Sights & Sounds
- What if you took a high fantasy story, added mecha, and then covered the whole thing in Stardew Valley's visual style? You'd get something that looks a bit like Chained Echoes. That isn't really a criticism; I love the way SV looks, and I'm sure the artistic similarities are coincidental anyway. Still, it looks like you could lift Glenn or Lenne's character portrait right from this game and make them a romanceable partner in SV. Beyond the portrait similarities, I found the environments, foliage, and buildings shared some visual likenesses as well
- With that in mind, Chained Echoes is an incredible-looking title that will be sure to please pixel art lovers. There's a lot of careful attention to detail in the towns, forests, deserts, and other biomes you traverse. The enemy sprites (especially unique encounters and bosses) are excellently crafted as well
- I can't get enough of this game's soundtrack. I keep opening up a tab and playing through it on YouTube. Stepping out into Rohlan Fields for the first time and being greeted by that area's theme really sets a great auditory tone for the game. After reaching Farnsport, the first major city, you're welcomed by yet another absolute banger. There's even fun goofy songs like the Goblin Village theme that pull away from the pretty and invigorating soundscape to inject a little humor. This soundtrack stands up there with Chrono Trigger, Suikoden II, and Star Ocean: The Second Story as some of my favorite RPG music ever
- All told, Chained Echoes is an audiovisual smorgasbord that's a 50+ hour delight for the eyes and ears

Story & Vibes
- As with many RPGs with a runtime longer than two days, the narrative is a sweeping epic composed of a few major story arcs, which are in turn comprised of smaller objectives and storylines. To avoid spoilers, I won't reveal many of the major plot points, but I'll describe the setup and themes
- Chained Echoes takes its sweet time setting up the plot and introducing the major characters. In the first act, you'll actually start off switching between the game's 4 (or 6, depending on how you'd personally categorize Kylian and Robb) major characters. First is Glenn, a red-haired mercenary and ace "sky armor" (mecha) pilot who is accompanied by his friend and co-mercenary, Kylian. Next up are Lenne, Princess of Taryn, and her friend Robb, an annoying little shit possessing a bow and arrow but no redeeming qualities, who have left their royal home to gain a better understanding of how the populace lives. Then there's Victor, an "Aar" who looks like a normal human, but has a lifespan running into the hundreds of years. He's a famous playwright who's well respected throughout the world and one of the last students of the ancient magical college at Nhysa. Finally, there's Sienna, a badass, katana-wielding cat burglar with a sour attitude and mysterious past. Eventually, their paths converge while seeking a common goal, kicking off the game's main action at the end of the first act
- Beyond the setup, the crux of Chained Echoes' story lies in the Grand Grimoire, an unbelievably devastating weapon imbued with the power of the gods that can wipe out an entire city in the blink of an eye. Generals, kings, and even gods vie over it to end the land's century long war, and it's up to Glenn and company to seize it and ensure that it doesn't fall into any nefarious hands
- Thematically, Chained Echoes falls into the category of high fantasy owing to all the swords and magic, but the existence of electricity and mecha imbue some additional sci-fi elements. The seeming contradiction in technological advancement is well-explained by the story, fortunately. In addition to the fantasy politics, religion also plays heavily into game's themes, with the church--effectively a multiarmed corporation behind many of the world's events--playing a major role in the plot
- As you may expect in a story that centers around war as a major theme, Chained Echoes is chock-full of political intrigue. Expect to see a lot of scheming, dramatic irony, and plot twists as a result
- In terms of content, Chained Echoes does not shy away from heavy subject matter. Robb, Glenn, and Ba'Thraz all have depressing backstories (Robb still isn't justified in his shittiness), and Kylian's is especially dark (consider this a content warning)
- With such a sweeping story, it's kinda hard to pin down a single vibe. There's a lot of sadness, heaps of action, and even a steady drip of situational humor to add a little levity. Something for everyone. I also applaud the story for not feeling the need to shoehorn a major romantic arc into the game; in fact, they actively avoid doing so when the story very easily could have headed in that direction

Playability & Replayability
- If you've touched a JRPG in the past 30 years, you should be pretty familiar with what's going on in Chained Echoes. Superficially, the turn-based battles and presence of avoidable enemies on the map reminded me of Chrono Trigger. However, the battle system (or, rather, systems) is notably different.
- Most of the time, you'll be fighting on foot with an active party of 4 with an additional 4 party members in reserve. These reserve characters can be switched in, penalty free, to take the "starters" place in the fight. Character switching is especially important as it helps lower your "Overdrive Meter". This meter features a sweet spot in which you'll take less damage and deal more, so you'll want to ensure you choose attacks and switch characters wisely to keep it within that range
- Later in the game, you'll gain access to Sky Armors, which change a few things about combat. In addition to the overdrive meter, Sky Armors have another mechanic dealing with which "gear" it's in. Taking actions in different gears will have differing effects on the overdrive meter, so you'll have to contend with that constraint in addition to the enemies
- Rather than unlocking new skills and abilities as you level up in normal RPGs, the vast majority of the combat skills you learn are available to you at the beginning. Collecting a Grimoire Shard (found on the map, rewarded after major boss fights, or gained by completing chains on your reward board) allows every one of your characters to unlock a new skill. These may be active abilities, stat boosts, or passive benefits
- In terms of combat difficulty, Chained Echoes is tough, but fair on the normal difficulty setting. If you find yourself struggling at any point, it's worth leveling up your skills, improving your weapons, and reconsidering your party composition in order to come out on top. In order to complete the game on normal difficulty, I had to do a lot of exploration and just a touch of grinding to make to through the game's final boss. I really liked how the game rewards exploration; if you want to succeed, try seeing more of what the game has to offer
- Will I wind up replaying this one? I don't know, replaying a 60-hour RPG is a tall order. I'm more likely to just give it a revisit when I've got a craving for the game to try a little postgame content and maybe pick up a few more achievements

Overall Impressions & Performance
- After playing Star Ocean: The Second Story R last year, my taste for RPGs has returned. It's wonderful to see high-quality indie RPGs like this achieve some critical success. It's by no means a perfect game, but the excellent presentation and clever narrative stand up there (but just a touch below) some of my favorites from the so-called "golden age" of JRPGs. It feels familiar but new at the same time, satisfying the requirements that make the genre appealing and marrying them to some interesting new ideas and mechanics. This is clearly a dev--a 1-person endeavor, I should add--who understands "what works"™ and how to introduce novel concepts in the spaces where they remove some old tropes
- There's not much I didn't like about the game. My biggest criticisms would probably center around the plodding pace of the story and battles. The narrative isn't just a slow-burn. I had to blow on it a couple of times to ensure the embers hadn't gone cold. There are unfortunately more than a few story beats that feel unnecessary or unimportant. And although combat is strategic and interesting to plan out, this can lead to some protracted fights even against normal enemies. If the pacing were just a bit snappier, this game would be right on tempo
- I played this on the Steam Deck, which is just about as good as a platform as I can imagine for enjoying a turn-based pixel art RPG. It ran perfectly without crashes or bugs

Final Verdict
9/10. If the art alone didn't compel you to add this title to your cart, rest assured that the gameplay and story (while a bit slow), should. Beating the game and every side story (but not 100%ing it) took 60 hours, so that $25USD asking price is more than fair for the amount and quality of content I experienced