories where its basically just an excuse to treat the player with another fan service-y image like one of the girls deep throating a polish kielbasa or something (I'm not entirely sure that's not actually in there). That's just what this game is so I expect it at this point.  The problem I have is if you are going to do the visual novel thing, the dialog and text have to be quick and punchy and entertaining. To go back to the Disgaea example, they are very good at this. Get your plot out, follow it with a joke, get me back into the game.

It does suffer from the problem of too much fucking text sometimes. There is actually a massive abundance of story in this game. Because when you choose a school to play as, you get to also chose a character. When you go into that schools story mode you then get to opt to play through an individual characters story which helps explains their motivations{sometimes}, or you can play the school story mode, which you could consider to be the main story of the game.

One of the biggest storytelling problems this game has, and more so in the individual character quests is some of the story dialog takes place during the level. So trying to catch the small text in a game where there are lots of character models flying around an a relatively high speed while at the same time trying to pay attention to my HUD and execute combos more often then not means I am missing a portion of the story when it is delivered. Thankfully the character stories tend to be less important so I don't as much worry about missing them.

Shinovi Versus makes the mistake of giving me literally whole screens of text. Just barfing un-narrated text at me without any character animation (or sometimes even a character on screen) of exposition. This is not a good way to do because eventually eyes gloss over and you just start skimming the text or skipping it entirely. In a story mode, that's a problem. Persona 4 Arena/Dancing all Night did it that way and as much as I love it, that's not a good way to deliver on the story. Lost Odyssey did this even worse and those screens were actual very important story exposition. It needs to be quick and punchy.

Sometimes you will get like 15 of these in a row, which is horrendous.
And apparently, modesty isn't much a value in this series.. 

The other issue I had is that I felt that the game was a little too easy. Now you can increase the difficulty before you start a level so I think for the remainder of the game I am going to do that now that I know the controls. But if the combat starts to feel a little samey and levels are too easy then that is just a recipe for disaster. I think out of the levels I have played I only really struggled with one particular fight and even then I haven't lost. 

What could be the game's biggest saving grace is the one mode I haven't played yet. Shinovi Versus features an online multiplayer mode. I know, I know, I bitch about multiplayer games all the time because online gamers are the scum of the planet. But this is case where I think it would give the game the challenge it needs. You can play versus in one on one battles or two on two teams. And there is also a co-op panty raid mode (I'm really starting to hate writing about this game) where you basically are on a race to collect them as they fall from the sky.

The moment you unlock this, there is no reason not to spam it.

I find myself thinking about the anime High School of the Dead when I think of something to compare this to. That show had a simple zombie premise, and interesting cast of characters, and really fun and dramatic combat sequences. But then in the middle of of all the fun action, there would be a super close up of a upskirt crotch shot, or slo-mo bullet time sequence going through a pair of boobs. Why? The show was good enough on its own, it didn't need the fan service breaking me out of an action scene to let me know boobs and vaginas exist.

And that's what I feel about Senran Kagura: everything about this series from what I can tell works great, plays great, and looks great. But if all the fan service that is in there was removed, I don't think it would impact the quality of the game without it being there. It would probably add some legitimacy to the story and situations playing out. Thankfully the majority of the cutscenes in battle are skippable so you can just mash X to get right back into the fight.

Senran Kagura: Shinovi Versus was my first taste of this installment. I got the game used and played it for a number of weeks. That's usually a pretty good sign as far as its play-ability goes. But I would be lying if I didn't feel like an absolutely creep while I played it. This is game that has literally no shame about what it is and proudly flaunts that fact. If you are looking for a game that is going to give you serious character development with a rich storyline in a complex universe? It might be in there somewhere, but Senran Kagura probably is not what you are looking for.

But if you are looking for a fast paced hack and slash brawler that doesn't take itself too seriously, that plays very competently and is fun to plunk down short term plays with, then Shinovi Versus delivers on that front. For all of the ragging of this game I did in this review, ultimately I enjoyed the time I spent with it and will probably go back to play more when I have time to kill. If they develop more on polishing the storytelling, game modes, and tweak combat some more I might be pretty excited to try the PS4 version of the game when It finally comes stateside. So if you are upset Dead or Alive Volleyball 3 isn't coming to the U.S. then maybe Senran Kagura: Shinovi Versus will scratch that itch for ya.

Now I feel I should play Beyond Good and Evil to balance this out. 

Disgaea 5: Alliance of Vengeance - A Contender for Overlord, Plip!

Edit: This review was done months ago, but I've been two flippin' lazy to screen shot images for it. Sorry for the delay.

It's already been well documented but if I was forced to list my favorite franchise of all time, you can bet your ass that the Disgaea franchise would be up there with the best of them. It's been a bit over a year since our last installment of this series (Disgaea D2), and while I had some lukewarm feelings to the necessity of it, I still enjoyed my experience with it.

It's been a number of years since the last numbered installment way back in Disgaea 4, but if you go back to that very vintage review of mine, you can see that I felt it was a return to form, being the that game I have liked the most since the original. This series has been consistent since its inception, but now we have our first shiny PS4 edition of the game. How will it hold up the legacy before it?

DISGAEA 5: ALLIANCE OF VENGEANCE(PS4)

Our tale opens up with us learning that there is a fierce demon emperor by the name of Void Dark, who is assembling a massive army of demons called "The Lost". Like an unstoppable wave, the Lost have been rolling through the Netherworlds either subjugating them to the Lost army or destroying them outright.

Here we find an Overlordess named Seraphina who is currently in the midst of battle with the Lost in the midst of an assassination plan to kill Void Dark. Before her forces start to get overwhelmed, a lone demon named Killia takes a seat in the middle of the battlefield and begins to eat a meal. When the Lost try to attack him, Killia dispatches them with incredible ease.

Serphina quickly becomes enamored with him and tries to use her Balor Gaze overload ability to subjugate him and make him her servant. When it doesn't work, she somehow becomes even more enthralled with him and begins to follow him as they reveal they both are out to defeat Void Dark. They don't know it yet, but this will be the seed that beings to form the Rebel Alliance of Overlords to take the fight to overthrow Void Dark.

It was interesting to see that Disgaea of all series decided to take on a theme of revenge and vengeance for its major plot points considering the very tongue and cheek nature of this franchise. I was concerned that they were going to go full serious with the story. The series always manages to have its serious moments but it manages to do so while still be amusing. Thankfully, as I played through it didn't really take long to show that despite the theme, the cheeky nature of the dialog wasn't going to be absent this time around. 

I kind of have split feelings on the cast this time around at the start of the game. This is usually a contested point in almost every version of Disgaea because there is always some really strong characters, and always some really weak ones. Disgaea 1 had Laharl but it also had Captain Gordon. Disgaea 2 had Rozalyn but it also had Tink, and so forth.

Disgaea 5 however seems to revolve around six major characters. Killia can be considered the hero, but he's kind of the cold stoic emotionless type. He's a deeply conflicted character, but his delivery always feels kind of monotone and flat. Seraphina kind of fills our Etna role, as she's the posh and pampered overlord of the wealthiest Netherworld, who abuses and underpays her prinnies. They are both great characters because they tend to compliment each others nature, I just wish Killia had more range.

Then you guys like Christo, Zeroken, and Red Magnus. Each of them falling into their own kind of anime trope. Christo is the tactician so its hard to know if he can be trusted, Zeroken reminds me of Axel in the way he jumps in like he's bad ass and ends up getting squashed. Then we have Red Magnus, who quite literally yells all of his lines, which is bad enough but when you realize almost all of his dialog is basically just citing the mid 90's version of the Rock from WWE, it becomes cringe worthy. None of them are grossly horrible I guess, but some are more likable than others.

But the best character, hands down, is Usalia. She's basically a bunny demon from the Netherworld TotoBunny, who is cursed to eat the food she hates the most: Curry. If she doesn't she basically turns into a berserker version of a were-bunny and pretty much can shred her opponents to bits. She's out for vengeance because she witnessed both her parents get murdered, but through it all she is a sweetheart to everyone and cute as a button. It was impossible for me to not love Usalia. Even though she is a monster type character which I never use, I had to because she was too great to be riding my bench.

She's a demon bunny who loves curry and blows up a planet with a giant prinny.
How can you NOT love Usalia?

This leads to my problem with the characters, because on top of having 6 major protagonists and 3 major villains, in addition to that every time you beat a Netherworld (read stage/chapter) their respective overlord joins you, basically adding another monster type to your party and taking up another spot. This annoyed me because I already have a list of created characters I made that are barely getting used because I have so many major protagonists to use. I know you can use up to 10 people in a level, but I pretty much never did.

Thankfully, the pocket netherworld (read: home base) as a number of things you can do with them here. A lot of the old mainstays are here like your weapons and items shops, the Item world, this games version of the assembly for the various things you can vote on. The Cheat shop makes a return so you can divvy up the earnings from a stages for level, money, mana, or skill grinding as well as raise the difficulty. But in addition to these things, there are a couple of new tricks to look at here.

The home base is packed with even more things to do than ever.

Most importantly, you can make "squads" these various squads give a number various effects that can take place in battle, in the netherworld, or through some of the other things you can. Boot camp is great for grinding because it takes a percentage of the experience of the leader, some shops like the Curry shop or the Alchemist only open up when a squad member is there. And then there are odd jobs people can do like the Research Team, where you can send off unused party members to other netherworld to get items, exp, prisoners, and other bonuses. There is like 30 squads and many of them are very useful so you'll want to level them up.

Some of these squads break the game in ways the old Disgaeas didn't. The Assembly squad is one of the best, because if you can max the level of it, everyone in that squad will always vote yes when you try to pass bills for new levels, bosses, abilities and so forth regardless of their stance on the issue. So you just pump like 30+ characters into the group and win bills you have a 1% shot to win by a landslide. In post game, you need the Elite squad, which I'll get into later.

Pro Tip. Putting your strongest character in the Capture squad is a great way catch people.
Using captives to level your squads is a great way to max out the important ones. (Or all of them)

In addition to things like the Item world, they've added a new "Character world" which basically lets you play a Mario Party style board game that if you can navigate to the finish by the end of the level, you can give yourself a permanent boost to some of your abilities which is great for increasing movement, or adding more room for passive abilities. Then you have the Innocent shop, where you can take your subdued innocents from the item world and make them breed and level, making getting that 900lv Statistician to level a grind a breeze.

I honestly could keep going about the various new shops and features you can play with in the pocket netherworld, but that could literally take up a whole review itself. So let's get back to the game. First thing I noted is that this game has an incredibly long campaign. I think before you get to the post game there is like 16 chapters of story each with at least 6 or so maps to fight through. It actually can be pretty daunting because some of these maps are pretty big, and geo panels can be frustrating. But as we all know, the solution to that is grinding for levels.

The character world is a great way to get your character extra stat boosts.
Which I basically spent on movement and nothing else.

And thankfully, this installment of Disgaea knows this more than others, because it seems to be the most grind friendly version of the game. I was late to learn this, but there is a glitch in the game that if you fight an enemy that is level 99, it gives the experience of one that is 300+. So that is a good place to get started until you can unlock the Martial Training levels. These unlock as you progress through the game, and if you can tackle a semi difficult level, you are rewarded a spot that is great for grinding at increased XP and Mana.

Going through these stages in rapid succession with the right combinations of items, innocents, attacks, buffs from the netherworld suddenly doesn't turn the game from a grind to level 9999, but how many times and how fast can you do it. If done properly, there is a martial training stage that is so difficult, if you can clear it it jumps you from level 1 to 9999. This is where the Elite Squad comes into play. When you are in that group, XP is reduced to 25%, but you get an massive increase to your stat growth, and this is where you start building your godlike characters.

Once you start one Hit killing these guys, Grinding is a breeze.

I guess I should talk about the game play at some point. Disgaea 5 stays true to the grid based tactical RPG roots that brought it to the dance, but not without innovation. Much of the mainstay Disgaea battle system goes unchanged from what you might remember. Bring up to 10 characters out and chose your moves and actions before you actually execute them, using your abilities or using team attacks if everyone is in proper proximity to do so.

Tower stacking is of course back and there are a whole new slew of tower moves you can use in battle, but I will be 100% honest because of the grind friendly nature of this one, I didn't use the tower attacks all that much this time around. It is still helpful for giving some of your lower level characters a quick jump, and in the late late late stages of grinding, its probably still a massive help.

In the last installment you were able to mount monsters, apparently this wasn't a very popular feature because they return to the Magi-change system where monsters can become weapons for a humanoid character to use. This of course, promoted my use of Usalia because she turns into fist weapons, which is exactly what Killia uses, so grinding with them increased the productivity twofold. But in addition to that monsters now finally have their own throw.

Even at high level, Enemies and Bosses can be tough to bring down.

Well sort of. They can't pick up and be in the center of a tower like others can, but they get something called Mon-toss, which allows them the basically punch a character to another square on the map. With some monsters boasting a 7 throw, this is a useful way to move some people. But also, if a enemy lands on monster, they are instantly tossed the throw distance in the direction they are facing. so with proper placement, you can move a character nearly across a whole stage before they actually have to take their move action. 

This is handy because it seems like some of the levels are way bigger than some of them need to be, and with some geo effects it forces you to take a long annoyingly linear path to complete them. Some of them forcing you to rely on throwing to even be able to complete a stage sometimes (or so it felt like to me). I thought we had gotten away from that style of play way back in the original Disgaea.

So what didn't I like about Disgaea 5 that I already haven't mentioned. The home base music. The home base music from Disgaea 5 is going to be the song that plays in the elevator that descends me to hell for eons.  I can barely understand what she is singing about. I can't tell if its in English, Engrish, Japanese, or some unholy combination of them. You will most likely be in your pocket netherworld often, so you will hear this song often. For the love of Christ use something a bit more upbeat like Makai Kingdom used or something.

It feels like there are less jobs than normal, but that's ok due the number of
characters the story barfs onto your party. You won't use half of them.

The rest of the music in this game is your pretty typical Disgaea fanfare. Kind of weird sounding future epic style music with some kinda tango-y undertones as I could be describe it. The only song in this game that blew me away is the one for the opening movie, which is also played for one of the final bosses and it makes the fight feel more bad ass. I am always a huge advocate of a proper score complimenting a video game to make its moments more impactful.

And I have bitched about this shit before, but Mugen Souls in all its failures had one really good idea, and that was to slightly animate the stills for emotions and reactions during dialog sequences. it tends to break up the monotony of the still images you see in visual novel style games and cutscenes that have been so prevalent in Disgaea. Almost everything about this game seems more polished up and new, but the visual novel style images make it feel old. It wouldn't have been a drastic change and I think it would have helped.

I hate to continue to beat a dead horse with an adopted red-headed rented step-mule, but this is another example of a DLC ruining what used to be a good thing. All of the old Disgaea's prided themselves on an abundance of post game content and unlockables. Lots of characters to play, bosses to fight, and mini stories to unlock. Now all that shit is withheld because they want to you pay for it with DLC separately or with a 30$ season pass.

And lo and behold, there was glitch for people who got the season pass that unlocked all the DLC at once instead of releasing it overtime like they planned to do. Again showing that the content was created, completed, and locked away on the disc instead of releasing it as part of the package. When will this shit stop? How much more do these companies need to gut their fucking customers out of their money? So now, I won't get to unlock all the old characters because I refuse to be any more for the content that should have been on the disc to begin with.

Characters from all over the NIS universe are available if you are willing to pay for them,
Which I'm not. Fuck you and fuck your DLC.

So by not doing that, the greatly reduces the amount of post game you can play. Now as far as I can tell, you can play 2 post game chapters to unlock bosses, fight a reoccurring minor character, fight Baal, and either play the carnage levels (increased difficulty), or new game plus. In the old versions of the game all the shit that would have been DLC would have all been included as stuff to do. Kiss my fucking ass, NIS.

This one is starting a get a bit long winded so I'll wrap it all up like this. Disgaea is a game series that has always been a model of consistency. It's a game that has been constantly making little tweaks and changes to to the formula to improve things, and have taken things out that didn't work as well. All the while managing to do so without changing how the overall feel of the game has been played. Even a bad Disgaea game is still pretty good game. What it usually hinges on is how good the story and characters are.

And if I can CRTL + B right here, I will say that Disgaea 5: Alliance of Vengeance might possibly be my favorite one since the first, if not overall. When I really got rolling with the story, I found it next to impossible not to love these characters, even with all their flaws. The story managed to get more exciting as it progressed, and all the little annoyances I had with the series (with the exception of DLC) have been polished to a mirror shine or removed completely.

When I finished the campaign story and some of the additional chapters, all I really had left to do was grind my characters beat some extra stages before I could fight Baal. I had other new games to play that I wanted to get to. But I didn't. I continued to grind my way to start boosting my characters, started going through the process of making my godlike characters to stand against Baal. I had to force myself to put it down so I could continue my other games.

It's been a long time since I wanted to just sit and grind with a Disgaea game. Probably not since the first, and that says a lot about how much I enjoyed this one. I felt that Disgaea 4: A Promise Unforgotten was a return to form for this series, and I feel that Disgaea 5: Alliance of Vengeance has some serious potential to be the best in the series. Highly, HIGHLY recommended.

This game makes me want eat curry, plip.