I all the time wish to see the announcement of a brand new IP. The gaming trade lives underneath a cover of sequels, spin-offs, and remasters, making it laborious for brand spanking new franchises to search out daylight. Natsume Atari and FuRyu’s Reynatis managed to search out its opening, however I really feel prefer it wanted some extra room to develop.
Reynatis is an motion JRPG rife with that fantastic melodrama that makes the style so enjoyable. It’s set largely in modern-day Shibuya, nevertheless it’s a day wherein magic exists. Some folks have it, some don’t, resulting in heavy regulation of its use. Inside this setting we’ve a younger wizard, Marin, who desires to be the perfect magic consumer who ever lived. We even have Sari, a magic consumer who works for the group that enforces its regulation. You may see the place these two are headed.
The participant controls each of those characters in flip, participating in missions that transfer the story and aspect quests that enable you stage up. There’s loads of story to be advised, fairly a little bit of which is fairly heavy-handed…in a manner that JRPG followers ought to take pleasure in despite the fact that it doesn’t include something new.
The fight system, nevertheless, is new. As a result of magic use is against the law, you possibly can’t simply break it out each time the state of affairs requires it. However break it out you’ll, as a result of fight is cut up into two modes. You may have Suppression, wherein you’re totally on protection, and you’ve got Liberation, which lets you assault. Liberation attracts consideration, nevertheless, inflicting bystanders to bust out their cell telephones and report you. So, for those who’re going to battle, you’ve both bought to be fast or non-public about it. Or each.
The really attention-grabbing factor right here is that you just’re compelled to learn to be defensive. A whole lot of motion video games will provide you with dodges and blocks, however you possibly can energy by means of most fights with solely minimal use. If that doesn’t work, you possibly can decrease the issue. That’s a nada in each instances with Reynatis. First, there aren’t any problem settings; you’ll both get good at its default setting otherwise you gained’t play. Second, defensive maneuvers are required to energy up your offense. You haven’t any alternative however to study the proper dodges and blocks with a purpose to make it by means of even probably the most primary battles.
For the primary few hours, this will probably be fairly annoying as you fumble by means of numerous button presses and stick actions. When you get it, nevertheless, fight turns into fairly slick and fulfilling…when it’s not getting in its personal manner (extra on that in a bit). It helps that Marin and Sari every have touring companions you possibly can swap in. This retains issues recent as you flip the combating over to totally different characters with totally different weapons and expertise. Looking for the simplest fighter for the varied enemies will be fairly thrilling.
Liberation and Suppression aren’t relegated solely to fight, both. When exploring Shibuya, you possibly can go into Liberation mode to see objects you wouldn’t in any other case detect. Once more, although, the folks gained’t like this, so that you’ll both have to swap again shortly or discover a good place to cover. Keep in Suppression mode too lengthy, nevertheless, and also you’ll construct up stress. Hit 100%, and also you’re compelled into Liberation mode. It looks like quite a bit to handle, I do know, nevertheless it’s really fairly straightforward to steadiness.
Exploration and fight aren’t relegated solely to Shibuya. You’ll typically have to enter one other dimension—known as One other—the place you’ll battle a bunch of monsters and purchase some useful objects earlier than reaching the boss on the finish. I believe these One other ranges greatest profit the sport by offering some totally different surroundings. Shibuya might look nice, however an entire sport set there would develop tiresome.
The story will get fairly convoluted as issues transfer alongside, and it by no means turns into terribly compelling. I’m nice with characters being melodramatic, however not maudlin. The road between them isn’t too nice. So, gameplay turns into the promoting level, and some points forestall that from actually taking off. The most important of those is the fight digicam, which will be downright merciless when in tight quarters. Making an attempt to keep away from assaults from a number of enemies when you possibly can’t really see the enemies is infuriating. Oddly, though the sport suffers from frame-rate drops when exploring Shibuya, they’re typically nice through the precise battles.
The frame-rate points could also be as a result of Reynatis tries to do an excessive amount of visually, not less than on the Swap. The characters and the environments each appear…off, for lack of a technical time period. You may virtually see precisely the place the visible sacrifices needed to be made on the Swap. That’s not an enormous deal; we’re used to it, proper? However you possibly can inform that a lot love went into this interpretation of Shibuya that I felt like I used to be letting the builders down by accepting their compromises for Swap {hardware}.
Alternatively, the builders let me down with the quite a few glitches. Reynatis froze on me a number of occasions, typically proper after a boss battle, forcing me to have interaction it once more (on the brilliant aspect, I actually did turn into fairly adept with this sport’s fight system). The sport even glitched on me as soon as when merely making an attempt to exit the menu. The UI began flickering and wouldn’t depart the display screen, though I might hear Sari working round beneath it.
So, though I do assume Reynatis is a sport that JRPG followers will wish to check out, I don’t recommend making an attempt it on the Swap. When you’ve got no alternative, wait till we’re deep into the Swap’s twilight and also you’re simply on the lookout for one thing to fill the time main up Nintendo’s subsequent console launch. So far as JRPG’s go, Reynatis is definitely fairly quick—30 to 40 hours—making it the preferable choice over replaying an earlier sport out of your library.
