As charming as this game seems, unfortunately I can't recommend it.
I went into this game basically knowing nothing about it. I heard it was Paper Mario-esq so I watched the trailer and bought it on sale to give it a try. I've since played through the main 4 chapters on hard difficulty but decided not to peruse the epilogue 5th chapter. My verdict? The game has some solid core concepts and heart, but simply isn't finished.
[b]Story[/b]
No spoilers: Initially, the story has some intrigue as you explore a new world alongside your mute main character. You quickly realize that everyone else are ghosts too, and there's some mystery as to what happened and why. Other side plot points are brought up or hinted at along the way, adding complexity to the story. Unfortunately that complexity is unrealized, as the plot remains shallow and questions go unanswered.
The pacing of the story is slow and heavily tied to location. You get new story beats as you continue moving throughout the world. There are no side quests or meaningful character interactions outside of the story.
Spoilers: Everything that the story had going for it falls apart before, or by the end of Chapter 4. Firstly, I want to address the pacing issues. Each chapter you play as different character. I like this in theory, but the characters don't maintain contact with each other, leading each chapter to feel detached and drawn out. Any character development for your first set of characters gets stunted, pushed aside, or hinted at with no real resolution. I went into this game thinking it was about the main white ghost, but our character doesn't matter in the story by the end. Starting in Chapter 2 the main character can talk just like all the other characters and their mystery is hand-waved away later on.
The plot of the story is our main character chasing another character Adrian, to try to get info from him. Chapter 1 follows the "main character" chasing Adrian until we're pushed off a cliff. Chapter 2 follows one of our party members looking for the main character, and she gets a whole side story with her brother. Chapter 3 has our characters reunited (kinda), and they continue chasing Adrian. Chapter 4 is from Adrian's POV, and involves us replaying the game from his perspective running away, but we play it in reverse order.
I liked the concept of going through the game zones again in reverse, it felt innovative and we were drip fed more info. However, by the end it felt drawn out and repetitive. The worst part of the story is the ending! There's no resolution to the main plot or any of the other hints dropped as you explore the world. What happened to the ghosts? Why was the water poisoned? What's the deal with the cult? It just feels unfinished.
[b]Overworld[/b]
The map zones look fine, I didn't have any issues with the art or setting or anything like that. I also thought there were plenty of save points and most in convenient locations. There's a nifty fast travel system and an occasional puzzle to solve as you traverse. There are a few side roads here and there which lead to treasure, and a mechanic where you can hide in bushes to ambush enemies and get the upperhand in battle, which I liked.
With all that said, I had some problems with the overworld. Some of these are nitpicks, some are bigger issues.
[list]
[*]At the beginning of the game, you get a dash to help you move faster. I wish this dash could be upgraded somehow, because a lot of the traveling segments are long and uninteresting. It takes a while to get anywhere.
[*]In the menu, there's a map of all the areas in the overworld and list of the main hubs you can fast travel to. The map cannot be zoomed in and there's no indicator of where you are currently. Each area is labeled with some small text that's hard to read. When you scroll through the list of locations, they do not highlight where on the map you're going, making it hard to use. In the end, the game gives you no real reason to fast travel or revisit old zones, so I didn't use the map for most of my playthrough.
[*]The game has a couple overworld "puzzles" to solve. Nothing very engaging. The main puzzle is to light, or unlight a series of torches in an area which will unlock a secret. The problem is these torches are also used all over the place as decoration, so you end up going out of your way to snuff every torch you see, unsure if it will lead to a secret or not. I found that annoying over time. The other "puzzle" is the lockpicking minigame. This was so trivial I wouldn't even call it a puzzle or a game. Again, the concept is there, but it feels unfinished.
[*]Once your team has told you your next objective, you better hope you remember it! There's no way to get that info again. If you forget where you're going, trial and error baby.
[*]Crafting exists solely to make combat badges for your fighters. Almost all loot you pick up will be for crafting. Most of the badges aren't worth making in my opinion, I kept waiting for the game to give me some good options, but they never seemed to come. Also, the way you get new crafting recipes is weird and never explained. There are purple pickups in specific locations that give you a choice between two crafting books. To my understanding, each location only has those two books to pick from, so your first pass through of the zones you miss half the books. The books get stronger in the later zones, which makes sense for the first pass through. In chapter 4 when you revisit the zones, you get the other book, but since you're going to zones in reverse, you get weaker books the more you progress.
[*]Leveling was ambiguous. I never knew what level I should be in any given zone. When I killed all the enemies, I seemed to stay on level with them until the very end of the game. There are no good grinding zones and I wasn't sure if enemies respawed at all until I got to the end of the game (they do).
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[b]Combat[/b]
Generally, I liked the combat system and found the fights challenging. Boss fights felt like boss fights, I often had to retry them 2-3 times until I understood the enemy better and could beat them. The combat was one of the best parts of the game for me.
If you lose a battle, you're given an option to retry it right away, which was really nice and keeps you in the moment. I felt that I became more proficient at combat the further into the game I got, since I gained new abilities and understood enemy mechanics better. Everything felt balanced. The final fights were harder, and I think that's because I was under-leveled and wasn't sure what level I needed to be. I decided to push though anyway and was able to beat the game after several attempts.
There are plenty of fighting characters to choose from. You get some through story progression, and others you can obtain in the overworld through special fights, which I also enjoyed. Each fighter has it's own archetype and playstyle, some more complex than others. My only nitpick with the combat system is that I wish characters had a bit more self-sustain built in.
[b]Misc.[/b]
[list]
[*]Music was charming, I enjoyed it throughout the game.
[*]There were some accessibility options in the menu which was nice. The game allows you to customize how you play by letting you scale how much damage you do, how much you take, general difficulty, and how much exp you earn.
[*]I wish we had a way to sort menus better. New items, skills, and characters always appear at the bottom of a list.
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To conclude, I see this game as one with more potential. The devs clearly had a vision for it, it just needs some more work to get polished up and finished.
