my favorite game i don't have the energy or brain to play through
this sure is a game
I would had handle it
This is a game meant for smart people that know how to take things seriously and do not have time for silly little children's games. For adults only.
This review contains spoilers
Ruina and the SMT franchise are two of the game series I think just sum up my taste in media as a whole. They're both, on the surface level, very "cool" media. They are very hard, but they are cool. It's cool to use Yesod in endgame where he absolutely demolishes everything. It's cool to defeat the Reverbration Ensemble Distorted, where the Library is falling apart but your LIbrarians are still fighting, as a tried and true victory lap (despite the major difficulty), it's cool to fight the Head and Claw while Binah's third theme plays, in a tried and true conclusion of everything the game's been building up to. Roland's furioso is an amazingly satisfying finishing attack. It's cool. It's satisfying.
It's satisfying because there is so much context dripping with everything we do. Everything in this game builds up to something else. YOU are learning, developing, struggling, to grow the Library, to get stronger, and to eventually reach the end point. The very process of winning a reception and burning the books to use is contextual. Just losing a fight is contextual. Everything fits into this grand narrative, where we are putting everyone's wills and emotions against Angela's thirst for knowledge and power. It's the same thing as Shin Megami Tensei, where we, both as players and in the narrative, grow and develop. But while Shin Megami Tensei excels at this grand, suffocating atmosphere, with world-changing implications, Ruina excels at much more personal development.
The emotional crux of Ruina is entirely dependant on three things; Angela, and how she's changed from Lobotomy Corporation (which is also an excellent game, although for different reasons), Roland, and his perspective on the City, and the denizens of the City, all with their dreams, wills, and personalities. It's not a stretch to say every character you meet in Ruina has their own motivations and personality that expands much more on how the City operates, and how these are pit against the City. Even the Rats, which are worthless bums in the eyes of the City, have their dreams. Pete wants to become a Finger, for exampe; it's these small things that make it become a personal fight between the Library and the denizens. Even larger scale fights, like Xiao, are personal fights, where she wants to tear down a Star of the City as vengeance as she burns herself alive.
Roland also has his own motivations, although these aren't really explored until mid to endgame, with his Realizations and everything from the Reverbration Ensemble and onwards. His entire motivation is revenge, as a pseudo reimagening of Orlando Innamorato and Orlando Furioso, as the Twelve Knights of Charlemagne are now twelve Fixers led by Roland (or Orlando, for his original name), where his wife Angelica dies and he lashes out in revenge. Project Moon seems to be a very big fan of reusing these novels to tie them into the thematic narrative of the universe (especially Limbus Corporation), but it never exactly feels like a lazy rehash, but as if it were an original idea, because it links to what the City is.
And to explain what the City is, we'll be moving quickly to Angela. Angela's is a bit of a hard topic to talk about, as it's entirely founded on her development in Lobotomy Corporation, and that game is a lot. But to expand on it in a simpler sense; Angela is about breaking out of a cycle. Lobotomy Corporation was a literal time loop for Angela, and she struggled to realize the Seeds of Light project. She was, once and for all, able to realize it, but that only lead to the Library, another cycle. This time, on her terms, as she employs the same skills as she did in LobCorp, gaining through death and tragedy. She's entirely about breaking out of her selfish desires and understanding what Ayin's goals were, as she eventually understands and reinstates the original Seeds of Light project, creating, once again, a ray of hope for the denizens of the city.
At the end of the day, that's what Ruina is. It's breaking out of a cycle. Everyone is stuck in a cycle of tragedy for various reasons, such as revenge for Roland, but it's only by breaking it that the cast was able to shine and gain a "happy ending". Despite the harsh circumstances, everyone we fought and killed had their own reasons to succeed. Despite Angela desperately wishing to become human, she still discarded it to finish Carmen's work. It's all just about breaking from a cycle.
Gameplay's really fucking fun it's probably my favorite gameplay out there.
Music's amazing yeah.
Art is great too.
Fuck XBox.
It's satisfying because there is so much context dripping with everything we do. Everything in this game builds up to something else. YOU are learning, developing, struggling, to grow the Library, to get stronger, and to eventually reach the end point. The very process of winning a reception and burning the books to use is contextual. Just losing a fight is contextual. Everything fits into this grand narrative, where we are putting everyone's wills and emotions against Angela's thirst for knowledge and power. It's the same thing as Shin Megami Tensei, where we, both as players and in the narrative, grow and develop. But while Shin Megami Tensei excels at this grand, suffocating atmosphere, with world-changing implications, Ruina excels at much more personal development.
The emotional crux of Ruina is entirely dependant on three things; Angela, and how she's changed from Lobotomy Corporation (which is also an excellent game, although for different reasons), Roland, and his perspective on the City, and the denizens of the City, all with their dreams, wills, and personalities. It's not a stretch to say every character you meet in Ruina has their own motivations and personality that expands much more on how the City operates, and how these are pit against the City. Even the Rats, which are worthless bums in the eyes of the City, have their dreams. Pete wants to become a Finger, for exampe; it's these small things that make it become a personal fight between the Library and the denizens. Even larger scale fights, like Xiao, are personal fights, where she wants to tear down a Star of the City as vengeance as she burns herself alive.
Roland also has his own motivations, although these aren't really explored until mid to endgame, with his Realizations and everything from the Reverbration Ensemble and onwards. His entire motivation is revenge, as a pseudo reimagening of Orlando Innamorato and Orlando Furioso, as the Twelve Knights of Charlemagne are now twelve Fixers led by Roland (or Orlando, for his original name), where his wife Angelica dies and he lashes out in revenge. Project Moon seems to be a very big fan of reusing these novels to tie them into the thematic narrative of the universe (especially Limbus Corporation), but it never exactly feels like a lazy rehash, but as if it were an original idea, because it links to what the City is.
And to explain what the City is, we'll be moving quickly to Angela. Angela's is a bit of a hard topic to talk about, as it's entirely founded on her development in Lobotomy Corporation, and that game is a lot. But to expand on it in a simpler sense; Angela is about breaking out of a cycle. Lobotomy Corporation was a literal time loop for Angela, and she struggled to realize the Seeds of Light project. She was, once and for all, able to realize it, but that only lead to the Library, another cycle. This time, on her terms, as she employs the same skills as she did in LobCorp, gaining through death and tragedy. She's entirely about breaking out of her selfish desires and understanding what Ayin's goals were, as she eventually understands and reinstates the original Seeds of Light project, creating, once again, a ray of hope for the denizens of the city.
At the end of the day, that's what Ruina is. It's breaking out of a cycle. Everyone is stuck in a cycle of tragedy for various reasons, such as revenge for Roland, but it's only by breaking it that the cast was able to shine and gain a "happy ending". Despite the harsh circumstances, everyone we fought and killed had their own reasons to succeed. Despite Angela desperately wishing to become human, she still discarded it to finish Carmen's work. It's all just about breaking from a cycle.
Gameplay's really fucking fun it's probably my favorite gameplay out there.
Music's amazing yeah.
Art is great too.
Fuck XBox.
it was ok
Completely ruined me. I'm obsessed and it's became my favorite game of all time now. Project Moon has forced me on their wild ride. I do not wish to be freed.
To preface this, I loved Library of Ruina (LoR) and highly, highly recommend it. If you can get into it, then it is a special game.
LoR is the sequel to Lobotomy Corporation (LC), and while you can play LoR without having played LC, I cannot wholly recommend doing so. LoR explains everything you need to know to easily understand the goings on of the game—you won’t be lost if you start out with this game. BUT none of the beats will hit anywhere near as hard if you haven’t played LC. Experiencing what (the majority) of the characters went through in the hell that was LC greatly enhances the experience.
The game would generically be explained as a turn-based deckbuilder RPG. Barely of that accurately describes the game. Do not think to compare this to other deckbuilders, the gameplay doesn’t resemble STS or any other game. It doesn’t go super hard into deckbuilding—each character can only have 9 cards in a deck. The thing is that you can have up to 5 characters in a battle, and you will be expected to finely tune your decks, passive skills, and strategies to beat what the game throws at you.
The combat is… hard to adequately describe. Look up a tutorial vid on YT to get a good idea of what’s going on there. Trying to explain it n a review would only cause confusion.
Beware: The game is not easy. The first 30% or so of the game is ‘easy’ content, both in terms of story and gameplay. Then the game will start requiring you to optimize your decks and play. You will have to think 1-2 turns in advanced and manage both yours and the enemy’s resources in order to win. In terms of story content, LoR does not shy away from the bad. If things like body horror or total mental breakdowns are too much for you, then you probably shouldn’t play the game.
Musically, the game is an absolute delight. Between full orchestral pieces, a little metal, and some Piano/Violin duets (they paid for the whole Violin, and by god they are going to use the whole Violin), and some Mili vocal pieces, the game has a large and varied OST—all of which is fantastic. But that is not the main draw. LoR’s OST works with the themes, story and emotions, enhancing and enriching the entire experience. The game interweaves the music with the entire experience in a way I have only seen done by Nier Automata. The OST is probably only a single step below Chrono Cross and Legend of Mana, the gods of video game OSTs.
The story is centered around the growth of the two main characters: Roland and Angela, through their growing “friendship”, their experiences with those in the city whose lives they take, and their interactions with the major characters from the first game (the Sephirot). It is about whether you can be truly free, to do something you want and do it only for yourself, and whether it is possible to do so without continuing the cycle of suffering—can you pursue your own self-actualization without crushing that of someone else’s? Can you accept and face sorrow and loss?
The game makes you care about the characters, both those you play as and those you fight. You are not always (or even usually) the good guy in any interaction, and you will feel bad with some of the harm you inflict.
This game is not a SCP-centric experience. While they are a good part of the gameplay, they are not there to be SCPs. Instead they are more thematic entities, representing pain, trauma, desires, etc. of the main characters. This game is character-focused not SCP-focused.
The game does amazing world-building. Each encounter gives you snippets of the lives of the people whose lives you are about to take. Enough to build a concrete idea of the entire world, but not enough that you are inundated in lore dumps or that the world loses its mystery and magic.
LoR is a long game and encounters are long. This is not a game for short bursts. Later fights and realizations can easily take ~1hr. By the point you reach “Star of the City”, you will think you’ve reached the endgame, but in actuality you’ll have reached the halfway point. As the game goes on, encounters get larger, more complicated, and much longer.
It ain’t perfect by any measure though. Like LC, the game absolutely sucks at explaining its mechanics. You will suffer for no good reason while learning them. The English translation, while fine and lightyears ahead of LC’s, is a little rough in the beginning (beginning = pre-Crying Children/Love Town). It isn’t hard to understand, but it is a definitely a little mechanical and too literally translated. Thankfully, it markedly improves in the later acts.
The UI is a disaster, both in menus and in combat. Keeping track of 10,000 overlapping arrows is not a skill you will ever want to develop, but it is one you must. You will accidentally right click out of a billion menus on accident. You will have trouble viewing status effects and character status screens will get in the way of combat. Navigation is painful for no good reason.
I feel as if I have written ~1k words without really describing the game. But it is more of an experience than anything else. I highly recommend it, but it is definitely not for everyone, and you need to be accepting of the jank you will encounter.
LoR is the sequel to Lobotomy Corporation (LC), and while you can play LoR without having played LC, I cannot wholly recommend doing so. LoR explains everything you need to know to easily understand the goings on of the game—you won’t be lost if you start out with this game. BUT none of the beats will hit anywhere near as hard if you haven’t played LC. Experiencing what (the majority) of the characters went through in the hell that was LC greatly enhances the experience.
The game would generically be explained as a turn-based deckbuilder RPG. Barely of that accurately describes the game. Do not think to compare this to other deckbuilders, the gameplay doesn’t resemble STS or any other game. It doesn’t go super hard into deckbuilding—each character can only have 9 cards in a deck. The thing is that you can have up to 5 characters in a battle, and you will be expected to finely tune your decks, passive skills, and strategies to beat what the game throws at you.
The combat is… hard to adequately describe. Look up a tutorial vid on YT to get a good idea of what’s going on there. Trying to explain it n a review would only cause confusion.
Beware: The game is not easy. The first 30% or so of the game is ‘easy’ content, both in terms of story and gameplay. Then the game will start requiring you to optimize your decks and play. You will have to think 1-2 turns in advanced and manage both yours and the enemy’s resources in order to win. In terms of story content, LoR does not shy away from the bad. If things like body horror or total mental breakdowns are too much for you, then you probably shouldn’t play the game.
Musically, the game is an absolute delight. Between full orchestral pieces, a little metal, and some Piano/Violin duets (they paid for the whole Violin, and by god they are going to use the whole Violin), and some Mili vocal pieces, the game has a large and varied OST—all of which is fantastic. But that is not the main draw. LoR’s OST works with the themes, story and emotions, enhancing and enriching the entire experience. The game interweaves the music with the entire experience in a way I have only seen done by Nier Automata. The OST is probably only a single step below Chrono Cross and Legend of Mana, the gods of video game OSTs.
The story is centered around the growth of the two main characters: Roland and Angela, through their growing “friendship”, their experiences with those in the city whose lives they take, and their interactions with the major characters from the first game (the Sephirot). It is about whether you can be truly free, to do something you want and do it only for yourself, and whether it is possible to do so without continuing the cycle of suffering—can you pursue your own self-actualization without crushing that of someone else’s? Can you accept and face sorrow and loss?
The game makes you care about the characters, both those you play as and those you fight. You are not always (or even usually) the good guy in any interaction, and you will feel bad with some of the harm you inflict.
This game is not a SCP-centric experience. While they are a good part of the gameplay, they are not there to be SCPs. Instead they are more thematic entities, representing pain, trauma, desires, etc. of the main characters. This game is character-focused not SCP-focused.
The game does amazing world-building. Each encounter gives you snippets of the lives of the people whose lives you are about to take. Enough to build a concrete idea of the entire world, but not enough that you are inundated in lore dumps or that the world loses its mystery and magic.
LoR is a long game and encounters are long. This is not a game for short bursts. Later fights and realizations can easily take ~1hr. By the point you reach “Star of the City”, you will think you’ve reached the endgame, but in actuality you’ll have reached the halfway point. As the game goes on, encounters get larger, more complicated, and much longer.
It ain’t perfect by any measure though. Like LC, the game absolutely sucks at explaining its mechanics. You will suffer for no good reason while learning them. The English translation, while fine and lightyears ahead of LC’s, is a little rough in the beginning (beginning = pre-Crying Children/Love Town). It isn’t hard to understand, but it is a definitely a little mechanical and too literally translated. Thankfully, it markedly improves in the later acts.
The UI is a disaster, both in menus and in combat. Keeping track of 10,000 overlapping arrows is not a skill you will ever want to develop, but it is one you must. You will accidentally right click out of a billion menus on accident. You will have trouble viewing status effects and character status screens will get in the way of combat. Navigation is painful for no good reason.
I feel as if I have written ~1k words without really describing the game. But it is more of an experience than anything else. I highly recommend it, but it is definitely not for everyone, and you need to be accepting of the jank you will encounter.
I once again was wrong about Library of Ruina.
It's not a PM game, we know.
But it's a damn good game
Sure it's not Lobcorp
Sure it's not LC2
Sure it's not Limbus
Sure it's not Distortion Detective
But it isn't trying to be any of those games in the past.
Lots of people blamed PM for innovating, except for Steam Workshop, that's a whole different story.
PM took risks with Library of Ruina, and you know. I give them more gratitude now and start to even respect them more even of their flaws, they are trying their best at making these games and did a good job at it too.
I watched documentaries of PM and their games and Alicesoft's Rance X, and from what I've seen they both do a damn great job.
It's not the writing of any of the past games but that's okay, in Library of Ruina there are very good receptions too and some good written too, it's just, we haven't taken notice of it, because they lie under all the other mediocre storyline quests.
I played 100 hours and did I enjoy it? Hell yeah, I even got the game with the DLCs for cheap, my money was worth the spending.
It's not a overly well written PM game but that's okay, if you want such a game there is Lobcorp.
But let me get down to the positives
Gun decks are really well done and feels really good, some guns feel meh but most of them are solid while shooting and do the job, and customizing guns is really deep too with some weapons, I am referencing this positive because past PM games failed to do this well with the engine they had.
I underestimated the DLCs, like they are great DLCs with tons of content to add, whether it's for a settlement or a whole new world to explore with a new narrative.
Except for storyline quests, most receptions were great.
Mods were this time integrated in the game which made it so much easier for people to access it.
RPG system is very dumbed down and lackluster but does the job relatively well, it's not as customizable as the old ones but that's fine, PM tooks risks and that's okay +/-
Negatives are pretty simple
Storyline quests, factions really felt lackluster, some storyline quests were good but most of them failed, sadly enough.
RPG system is +/- but it's still in an negative, it's very dumbed down and is not that customizable.
deck building is also a +/-, it does the job but nothing really amazing.
I think that's about it, now that I think about it, Library of Ruina wasn't too bad of a game, its just that PM wanted to innovate in such ways it really stood out but some of them failed, people were disappointed of some things but nontheless it's a fun game and surely a great time to play. Having negative thoughts about this game really just doesn't feel good, just because it wasn't a PM game for me, but still had a great time.
10/10 Where is my Lobcorp 2
BTW I am really excited to nuke people in Limbus
It's not a PM game, we know.
But it's a damn good game
Sure it's not Lobcorp
Sure it's not LC2
Sure it's not Limbus
Sure it's not Distortion Detective
But it isn't trying to be any of those games in the past.
Lots of people blamed PM for innovating, except for Steam Workshop, that's a whole different story.
PM took risks with Library of Ruina, and you know. I give them more gratitude now and start to even respect them more even of their flaws, they are trying their best at making these games and did a good job at it too.
I watched documentaries of PM and their games and Alicesoft's Rance X, and from what I've seen they both do a damn great job.
It's not the writing of any of the past games but that's okay, in Library of Ruina there are very good receptions too and some good written too, it's just, we haven't taken notice of it, because they lie under all the other mediocre storyline quests.
I played 100 hours and did I enjoy it? Hell yeah, I even got the game with the DLCs for cheap, my money was worth the spending.
It's not a overly well written PM game but that's okay, if you want such a game there is Lobcorp.
But let me get down to the positives
Gun decks are really well done and feels really good, some guns feel meh but most of them are solid while shooting and do the job, and customizing guns is really deep too with some weapons, I am referencing this positive because past PM games failed to do this well with the engine they had.
I underestimated the DLCs, like they are great DLCs with tons of content to add, whether it's for a settlement or a whole new world to explore with a new narrative.
Except for storyline quests, most receptions were great.
Mods were this time integrated in the game which made it so much easier for people to access it.
RPG system is very dumbed down and lackluster but does the job relatively well, it's not as customizable as the old ones but that's fine, PM tooks risks and that's okay +/-
Negatives are pretty simple
Storyline quests, factions really felt lackluster, some storyline quests were good but most of them failed, sadly enough.
RPG system is +/- but it's still in an negative, it's very dumbed down and is not that customizable.
deck building is also a +/-, it does the job but nothing really amazing.
I think that's about it, now that I think about it, Library of Ruina wasn't too bad of a game, its just that PM wanted to innovate in such ways it really stood out but some of them failed, people were disappointed of some things but nontheless it's a fun game and surely a great time to play. Having negative thoughts about this game really just doesn't feel good, just because it wasn't a PM game for me, but still had a great time.
10/10 Where is my Lobcorp 2
BTW I am really excited to nuke people in Limbus
i've only played a handful of hours, but this game fuckin rules so far
I'm in love with this game's tone and direction but there's just so many mechanics happening on top of each other at once that it's genuinely overwhelming to go through a single round of combat. The power creep between floors constantly invalidates old decks you build as well.
I can't play it without my brain melting down after an hour of gameplay.
I can't play it without my brain melting down after an hour of gameplay.
I do not think I'm ever going to find another piece of media I resonate with as strongly and profoundly as this
This game gave me like 8 new mental illnesses can't thank it enough
ProjMoon ruined my life with this duology in the best way possible
pretty good
good story good gameplay and amazing soundtrack
i enjoyed
good story good gameplay and amazing soundtrack
i enjoyed
I can finally flex that my favorite game of all time isn't a weeb game
HE TURNED INTO A BOOK
FUNNIEST SHIT I'VE EVER SEEN
FUNNIEST SHIT I'VE EVER SEEN
Hokma balls
We do not talk about Love Town.
Peak narrative experience.
You can't get any better than this.
Hod my beloved...
You can't get any better than this.
Hod my beloved...
I don't think this is how a library works.
This is my new favorite game 🙂.
I have to start with this: Please play Lobotomy Corporation or watch a 100% playthrough of it before you play this game! It's technically not required but this is a direct sequel with most of the main cast returning from it. The librarians' character development largely happens in lobcorp, and a lot of Angela's development in this game happens because of the events that happen in it. If you like any of the characters at all then I highly, highly recommend playing it before this.
This is a fantastic game with great characters, story, world building, music, and art, created by developers who care deeply about their fanbase. It is a turn based deck builder type game so there is some strategy required for this, and if you don't want to play it yourself you should watch someone else play it because there are story bits and a lot of extra character exploration to be found in a number of these fights.
I don't want to spoil it so I won't go super in depth about it but this game talks a lot about recovering from abuse and dealing with the baggage that comes with it, like trauma and unhealthy coping mechanisms, among other things. In general, Ruina does a lot of looking at how the best and the worst of us deal with our problems. It also heavily critiques capitalism in a way that makes me wonder if this is specifically targeted at Korean workforce culture and the way people don't take mental illnesses that seriously, but I don't know much about Korea so I can't really speak on it. A lot of this is sensitive content, and also there is some gore, so look at the "does the dog die" page for this game in case you need it.
The last time I loved a game like this was when I played Umineko for the first time, literally 6 years ago. This is definitely going to be a favorite for a long time to come.
In conclusion I would like to marry every single librarian, especially Binah and Angela.
This is a fantastic game with great characters, story, world building, music, and art, created by developers who care deeply about their fanbase. It is a turn based deck builder type game so there is some strategy required for this, and if you don't want to play it yourself you should watch someone else play it because there are story bits and a lot of extra character exploration to be found in a number of these fights.
I don't want to spoil it so I won't go super in depth about it but this game talks a lot about recovering from abuse and dealing with the baggage that comes with it, like trauma and unhealthy coping mechanisms, among other things. In general, Ruina does a lot of looking at how the best and the worst of us deal with our problems. It also heavily critiques capitalism in a way that makes me wonder if this is specifically targeted at Korean workforce culture and the way people don't take mental illnesses that seriously, but I don't know much about Korea so I can't really speak on it. A lot of this is sensitive content, and also there is some gore, so look at the "does the dog die" page for this game in case you need it.
The last time I loved a game like this was when I played Umineko for the first time, literally 6 years ago. This is definitely going to be a favorite for a long time to come.
In conclusion I would like to marry every single librarian, especially Binah and Angela.
This review contains spoilers
It's all a stage play, at the end of it.
This was a surprise hit for me, as I'd never been much for card games, although it's hard to call this 'just a card game'. The World, Music and characters really sell this unique experience as something else.
This was a surprise hit for me, as I'd never been much for card games, although it's hard to call this 'just a card game'. The World, Music and characters really sell this unique experience as something else.
this is my new favorite game
Alguém me da um pc decente pra zerar essa porra
THOUGH IT MAY HURT TODAY TOMORROW ILL BE HEADING MY WAY
They Didn't find the Books in Their Place
That's that, and this is one of the best games ever made.