izigame.me

Here is as spoiler free of a review as I can write.
Graphics: 8.5/10
The Good:
The character sprites and mechs are gorgeous and well animated. As are the overwhelming majority of the bizarre monsters you fight. Some skills really felt like a delight to use and there weren't any issues of things looking wonky or out of place in the context of the combat. The vivid background colors and art style really pop in their own way, and there are a variety of areas to explore including but not limited to: caverns, mountains, forests, plains, cities, foothills, an archipelago, and even an alien looking swamp. There is also solid use of paralax mapping throughout the game and they do a good job of making the world look and feel lived in.
The Bad:
That said, the backgrounds are reminiscent of another indie title, Fell Seal. Here, the maps looked like Fell Seal's style but if it were done with the RPG Maker tileset editor. There were little pieces, especially around corners, where you can see that the tile asset was reversed and didn't properly match where it was placed. I also noticed minor transparency issues on some of the tiles. I even saw some classic poor use of light where shadows were cast in the wrong direction. Map making is diffcult, tedious, and often unsung work, and this isn't to say I think they did a bad job, but it could've used maybe another set of experienced eyes on it. The style itself didn't match the character sprites as fluidly as it could have, as if the people designing the maps and characters only coordinated occasionally, if at all. It can be a bit jarring if you're a person that notices that kind of thing.
Systems: 9/10
The Good:
There's no traditional leveling in Chained Echoes, and I love it. The combat design is a thing of beauty, it's what FFX should have been. The mech combat was also just different enough from the on foot combat that it was fun for most of the game. The way that funding was handled and how the junk you sell to the vendor unlocks rare deal purchases was a good choice for an RPG and did well to tone down the suspension of disbelief that comes with some random worm having currency on it.
The Bad:
Towards the end of the game the mech combat fell off. I think it needed just a little more customization to finish as strong as it started. The gem upgrades were ridiculous. It's so bad, that in my opinion if I went into the nuts and bolts of it, it would taint the perception of my scoring of this section. If it were required to min-max these upgrades to do any of the content in this game, I absolutely would do a teardown of it and where they completely missed a fantastic opportunity to use this mechanic for further customization. Fortunately, the game is balanced around not needing to min-max, so you can just pick two types of gems for each character and mash together the highest level you can. If you are a min-maxer though, expect a lot of frustration as the gem combining UI is one of the worst crafting UIs I have ever seen in a game, gathering the gems is mostly RNG dependant, and the restrictions on combining them will make you want to throw things. It feels like something that was done very late in development and lacked the polish of the other systems.
Story: 9/10
The Good:
The story was fantastic overall. There were a few solid twists where my hopes won out over my expectations. Yes, if you hadn't already heard the wails of your nearest pearl clutcher from their fainting couch, they use the occasional curse word. The ending is reasonable and satisfying once you give it some time to process.
The Bad:
The Code Geass and Fullmetal Alchemist references were some visible scaffolding in an otherwise good story. In spite of their audacity to occasionally use curse words, there is a scene in where someone refers to a character as a "darn thief" and from then on those characters spoke in Deep South accents for the rest of the game in my head. Just say "damn thief." It's ok, I promise.
Sound: 10/10
The Good:
This sound track is great, none of the music ever really felt out of place and it deserves to be up there with the great RPG soundtracks. The SFX were satisfying in almost every instance.
The Bad:
The only exception to the otherwise flawless SFX being the little bleep when you use an Ultra Move. That should have been something better than a mildly distorted menu click. Also, the cut in when activating an Ultra Move needed to be maybe 15-30 frames longer. This is a timing that was more or less perfected in Street Fighter Alpha, so I am not really sure why that timing was so off here.
Lasting Impression: 8.5/10
The Good:
Chained Echoes is a game that has a lot going for it. The exploration felt mostly organic and was something I genuinely enjoyed until the endgame. The reward board for the exploration was brilliant in that it encouraged exploration by showing you what you can explore while also offering significant, satisfying, and tangible rewards for doing it. The story leaned into tropes mostly in the right places and subverted them in fresh ways. The messaging of the story overall and character writing were melodramatic at times, but not overly so.
The Bad:
Honestly, up until the very end of the game, I was willing to unequivocally recommend it to any RPG fan out there. Unfortunately, once it hit that endgame, it felt like they kinda lost it. For a game that put so much effort into being a "Here's a traditional JRPG, but with new and actually innovative twists," there were design choices in the endgame that don't happen in other games for a reason. Between that and how the last boss was handled, that was a big miss for me. I commented while fighting the last boss that, "If this is the last boss, I am going to be salty about it." It was, and I am. That last boss was awful. It was like building a glorious masterpiece of a building and then putting a giant golden poo emoji on top of it. I understand why something like that needed to be done from a narrative perspective but they went too far and it cheapened the party's, and by extention the player's, victory.
I believe a 90% is a generous score for this game. Overall, I believe the team did an exemplary job with 95% of the game and I don't regret my experience playing it. If there is a DLC, I will certainly consider picking it up, and I am willing to recommend it to people with the advice of measuring your expectations once you hit the final act.
Final Verdict:
Chained Echoes is incredible build up leading into average final encounter into a failed climax, but at least there was satisfying enough aftercare.