This review contains spoilers
Digimon Survive gets a lot right but some pretty unforgivable mistakes stops it from being a modern classic.
I want to start off by saying I did not know this was going to be a visual novel, I've never liked that style, and I bought this game because of the tactical fighting, and well, it's Digimon! That being said, are modern visual novels this visually pleasing? I loved the way the characters are fully fleshed out and gave a 3D presentation. The world is beautiful. Whoever worked on the world building/art really dug into that Digimon feeling. With that came fantastic characters. Most characters have their own personality but manage to steer away from the classic anime trope of being one dimensional. This was integral considering you have to interact with them and build relationships. Everyone has something you can like about them, and a few may annoy you at times, but that's very a human thing, it all adds into the world building. The only character I disliked a lot was Shuuji. It was extremely frustrating being unable to give him a punch in the face for how abusive he was. Lowkey I was happy when Lopman ate him.
On the other side of this, Minoru gave a fantastic representation for character development. After the incidents with Ryo and Shuuji, he begins to lose faith in Falcomon, with it leading to him becoming a douche. But as soon as I started to dislike him, he listened to what I told him and actually put in the effort to make it up to Falcomon. He grew. (just like the Digimon do, get it?)
The story in general was keeping me hooked, well, until it wasn't. What was it that went wrong? I'm not even so sure myself. There just came a point where I wanted to skip a lot of the dialogue. It was a slow burner, but it did manage to hook for me a solid portion of the story. After a while though it does run out of steam. The Shuuji incident was pretty iconic in its own right. Though, the whole "the Master is just a big robotic entity" was pretty awful storytelling. That was a terrible idea for a boss. Arukenimon was a thrilling boss to play cat and mouse with, hell, Piedmon's very short stint as being the "real" villain was intriguing. The Master's reveal was simply underwhelming.
Thinking about it, I know why the story became boring for me.
It's too long. I know, I know. My all-time beloved Final Fantasy VII is longer. The difference is that isn't a visual novel. You can explore the world, it's less dialogue focused with you spending more time fighting and running around the world you're in. You can't do that in a visual novel, you are anchored to a spot. Standing in that spot for 95% of the game time is not engaging enough. This leads me to my next issue, the game mechanics itself. Why are the fights so basic until at least part 9? I played 99% of the battles on auto because of how easy they were. Plopping two enemies in the middle of the map with your six just a few squares away, is terrible level design. They did a piss-poor job all around when it came to the combat. Why can't our Digimon start the battles Digivolved, it's a tedious action to do every time.
Overall, Survive has beautiful art, good characters, and a solid story for 75% of the game. But the fighting aspects were sub-par and really held the game back from being a solid 8-9/10. The final villain was boring but a tweak to that would have made the story one of the best I've played.
7/10.
I want to start off by saying I did not know this was going to be a visual novel, I've never liked that style, and I bought this game because of the tactical fighting, and well, it's Digimon! That being said, are modern visual novels this visually pleasing? I loved the way the characters are fully fleshed out and gave a 3D presentation. The world is beautiful. Whoever worked on the world building/art really dug into that Digimon feeling. With that came fantastic characters. Most characters have their own personality but manage to steer away from the classic anime trope of being one dimensional. This was integral considering you have to interact with them and build relationships. Everyone has something you can like about them, and a few may annoy you at times, but that's very a human thing, it all adds into the world building. The only character I disliked a lot was Shuuji. It was extremely frustrating being unable to give him a punch in the face for how abusive he was. Lowkey I was happy when Lopman ate him.
On the other side of this, Minoru gave a fantastic representation for character development. After the incidents with Ryo and Shuuji, he begins to lose faith in Falcomon, with it leading to him becoming a douche. But as soon as I started to dislike him, he listened to what I told him and actually put in the effort to make it up to Falcomon. He grew. (just like the Digimon do, get it?)
The story in general was keeping me hooked, well, until it wasn't. What was it that went wrong? I'm not even so sure myself. There just came a point where I wanted to skip a lot of the dialogue. It was a slow burner, but it did manage to hook for me a solid portion of the story. After a while though it does run out of steam. The Shuuji incident was pretty iconic in its own right. Though, the whole "the Master is just a big robotic entity" was pretty awful storytelling. That was a terrible idea for a boss. Arukenimon was a thrilling boss to play cat and mouse with, hell, Piedmon's very short stint as being the "real" villain was intriguing. The Master's reveal was simply underwhelming.
Thinking about it, I know why the story became boring for me.
It's too long. I know, I know. My all-time beloved Final Fantasy VII is longer. The difference is that isn't a visual novel. You can explore the world, it's less dialogue focused with you spending more time fighting and running around the world you're in. You can't do that in a visual novel, you are anchored to a spot. Standing in that spot for 95% of the game time is not engaging enough. This leads me to my next issue, the game mechanics itself. Why are the fights so basic until at least part 9? I played 99% of the battles on auto because of how easy they were. Plopping two enemies in the middle of the map with your six just a few squares away, is terrible level design. They did a piss-poor job all around when it came to the combat. Why can't our Digimon start the battles Digivolved, it's a tedious action to do every time.
Overall, Survive has beautiful art, good characters, and a solid story for 75% of the game. But the fighting aspects were sub-par and really held the game back from being a solid 8-9/10. The final villain was boring but a tweak to that would have made the story one of the best I've played.
7/10.