Vanillaware makes wonderful video games, from GrimGrimoire to Odin Sphere to Dragon’s Crown. Nevertheless, it wasn’t till its 2019 launch, 13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim, that the developer’s title grew to become synonymous with “you need to play this staff’s video games.” It’s arduous to inform what, precisely, made 13 Sentinels the breakout title for Vanillaware, delivery greater than 1 million copies worldwide as of August final yr, making it the studio’s best-selling title. The simple reply might be its beloved story, each in the way it performs out and the way it’s infused into the sport’s real-time technique mech fight.
Writer Atlus and Vanillaware launched it in 2019, so when the staff introduced its newest title, Unicorn Overlord, final September, it was straightforward to conclude that this was the studio’s subsequent huge focus. And it’s, however curiously, I discovered in an unique preview of the sport Vanillaware conceived it in the course of the improvement of 13 Sentinels, with its creation dealt with in parallel with that sport, albeit with a special staff and director.
“[It] was not a change of style, however fairly a staff effort to create a worldview that was initially based mostly on the premise of a fantasy,” lead sport designer Wataru Nakanishi tells me over e-mail after I watch roughly an hour of dwell Unicorn Overlord gameplay. Notably, the sport isn’t a response to the sci-fi trendy motion of 13 Sentinels as I anticipated; the staff needed to make one other fantasy sport, which checks out contemplating that’s the place its roots lie, relationship again to its debut sport, 2007’s GrimGrimoire. Vanillaware’s historical past, it’s 13 Sentinels that stands out because the oddball match, with many of the studio’s video games falling into the fantasy camp.
Nakanishi says Unicorn Overlord is Vanillaware’s spin on the tactical fantasy RPG, and that’s instantly clear within the opening hour. Protagonist Alain is round 10 years previous within the prologue, when he and the Queen of Cornia, Ilenia, witness a revolt by the hands of one in all her trusted generals. Fearful in regards to the kingdom’s destiny and bloodline, her most trusted knight, Josef, is tasked with spiriting the prince away to security. The primary sport’s story picks up 10 years later; Crown Prince Alain is round 20 years previous, dwelling on the island of Palevia, the place he’s grown up because the revolt. Whereas sparring along with his pal Lex, a ship flying Zenoiran colours sails into the harbor and it’s clear they imply no good.
Instantly, I’m in love with the rating, which oscillates between medieval choruses and an orchestral mixture of horns, winds, and different devices typical of the style. Nakanishi tells me the impartial music group Basiscape, who scored 13 Sentinels beneath the course of composer Hitoshi Sakimoto, is returning to create the musical soundscape of Unicorn Overlord, this time beneath Mitsuhiro Kaneda, who additionally labored on 13 Sentinels’ rating. Nakanishi says Kaneda’s rating has a “newness that befits the title, ‘Rebirth of tactical fantasy RPGs,’” which is one thing the staff mentions varied instances when discussing the sport. The assertion is a daring one and, taken at face worth, nearly conceited. However Nakanishi clears it up humbly.
“[That statement] displays the truth that it is a difficult title created within the tactical RPG style, which we now have all the time beloved, with new challenges, and that we wish to convey this to our gamers in an easy and proper method,” he says. “We’re making varied efforts to make the sport accessible to individuals who have by no means performed this style earlier than.”
After my hour of gameplay, that’s a considerably tall order. The style is traditionally one of many extra complicated to get into, and my preliminary impression of Unicorn Overlord is that newcomers would possibly discover it overwhelming, even perhaps odd at first. You don’t essentially management the person fights that occur in fight encounters – as a substitute, you identify the place you wish to transfer on the “tactical battle map.” Bumping into an enemy makes battle inevitable, however earlier than mentioned battle takes place, you’ll be able to basically look into the long run to see the way it performs out by checking unit formation, which expertise they’ve arrange, and extra.
In any case checks are in place, and after checking with a statistic measure that tells you ways they could honest in battle in a Hearth Emblem-esque approach, the battle begins; you don’t take part however as a substitute, watch what occurs. Success comes from energetic expertise, which use factors regenerated between skirmishes, and passive expertise, which set off in fight when sure situations are met. For instance, one passive ability I see heals a unit’s character on the finish of a battle, a essential software as well being doesn’t regenerate between bouts.
Again on the superbly illustrated tactical battle map, I watch an entire battle stage, which options its personal win-loss situations, play out. The participant first interacts with the Command Put up, the place they deploy models based mostly on Valor factors they’ve accessible to spend. Vanillaware tells me liberating cities and fortresses and defeating enemies earns extra of those. It’s also possible to spend these factors on particular Valor Expertise, which apply distinctive buffs inside and out of doors fight. From right here, Unicorn Overlord performs nearly like a board sport, the place you have to tactically place your varied models on the map – every comprised of various characters and companions with their very own use case – and transfer them accordingly.
Admittedly, it’s all fairly complicated as I’m thrown instantly hands-off into the combination, however I do witness many tutorial messages and screens we skip over for the sake of time. Nakanishi assures me Unicorn Overlord options a whole lot of in-game help, together with “tutorials, advisable composition examples, automated tools, technique settings, and switching issue ranges in order that as many individuals as potential can get pleasure from essentially the most thrilling elements of the sport […] with out changing into overwhelmed.”
As soon as an encounter begins, both by your personal unit working into an enemy or vice versa, an initiative order determines when combatants assault, and the complete battle continues till the enemy (otherwise you) are defeated or all combatants run out of motion factors. Within the latter situation, the facet with essentially the most well being remaining claims victory. The extra of it I see, the extra I admire its cinematic strategy – I, the participant, set the items onto the board after which watch the strategic planning (or chaos) repay, hopefully in a win. Nakanishi says the draw of this kind of gameplay is immersion.
“[In] the case of tactical RPGs, the mix of a method factor, by which you have got a chook’s eye view of the battlefield and make exact, step-by-step strikes, and the role-playing factor, by which you grow to be hooked up to the characters dwelling on the planet and struggle alongside them, is a sport style that gives the best sense of immersion,” he says. “That is the principle attraction, and the staff locations nice significance on this sort of sport expertise.”
After just a few fights on this preliminary stage early within the sport’s opening hours, we liberate a Palevian city beneath Zenoira, switching it from a pink flag to our blue flag, selecting up two Valor factors within the course of. This newly liberated city is now a base from which we are able to deploy models. We advance by means of the stage, utilizing Josef to cowl further floor as motion takes place in actual time, and he strikes the quickest, whereas swapping allies out and in of varied models as soon as two models are inside the radius of a particular inexperienced circle on the tactical battle map. Vanillaware says it’s important to benefit from this characteristic, as broken allies would possibly must fall again whereas more proficient ones, like a companion that makes use of magic (or magick because it’s known as within the sport), or one other with excessive stamina indicated by the quantity on an on-screen defend, head to the entrance of a unit’s pack.
Inside every unit is a player-created make-up of courses, too, which could decide the way you advance them on the tactical battle map. Horseback cavalry are wonderful in opposition to Infantry, a normal soldier, as are Knights. With their nice defend, Hoplite courses provide excessive protection. They’re appropriate for shielding an space or unit, so countering with a excessive agility class is further vital when going through one.
Exterior of fights, gamers can use gadgets to heal or buff companions, change a loadout and tools, and extra. And all of this – the fight of Unicorn Overlord – is only one half of the expertise, with the opposite being exploration.
“On the overworld, huge targets are all the time clearly offered, and gamers determine on their very own find out how to obtain them,” Nakanishi says. “Amenities comparable to cities and forts world wide are managed by the principle enemy known as the New Zenoiran Empire, and whereas exploring the overworld, you’ll be able to recruit allies, procure tools and gadgets, and make preparations whereas liberating cities. Varied quests and occasions will happen alongside the best way, however it’s as much as the participant to determine in what order and find out how to full them, so relying on the scenario of the troops […], chances are you’ll generally must keep away from them or postpone them.”
On that word, Vanillaware expects gamers to roll credit at 50 hours, however completionists can count on upwards of 100.
I’m not totally bought on the fight and exploration, however that’s as a result of I haven’t but performed it for myself. It seems to be fascinating from a mechanical standpoint, and it’s actually distinctive. If Vanillaware has made one factor clear in its portfolio, it’s that the studio has little regard for developments; it marches to the beat of its personal drum inside acquainted genres, even when they’re area of interest.
“Video games that we discover fascinating from the underside of our hearts are usually from genres which can be thought-about area of interest,” Nakanishi says. “So fairly than deliberately selecting these genres, it’s as a result of we simply occur to love them. Nevertheless, regardless of the style, it’s meaningless if the shoppers who buy it can’t discover it fascinating, so we all the time give attention to guaranteeing the sport we’re producing is comprehensible and pleasurable to play.”
Area of interest or not, Unicorn Overlord is a deal with for the eyes. Traditional SNES RPGs of yesteryear encourage Vanillaware this time round, Nakanishi tells me, and the studio needs Unicorn Overlord to appear to be a kind of video games however on a contemporary platform, full with a full suite of English or Japanese voice over. The artwork design, born from a single piece of idea artwork, is supposed to evoke that interval’s video games, someplace between retro and painterly. That piece of artwork can be the sport’s title display screen. “Based mostly on this illustration, the character designs for battle had been determined, battle backgrounds had been drawn, and the general artwork type got here collectively,” he provides.
All of this solely scratches the floor of what I noticed in that first hour of Unicorn Overlord gameplay. There’s loads of story crammed into it – a narrative not value spoiling right here because the narrative is an enormous draw for a lot of Vanillaware followers – and an intense variety of menus RPG followers will certainly love digging into the trivialities of. There are greater than 60 companions to recruit freely all through the marketing campaign, relying on the way you deal with the sport’s extra open nature of development, and many nice music and visuals to accompany it if what I’ve already heard and seen is any indication. Briefly, there’s nonetheless a whole lot of sport to uncover in Unicorn Overlord, and even after an hour and a prolonged interview, it feels as if I’ve barely wrapped my head round this tactical fantasy RPG expertise. With little time to go till its launch subsequent month, I’m excited to see what Vanillaware can do with its return to the fantasy style, the place its historical past started nearly twenty years in the past.
This text initially appeared in Concern 363 of Recreation Informer