You thought it was turn based, but it was me, DioField

The DioField Chronicle is an odd one among the cavalcade of tactics we’ve seen this year. It’s real-time, rather than turn-based; it’s about tight, compact skirmishes rather than drawn-out battles. DioField mixes wyvern and rifles, swords and ?sorcery??, and even some airships for good measure.

Throughout the 20-ish hours it took me to finish The DioField Chronicle, there are some pretty cool concepts and ideas on display, though they’re not always framed the best. There’s a solid story, but some odd choices in direction. DioField is an interesting strategy game to play, even when it’s not at its best?.

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=16eW4pAJUKU

The DioField Chronicle (PC, PS4, PS5 [reviewed], Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch)
Developer: Square Enix, Lancarse
Publisher: Square Enix
Released: September 22, 2022
MSRP: $59.99

The DioField Chronicle follows the Blue Fo?xes, a mercenary group under the employ of a duke on the island nation of DioField. The island is rich in Jade stones that have magical properties, making it a prime target for?? trade, subterfuge, and invasion from the nearby continent.

Two up-and-coming warriors, Andrias and Fredret, are the c??ore of the story and are soon joined by errant knight Iscarion and the powerfully magic descendant of nobility, Waltaquin. These four comprise the heart and soul of the Blue Foxes, and much of the story revolves around their rise to power amidst the political intrigue and fighting that constantly besets DioField.

Drama is at the heart of the story, and th?ere’s a lot of appeal in seeing how these four come together and deal with mounting tension as their goals start to differ. The interpersonal drama really clicks in solid moments, like Waltaquin teasing Andrias or Iscarion doubting a plan. Each of the characters has nicknames for each other too, which is a nice little touch.

Rising tension

The broader geo?political intrigue, however, falters. It was hard to develop a sense of place, as the world is often only shown on the blue-lit briefing board before each mission. Major plot events occur inside narra??tion, alongside still images, even large plot moments. A few major characters are only shown as undetailed portraits.

While Andrias�story (the player largely plays as Andrias) comes to a pretty good conclusion, the getting-there feels a little hurried. There is a good chunk of world lore in the Blue Foxes�library back at home base, to help fill in gaps. But I ultimately came to just enjoy the infighting, as the bro?ader political story swept up and over me.

DioField’s focus drives much more towards the action on the field. It’s a real-time strategy RPG, where the player deploys four units to a field (eight with their assist partners) to take on the enemy. The system feels l?ike a mix o??f real-time-with-pause RPGs and classic tactics, and on its surface, it works.

The gears of The DioField Chronicle’s combat are really solid. Having to adjust and maneuver in real-time often kept me on my toes, and enemies could do a significant chunk of damage if I wasn’t dodging area attacks and controlling the crowd. Elements like? backstabbing, surprise attacks, and holding chokepoints feel tactically rewarding. While I would’ve liked to see terrain be just a hair more rewarding, I overall like the main concept.

Off to war

Combat is about the execution though, and that’s where DioField falters a bit. For one, every unit has special abiliti??es, allowing them to do actions like stunning an opponent, rain fire on a group, heal an ally, backstab an enemy, etc. All of these skills are tied to weapons, with some universally available depending on your class.

While DioField is lenient with pause-time, allowing the player to essentially freeze the action anytime they want to issue a new waypoint or use an ability, this leads to a very start-and-stop feeling in some missions. I don’t mind the tension of waiting on cooldowns, but a few battles felt like I was storming forward and constantly stopping to hit the ??skill button and use abilities, like a car i?n rush-hour traffic.

These skills are also extremely powerful, at different stages of the game. My experience with The DioField Chronicle’s combat feels best described by a bel??l curve. Early on?, I found that it was pretty easy to clear most early enemies by aggravating them, getting them bunched up. Then I'd rain fire, arrows, and powerful summons down upon them. Easy enough.

In the mid-game, however, new units started to appear. These units had powerful abilities, big AOE attacks that could wipe my crew, and a mix of powerful ranged hitters and bulky frontline troops. Special monsters add in some really neat twists. Salamanders and coeurls have abilities that feel like?? MMO-style attacks. I'd have to quickly re-position and adjust, balancing how I wanted to use my resources to best burn through t??heir copious health bars.

But near the end-game, I was breezing through fights. Andrias could have probably solo-cleared whole maps by himself. Certain characters have a great mix of abilities and natural talents that turn them into absolute powerhouses by the mid-30s, and I was breezing through maps several levels higher than my party. These feel rewarding, given how much investment has been put in. But the ene?mies can't seem to keep up with y?our squad by endgame.

The path of least resistance

The DioField Chronicle has a really cool diversity of options, in its characters and builds. One ranged attacker is more of a hunter, while another is a sniper. One of my magic users?? excelled at hitting as many enemies as they could, while another could gain health while he healed. Interesting choices can be made on who to deploy and where. These compound as you try  to account for having different crowd control effects, auras, and bonuses available fo?r every extra edge you can get.

A lot of that falls away, though, as the game goes on. Cool synergies are nice, but it frequently became a question of how to do the most damage. I don't feel incentivized enough to utilize different troops. The path of lea?st resistance just made the most sense. To be clear, I enjoyed blitzing my way through a map, finishing a map with a par-six minute time in under 60 seconds. But it soon felt extremely repetitious. ??I could essentially stop caring about the bulk of strategy, planning, and maneuvering in favor of my well-equipped squad mowing over enemy after enemy.

Battles are fast though, which keeps them interest?ing and concise. The loop can really hook you in, too. Fight a battle, reap some rewards. Go back to home base, spend it on new weapon development or building out the base. Talk to some of your recruited units, get some?? new insight into their character, and open up a new side mission. Depart, rinse, repeat. I caught myself falling into this loop pretty easily, burning hours in the process.

DioField also looks pretty darn good. The character models are going to be a personal like or dislike, but the dioramic arenas and big, beautiful summon animations are nice homages to the tactical lineage at Square. Lancarse did a good job in making a world that looks distinct, too. The mix of science and magic feels really original, and I like that among many long-running series and remasters, The DioField Chronicle feels like something new and intriguing.

Jade in the rough

The DioField Chronicle feels destined to be called a hidden gem years from now. Despite some faltering and misgivings, I can’t help but enjoy the loop. Sending your units into combat, raining magical power down on enemies as your cavalry charges in and assassin tears up the backline, just feels good in DioField.

It hasn’t hit the heights of other strategy RPG contenders, but The DioField Chronicle shows a lot of promis??e. It’s different, it’s engaging, and it's got a fast pace that moves from battle to battle. I felt like I got a good, interesting strategy RPG experience out of th?is first game, and I really do hope there’s more in store. DioField certainly has the space for it.

_{[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publisher.]}

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The DioField team tells us how their strategy RPG will make a name for itself

With just about a month until it launches, The DioField Chronicle will join a growing list of tactics games launching this year. If you've played the demo already though, you'll know DioField stands out in a few ways: its art, its design, and the way it utilizes real-time strategy on t??he field.

We had a chance to chat with the developers behind The DioField Chronicle, to learn more about why they went this direction. The team did anticipate a few strategy RPGs to be coming out close to this game. And according to producer Shigeyuki Hirata, the plan was for DioField to stand out.

"We wanted to ensure that the title that we would be developing would be a??ble to differentiate and kind of stand out within the pack," said Hirata via translator. "So that it doesn't, you know, get buried within ??all those other titles."

The DioField Chronicle team wanted to ensure that it fit within both the real-time strategy and simulation RPG framework. This would, in ?turn, create a new SRPG.

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=16eW4pAJUKU

A history of war

And it certainly helps the game stand out. In our preview, I wrote about how even in a year with g?ames? like Triangle Strategy already out and Tactics Ogre Reborn on the horizon, The DioField Chronicle manages to fe?el fresh and interesting thanks to how different?? it handles.

It's particularly notable because, when asked about inspirations, Lancarse development director and battle designer Fukui Hirofumi cit??es some classics. He says the team referred back to games like the Ogre Battle series, as well as Fire Emblem and Front Mission, as reference points. But when it comes to the real-time aspects, they looked elsewh??ere.

"But as far as real-time e?lements go, we would refer to [League of Legends] or Diablo for more action-based references,?? essentially," said Fukui. "But we did want to ensure that it still felt like an SRPG game, with additional real-time elements tacked on and a?dded to this SRPG game."

The result is an RPG that feels like both a real-time strategy affair and a traditiona?l tactics game. Pla?yers bounce between battles and the home base, developing their tools out of battle and then bringing them in to ensure victory.

Building a battle

Even while the game is built on core pillars of infantry, cavalry, ranged units, and mages, the team wanted to ensure a level of customiz??ation. Andrias, for example, is an infantry unit that has trained well in assassination and subterfuge. He's very skilled at doing single-target damage and back-stabbing opponents.

Contrast this with Izelair, who's a bit more of a vanguard leading the charge, and units can vary even under the same umbrella. The DioField team wanted to incl??ude additional elements that extended customization beyond just the four archetypes.

Managing all those abilities in real time might seem tough, but that's where the pause comes in. Real-time strategy games have had mixed s??uccess in issuing commands and deploying orders through a controller. The team incorporated a pause, when issuing certain abilities ??or commands, that gives the player a little time to line everything up right.

Summons add an additional layer too, with them acting as essentially trump cards. Game and art director Kumagai Takahiro says the summons can be seen as an homage to all other Square Enix SRPGs, though the initial inspiration was Ogre Battle.

Magic and science abound

The world of The DioField Chronicle stands out a fair bit too. It mixes magic with technology, with science and sorcery playing hand-in-hand. Some mages can call down a rain of ?fire, but there are also holograms ?that pop up at the war table as the mercs plan their next move.

"In general, we didn't wan??t to just limit it to kind of m?edieval inspirations," said Hirata. "Rather, we were kind of more interested in pulling from more of, like, the Industrial Revolution phases, essentially."

This mix of tech and magic?? makes for a really interesting look??, like League of Legends' Piltover with a heavy dose of Ivalice. This extends out from the home base to the battlefie?ld, as Takahiro says the team wanted to ensure that the hi??story and culture could be felt through the environments seen in the game.

The diorama-style view, mixing 3D graphics with a top-down style and?? pull-backs that feel very Ogre Battle, also made it easier to command troops ?on the f??ield.

All of it comes together to make a strategy RPG that certainly feels different from?? the rest. It's a new world for Square Enix and Lancarse to explore, but one thing seems for certain: it won't be like the rest you've played.

The DioField Chronicle launches on September 22 for PC, PlayStation, Xbox, and Switch.

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Storm the DioField today

Square Enix and Lancarse's strategy RPG The DioField Chronicle has a demo, and it's available right now. The upcoming game has an introdu?ctory demo live now on d??igital storefronts for PC and console.

The demo kicks off right at the opening of the game, and up through the first chapter. Save progress will carry over from the demo into the full version of The DioField Chronicle.

You can find it here on the PlayStation Store for PS4 and PS5, the Microsoft store for Xbox Series X|S and One, on the eShop for Nintendo Switch, and on PC via Steam.

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=16eW4pAJUKU

The DioField Chronicle is a strategy RPG following a band of mercenaries, caught up i??n the war and machinations of the politicians around them. A core group of heroes tries to navigate shady dealings and plots while trying to effect change for the better, especially on the island nation of DioField.

Keeping three moves ahead

I got the chance to check out The DioField Chronicle early, and played this section in particular. You can find my full impressions here, but I came away surprised by how diffe??rent it felt.

This year is not exactly wanting for tactical RPGs, with new entries like Triangle Strategy and the revival of classics like Tactics Ogre and Front Mission providing ample fodder for strategy fans. The DioField Chronicle stands out by taking a real-time str?ategy spin on the RPG concept, allowing units to move in real-time on the field.

Mix in some interesting class variations and some tight, well-designed arenas to fight in, and it all works pretty well. The player can even retreat to a home base and chat with allies, build up base buildings, and purchase upgrades, in a very Fire Emblem: Three Houses manner.

If you like a little strategy mixed into your RPG, it's worth giving a shot. The DioField Chronicle demo is ou??t now, and the full game is out on September 22.

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The DioField Chronicle feels like a mixture of RTS and RPG, and it works

Tactics fans are not left wanting this year. From re-releases and remasters to brand-new titles, there hasn't been a shortage of good strategy options to go around, and Square Enix has been at the forefront of it. Because of that, I was left wondering where a new IP like The DioField Chronicle would fit in.

The answer, as it turns out, is that it doesn't. The DioField Chronicle, from Square Enix and Lancarse, isn't a classic turn-based tactics game like Tactics Ogre. It's not turn-based at all. It?'s a real-time strategy RPG, and those two flavors meld together to make a surprisingly interesting and novel concept that stands out all on its own.

We got some hands-on time with the demo for The DioField Chronicle, ahead of its release. And it doesn't take long to get started; right out of the gate, there is intrigue, assassination, and peace broken by sudden act??s of war.

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=16eW4pAJUKU

The story of DioField doesn't stray too far from the usual tactics fare. After the a??ssassination of their friend, Andrias Rhondarson and Fredret Lester set out to become notable mercenaries and create change in the world. They? join up with more characters as the demo goes on, forging a reputation through every battle.

Some of the names are, quite frankly, exquisite RPG fare. Iscarion Colchester, Lorraine Luckshaw, and my favorite Waltaquin Redditch are all so elaborate that they become endearing. (They also allow the characters to fondly nickname each other, which is a fun bit.) As these characters get to know each other, there's an air of intrigue and deception aroun??d everything. Who's playing who, and where does the real power in the land lie? All the while, a larger war looms overhead.

Taking the field

Once the battles commence, The DioField Chronicle i?s, essentially, a real-time strategy game. Your party of units and the enemy's act i??n real time. This is a different feel from other tactics games right from the jump; action can happen fast, and a battle can swing in mere moments.

It isn't quite a Command & Conquer-style slamming-together of armies, though. Micromanagement and positioning is key. Enemies have vision, which you can navigate around to se??t up sneak attacks or ambushes. Aggro can be roughly reset by having one unit retreat and forcing in another. Environmental h??azards, like explosive kegs or barricades, provide interesting nuances to the playing field.

For my demo, I played on the PlayStation 5. I've got some experience playing console RTS games, like Halo Wars. And The DioField Chronicle manages to make the action feel at-home enough as it is. The action thankfully never escalates too far, as the demo tends to focus on localized fights on small maps rather than massive battles. But even within those, I find DioField ??fe??els solid enough to micro-manage my units around in, though I am curious to see how a mouse and keyboard fares.

And on top of this, there are many RPG elements. Every unit has special abilities they can employ to s?w?ing the tides of war. Fredret is an effective frontline cavalry, able to charge through enemy lines and disrupt their position. Iscarion, meanwhile, is an archer. His role is largely to hang back and rain fire. But one of his moves lets him continuously rain arrows on one area, which can really cause damage at a chokepoint.

Enemies have skills too, requiring you to quickly move out of their forecasted danger zones or interrupt them with a good Shield Bash or Stun Arrow. Creating a strategic advantage through terrain or character positioning often made t?hese abilities feel more rewarding, and they also gave me a few aces for handling overwhelming odds. The peak of these trump cards is essentially a summon attack, which you can use after collecting enough energy; in the demo, it let me call on Bahamut to rain ??doom upon a small area.

It reminds me a bit of Dawn of War 2 or Warcraft 3 in its hero unit focus, with a heavy tinge of Tactics Ogre on top. The art helps The DioField Chronicle feel very unique in its own right. Characters have a distinct and stylized 3D appearance, and maps have a diorama look that's reminiscent of Triangle Strategy's excellent level designs. Add in the interesting mix of magic and science at the heart of DioField'?s "Modern Magic," and it's a bit li?ke Ivalice and Arcane's Piltover had a meeting of the minds.

Home away from the battlefield

Between missions, the player can return to a home base that will surface some Garreg Mach Monastery vibes for any Fire Emblem fans. Here, you can build up your base and improve you??r different stations, while also spending resources and points to empower the units under your command. Even ??early on in the skill tree, I was unlocking some cool new abilities or neat upgrades for existing ones.

It all has a good flow, making it easy to get lost in the rhythm of "just one more battle." While the story has yet to really grab me compared to other options, I am enjoying the world itself; DioField's world feels like a powder keg waiting for a spark, and looking for where that will first start off is compelling enough at the?? moment.

Really, it's the combat and base management loop that's got me more eager for the final game. With each new battle, I'm discovering cool new ways to approach battles, and being forced to adapt in increasingly difficult situations. I'm interested to see ??if the arenas themselves add a few more strategic twists, but I've already seen a few defense maps and interactable hazards that have my hopes high.

The DioField Chronicle is a mixture of two genres, RTS and RPG, clicking together incredibly well. If nothing else, it promises to be a different and interesting experiment. It might have been easier to make this a turn-based tactics affair, but doing so would have robbed DioField of the things that make it worth checking out. We'll see if the whole affair can come together on September 22.

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Lancarse's tactical battler has a release date

It looks like The DioField Chronicle is just around the corner. The new RPG from Lancarse and Square Enix has a release date set for Septembe?r?? 22, 2022.

The date was first shown during a livestream about The DioField Chronicle for Japan, with a dat?e of September 22, 202??2 but no mention if that included North America.

Store pages and pre-orders have been going up, however, with a Sept. 22 date set on the PlayStation Store, Xbox store, Steam, and Square Enix Store.

The DioField Chronicle is retailing for $59.99, though a Deluxe Edition can nab you some extras for $74.99. Or there's the $169.99 Collector's Edition set, which includes a full-on board game based on The DioField Chronicle. I do respect the creativity with this ??particular pac?k-in.

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=T62KUVFuLwg

It was me, The DioField Chronicle

The DioField Chronicle is a new strategy RPG from Square Enix and Lancarse. It follows a b?and of mercenaries called Blue Fox, as war erupt?s around them.

It advertises a real-time battle system that utilizes strategy and decis?ion-making about units' strengths and weaknesses.

Plus, it's also got a diorama-style visual for battles that looks pretty great. It's reminding me a bit of Triangle Strategy with its isometric view and shading.

The DioField Chronicle was first revealed during a Sony State of Play in March, alongside another Square Enix game Valkyrie Elysium. That new Valkyrie game has been locked in for a?? September 29 date for PlayStation platforms, with a PC launch coming later on November 11.

It looks like between those two games and the Crisis Core remaster, Square Enix has a good amount of games ?in store for the months ahead.

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Rise and grind

Monark starts off with very little preamble. Within about ten or so minutes, you're already battling??, already meeting major characters, and already seeing some dark story developments. It starts out with a lot of great ideas.

The disappointing part of Monark is th??at it struggles to keep that initial luster over the course of its run. It has some real great moments, like big boss battles with tailored tracks, surprising story twists, and a fairly deep and interesting combat system. It's the hours of necessary grind, repetitive environments, and narrative stumbles?? just can't keep pace.

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=pIOUVqGaejE

Monark (PC, PS4, PS5 [reviewed], Switch)
Developer: FuRyu
Publisher: NIS America
Released: Feb. 22, 2022
MSRP: $59.99

Monark is a new RPG from Lancarse and FuRyu, with some help from a few former Shin Megami Tensei developers. It's got the vibe of an SMT game; Shin Mikado Academy has been cut off from the outside world by a magica??l dome barrier, and inside, a mysterious mist is flooding the grounds, driving students mad. Amid a l?ot of horror are Pactbearers, individuals who've made a deal with the patron deity of one of the seven deadly sins to see their wish fulfilled. It's a bad time to be a normal, everyday student at Shin Mikado.

You awake as an amnesiac student and are plunged into the Otherworld, an alternate dimension where demons manifest. In a last-ditch effort to save some friends you've just made, you ma?ke a Pact with the demon Vanitas, becoming the Pactbearer of Vanity. Everything settles down after you slay some demons, but then the dean of the school arrives and reveals the facts: to erase the mist and return everything to normal, you'll need to defeat the other Pactbearers—and eventually, yoursel?f.

Monark's setting is one of its biggest strengths. While an RPG set in a school might not be novel, the mist and Pactbearers—who can use their Authorities to change the real world—make for a creepy, horror-tinged world to explore. Breaking the Pactbearers means going into the mist to find points where your cell phone can connect to their Ideals in the Otherworld, all the while avoiding maddened students and watching your own s??anity drip away, tick by tick.

There's a new horror around every corner at Shin Mikado, and gradually dispelling the mist and restoring the halls ??and its students to normal feels good. It doesn't help much that the hallways are all pretty same-y, and the school grounds are limited in scope. But as a contained setting for an RPG,? it feels like it serves its function to the story well.

When you're not exploring the mist, you're battling, and that's one of the main drawbacks of Monark. The actual combat of Monark is very interesting. Your party is made up of you, whichever human companion is accompanying you on this excursion, and fiends that embody your own desires. Personality quizzes interspersed throughout the story and around the campus basically Myers-Briggs your own ??desires onto a chart, graphing your attunemen??t to the seven deadly sins.

Because my first test revealed a desire for power, and wanting to claim it for my own, I was given a familiar of Gluttony. Throughout the story I'd accumulate Pride, Sloth, Lust, and ??Wrath too. They don't just act as representations of your own answers, but their gameplay matches ??their vices; Gluttony is adept at stealing buffs for itself, and Lust could Charm enemies to my side.

Battle??s are tactical, with each of your characters moving and then acting, waiting, or deferring their action to another unit. Deferrals are crucial, as they provide you with extra turns, letting you heap on damage and rack up multiple hits if uni??ts are nearby to toss in follow-up attacks.

Deferrals also rack up Madness, which can also be driven up by using your Authority powers. Hit 100% Madness, and a character will go berserk; they'll get increased stats, but you'll lose control and have to watch them hit anything (friend or foe) until they eventually pass out. Balancing this out is ??Awakening, a meter you can charge up to reach an ascended state, providing stat bu??ffs, access to special moves, and wiping the Madness slate clean.

On top of that there's Resonance, you?r own protagonist's ability which can share buffs and states across units including Madness, Awakening, and Enlightened, which only turns on if you hit 100% on the former? two at the same time. It is a lot.

What's nice is that Monark's many systems don't feel too overbearing. There were certainly a few times I accidentally went Mad or didn't set my deferrals up quite right, but when it's humming, Monark battles feel like a good mix of predetermined strategy and on-??the-fly adaptations. Getting a 'perfect turn,' where your whole party hits Enlightened status and goes wild on the enemy, feels great.

Less than great is how often you'll be doing all of that, because Monark is a grind. Mandatory battles are sparse, but the level floor for each one jumps up higher for each new slice of story??. Leveling up a c??haracter means spending Spirit, a universal currency that everyone shares, and upgrades are costly compared to how much you usually get per-battle.

It wasn't uncommon to spend at leas??t a couple hours between each new story beat just grinding out battles. This could be fine on its own, but efficient grinding usually meant playing one map over and over again. Enemies have some interesting moves, but ??for the most part, they fall under a small number of categories. Arenas all look the same, and outside some breakable walls and environmental hazards, terrain was rarely a concern.

So many hours of my Monark p??laythrough were spent in one arena, repeating the same actions over and over. It wasn't long until I had enabled most of the quick movement options just to speed it all up, and I was still dreading each new beat and how many more runs of the Precipice of Wrath II? arena it would entail.

Even when many RPGs might also demand grind, they offer a little more variety, and the ratio of story-to-grind tends to feel a bit better. That ratio is skewed towards the latter in Monark. There are some interesting threads it builds up, as Monark tries to tackle issues like bullying, guilt, grief, and heartbreak. It also veer?s wildly off-course on some of those, in fairly odd ways.

Some of those writing misses aren't helped by how staggered Monark feels. With both necessary grinding time and a penchant for stopping in hallways ?so your human companion can monologue a bit about their backstory, each Pactbearer's section feels way longer than its story might suggest.

Characters are introduced, and then siloed off to their respective arcs. This isn't really a "party" RPG, but one where?? you're picking companions after spending one introduction story with them. It was hard to develop a real attachment to any of them, and even characters I dig like Ryutaro and Nozomi feel short-shifted by the pace of the narrative.

It's a shame, because the music and character art of Monark is wonderful. Portraits really pop off the screen, and both the regular tunes and special boss fight songs are absolute stand-outs. The 3D world doesn't always have the same draw, e?specially in the Otherworld. But there were areas of mist, especially later on, that were real spine-tingling sections.

By the time I finished a run-through of Monark, it felt like I'd climbed uphill to find something at the top. And oddly enough, even the individual endings feel like a bit of a gut-punch. You're basically told to go back and play other routes, to discover a 'true ending.' But by that time, I felt I'd seen enough of what Monark does. It was like asking a mountain climber, at the top of the ??summit, whether he'd like to jump right back to the bottom and do it again, right now.

Monark has a fantastic universe, with art and music to match. Some of its story beats are solid too, and even when a couple missed, others were suitably dark and dreary. ?Its cast even has some fun?? moments and emotional hits, though I preferred a few over others. And its combat is a really fascinating, engaging system that feels like spinning plates in a good way.

I just can't get past the grind. I can't push through the glacial pacing it imposes, the constant starts and stops, and the same arenas over and over. Every time I started to get invested in Monark, I was blasted back down into another few hours running the same fight, over and over, for whatever Spirit it might give? me.

There is enough here that I'd give a Monark follow-up a shot. One that fills out its stories a bit more, amps up the horror, and flattens out the grind. There are some novel ideas here, and if you're looking for something outside the RPG status quo and with a darker vibe, Monark could fit the bill. Just go in knowing that it can get arduous, and you'll need to overlook those faults to find what Monark does that's really different.

_{[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publisher.]}

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