Don't let my playtime mislead you. This game was originally bought and beaten on the Playstation Vita.
Amazing game. Obviously not quite as good as the newer entry, Time Stranger, but a great representation of what JRPG Monster Collectors, and especially Digimon games, *should* be. The writing is mature but nothing special, but it's come a long way from "kids go into a digital world and have wacky adventures", and it's an absolute 10/10 entry in a franchise that was yearning for a revival, especially after whatever Digimon Next Order was.
Save for a couple challenge bosses, no fight ever forces you to use a certain team composition. You are free to use whatever digimon you want. There's two (well, technically four) type matchups. Type, which is Data > Vaccine > Virus > Data, and then three different Element triangles, Fire > Plant > Water > Fire, Earth > Electric > Wind > Earth, and Light > Dark > Light. What makes this really customizable is that your team roster has a massive 11 slots, limited only by the "cost" of each digimon, with stronger ones costing more space, and the ability of digimon to inherit skills from past forms. For example, going down the MagnaAngemon line to gain healing and revive abilities, and then de-digivolving to Kudamon and Wanyamon and going down the MachGaomon line for strong Wind abilities, before de-digivolving to go down yet another line. All the while, as you digivolve and de-digivolve, you will be gaining ABI points, which act as a cap on how much you can essentially EV train your digimon stats. So, more digivolving means more skills and more ABI, which means more stats. You can literally have any build on any digimon you want, especially when you consider most digimon also have a unique passive skill which also usually applies to all digimon in battle as well, such as increased speed or regaining SP every turn. Online leaves much to be desired, especially with most of the fights just being tryhards with Turn 1 teams that make getting the achievements kind of hard (and a big middle finger to any company that ever includes achievements for competitive online play in a single-player game) but they're rather predictable setups so you can usually run an effective counter.
Hacker's Memory is more of a side story than a sequel, and relies on the player having beaten the original game, so play Cyber Sleuth first. HM is more refined, but CS sets up the story. However, your save data is shared between both games, so any digimon or medals you unlock in one is unlocked in the other, and vice versa, saving a lot of time grinding once one is fully beaten.
Yes theres a lot of dialogue. Its a JRPG. Yes theres a lot of mashing the A button. Its a JRPG. Yes theres a lot of grinding. Its a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ JRPG. No there is not an unreasonable amount of any of those three. If theres a lot of grinding, its because youre not doing it good. If theres a lot of dialogue, its because youre doing story missions. If youre mashing the A button, its because youre not facing anything special. Boss fights take strategy, story takes words, and levelling takes planning. You have google, use it. 100%'d the OG (Not Hackers Memory) in around 150 hrs. That included all Digivolutions, all Medals, and all Achievements.
It's a shame that BAMCO is removing the steam trading cards, but like, thats not enough to just downvote a game?? are you an absolute moron? Games are meant to be played and enjoyed for their time, not to earn you a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ badge on your steam profile from buying a bunch of trading cards. None of you bought this $60 game specifically for trading cards, so who cares.
