Perhaps it even tries too hard with its story and gameplay mechanics, without offering enough incentive to see the story through to its end. It actually succeeds at that task, at least partially. Overall, Monark does its bit at trying to do something different from most other JRPGs. Especially during boss encounters, where it even transforms into real songs with lyrics (no karaoke, unfortunately). It gets quite more intense during fights, though. The soundtrack too is average, content to stay in the background while the player explores the school. Although, customizing our fiends with different faces and hairstyles is quite interesting. Even the otherworld doesn’t look that distinct. The academy halls are quite bare While exploring the park outside almost gives you Silent Hill vibes, with how empty it feels. Graphically, the game looks like other modern JRPGs – beautiful character portraits, and mostly average everything else. Vanitas does look quite cute when his tongue falls out. It’s a bit complicated, but everything is explained quite thoroughly in the game Especially helpful for understanding the plot is our main Daemon friend, called Vanitas – who looks like some disquieting Persona plushy, and loves speaking with both rhyme and alliteration. When a pact is formed between a human and a Daemon, three crystals (Ideals) appear in the Otherworld: crack the crystal, and you’ll break that pact. The main task is to defeat the seven Pactbearers and free the academy from the Mist, which is actually of their making. Our protagonist is a young student affected by amnesia – a very cliché plot device that, regrettably, isn’t used here in any innovative way. Sadly, that doesn’t always work – especially if you’re trying to save points to unlock more powerful abilities. This means that even if you always get “D” for combat, you can still gain some levels. Granted, the developers did try to make this easier by letting players dismantle items for spirit points. But that’s not the case The number of fights is limited: Once a floor is clear from the mist, the only way to fight is by going to the next level. The design tends to reward players who rush through fights, rather than taking their time planning ahead Or perhaps those who retry each fight a thousand times.Īll that would be fine, however, if there were additional fights, so that one could make up for bad marks. So, if one continues making poor showings in combat, they’ll end up on a downward spiral of slow levelling – that could lead to a lot of trouble during boss fights. Those are usually given after fights, based on how well our team performed. The player uses spirit points, a bit like classic XP, to unlock abilities and level up characters. Even levelling up seems to work in a way as to make the battles even harder. The otherworld does look quite distinct, but isn’t anything that special.Īnd make no mistake, Monark does not kid around with how difficult its fights are. Still, Monark does play quite differently from both titles. Kazunari Suzuki, the designer behind those series, is on the development team. If this reminds you of Shin Megami Tensei and the Persona series, well, you’re on the right track. A strange mist is slowly poisoning the halls of our school, the Shin Mikado Academy, making the students go crazy. After this, we finally find out what our main task is. It, along with our ideals and stats, will affect the various automatons we control, called fiends. That sin will serve as an allegiance of sorts. A simple psychological test then determines our capital sin (apparently, Gluttony comes up a lot). The player assumes the role of the silent protagonist, whose name, but not the appearance, we can select. It features real time dungeon exploration, turn-based combat – and a smorgasbord of characters that’ve gone off their rockets. For 2022, we have Monark, developed by Shinjuku studio Lancarse. Among those are 2019’s The Caligula Effect and 2017’s Lost Dimension. Those that did, however, presented some interesting design choices. Japanese publisher Furyu has long been working together with NIS America, releasing a number of JRPGs that deal with complex psychological subjects of reality and identity.
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