Mark my words: Ara Fell: Enhanced Edition will be a strong contender for best 16-bit inspired JRPG to come to Switch this year.
Rogue Legacy is all about family businesses gone wrong, and I’m in love with it.
In a year already stacked with a number of quality Switch RPG releases, Star Ocean: First Departure R has been a pleasant, budget-friendly surprise.
Dragon Quest XI S: Definitive Edition is not only a love letter to fans of the traditional JRPG, it also serves as an easy-to-digest point of entry for newcomers to the age-old genre.
Ni No Kuni embodies every child’s dream of becoming the hero – or heroine – of their own fantasy tale, but spins it in such a way that is inviting to even the most seasoned of adventurers.
Does this sequel to the lovable builder/JRPG hybrid – Dragon Quest Builders – go above the accolades of its predecessor, or does it fall just short of that feat? Let’s find out!
Matsuno-san’s 1995 classic tactical RPG has been trimmed up and repolished for the modern era, and remains an essential part of any TRPG fan’s collection.
What Bastion set out to do years ago still holds up well today, although the unique storytelling approach, in many ways, does more harm than good.
Quest of Dungeons might be one of the oldest rogue-likes on Switch, but it is easily one of the most entertaining for the price.
CHASM is the perfect Metroidvania for those that desire a heavier emphasis on RPG systems at the expense of less flair on the action side of things. If you like the more RPG-centric Castlevania games from the PS1 and DS eras, there’s a lot to love here. Lore nuts and audiophiles may not have a lot to get excited about, and it isn’t as infinitely replayable as the procedural generation system would have you believe, but CHASM still proves to be a solid experience.
Coming into Asdivine Hearts, I was cautiously optimistic due to my experiences with Antiquia Lost and Revenant Saga. I can honestly say that this game trumps both of them in all aspects, and is certainly worth the time of those individuals looking for an old-school JRPG that won’t take 50 hours to complete. It won’t be as memorable of a ride as the classic RPG titles we all know and love, but is a good enough experience to recommend at the price given you temper your expectations a bit.
Earthlock does, for the most part, succeed in going beyond its nostalgically-inspired roots.
The amalgamation of RPG mechanics and deck building is sound, although neither component achieves the depth likely to be found in products dedicated completely to one or the other.
Mages of Mystralia is basically Zelda with wands, and that’s not a bad thing. Probably the worst thing about that fact is that it isn’t what I would consider an RPG, but the game was not marketed as one either. However, when I saw spellmaking my mind immediately went to Elder Scrolls: Oblivion and I simply hoped that Mystralia would end up having more elements of the RPG genre than the occasional weapon and resource upgrades. Regardless, I laid in the bed I made and found Mages of Mystralia to be a good action adventure game. The occasional dips in performance, shadow-based glitches, and lack of side quest tracking are minor annoyances, sure, but are annoyances nonetheless. And despite the story being well fleshed out, I found the combat and puzzle solving to be the more interesting parts of the game. Most importantly though, Mages of Mystralia makes you feel like an actual mage with its spell creation system, and who doesn’t want to be a freaking wizard from time to time?
Alchemic Dungeons DX, though shy about difficulty in the beginning, is an enjoyable roguelike with heavy – albeit simple – RPG mechanics built right in to the experience.
Battle Chasers: Nightwar does turn-based combat with a level of finesse that isn’t seen enough anymore.
Vaporum is very much a thinking game, despite being labeled as a real-time dungeon crawler. If you actually want to use your mind a bit – or have no shame in using a guide at times – Vaporum has much to offer.
Xenon Valkyrie+, for the most part, succeeds in what it promises. While the story really suffers from its overhyped, pie-in-the-sky tagline, the gameplay itself is challenging (but fair), and that is coming from an inexperienced/sissy roguelike/lite consumer like myself. Some issues exist beyond the overpromised story, but it’s difficult to fault it harshly when you consider the game sits at only $9.99USD retail. It might not satisfy the most hardcore roguelike/lite fan out there, but it has certainly made me consider trying more types of these games in the future. Xenon Valkyrie+ releases on Nintendo Switch on January 1, 2019.
For me, DragonFangZ is a great example as to why you should not judge a book by its cover alone, because hidden behind the cutesy design is a very enjoyable roguelike – one that, in some ways, challenges a few of the age-old conventions of the genre. The depth and flexibility of the Fang mechanic helps keep things fresh (and your available toolkit vast), and the added incentive to fight out in the open because of the Brave system sets in motion a nice change of pace (and is less claustrophobic than corridor farming). If you can look past the price and the abysmal translation, DragonFangZ has a lot to offer to those that prefer more RPG in their roguelikes.
The blend of rogue-like/lite mechanics, RPG elements, and Zelda-esque dungeon diving makes The Swords of Ditto: Mormo's Curse a delight, but only if you are willing to embrace its zaniness first.