-Written on December 12, 2020-
The story for this game is just pure insane, to put it in simple terms. You would think it's just gonna be another mecha game that you fight against kauji at the very beginning of the game, and it is for the most part. However there is just soooo much more that goes behind the scenes with the kauji invasion.
One of the coolest parts of the game is how you can go through the story and unravel the mystery in many different ways since you play through the story throughout the perspective of 13 characters and each character add a puzzle piece to the overall story. Since you can hop around the characters' stories at any given time, no two people going to have the exact same experience with the story. The way the story is even told like this and it still very coherent without falling apart is just honestly a testament to writing ability.
Things not going to make sense at all very early on and you probably won't get the overall picture until the very end of the game. In fact, if I told you the ending of the game when you start the game, you probably won't believe me since it seems like it's that far-fetched. The game is a constant plot-twisting adventure with a lot of mind-blowing reveals that you just wondering how that even makes sense. The most I will say without spoiling anything more than the first hour of the game masterfully incorporate nearly every major Sci-Fi subgenre and you wouldn't even realize it at first.
One of the things I really love is the aesthetics. The art is just gorgeous and well animated since it looked hand-painted and I actually appreciate the fact that the characters actually looked like Japanese people with dark eyes and realistic hair colors. It's honestly really refreshing considering so many Japanese games have a super colorful cast with appearances. So when I heard someone said 13 Sentinels was a "generic anime game" and I was ?????? since the game barely looks like something you would see from your everyday anime. The OST is great as well since it's a mix of electronic, ambient, and orchestral music and it adds a lot to the emotion with certain scenes.
Not to mention none of the characters don't act tropey as you see in anime. Rather most of them behave like believable teens in high school and there are no clear-cut black morality evil characters. A lot of these characters just trying to live their everyday life in high school rather than being this grand action hero until they're forced to do so. Nearly everyone in the game is mortally grey and their complex motivations add a lot of depth to the already expansive and puzzling story. Character relationships also done well since they add another dimension to their writing and their motivations. It is just nice to have a lot of flawed but believable characters that aren't overly exaggerated with their personality.
There is actual gameplay as well, the tower defense RTS mode. Overall it feels like a side game and it didn't really need it but it's still cool to actually fight against the kauji with the pilots. There is actually a surprising amount of depth with the gameplay since you can level up stats and abilities and there are 4 different types of Sentinels you can use for different situations and strategies. At first, it might seem like it's just a tackled-on mode but it gets challenging as you make progress and you got to actually think ahead with what you going to do with your Sentinels. Not to mention you can't use everyone all of the time, so there's that to consider as well. I can safely say there's a lot of decent effort put into the RTS mode. Plus you still get chunks of character interaction and info you don't get in the main story mode as well.
13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim is just a purely amazing game with very few flaws. It's my personal game of the year (yes I even love 13 Sentinels more than I love Cold Steel 4), It's very close to my all-time favorite game (just right behind Steins; Gate) and overall one of my favorite stories period, not just in games. In fact, I think this, Steins; Gate and 20th Century Boys is my holy trinity as far as my favorite Sci-Fi stories. I haven't experienced anything that mixes Sci-Fi, Mystery, and Psychological so well in a very long time and those are my favorite genres, so no surprise the game click with me so well. I don't care what The Game Awards say, The Last of Us part 2 didn't deserve to win Best Narrative, this game does right here. And it's so sad very few people didn't even hear about this game, let alone play it. If you love a good story, then please play this game. 13 Sentinels is going down as one of the things I will shill so more people can play it. It's a criminally underrated masterpiece.
The story for this game is just pure insane, to put it in simple terms. You would think it's just gonna be another mecha game that you fight against kauji at the very beginning of the game, and it is for the most part. However there is just soooo much more that goes behind the scenes with the kauji invasion.
One of the coolest parts of the game is how you can go through the story and unravel the mystery in many different ways since you play through the story throughout the perspective of 13 characters and each character add a puzzle piece to the overall story. Since you can hop around the characters' stories at any given time, no two people going to have the exact same experience with the story. The way the story is even told like this and it still very coherent without falling apart is just honestly a testament to writing ability.
Things not going to make sense at all very early on and you probably won't get the overall picture until the very end of the game. In fact, if I told you the ending of the game when you start the game, you probably won't believe me since it seems like it's that far-fetched. The game is a constant plot-twisting adventure with a lot of mind-blowing reveals that you just wondering how that even makes sense. The most I will say without spoiling anything more than the first hour of the game masterfully incorporate nearly every major Sci-Fi subgenre and you wouldn't even realize it at first.
One of the things I really love is the aesthetics. The art is just gorgeous and well animated since it looked hand-painted and I actually appreciate the fact that the characters actually looked like Japanese people with dark eyes and realistic hair colors. It's honestly really refreshing considering so many Japanese games have a super colorful cast with appearances. So when I heard someone said 13 Sentinels was a "generic anime game" and I was ?????? since the game barely looks like something you would see from your everyday anime. The OST is great as well since it's a mix of electronic, ambient, and orchestral music and it adds a lot to the emotion with certain scenes.
Not to mention none of the characters don't act tropey as you see in anime. Rather most of them behave like believable teens in high school and there are no clear-cut black morality evil characters. A lot of these characters just trying to live their everyday life in high school rather than being this grand action hero until they're forced to do so. Nearly everyone in the game is mortally grey and their complex motivations add a lot of depth to the already expansive and puzzling story. Character relationships also done well since they add another dimension to their writing and their motivations. It is just nice to have a lot of flawed but believable characters that aren't overly exaggerated with their personality.
There is actual gameplay as well, the tower defense RTS mode. Overall it feels like a side game and it didn't really need it but it's still cool to actually fight against the kauji with the pilots. There is actually a surprising amount of depth with the gameplay since you can level up stats and abilities and there are 4 different types of Sentinels you can use for different situations and strategies. At first, it might seem like it's just a tackled-on mode but it gets challenging as you make progress and you got to actually think ahead with what you going to do with your Sentinels. Not to mention you can't use everyone all of the time, so there's that to consider as well. I can safely say there's a lot of decent effort put into the RTS mode. Plus you still get chunks of character interaction and info you don't get in the main story mode as well.
13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim is just a purely amazing game with very few flaws. It's my personal game of the year (yes I even love 13 Sentinels more than I love Cold Steel 4), It's very close to my all-time favorite game (just right behind Steins; Gate) and overall one of my favorite stories period, not just in games. In fact, I think this, Steins; Gate and 20th Century Boys is my holy trinity as far as my favorite Sci-Fi stories. I haven't experienced anything that mixes Sci-Fi, Mystery, and Psychological so well in a very long time and those are my favorite genres, so no surprise the game click with me so well. I don't care what The Game Awards say, The Last of Us part 2 didn't deserve to win Best Narrative, this game does right here. And it's so sad very few people didn't even hear about this game, let alone play it. If you love a good story, then please play this game. 13 Sentinels is going down as one of the things I will shill so more people can play it. It's a criminally underrated masterpiece.