metroidvania + pokemon + final fantasy (your party members are the monsters) is a stellar combo in theory, and thankfully also in execution. i played this whole game in one week, got neck-deep in the party build meta, explored every single nook and cranny, and had dreams about playing it. it's a nearly perfect intersection of very specific interests for me, and i sometimes wish i could wipe my brain clean so i could experience it all again. maybe not the story though. the story was aggressively okay.

that said, complaints about the repetitive navigation are so valid. more than once, i found myself spacing out or falling asleep trying to get to a certain area, and i did not especially enjoy most of the puzzles. eventually i got to a point where i just defaulted to looking some of them up because i have ADHD and cannot be bothered to memorize the placements of which lever affects what door when it's off-screen. there's some tedium to the game for sure, and it won't be for everyone. i was able to happily power through it because i love a game with smooth movement, and this one had it.

the party-building and combat aspects are finely tuned but seem very unfriendly toward casual players; i found myself needing to engage with the gameplay meta in a way i didn't intend at the start because i started getting my shit absolutely whipped by babies and it felt bad. still, i do appreciate the options players are given to engage that deeply with the system; i cannot tell you how satisfying it was to wipe the floor with my spinner/bard/caraglow team. on the other hand, i literally did not use any other monsters after finalizing this team.

all in all, it was well worth the money and time i sunk into it and i'm looking forward to the next game the devs are working on.

Monster Sanctuary is an indie JRPG metroidvania with pokemon-style gotta catch em all theme. Overall the game is quite well made, the graphics are decent indie-style "pixel art", music is good and story is good enough that it's fun to follow and has some plot twists even. The battle is very traditional JRPG style turn based combat, quite engaging and 99 % of the game the difficulty level is just right that keeps you interested without being too hard, where it falls down is that last part of the game has so hard difficulty spikes that makes it nearly impossible to complete even after googling ideal party combinations and finding out everyone else had the same problem. The game is also quite unthankful towards grinding, having level caps and skill trees that cannot be finished, to top it all you will find out that grinding levels for all the monsters was total waste of time since simply catching the monster anew when you're at max level will give you an almost max level monster, this kind of uncommunicated things about the main game mechanics are typical indie mistakes that I cannot score this game more than 3½ stars out of 5, it left bad after taste.

Two main issues. First, the genre combo has no synergy. 2D Metroidvanias have a lot of backtracking so the combat should be quick. Turn based monster collectors tend to have long battles so different play styles, such as set up or stall, can be viable. Likewise, in monster collectors the player doesn't have access to every ability they've gotten at all times, one has to choose what team to bring. This opposes the Metroidvania idea of trying all your new abilities when you are backtracking. This genre combo was just a bad idea from the inception.

Second, the monster collecting gameplay encourages constant switching but makes it annoying to do so. This is just a problem with the developer's execution. In games like Pokemon there is a weak incentive to switch monsters as using the ones from the start can easily take one through the whole game, leading many players to just use their one Charizard as much as possible. This compliments the highly detailed level of customization though EVs, IVs, moves, abilities, held items, etc. Oppositely, games like Megami Tensei give a strong incentive to consistently switch demons in your party, as each demon will stop learning moves after only a few level ups. There is relatively little customization so fusing away a Jack Frost you've had for an hour doesn't feel bad at all.

This game can't decide what camp it wants to be. New monsters are easy to acquire. Hatched eggs will be at your party level so they can be useful right away. However, there is also a large amount of customization. There's skill trees, held items, form differences, and having to set these up every time you get a new monster is very tedious. The Metroidvania aspect asks the player to use the latest monsters for overworld abilities, but the turn based combat asks one to get out their spreadsheet to figure out the best investment for skill points.

Overall, this game had a bad concept and has bad execution. I imagine I enjoyed this game much less than others because I am a huge monster collecting game fan, and thus have played all the notable works of this genre. However, likely many of the fans of this game were people who only played Pokemon, were disappointed enough by Sword/Shield to finally try a different game in the genre, and then loved this because it was something different at all. Releasing a monster collecting game in 2020 was a fantastic release time.

Monster Sanctuary is a creature-capture metroidvania with a turn-based combat system. While the story itself is somewhat lackluster, the gameplay is absolutely phenominal. You find yourself exploring the world, battling and combating new and fun creatures. These new critters not only have unique uses in combat, but also grant you new overworld powers to allow you to progress through the game as you would expect from a metroidvania. Behind each monster's wonderful pixel art exterior they each have an in-depth skill tree as well as various other avenues for customization. While I don't think it's more intricate than the obvious comparison - Pokemon - it is far less esoteric and easily accessible. These combat intricacies are further explored in exciting PvP battles, as well as the fairly challenging PvE encounters. Along with a baked-in randomizer and other challenge modes, this game is jam-packed with content and easily worth the asking price of only $20 US.

The elevator pitch for this game is "Monster Taming Metroidvania", a pitch that the game for the most part it lives up to. What one might not expect from this game, however is the very complex combat system, with every monster having an extensive skill tree to pick from, and a combo system that rewards well thought out team compositions. This complexity, however, is a double edged-sword; the system is very engaging if you find fun in creating highly synergistic team compositions, but if you're looking for a more casual experience a la pokemon, it may become a hindrance since even fights against wild monsters can be difficult without a strong team. Aside from the combat, the game largely is what one would expect — the metroidvania and monster taming genres work naturally well together, since the desire to find and capture new monsters encourages the exploration metroidvanias are known for.

Decided to try this game on a whim based on the huge appeal of a monster-collecting Metroidvania, where your creatures' abilities are needed to traverse the world. I thought the exploration was going to be the main draw, and the battles an afterthought. However, everything else about the game soon became outdone by the intricacy and challenging nature of its battle mechanics.

Presentation-wise, the game has fairly simple but effective pixel art. The humans are nondescript little pixel people, but the monsters look great and are animated well even in their small overworld form, which is important not only for battle but because every single one can follow you around. The monster journal provides some gorgeous pixel portraits that give you a more detailed look at what each creature really looks like. As for the music, it ranges from passable to rather good. I got pretty tired of the basic battle theme, which all too often interrupted the atmospheric songs of certain areas.

The main story is pretty basic, including a twist that was really easy to see coming if you're paying attention (although I would rather a twist be predictable than come out of nowhere with absolutely no way to figure it out), but this game shines more in the background worldbuilding it establishes, including a ton of detail on each monster, its behavior and its history with humans in the sanctuary. Speaking of which, the creature designs are in general very cute and charming, and it's tempting to just use a team full of your absolute favorites like you could get away with doing in Pokemon, but that may not be an option because if you're not putting thought into team composition, this game will kick your butt.

So let's talk about that. Battles always consist of three monsters vs. three monsters (with keeper duels featuring a full team of six, a backup mon swapping in when one of the active three is defeated). The interplay of abilities in your current grouping of three will be vital to victory. Each monster has a detailed skill tree, and you get to choose a new skill every time you level up (but there is a level cap so you can never grind so much that you just fill out the entire tree). These include not only new attacks, but plenty of passive effects. Buffs, debuffs, shielding, healing- all of these considerations are important, because this game is NOT easy, and throws a lot of opponents at you who actually have good strategies, and will wipe the floor with you if you aren't thinking through your own team synergy and actions carefully. In fact, the vast majority of damage done on a given turn (at least in my case) comes about "off-turn" at the start of your opponents' movement via debuffs like poison, bleed, burn, the chill-congeal combo, etc.

If it sounds complicated... well, there's even more that goes into the stats. Each monster also has a weapon slot and three additional equipment slots, all of which can be improved via crafting, you can feed your monsters to give them small boosts, past a certain point you can change your monsters into one of two color-shifted forms which confer different advantages... there's a LOT to keep track of. That's what makes this game so interesting, but if you're just looking for a mindless fun time unwinding with cute creatures (no shame in that!) this may not be for you. When I was stuck on a certain battle near the end, I changed to "casual" mode out of curiosity and didn't find it to be much easier, since the opponent's team strategy was still good enough to compensate for having less health in this difficulty setting.

That said, if you DO find a team comp that works well for you, a lot of this game can end up being kind of a slog, as you don't really need to switch up your team and you can get through most battles using the same strategy. And then suddenly the game throws a curveball of a boss battle at you, and you feel the need to totally re-evaluate. Still, unless you're playing on the highest difficulty level, don't believe anyone who says you absolutely must follow a certain team comp or strategy to get through. I used plenty of early or mid-game mons that I liked and managed to win without constantly resetting my skill trees to min-max or creating an entirely new team just to deal with one boss, or anything like that. I saw some people get turned off of this game by difficulty spikes, but there are lots of ways to get through a tough battle, you just have to find one that works.

As for the Metroidvania aspects, it does feel good to move around the world, and it's neat that sometimes the game gates you by a required ability and you're left to find the appropriate monster(s) by looking at the monster journal and figuring out which ability could help you. A couple times there were story gates with hints that you needed a different monster, but mostly it's up to you to figure out how to solve a problem, or if you're even able to at that point or might need to revisit with a later-game companion. Unfortunately, while some creatures do cool movement-related stuff, a lot of monster abilities boil down to simply activating elemental orbs, and most of the world's puzzles are based on... pulling levers to open gates in the correct order. WOW I got tired of seeing those levers.

To sum it up, this game is a very interesting combo of genres, and they might not always mesh together smoothly. Certain parts can start to feel tedious or like a slog, as developing too good of a team might have you suffering from success as you grind through repetitive battles. But if you're looking for a challenging RPG experience that makes you think, with some charming creature designs into the bargain, this game could become your new obsession.

4/5 I recommend.

My Monster Sanctuary ► https://youtu.be/Wa-Ag3d9uEQ

Monster Sanctuary is a Monster Collector game smashed together with pixel-art, JRPGs, & Metroidvanias

Amazing game. It's a Metroid Pokemon RPG game. You can fight and collect monsters while exploring a rich world. Every monster has a skill tree. You're encouraged to find monsters that have synergy with each other. Some might be good for bosses while others are better at duels.

You don't have to grind levels, that happens naturally as you progress. You'll have more fun and success trying different groups of monsters. Also your monsters have abilities to explore the world. I loved they helped instead of only fighting.

There were times I was feeling good in an area just to get absolutely destroyed by a boss. Some difficulty spikes but once I swapped my team around, it was good again. Hard to find anything real negative about the game. The music was awesome and the pixel art is beautiful and bright. I love all the environments. The monster designs in your book are delightful. A really solid game.

I don't think I've ever played a game where the ratio of how I wanted to like it vs the amount I actually enjoyed was so high. On paper, this should be the perfect game for me; how could I not love a creature collector metroidvania? Unfortunately, this game serves as a good reminder that putting two different styles of game together is not a simple task by any means. The two feel at odds with one another, if anything.

The biggest issue by far is that the team building aspect is far more complicated than it needs to be. Even on the lowest difficulty, it feels like the game expects you to perfectly understand every single mechanic and stat like competitive Pokémon, without the terabytes of easily accessible data compiled over 20 years. Combine that with some really annoying menu design and far, far too much gear and individual stats and I found myself more annoyed than anything just trying to get through the game.

It's a shame, because there's so much promise in this game, but it misses the mark just enough to make me think twice about whether or not I can comfortably recommend it. I think if this game can get a decently sized modding community behind it, there may be some hope, but as of now I'd only recommend if you really enjoy the micromanaging aspects and/or are willing to drop 50+ hours.