What is the deal with the....I dunno what to call it so I'll just call these things the AA-Anime game. While these games aren't AA priced, they feel like they are made on a AA budget at best. You all know how I felt about Scarlet Nexus, but if you look back you might also remember my impressions of some other AA-Anime games like Conception 2, Ys 8, and Tales of Berseria.
All of these games are technically JRPG's but I've been calling them anime games because they all seem built around that similar structure in which, if I had any knowledge of anime, they feel more like playable ads for a television show rather than trying to be complete games.
Tokyo Mirage Sessions has the exact same feel. A crazy anime premise set up very quickly at the beginning of the game, a build up to the main gameplay loop, and then off you go. What makes TMS feel like most of the other "anime" games is that everything is so piece meal. The world map is just a menu of areas that either lead you to a single room, or a very small "street" in which you can find two shops on, or you can select whatever your active dungeon is.
The biggest problem with the games is the dungeons imo. Usually they are all either exactly the same with different colors, or slightly different (maybe randomized) with different colors. Dot Hack was like this, Persona 4 was like this, Conception was like this, Nights of Azure was like this. And it always feels so low effort. I can partly understand if the title was a budget title, but these games are $60 full priced fuckers. Tales of Arise, Ys 9, Scarlet Nexus, all of them are full priced games that in my opinion don't offer full priced experiences. Everything about the core design here is disconnected from everything else. City maps, world maps, combat maps, are all extremely limited and frankly boring.
Some games like Ys 9 are slightly better at covering it up by changing the location. Sometimes a prison, or a cave, or a castle, or whatever. But the problem remains the same as you zone into the "combat area" the map is very boring with nothing to really see or explore as even the walls themselves are basically barren textures. None of the locations every feel like parts of the same world, and some anime games actually write alternate worlds into the zones to give this kind of thing an "excuse" which still doesn't explain away the blandness.
I brought up Persona, and that is an example of a series that does it right imo. Namely Persona 4 and, even more so, 5. These games do have you go into an alternate dimension and in the case of 4 all the dungeons are just recolors of the same randomized idea. However with 5 every dungeon was handcrafted to fit each dungeon theme. The reason why Persona 4 pulls it off is because the game's narrative is fantastically told, the "real world" is more open even if you zone from spot to spot, each spot has a lot to do so they feel more dense and alive. Persona's cram as much as possible into their limited spaces.
So enough rambling.
Tokyo Mirage Sessions then. It's a persona clone. Except inside of the power of your inner demons used to fight monsters in the "otherworld" you use the power of being an extremely cute popstar to battle monsters in the "otherworld". Each character has a special weapon they unlock which manifests in the form of some sort of warrior (their Persona's basically), they each have an element and a specialty that you can use to combo with other characters to deal massive damage to the monsters. While you don't collect all the Pokemon in the game, they do drop their "essences" which can be used to evolve your weapon into a better version. Which already makes the combat less interested because you don't really have the strategic options that Persona would have with all the different monster loadouts to bring into battle. So instead it plays out like a Pokemon battle with an extremely limited team. And once you figure out which attacks from each of your party members work for the monsters in whatever dungeon you are in, you basically spam them until you reach the next dungeon.
Speaking of dungeons, this game really really wanted to be Persona. So while the Dungeons are themed differently and occasionally have a flavored puzzle, you still will end up in the same hallways with the same enemy shadow things around every corner. It's like a Persona 5 dungeon, but poorly done, because there is not as much thought put into the theme of what the dungeon is about and why it is the way it is. It's just a dungeon, go through it, fight the boss at the end so we can all go the fuck home.
I will say the popstar outfits and the attacks are fun to pull off, despite the repetitiveness, and it is an interesting concept in idea. So far in my 5 hours of playtime they haven't really evolved it beyond evil portals suck out people's talent and there are monsters to fight because this is a video game. Let's just say I'm cautiously optimistic? I do find the turn-based JRPG combat much more fun and interesting that the sluggish attempt at action RPG's from Scarlet Nexus, and I like the themes around the story better. TMS so far is a better game but I still don't think it was worth the full price.
I think that's my biggest gripe maybe. These games shouldn't be full price, because they are not put together well enough to be worth that cost. I don't care if the games are still 60 hours, if it is 60 hours of the same shit over and over again then it's actually a 10 hour game with 6 reskins.
All of these games are technically JRPG's but I've been calling them anime games because they all seem built around that similar structure in which, if I had any knowledge of anime, they feel more like playable ads for a television show rather than trying to be complete games.
Tokyo Mirage Sessions has the exact same feel. A crazy anime premise set up very quickly at the beginning of the game, a build up to the main gameplay loop, and then off you go. What makes TMS feel like most of the other "anime" games is that everything is so piece meal. The world map is just a menu of areas that either lead you to a single room, or a very small "street" in which you can find two shops on, or you can select whatever your active dungeon is.
The biggest problem with the games is the dungeons imo. Usually they are all either exactly the same with different colors, or slightly different (maybe randomized) with different colors. Dot Hack was like this, Persona 4 was like this, Conception was like this, Nights of Azure was like this. And it always feels so low effort. I can partly understand if the title was a budget title, but these games are $60 full priced fuckers. Tales of Arise, Ys 9, Scarlet Nexus, all of them are full priced games that in my opinion don't offer full priced experiences. Everything about the core design here is disconnected from everything else. City maps, world maps, combat maps, are all extremely limited and frankly boring.
Some games like Ys 9 are slightly better at covering it up by changing the location. Sometimes a prison, or a cave, or a castle, or whatever. But the problem remains the same as you zone into the "combat area" the map is very boring with nothing to really see or explore as even the walls themselves are basically barren textures. None of the locations every feel like parts of the same world, and some anime games actually write alternate worlds into the zones to give this kind of thing an "excuse" which still doesn't explain away the blandness.
I brought up Persona, and that is an example of a series that does it right imo. Namely Persona 4 and, even more so, 5. These games do have you go into an alternate dimension and in the case of 4 all the dungeons are just recolors of the same randomized idea. However with 5 every dungeon was handcrafted to fit each dungeon theme. The reason why Persona 4 pulls it off is because the game's narrative is fantastically told, the "real world" is more open even if you zone from spot to spot, each spot has a lot to do so they feel more dense and alive. Persona's cram as much as possible into their limited spaces.
So enough rambling.
Tokyo Mirage Sessions then. It's a persona clone. Except inside of the power of your inner demons used to fight monsters in the "otherworld" you use the power of being an extremely cute popstar to battle monsters in the "otherworld". Each character has a special weapon they unlock which manifests in the form of some sort of warrior (their Persona's basically), they each have an element and a specialty that you can use to combo with other characters to deal massive damage to the monsters. While you don't collect all the Pokemon in the game, they do drop their "essences" which can be used to evolve your weapon into a better version. Which already makes the combat less interested because you don't really have the strategic options that Persona would have with all the different monster loadouts to bring into battle. So instead it plays out like a Pokemon battle with an extremely limited team. And once you figure out which attacks from each of your party members work for the monsters in whatever dungeon you are in, you basically spam them until you reach the next dungeon.
Speaking of dungeons, this game really really wanted to be Persona. So while the Dungeons are themed differently and occasionally have a flavored puzzle, you still will end up in the same hallways with the same enemy shadow things around every corner. It's like a Persona 5 dungeon, but poorly done, because there is not as much thought put into the theme of what the dungeon is about and why it is the way it is. It's just a dungeon, go through it, fight the boss at the end so we can all go the fuck home.
I will say the popstar outfits and the attacks are fun to pull off, despite the repetitiveness, and it is an interesting concept in idea. So far in my 5 hours of playtime they haven't really evolved it beyond evil portals suck out people's talent and there are monsters to fight because this is a video game. Let's just say I'm cautiously optimistic? I do find the turn-based JRPG combat much more fun and interesting that the sluggish attempt at action RPG's from Scarlet Nexus, and I like the themes around the story better. TMS so far is a better game but I still don't think it was worth the full price.
I think that's my biggest gripe maybe. These games shouldn't be full price, because they are not put together well enough to be worth that cost. I don't care if the games are still 60 hours, if it is 60 hours of the same shit over and over again then it's actually a 10 hour game with 6 reskins.
