"Proof of life" - so goes Astlibra's rarely used but pretty important subtitle. It's a major theme in the latter part of the game, where the sheer level of time travel shenanigans and fantasy bullshit happening makes it a pretty pressing issue - but I won't go into that. But deliberate or not, the term so brilliantly encapsulates the game itself.

Its impossible to talk about Astlibra without mentioning it's development cycle. As I write this, for instance, the dead space remake has just launched. When Astlibra started development the original was still a year away. Sole developer Keizo has plugged away at this and one or two other games in his free time over 15 damn years. And this is a guy with an office job. This game is his "Proof of life". And it bleeds out of every damn screen in the game.

There's a ridiculously large amount of ground to cover but Astlibra boils down to a sidescrolling ARPG in the vein of Ys III and Zelda II, shoved in a blender with stuff from Comiket. You get astonishingly flashy and silly combat combined with puzzle design from 1990, whilst some insanely hard doujin music which may or may not include hatsune miku goes obscenely hard in the background. And then you'll come across some insanely detailed boss sprite with cleavage that takes up half the screen and fires dodonpachi patterns of magic at you.

This is not only kinda silly, but also legitimately kinda great. The combat's main hook is effectively building up magic spells by dealing damage, and those magic spells give you temporary invincibility upon cast - which encourages super aggressive play. Bosses in particular are fantastic, but just clearing screens of enemies is somehow a joy after 30 hours of play, particularly as new engagement options keep on opening up even into the super-late game.

In general there's just so, so much you find, miss, or just ignore in Astlibra that feel like they meaningfully give you new options or feel impactful. I have absolutely no fucking idea how it does it. Things like triple jump boots and launchers are hidden in corners, random crossbows you get to solve two puzzles is powerful in combat, and mage staffs are widlly powerful but basically ignorable for the vast majority of players. The game clearly doesnt expect a player to get absolutely everything but also expects them to at least have some stuff - and the balance is struck just right.

Maybe most surprisingly, the story kinda hits. The current english localisation is a bit rough (it only really worksas it does because 2007-angsty fan translation tier fits well for the game) and you can undoubtedly pick a million holes in it's time travel/meddling gods bullshit, but it really nails it's emotional beats and hooks. KEIZO really knows how to turn a knife and throw in some good twists. The first two thirds of the game are a bit house in fata morgana-y in how they're individually story based whilst teasing at the greater whole - and that the batshit final chapters actually keep the emotional core and it's themes front and centre is remarkable. The core theme of butterfly effects and every choice coming with costs are very well done. And honestly the characters are also great - adorable crow Karon is effectively the voice of the unnamed protagonist for the entire game and is always a delight in particular. It hooked me, which is something i was not expecting at all.

Astlibra also does something very, very clever. It cheats. The revision release, whilst of course being extremely similar to just Astlibra's free version, is a result of KEIZO recruiting a handful of people, including ex-vanillaware artist Shigatake to refine the graphics, smooth the edges and add a few bits of content. And with it the game gains a much more defined aesthetic (the free version looks even weirder than the current release trust me) and refinement whilst still retaining that glorious individuals heart. It's kinda genius.

Yeah, looking at Astlibra truly critically it'll be very easy for someone to absolute rip into it. It's a bit overlong, it's difficulty balance is suspect, the postscript isnt worth playing, it's a bit too horny, it's aesthetic varies from looking like a straight up vanillaware title to looking like a geocities website and it's a bit repetitive. But as the sort of jaded asshole who was ready to make those sorts of comments, i really don't care, and it's not just the context of it's 17 year development. Astlibra is overwhelmingly charming at every single turn, fun, hype as hell and continually engaging with it's story, gameplay loop and seemingly endless secrets.

Something about this game just dredges up the wonder I had for playing RPGs as a kid which very little can manage these days - Ys VIII does, and Xenoblade can for moments - and I have loved it unconditionally. I have been up til 3am playing Astlibra just wanting to push ever onwards.

It's certainly not for everyone - the demo will probably serve as a good litmus test for whether you're into this sorta thing, and I'd reccomend checking it out first (especially as the game itself basicaly doesnt have a tutorial so it serves dual function). But I would like to think ive got it across in this review that if you're into this, you're probably going to be really into it.

Can you tell I love this?

Astlibra no es ni de cerca perfecto pero aun así no impidió que me maravillara la ambición de su relato. Acompañado de un combate sencillo y una construcción de personaje satisfactoria y adictiva. Su historia es emocional y bella todo bajo la clara mano de un escritor amateur pero con una enorme pasión y amor a los jrpgs que lo inspiraron.

Experiencias como estas son de admirar, imperfectas pero al mismo tiempo igual de cautivadoras.

Keizo esta sin duda es la prueba de tu existencia.

This is one of the best indie games and games in general, I have ever played.
It is not perfect, chapter 6 was the only chapter I did not enjoy thoroughly, but everything before and after that (and boy there is a lot after that) was incredibly entertaining. The soundtrack is amazing and will surprise you here and there. The story is chock-full of fun unexpected plot twists and it plays with your expectations a lot. The characters really grew on me and I was amazed by how far the story went. I can not imagine how to write this story. This is a story driven game, but the gameplay probably was the biggest surprise to me. It just plays really freakin well and keeps introducing new moves and mechanics. I am not someone that likes to grind, but in Astlibra, I did it gladly. I managed to get the true ending and it does not disappoint. I am super hyped for the dlc that is currently in development. 10/10

Do not forget: You are taking other people's treasure when protecting your own. If the Scale of Destiny favors a soul, it destroys the fate of another. Will you change this balance, or cast your eyes aside? Is it true that your choices bear no responsibilities? Is it true that you committed no crimes?

Do you ever know from the very moment a title screen hits you're about to play an all-time great? The PC-98 music hits, the moonlit background descends, and I knew instantly Astlibra was about to become one of my favorite games.

The story of Astlibra's development is effectively canonized by now: if you know about this game, you probably already know it's a 2D sidescrolling JRPG developed by one guy, KEIZO, for 16 years. From both a gameplay and narrative perspective, this makes Astlibra feel retro and modern simultaneously, and oh God does it show this is an indie project.

There's something to be said for the sheer freedom of expression allowed when one has absolute authority over their creative expression, especially in a culture like Japan routinely producing off-kilter ideas. Keizo is, like any good Japanese artist, fucking horny. You thought Takahashi was horny while directing Xenoblade 2? Nah, fam. Astlibra is plagued with scantily clad titty beasts. Plant monsters whose only censorship is her vines, floating bodies without appendages but no deficit of cleavage, goddesses whose battle armor is lingerie, individual boob physics on each breast, and a year's supply of juvenile sex humor you've seen in literally every ecchi you've ever watched. To really round off the sentiment, there's a traditionally JRPG colosseum-like arena with individual matches and one of those matches is titled "Harem" in which you have to slay every degenerate demon the game has ever thrown at you. Keizo is fucking horny.

Keizo is also, like any good Japanese artist, fucking extra. This man has read his fair share of visual novels, clearly loves time travel, and probably threw every idea he ever had over its development time at the wall and performed mad science to fuse it all together. This design philosophy extends to the gameplay for sure, but I'll come back to that later, because there's a phenomenal story here if you can make sense of it all.

Time travel is fascinating; even when it's riddled with plot holes it's gotta be one of my favorite genres. There's not a lot of "meaningful" choices in Astlibra, but there are choices, you can make the wrong ones, and you will feel the weight of them. There's VN-style epilogue-like "dead ends" (not always bad endings, necessarily). But most importantly, Astlibra's central theme is its opening tagline: life is a series of choices, and every time you make a choice to help someone, to save someone, you hurt or lose someone else. You could have the literal tools of God in your hands with the ability to correct any history you saw fit, but the butterfly effect unfolds -- what will you lose in the process?

Chapter 7 really struck an emotional chord with me, one that all-time greats like Fullmetal Alchemist (2003) and Mahou Shoujo Madoka Magica have, when the price of obsession was made manifest. What are you willing to sacrifice for your obsession? I watched a dry comedy-drama called Russian Doll last year, also a time travel story, and a certain character described something they termed a "Coney Island moment": your one past decision where everything went to hell. You made one catastrophic decision, however inconsequential it seemed at the time, tugging the lynchpin that kept your entire life together, and the butterfly effect surely unfolds. Astlibra's thesis is thus: if you could reverse time and undo the "Coney Island moment," sacrificing all the bonds and memories you made in the process, would you, and could you live with the consequences afterward? So many ideas are thrown into the story & lore it can be difficult to untangle, and yeah, I'm pretty sure it's riddled with plot holes (although I'll note that by the end it felt like every loose end was resolved), but if you can untangle the mess and bask in the distinctly Japanese zaniness, it packs some serious emotional weight.

If you choose one, you lose another. I made my choice by weighing my options on the Scales.

In a sense, the over-the-top design philosophy is infused into the gameplay nearly as much as the narrative. By the postgame there are four different progression systems, you unlock a wide variety of techs called "Karon," and I really have no idea how differently the game plays by experimenting with the many different build options because I fell into my rut around 25% through and brute forced my way to the end. I finished the game on hard, and it was fucking hard. My final clock time -- getting 100%, including achievements -- was 61.5 hours, and Steam registers a playtime of 95 hours. There's idle time in there for sure, but that demonstrates well over a dozen hours of lost progress because there is no autosave and trash mobs can fucking rip you a new one. By chapter 5 or so, it's entirely practical to be dying within 3 hits.

Combat is visceral; JRPGs normally make me sleepy, but the gameplay loop is fucking crack. You will be swarmed by fields of mobs as you hack 'n' slash your way through them, manipulating your iframes, guard gauge, cleverly hidden techniques, possession skills (the closest the game comes to a magic system), and Karon build to steamroll them as efficiently as possible. The gamepad rumbling in your hands with every slash, the frustration of playing what often feels like a 2D soulslike (or Metroidvania, the OG soulslike) where every input matters, dying, dying, and dying again to fucking trash. Every chapter has its own equipment section with materials dropped by mobs only found in that chapter, accompanied by a super streamlined and super rewarding crafting system, making it sinfully easy to blow 5 minutes grinding for a few more mats to purchase that next available weapon. The game rewards grinding almost too well. You can respec anytime you want, you chart a poorly implemented sphere grid, you grind your way into a veritable armory, wherein mastering each piece of equipment unlocks new Karon abilities or unlocks more magic crystals, necessary to actually equip Karon abilities, and you will never have enough magic crystals to equip more than 10-15% of your available Karon abilities at any given time, allowing plenty of room for experimentation.

The game's biggest flaw is how it reeks of early-to-mid 00s development. The gameplay loop is simple. The shitty ESL translation steals heavily from American idioms, like "using the John," in ways that just make zero sense within the setting's context, yet it's nonetheless nostalgic to a time of mediocre VN translations (Tohsaka's anus is defenseless), shitty anime subs, and downloading new episodes on BitTorrent then burning them to your DVD while posting screenshots of your ripped DVD collections on fan forums. The puzzles and platforming are excruciatingly retro; satisfying in their own way, but to solve them you have to think about them from a design perspective of a different era. You literally walk through glitches in the scenery to solve puzzles. Secret treasures in the game are well hidden in fucking pixel-sized green arrows, in the late game behind scenery, obstacles, and other hurdles making them, frankly, impossible to find unless you have a treasure guide up, and I absolutely recommend one to the side while playing. It's borderline cozy how there are virtually zero guides available online because it's so niche and playing it draws you into a real community; but there is a treasure guide, you should use it, and expect that otherwise, you will probably have to figure shit out on your own.

The art design is quirky yet charming, drenched in effects, 2D sprites slapped on backgrounds that are essentially two images photoshopped together exacerbated by its stiff animation. I adore the music. It is again something one should treasure through discovery, but the PC-98 aesthetic drenches this game artistically, and there's not a single bad track.

Really, everything comes into harmony to produce a grossly addictive game as I was propelled from literally the first 30 minutes to see the plot unfold, yearning to see the story's earliest and most harrowing mysteries resolved -- in most cases, far differently than I could have ever imagined. Right up until the postgame.

The postgame is effectively a sequel slapped on top of the base game; you think the bulk of plotlines are resolved, you think you've unlocked and done everything, and not only does the game implement MORE new mechanics with a Diablo-like loot system literally 45 hours into the game, but the story resoundingly emphasizes things are not yet over with a new mystery that completely curtails your ability to accept the game's "proper" ending as it is. And oh boy, the postgame is fucking fun, but everything falls apart.

It's best to go into this relatively blind, but I have a lot to rant about here. I won't spoil anything in detail but skip this paragraph if you don't want any expectations skewed.

--
The riveting difficulty gets tossed out the window as the game throws a new layer of possession skills that essentially trivialize every encounter you'll face until arguably the final-final boss (who still wasn't a fragment as difficult as the game's two "proper" final bosses), and the story almost literally deus ex machinas into oblivion every theme it spent its entire length establishing for the sake of conclusion. This game had a theme, goddamn it, and an excellent one at that. And the worst part about it is that I'm not even that mad, because the method by which it does so is, although tropey, so fucking cool it plays right into one of my favorite narrative structures. While the entire premise gets massacred in the process, it's done in a way that contextually makes sense (if you can look over how bloody extra everything is). But Astlibra's thesis carried so much emotional weight that seeing it discarded for the sake of worldbuilding and resolution is painful. By all rights, the proper ending is satisfying enough for a certain kind of crowd -- my kind -- and the postgame is just a postgame, however beefy it is. Can I reject the unfolding events as noncanon? Hard to say.
--

Struggling to regain what I lost made me lose everything else.

It's rare these days I can play a game and not levy a dumptruck load's complaints at it; I'm aging and I have a lot to bitch about it. A game's worth isn't so much defined by its flaws as it is how much its draws transcend those flaws. Astlibra is a gem. It's uniquely its own, there's so much to digest, and its creative expression is something you can really only get out of a game developed by one KEIZO for 16 years. The sort of poetic beauty to it all: the slice-of-life adventure of handling a new town's dilemmas every chapter; your guild master opening each chapter with a spine-tingling, heartrending summary of whose woes you must resolve; to see a VN-style opening theme at the end of EVERY FUCKING CHAPTER; all in a spacetime transcending romantic epic in pursuit of your first love. It's quirky, it's convoluted in a way only a JRPG could be, and it's beautiful. Go, my minions!

Truly one of the best Action RPGs ever made. Beautiful 2D graphics, awesome soundtrack, batshit crazy anime story with tons of dialogue (easy to skip if you don’t care) and super responsive gameplay. The game is crammed to the ceiling with content. There are so many levels, monsters, bosses, more monsters, more bosses, items, gear, hidden treasures, puzzles, likable characters, vast amounts of difficulty options, arena challenges and more. And don’t get me started on all the RPG systems that are put into this game. It can sound overwhelming when reading about all the systems before starting the game, but Astlibra manages to introduce the systems step by step over dozens of hours of gameplay. The player character can level up, distribute attribute points, do magic, add items to a magic Libra, distribute points on a giant Sphere Grid, find and craft dozens and dozens of weapons, shields, armors and accessories and unlock boards for every single weapon, armor and accessories to improve it even more. Seriously, if you like to become the baddest of badass RPG characters with endless grinding, optimization and build options, this is your game. But it is also your game if you like crazy anime stories. Or just a laid back, relaxed Hack’n’Slay with nice graphics. You know what? If you like videogames even a bit, you have to get this game. Period. It’s a masterpiece. Some of the best 20€ you can spend on Steam. Get it and spread the gospel. Don’t believe me? Try the demo. And oh, this is the PERFECT Steam Deck game as well.

This game was a complete surprise to me. A friend in a discord recommended it a couple months ago and if not for that I’d have not heard of this game. A brief search shows barely any media coverage. Just a handful of english reviews and only a couple of those from niche sites I was actually aware of but never would visit.

It was developed since 2007 and by only the sole original developer for most of that time until he had help for developing this Steam version (before the Steam version there was a freeware version). This background reminds me a lot of the story of Dwarf Fortress albeit not as long a dev time. It’s great seeing a passion project like this succeeding. Knowing its background makes a lot of the smaller issues I have more forgivable too.

The combat is easily its greatest strength. It's a fairly straightforward side-scrolling ARPG at the beginning but as you play you get new combat techniques and possession skills (magic basically) that keep things fresh and add depth. For example as you explore you’ll find scrolls that unlock techniques like a sky slash and backdash. Regarding the possession skills that gets very interesting as using them gives you i-frames and proper usage of them makes a big difference in boss fights and it's balanced by preventing you from spamming possession skills by needing ST which you build by attacking monsters with your weapon.It’s fantastic when this all comes together in boss fights.

The story is rather interesting. Wont say too much to avoid spoilers but it has some good twists. Whenever I thought I had things figured out, new story information had me reconsidering.

Weakest point is its sub-par translation. It's like that of a JRPG from 20+ years ago. You’ll understand it fine. Issue more is characters dialogue is less natural then it could be and word choices at times are slightly off. This translation, and occasional though not too often pervy dialogue, can take away from the narrative at times. Good news is a recent post from the publisher recognized criticism of the translation and confirmed they will be improving it, presumably in time for the Switch port the post also announced.

There are A LOT of systems in this game. None of them are bad but it does hit a point where I question if it needed some of them. For example you have a basic leveling where each level you get 5 points to distribute among your stats, perfectly normal so fine. Then your weapons and armor acquire proficiency as you use them which unlocks new abilities and you set these abilities in a menu that requires you have enough magic crystals for whatever the ability costs and you can change your ability loadout at any time. Then there’s also a growth chart where you can spend Force (an elemental currency dropped by monsters) and this also increases your stats and unlocks new possession skills and some weapons and more magic crystals. None of these are unheard of systems but usually games don’t have this many. Why overcomplicate things by increasing stats by distributing points every level and spending Force to increase them too? One makes the other a bit redundant. Could easily drop one or two of these systems. Those aren’t even all of them but the other major one is more unique and justifies its existence, explaining it would need some spoilers.

For the background visuals they stitched together stock photos to make everything and at times it was really odd looking where it's clear they pieced photos together or it clashes with the anime style characters and monsters. At its best it does show some great looking scenery though. The character and monster designs are nice looking but their animations can be a bit stiff.

Took me 30+ hours to finish the main game and having looked at the japanese wiki with google translate, the post-game is ridiculously beefy. It was much longer than I’d have initially expected but I was impressed with how it kept me engaged the whole time. Easily can get 10’s of hours more of this without starting a new game.

Very enjoyable experience overall, especially considering its background. One last note for anyone who plans to play it, there’s an arena that unlocks new challenges after every chapter. Always do it when you can. There’s a few extremely important items locked behind that and the game doesn’t tell you this. Odd choice but I assume is a consequence of the developer wanting it to have meaningful rewards.

Due to work and family stuff this game took me a month to finish, an entire month (Which was like 100 hours play time), but it was more than worth every minute of time I spent on it and now I feel like that one Danny DeVito meme, the biggest "I get it now" moment I've experienced in video games in awhile.

The game was simply peak. Like holy shit, probably the best indie game I've ever played (Not counting like Falcom stuff and whatnot because while they're an indie company, it's a much different situation) and the fact this game was made by 1 guy and it was literally his life's work that took like 15 years to make is just so admirable and inspiring and you can feel the passion and creativity in literally every part of the game.

The plot for Astlibra starts out simple with the protagonist and nameless hero looking for his long lost childhood friend and home town, but it slowly evolves into one of the most insane and mind-bending narratives I've ever experienced, all I can say is it was certainly an adventure. Astlibra has a penchant for the kind of storytelling you'd find in a visual novel and the amount of plot twists is just crazy and the variety of philosophical themes explored is baffling, but the best thing is despite having so many different elements everything felt fully fleshed out and by the end there were no loose ends either, definitely the kind of game you want to go into as blind as possible due to just how surprising it can get.

I'll just say that Astlibra perfectly represents Thomas Sowell’s philosophy on choice. There are no solutions in life, only trade offs. You’re always giving up one thing for another.

However a lot of games feel that to make a good story they have to sacrifice gameplay, but Astlibra isn't one of those because the gameplay was also one of the most addictive gameplay loops I've experienced in quite some time and from the moment I picked it up it was difficult to put down. The combat itself might seem simple at first being a basic side scroller hack n slash/beat em up, but it only gets better and more complex as you find technique scrolls throughout the world and learn more moves and abilities because by the end the combat actually has so much depth to it and it's very challenging at times, especially the bosses which almost have a bullet hell feel to them at times like in older Ys games.

Although the most fun part of Astlibra to me is the depth in the customization which is just unfathomable between all the weapons you can find, all your spells and all the ways to upgrade and enhance your character from learning skills through mastering weapons, leveling up with experience and also using an item known as Force to acquire permanent stat boosts and abilities on a system called "Growth" which is like the Sphere Grid from Final Fantasy X. I also love the grind of having to craft your own weapons/armor with material you get from different enemies, it makes the feeling of progression more impactful because you really work for it.

Astlibra is also just a beautiful game too, the background arts, monster designs and character sprites are gorgeous and done by Vanillaware alumni artist Shigatake and some can be a bit excessively horny at times (If you've played Dragon's Crown, you already know what I'm talking about) but it's all gorgeous art and really makes Astlibra such a beautiful game to play through making all the various levels so vibrant and diverse.

And the OST is also INCREDIBLE too. So many artists collaborated for the music, but there isn't a bad song in the game and there's so much diversity too with everything from full on prog metal to old school Nobou Uematsu sounding synth tracks, some strong melodic shredding with violins that remind me of Falcom Sound Team JDK's work especially the stuff they do for the Ys series and even some electronic type music too.

Astlibra is one of those rare gems where genuinely every thing about it is just so well crafted from the mind-bending narrative to the fun, fast, fluid combat and intricate progression systems which give so much customization, to the beautiful level design and art and the masterfully composed OST. While it clearly takes inspiration and influence from many of the classics of both the J-RPG genre and the visual novel genre, there's really nothing else like the game in terms of execution and I can't recommend it enough because of that. I know that it's an experience that will stick with me for many years to come and I can only thank KEIZO for dedicating his life to giving so many such an incredibly passionate and creative game that everyone deserves to experience.

The game starts out a bit rough, but man does it go places. I wish I were in the mood to write a full review, because there's a lot worth writing about here. Maddmike and NightTray cover most of what I'd have to say in their reviews, though, so I'll just mention a few things for now.

I think the basic combat mechanics are a bit clunky. There's a bit of a stiffness to attacking, dodging, and shielding that feels slightly off. Some enemies, particularly early on, have annoying tells for their attacks. I frankly didn't understand why people liked the combat at first. Then more systems opened. More and more new skills and spells became available. My opinion of the combat steadily rose until I was having an absolute blast by the midgame. There's nothing quite like it and I really love the emphasis on using i-frames from spells to dodge attacks -- it allows for a grant offensive pace. The underlying clunkiness never really goes away, but it becomes such a small part of the combat that it almost entirely stopped bothering me.

One other gameplay note: I started on hard and the enemies felt annoyingly spongy making the game rather grindy, so I bumped it down to normal. Normal was honestly a bit too easy, though. I only had to bother learning boss patterns when I challenged some content much earlier than intended. That didn't really impede my fun, though!

The story is absolutely over the top anime nonsense and I love it. The best comparison I can think of for the amount of escalation in the plot is Gurren Lagann. It just keeps getting bigger and crazier, but manages to stay meaningful and coherent. I also found the characters grew on me a ton over the course of the game despite some tropiness.

Definitely one of the best games I've played this year, and it's already been a great gaming year for me!

Astlibra Revision is RPG Mechanics - The Game. Every single RPG mechanic you've ever seen is jam packed into this in a way that makes your brain flood with dopamine every 30 seconds as you get more powerful with no care in the world for balance (which is ironic considering the scales mechanic). You literally get new mechanics up until like the very end of the game, in fact I don't think there's any limit to the amount you can grind in this game if you just want to keep getting stronger forever, which is pretty neat. Also literally no other game looks like this, I love how cobbled together its art style looks because that's also how the game feels on every other level. It's kinda a sort of cohesion through incohesion which I think is really special and interesting from a game made by (mostly) one person.

You start with a stick, beating slimes and soon are fighting dragons and other epic creatures, a slow and intense, not really boring grind to reach godhood levels, seeing big numbers popping over and over as you slash or explode your enemies.
Developed by a single person in the span of about 15 years, Astlibra Revision is an enhanced version of Astlibra proof of life. It adds a new chapter - and has new art by Shigatake, making it closer to almost being a Vanillaware title.
The plot is as heavy as any RPGs and visual novels, making it an interesting and important point. Hell, so many good time travel stories spawned since its initial development that I feel a little burnt out by them, but it's always cool and exciting to see.
Finding hidden equipment, learning new mechanics and plot details, challenging bosses you missed before, having a huge variety of equipment and customization that make progression extremely fun.
And the soundtrack is really cool as well, mixing many genres and a lot of good and memorable Vocaloid songs. They are memorable, and I still listen to them from time to time.
Chapter four was the lowest point for me, mostly due to story-related reasons. Chapter 3 and everything else gets better as you go, plus the post-game teaches you new mechanics with a lot of content, making it worth your time with a rewarding and fulfilling new ending.
This game is an inspiring indie achievement and I'm glad to have played it. Might play the DLC someday.
Pumpkin Hill Part II - https://youtu.be/rO6Hcsq3nRs

Quite possibly the most unhinged game I've ever played.

I went in expecting a simple 2D Action RPG that'd be short but sweet as it was mostly made by one guy... turns out this is a +50 hour RPG that took 14 years to complete with one of the most insane stories I've experienced in quite a while that kept going on and on and on. I got to several points where I'm like "I believe I see the end of this massive tunnel... oh no wait there's still more." Yeah I think that phrase describes Astlibra Revision perfectly, there's always more.
Where to begin... lets start with the visuals. Most of the environments and backgrounds are these edited public domain photos and materials. It gives a strange tone to the setting of the game, as I'll be starring in the background and its very obvious that these textures of this cave are just actual photos of cliffs and rocks. Some of the enemies are like this... I think. It's hard to tell with some of them, but I'm pretty sure the dev used real photos for the penguins you fight at the snowy mountain. Its a bizarre style that straddles the line between being low-budgeted and stylistic. Its funny how this made me pay attention more to the backgrounds, trying to discern what are photos and what were originally made assets. A lot of monsters and bosses are original, and to its credit there's a lot of interesting designs that show a often-treaded but no less bombastic style of medieval fantasy.
Though speaking of designs, if you aren't privy to "anime" designs or tropes then parts of this game will be hard to stomach. You fight a loooot of giant women with huge breasts which is one thing, but the story also has "classic scenes" like the hot spring visit, or the scene where a woman has to wear something very skimpy because of a big misunderstanding, or the "N-not like I like you, idiot!" and so forth. I really hate talking about this stuff, but it be remiss of me to not give a heads-up. To be fair this game took 14 years to make. I can't vouch what was changed during all that time, but standards of art change just as much as the technology we use to play games. What's seen as fine at some point is seen as "trashy" later in time, even if some of this was always the latter to begin with. It's not unlike how the infamous Duke Nukem Forever was a mess of old mechanics and set pieces that felt immediately dated when it came out since it took so long to be "finished", only that the differences is that they are, thankfully, fleeting moments in this marathon of a game. You aren't going to go on a road trip without having to drive around some potholes, but I wouldn't argue with you if you said they should've patched those holes up.
Dwelling on these misgivings wouldn't be fair as it ignores the entire plot and boy howdy what a roller coaster it is. It involves a lot of time travel with the protagonist able to prevent disasters and fixing many a tragedy by traveling into the past. That's putting the time travel mechanic as simply as I can, but they take every advantage they can with it. Nearly anytime I wonder "What would happen if they did this?" they'd actually explore that possibility in due time. Does it always make sense? I don't know. Time travel isn't real so who the hell knows. I was admittedly smiling and nodding a lot of times when some unforeseen consequence unfolds, or a new rule of this temporal manipulation rears its ugly head. I was always like "I'm hear for it!" I'm also glad that some of my fleeting thoughts on the motivations and goals of this diverse cast gets explored in many ways. The protagonist, for example, is searching for his childhood friend that he lost eight years ago. And without spoiling it I had certain thoughts about this dynamic that I'm happy to say that the author did explore, and rather thoroughly at that. Some of the craziest reveals need to be seen firsthand, it goes places.
I don't wish to delve too much into the nitty gritty of the plot, so what do you even do in this game? I listened to a podcast that gave this game a near perfect descriptor, "It's like if Vampire Survivors had actual structure and a plot". This game is all about that progression and dopamine. You can place stat points into any stat you want, but re-speccing is easy, free, and even encouraged. Every armor, shield, and weapon have a experience bar that, when filled, will reward with either a skill or a skill slot in order to use said skills. Skills do, in fact, have a massive impact on how you play, so you're encourage to use as many weapons and armor as you can. Enemies drop materials in order to buy equipment, as well as "Force" that's used on this massive skill tree. The skill tree is mostly for permanent stat ups and the rare treasure, but it also gives access to the magic spells that have a wide variety of effects. Importantly, MP is only gained by attacking enemies, and it will decrease by itself if you idle for too long which encourages an aggressive playstyle. In exchange casting a spell will grant brief invulnerability, so you can blast through a wave of enemy bullets with good timing. Further increasing aggression is a combo counter that rewards several bonuses the more hits you rack up in quick succession, so don't stand around for too long. The flexibility in how you play your character is perhaps the strongest point of this game. I've had many instances where instead of grinding for better overall stats when I hit a brick wall, I changed my stats and equipment that made the bosses much easier to deal with. One of the most memorable moments I had was with this one secret boss that I fought way sooner then I should've. Unluckily for me it was a DPS check, meaning if I didn't deal enough damage in a short enough time then it was a instant-death. It was straight up impossible to pass the DPS check at my current level. Luckily I had a skill where my damage was multiplied threefold, but as a consequence I died in one hit. I could then pair that up with a skill where you can take one hit for free per battle, and I essentially was playing Ghost n' Goblins for the whole fight. Felt amazing when my crazy plan actually worked... after many deaths.
The Vampire Survivors comparison comes from how explosive fighting can get. You can reach a point in power where you can kill anything with your 30 foot sword and your giant dragon summon, as your enemies erupt into gold and force confetti. These sessions can be a relaxing background game to play, but not the most enthralling if you're going for every achievement. I didn't get all of them, about 90% or so. It is a good sign from me when I go out of my way to get achievements in your game, but I'd be lying if I said I got that much more out of the game for getting them. This can be a very grindy game, almost never required if you want to see the end of the game but there is some great and exciting content that'll be way harder if you go in ill-prepared. I did do a lot of grinding just because I wanted to do it, so take that for what you will.
One thing that caught me by surprised are the many puzzles in this game. It's not always a straight shot to the chapter boss, you'll have to do some thinking and inventory management to progress. Sometimes the path towards progression can seem borderline cryptic, but there's usually a NPC nearby that can provide hints and guidance to what to do (sometimes you'll need to talk to the same person more then once). Oh by "inventory management", I mean that this game will rarely use a item automatically from your inventory. You have to manually open up your items and use the specific item needed. I kinda liked it actually. It made me feel smarter solving even the more basic puzzles since it was up to me to figure out what I needed to do, but maybe it could've used keys automatically at least.

Even at times I kinda wished this game knew when to end properly, I can't deny the amount of effort and passion that was put into this game. It feels like someone wanted to include everything they love into one game, and despite some iffiness here or there, it manages to put itself together far more eloquently then you'd expect. You'll be in for the long haul, but it'll be a unforgettable adventure unlike many.

...What do you mean there's going to be DLC?! This game is already 50 hours long!!

Apparently, it is only made by one person. Which doesn't seem that way in most of my playthrough, but I will take that into account.

I don't typically play side-scroller, but I will say that the combat is really engaging and fun. It has a complex system, which can get pretty formulaic late in the game, but I guess it's a given, considering how broken you can get later on.

The soundtrack is actually incredibly hype.

The story is where it's at. You started off playing as a hero with a bird looking for someone dear to him and you get this feeling that something is.. off. It's nothing special or unique at first glance, but this game is the epitome of going from 0 to 100. Never in a million years would I have ever guess the game's final sequence of moments or even the hours leading up to it judging from how it starts. There are a lot of plot twists that you won't expect and fortunately it's quite well done. It does get pretty "anime" at times, not in a bad way mostly, I would say it's part of the game's charm.

The characters, especially the main cast, have a soul and personality and not just there to push the MC. They all have their own goals and role to play.

My only complaint for this game is that, it does get slightly dragged near the end. There are new elements but some things are also recycled. Since, it is made just by one person, I will let that slide. Though at this point you're probably too invested for this to make you lose interest anyways.

Overall, this is hands down one of the best Indie games I've played, especially in terms of narrative. KEIZO really poured his soul into this, and I hope to see more of his work.

Complete the main game
Now I can safely conclude that Astlibra Revision is the best JRPG in 2022.
This game is a 2D ARPG just like Odin Sphere or Muramasa. However, the story occupies a large part of this game and it's pretty good. I would even compare it with Chrono Trigger.
But it still has some drawbacks, the difficulty curve and growth curve are not very reasonable. You have to do a lot of grinding to level up.
Anyway, if you think Elden Ring can be the GOTY, I see no reason why Astlibra Revision can't.
At last, let me tell you a scary thing: this game is made by one person.

Astlibra Revision is one man's labor of love, the magnum opus of hobbyist game designer Keizo Morishige. This is a polished version of his browser game Astlibra (labeled accordingly!), completed over the course of a decade and a half, which shows - there's a LOT of game here. Combat is tight, nail-bitingly precise down to a matter of frames, and near-infinitely customizable with a bevy of buffs (or debuffs, if you wish), weapons, and special abilities. There's ample room to play this game with nearly any build or strategy you like.

While mostly cobbled together from free assets (though very well-chosen ones - the soundtrack is killer), Vanillaware artist Takehiro Shiga (better known as Shigatake) worked on refined character art for Revision, paired with breathtakingly detailed boss designs by artist Haku Tatsufuchi. As a Vanillaware diehard, I was first drawn to this game because Shigatake worked on it, but the rest of the game is far too solid for that to be the only thing worth mentioning.

The story plays out in an episodic fashion, down to an anime-like opening sequence (complete with theme song!) before each chapter. You play as Popular McJRPG Guy and his personal Crow of Judgment on a sprawling journey that comes further off its hinges as the game progresses - there is heartache and fanservice in spades, predictable in spots and utterly blindsiding in others. It's best to experience it blind! The English translation, originally fraught with grammatical errors, has been significantly improved with a patch, but the old one is currently still available through a beta channel should you wish to use it.

The MSRP is a steal for the sheer size and quality of this game. Of all the Games By One Guy out there, this is as good as it gets! To all aspiring game designers - this game is proof positive that if you are truly passionate about your creations, it can be seen and felt from a mile away.

A job very well done by KEIZO and collaborators - warmly and enthusiastically recommended.

If you really like old school Ys games specifically the sidescroller RPG Ys III: Wanderers from Ys then you'll probably love Astlibra.

There are a number of sore spots like the Aguni boss fight in the lava area and a number of really frustrating bosses in the post-game story where they'll throw multiple 150k HP bosses with 1 hit kill lasers but despite all that I ultimately enjoyed the 60+ hours I spent with this game and would highly recommend it to anyone who:

1. enjoys the difficulty of the Ys series
2. has a lot of patience

The post game is excellent btw: it kind of turns into a diablo-like loot game where enemies start to drop Weapon/Armor/Accessory boards which basically makes all equipment viable at the end game by letting you slot in extra bonus stats or skills into everything.

Theres one other thing I should mention: I feel like this game is weirdly balanced around an ability in the game called "Berserk" which basically gives you 3x damage but also makes it so if you're hit once you die. Now maybe its because I was playing on Hard Mode but I was dying pretty much in 1 hit anyways without that ability. And if you do end up using healing items in boss fights, they don't reset if you end up having to restart the fight from a death. So, if you end up playing the game I would suggest going into the game knowing that you're probably going to have to use this ability at least for the main game.

I think this is basically what Falcom would have ended up making by Ys 8 if they had carried on with the side scrolling games after 3.

The game is a bit rough and ready as you’d expect for something a guy put together in his spare time, especially graphically, but the fundamental combat is so much fun it carries you through. The story ended up getting me as well - especially in the extra chapter added for Revision which had me completely gripped in a situation where they could have had me drop completely off.

I can’t recommend this enough; there’s a good sized demo available which shows both low and high level combat and it runs on absolutely anything.

Steam Deck report: faultless, except for some slightly scratchy sound occasionally. Expect 4 hours on battery.

One man, one dream, and 16 years of passion culminate in this orgasmic action rpg.

Like every respectable man in the land of the rising sun, he inserted a significant number of cute maidens in this epic journey of one man who sacrifices everything to save his true love through time.

You have a considerable number of companions with different bosom sizes and goals, and elemental summons that can control fire and ice but not the size of their skirts, massive bosses with massive cleavages and a respectable number of underwear jokes, even some gender-bender shenanigans for the ones with more "eccentric" proclivities, a coomplete experience.

As a tip I recommend playing on harder difficulties or else you probably find this game easier than getting an erection playing Nier automata.

This is, without a doubt, my favorite game of the last decade.

If you are a fan of Korean grinders like DFO or Maple Story, but want a single-player experience that gives absolutely no craps about balance, you will have an absolute blast with this game. It wants you to break it. It dares you to break it. And when you do, it's pure bliss.

What starts off as a simple side-scrolling action game with a grand total of 3 actions turns into a game where you build our your moveset to encompass thousands of possible combinations. You're whipping spells, attacks, dodges, summons, all while fighting massive screen filling bosses and timing your iframes to dodge attacks that will one-shot you.

Gameplay is king, but the story is no slouch either. The writing is a bit juvenile, but the story itself is a tale of consequences. Your actions impact everyone, for better or worse. How you choose to internalize or validate these choices is ultimately how you view the world. It does drag on a little bit, but honestly, I didn't care.

And the game is horny. So that can be a positive or negative.