On the one hand, I think gacha is an interesting move for Project Moon. For the billion problems inherant to the genre, the gameplay in previous Project Moon games could easily fit well into it, and a game like Arknights (and maybe ONLY Arknights, though im sure theres others out there under my nose) proves that the medium has legitimate value as a means for some pretty excellent long form storytelling. And the sheer amount of money involved with a successfully operating gacha enables high production values and things like high amounts of voice acting and out-of-game official content, which i personally feel could be well suited to Project Moon's styles of game design and obscenely long storylines.
On the other hand - oh god project moon made a live service game, it has already fallen apart, and they will probably not get away with it. It runs like complete shit, it has already required enough maintenance to justify them sending out 20 free pulls to everyone, it is buggy beyond belief, and the general user experience is absolutely terrible in a genre that will eat you alive for not being tip top in terms of polish.
Main thing that needs to be said is that Limbus company is a game that feels an awful lot more complicated than it actually is. When you get down to it this game is heavily streamlined versus most Gacha (Genshin is a more complicated game than this, unironically), and the gameplay is essentially a bottom of the barrel autobattler with a colour matching minigame beforehand. The UI and onboarding process are utterly abysmal and really dont help matters, as the game flashes by way too much information way too fast, and then obscures pretty important stuff such as the coin flips and support skill stuff to an extent where it really just feels like a game you're meant to outlevel and turn your brain off.
This is compounded by the game being way too RNG heavy. It's not like its a game where you can really influence rolls or work to create strategies which work with variance, the game is just constantly flipping coins and rolling dice on what skills and stuff you get and who's getting the upper hand in fights. And it all happens so quickly its so, so easy to glaze over everything thats happening.
Maybe it's just knowledge of the other Project Moon games, but the whole thing has this impression that its really just another game in their universe that's been crowbarred into a gacha format rather than something built from the ground up to accomodate and really work with the model. It really shows with the particularly bizzare decision to make the game consist of only 12 units, with you essentially rolling your gacha for alters and special moves for them. I get it's going for a sort of MTG planeswalker thing where they show up in different forms all over and whatnot but, still seriously feels like writing yourself into a huge hole for a game set to be being built upon for years and years.
It isn't helped by a truly shit launch. If gacha gamers have standards for anything it's polish, and boy does this not have that. Performance is terrible, with hitching and frequent stutters on mid range phones and god forbid you've got anything over a few years old. Servers have already crashed multiple times, they've had to pull a pack from the shop for being underpriced (not a good move). Some UI buttons just don't work! Tooltips and menu stuff still come up in Korean! I can only imagine the state it must have been in before it got delayed.
I do still think the conceit of Project Moon doing a gacha has potential, but this isn't the realisation of that. This is more like another Project Moon singleplayer game that's been chopped and beaten into a gacha shaped hole, when they have two perfectly serviceable and extremely content rich games right there!
The writing and art chops of Project moon do seem to be here, even if "Mysterious amnesiac becomes commander of cool team" as a setup in gacha has now been beaten like a dead horse, and despite what's claims to the contrary, this really doesn't seem like the best jumping on point to the moonverse. And frankly, I would have serious doubts that the loyal fanbase can prevent limbus reaching end of service before it's story is done.
Maybe I was too naive with my hopes, but Limbus Company really just is a worst case scenario. Beloved developer goes live service, reaps all the negatives without a single thing for the good.
On the other hand - oh god project moon made a live service game, it has already fallen apart, and they will probably not get away with it. It runs like complete shit, it has already required enough maintenance to justify them sending out 20 free pulls to everyone, it is buggy beyond belief, and the general user experience is absolutely terrible in a genre that will eat you alive for not being tip top in terms of polish.
Main thing that needs to be said is that Limbus company is a game that feels an awful lot more complicated than it actually is. When you get down to it this game is heavily streamlined versus most Gacha (Genshin is a more complicated game than this, unironically), and the gameplay is essentially a bottom of the barrel autobattler with a colour matching minigame beforehand. The UI and onboarding process are utterly abysmal and really dont help matters, as the game flashes by way too much information way too fast, and then obscures pretty important stuff such as the coin flips and support skill stuff to an extent where it really just feels like a game you're meant to outlevel and turn your brain off.
This is compounded by the game being way too RNG heavy. It's not like its a game where you can really influence rolls or work to create strategies which work with variance, the game is just constantly flipping coins and rolling dice on what skills and stuff you get and who's getting the upper hand in fights. And it all happens so quickly its so, so easy to glaze over everything thats happening.
Maybe it's just knowledge of the other Project Moon games, but the whole thing has this impression that its really just another game in their universe that's been crowbarred into a gacha format rather than something built from the ground up to accomodate and really work with the model. It really shows with the particularly bizzare decision to make the game consist of only 12 units, with you essentially rolling your gacha for alters and special moves for them. I get it's going for a sort of MTG planeswalker thing where they show up in different forms all over and whatnot but, still seriously feels like writing yourself into a huge hole for a game set to be being built upon for years and years.
It isn't helped by a truly shit launch. If gacha gamers have standards for anything it's polish, and boy does this not have that. Performance is terrible, with hitching and frequent stutters on mid range phones and god forbid you've got anything over a few years old. Servers have already crashed multiple times, they've had to pull a pack from the shop for being underpriced (not a good move). Some UI buttons just don't work! Tooltips and menu stuff still come up in Korean! I can only imagine the state it must have been in before it got delayed.
I do still think the conceit of Project Moon doing a gacha has potential, but this isn't the realisation of that. This is more like another Project Moon singleplayer game that's been chopped and beaten into a gacha shaped hole, when they have two perfectly serviceable and extremely content rich games right there!
The writing and art chops of Project moon do seem to be here, even if "Mysterious amnesiac becomes commander of cool team" as a setup in gacha has now been beaten like a dead horse, and despite what's claims to the contrary, this really doesn't seem like the best jumping on point to the moonverse. And frankly, I would have serious doubts that the loyal fanbase can prevent limbus reaching end of service before it's story is done.
Maybe I was too naive with my hopes, but Limbus Company really just is a worst case scenario. Beloved developer goes live service, reaps all the negatives without a single thing for the good.
DrDelicious
1 year ago