Que jogo absurdamente daora
Extrai referência de vários jrpgs clássicos, como também de outras fontes, e usa elas como base para formar um worldbuilding rico e criar personagens bem desenvolvidos
Todo momento esse jogo te joga reviravolta atrás de reviravolta e você só fica cada vez mais curioso em continuar
A gameplay é bem feita, o jogo te oferece desafios na dose certa e te entrega as ferramentas necessárias para superá-las
Infelizmente o combate com mecha não foi tão polido

To consider Chained Echoes as a "hidden gem" would be an understatement and does not do this game enough justice to show how much this title was under appreciated. After finally getting around to 100% this game even though I beaten this last year. I still consider Chained Echoes should've been contender for "JRPG" of 2022. It's just a shame it dropped at the near end of 2022, so it was under a lot of peoples radar. Many who have played it though, those people would agree that Chain Echoes beautifully pays homage to JRPG genre, where influences/easter eggs in a measured way, never allowed them to overshadow the game. Although in my opinion, this game felt like an anniversary to every great JRPG title over the decades and condense every idea that made those series great, into one game.

From the town building system that similar to that of Suikoden. To the names of characters, combat system and star level up system that shares resemblance to Chrono Trigger and Wild Arms. The game also uses some inspiration from Final Fantasy 6 & 12 for it's NPC designs, location designs and the reward system (reward board). Hell, even one of the post-game secret bosses (that's a Kickstarter reward design btw) shares inspiration of Seymour from Final Fantasy X, although it's probably paying homage to Chel from Okage: Shadow King.

As a die hard Xenoblade and (more importantly to my life growing up) Xenogears fan, I can not forget to mentioned how much I absolutely love the OST that give me a sense of reminiscence, especially when you enter in Rohlan Fields for the first time, heavily reminiscent of Xenoblade's plains in design and music. The Flower Fields of Perpetua seem to be strongly inspired of Satorl Marsh (one of my favorite locations) from Xenoblade as well. Let's not forget when you're roaming around the vibrant/uniquely different locations, Chain Echo also has pick-collectables, although unlike for Xenoblade series. These pick-ups are not necessarily important towards level/gear progression, but they do unlock "special deals" from merchants that will sell you bundles that can be a variety of things, like material, items and weapons that can help alleviate the burden on your wallet when buying gear or upgrading said gear. So there's less incentive to actually grind but more encouragement to explore because of it. Which this game does an exceptionally good job "trimming the fat" by not having you to grind at all or as much. Unique Monsters are also present in this game too, some of which require a bit of RNG to spawn, but overall. Most of them spawn under certain condition that are never a hassle to get them to spawn, which is a huge plus.

What really caught my attention however, is how insanely similar the main characters/story points are from Xenogear. Right off the bat, the game starts off with the annihilation to a city and death of many people that feels similar to the destruction of lahan scene at the very start of Xenogear. That has Glenn (one of the main characters) over the course of the story, overcome the trauma and repercussion over his action that was out of his control and learn acceptance from it. Even to go far as to contemplate suicide. Despite the high-spirited/vibrant sprite-art aesthetic, this game does not shy away from darker tones that doesn't try to use edgy tones just for the sake of going "look at how dark this is, ain't it gritty?!!" but to have a realistic tone to the story. If you're a huge Xenogear fan, as you progress towards act 3 & 4, you'll really see how similar the plot points are to that game. You might even spot which one of the main character shares some resemblance to Elly as well.

Even back 2022, playing this was such a breath of fresh air. A combination of both traditional JRPG and modern quality of life implementation that made it such a joy to play through to the end. For example. You can retry battles right away without going back to a save point, run away from battles instantly and without fail and you can retain your super meter so you can easily farm limit breaks or whatever if you're having a tough time with a fight. Starting with a full super meter in every boss encounter so you don't need to run around for 10 minutes getting monsters to beat you in the face to build it up.
Aliment afflicting is so damn good and does what I wished most games does with status effects. By removing RNG. Each time you inflict an ailment, they gain a resistance to that ailment. Resistance (in this instance or from equipment, items, etc.) means that you avoid that many instances of the ailment. So, the first time you inflict Blind, you need to do it twice to inflict it again. Then three times. Then four and so on.
Since ailment effects are also predictable (Blind status means if an enmy does a doing physical attacks, they WILL always miss) means you can completely plan your actions. It also means you can hold your guaranteed blind/silence/inact attacks until you KNOW you need to avoid something. It's completely predictable and you can use it to your advantage.

During the game's development, the one thing that really had me overly excited to point of considering Chained Echoes a spiritual successor to Xenogears, was the Mecha battle system but it does indeed do some things that differentiate it from Xenogear's gears/fuel system, and that's "gear switching". A system that plays together with Chained Echoes overdrive system. Once you're in a mech, you have options to switch between three modes. Gear 1 lets use skills that consume less "MP" and reduces your overdrive meter, but Gear 2 consumes more "MP" but does more damage, as a result though, it increases your overdrive meter. While switching to Gear 0, disables you from using skills at all but it replenishes your "MP", not only that but doing this reduces the amount of damage you take greatly if you decide to defend. So you have a complex system of planning out when to go "all out" but also finding the right time to conserve "MP" and defend against team wipe moves while playing a constant tug-of-war with the overdrive meter that determines how much damage/heals you can dish out. Some people may hate this system or some will love it, but I absolutely love that more thought was put into the mecha combat than it just being attack/defend. It's a nice change of pace from the hectic and at times, nerve racking ground combat.

On that note, ground combat uses a sort of FFX-esque/Octopath Traveler CotC switching system where you can switch between front and reserve party members during battle. With characters and their abilities all feeling fairly unique, they all serve a defined roles which incentivizes team work and synergy around the implementation of the Overdrive system (located at the top corner of the screen during combat) that works like a thermometer for abilities, warning players when they overdo specific actions you'll not only deal less damage/heals but you could suffer even more damage as a result. The goal of Overdrive is to balance turn-based combat and encourage players to diversify their attacks by not brainlessly spamming OP skills. It's a really creative and a engaging system. Added by the fact that you regain full life after every battle, the gameplay is balanced around. So it removes the incentive of having to save money for HP/MP items outside of battles like most JRPG. So it always keeps back-to-back combat engaging at all times. By far one of the most creative JRPG combat system of recent years.

Love it or hate the game (for it's ending), Chained Echoes was clearly made by someone who truly loves and understood the genre. I'm grateful that I backed this game years back and got to play something like this in my lifetime, if you're a hardcore fan of the genre (or Xenogears), absolutely give this game a try. It's quite the experience.

Chained Echoes has so much to like while also managing to feel unpolished in many other ways. It's genuinely impressive how much one person has created here, with a strong art direction, a solid story, and some great music as well. The battle system is the area that I take the most issue with. The ovedrive / overheat system is cool in theory, but ends up resulting in more micromanagement than necessary, often getting in the way of strategies by requiring random moves to reduce the heat bar. The Sky Armor battles feel even worse, given there are fewer ways to manage the heat bar. On top of this, too many bosses have the ability to act multiple times per turn, creating some scenarios that feel truly unfair. Despite these quirks, I did enjoy Chained Echoes a good bit, but it wasn't as enjoyable as it could have been.

Behold the second coming of Chrono. Blah blah love letter blah blah golden era jrpg blah blah. Jokes aside, while the game is clear about its inspirations, it does stand on it's own without resorting to nostalgia. It masterfully ticks all the box of what makes a great rpg. The story is really well-paced and starts strong. The characters are interesting and have their own arc inside the story. There are interactions between the party members that adds to the flavour of the game. The battle system allows for challenging encounters that actually needs strategy (buffs and debuffs really makes the difference). The graphics and sounds are also amazing. Overall, this is a incredible experience and a must-play to every rpg fan.

Chained Echoes is not perfect, it's not the most artistic game I've ever played and it definitively has its flaws, but it was an extremely fun experience. I went into the game not expecting much but I was really surprised by what the game gave me.

Let me start with the worst parts: yes, this game's story is a mix of maybe too many things, you don't always understand where the creator wanted to go and many things feel rushed if not unexplained. Despite that, I think the game has a likeable cast, an extremely solid intro of over ten hours and the story manages to be good enough to be enjoyed and have its touching and memorable moments.

That aside, what this game does is something I don't often see in a JRPG. The gameplay is extremely FUN. From the combat to the exploration, this game really nails it and in a lot of ways it reminded me of why I loved CrossCode. You have to go from point A to B but the level is so big and full of stuff that you might spend hours just looking up for every small chest instead of doing the main quests.

As for the combat, I never got bored of the combat system and every trash fight was enjoyable even if not providing a challenge because the game has so many fun skills to use or combos to create between different abilities that I really enjoyed just mindlessly wrecking a horde of trashmobs, instead of trying to save my MP while spamming physical attacks.

And perhaps the strongest point of the game is the sidequests. The game has very humorous and lively quests that are unlocked as you progress or that you discover by exploring. They're all fun and there is a LOT of optional areas to explore. Hell, at some point the map really opens up and you get an overwhelming amount of things you can do at once, I thought it was a blast.

Chained Echoes is a really good game. It knows how to be fun and I could feel the author's spirit. I don't care that it's flawed, I think it's fine the way it is because ultimately the author wanted to do an homage to his childhood games and I think he managed to do so.