In Etrange Overlord, many missions have ‘hidden’ optional objectives, which you’ll need to complete if you want to gain more experience to upgrade your Happy Life Level and earn the related unlocks, such as increased weapon upgrade caps. While these become visible after clearing a level, knowing about them ahead of time can mean saving […]
Etrange Overlord is an action RPG with musical interludes produced and written by Sohei Niikawa, the creator of the Disgaea series, whom we interviewed previously. The project is a collaboration between his company SuperNiche LLC, BROCCOLI Co., and Gemdrops, Inc. Notably, the president of Gemdrops previously worked with Niikawa on Rhapsody: A Musical Adventure, another […]
Released back in 2023 (or 2024 for those in the west), Ys X: Nordics was the tenth numbered game in Nihon Falcom’s golden oldie Action RPG series. Having played it for myself back then, I really liked the game and it became a personal favorite despite some quirks that needed ironing out. Not long after […]
The latest of Nihon Falcom’s Trails series to be localized is finally here! The Legend of Heroes: Trails Beyond the Horizon (Eiyuu Densetsu: Kai no Kiseki) is the third Trails title of the Calvard arc of the games. This title seeks to build towards a bigger, grander chapter that’s been coming together over the previous […]
After the not-quite conclusion of the Trails of Cold Steel arc, Nihon Falcom put forth one final game in the Erebonia saga to tie up some loose ends before finally moving forward with the next arc of their long-running Trails JRPG series. The Legend of Heroes: Trails into Reverie serves as a sort of sequel-slash-bridge […]
Many of us of a certain age remember how Terminator 2: Judgment Day shaped our world, only to flash forward and find ourselves playing one of the many terrible licensed games based on the film for home consoles by LJN or Ocean. Years later, Bitmap Bureau has been programmed to go back in time and […]
Etrange Overlord brings together the man known for creating the Disgaea series (Sohei Niikawa), the character artist from Re:Zero (Shinichiro Otsuka), and a wide range of other talent to create an upcoming action RPG with musical themes. We had the chance to play the opening hour of the game and shared our thoughts, but we […]
Mado Monogatari: Fia and the Wondrous Academy is the latest installment of the Mado Monogatari (Sorcery Saga) series, a very long-running JRPG franchise composed primarily of rather cute dungeon crawlers. It’s the series the Puyo Puyo franchise originally spun off from (and eventually far outgrew), hence the presence of several characters and franchise iconography. But […]
It’s time to return to Edith and bear the nightmare once more! The second game of the Calvard arc of Nihon Falcom’s long-running, ever-expanding Trails series is now here in English with The Legend of Heroes: Trails Through Daybreak II. Following shortly after the events of Trails Through Daybreak, Arkride Solutions once again must take […]
Roughly 20 years ago, NIS released the original Phantom Brave on PS2 as a sort of project adjacent to their Disgaea series. It endured as something of a cult favorite, receiving many re-releases and updates throughout the years on several consoles. Out of the blue, however, it was announced it would be getting a full […]