Deception IV: The Nightmare Princess is sadly a nightmare to play through. The gameplay is unbalanced towards the computer, the graphics are PS2 worthy, and the whole concept of trapping humans in horrible and embarrassing ways is just not enjoyable to play.
In Deception IV, you play as the devil’s (“The Great One’s”) daughter, Laegrinna, who is trying to bring nightmares to humans so The Great One can be reborn and Laegrinna can regain her powers. As Laegrinna and her allies are invaded by humans, it is up to them to find the Holy Verses so they can bring back their master. The characters in the story have no depth and adapt from general stereotypes seen in anime. However, the writing can sometimes have a bit of personality through its side characters; for example, there is a crazy religious leader who thinks she was given a gun by God to defeat the demons: Laegrinna and her allies. This woman loves the fact that she is going on a hunt; she’s been waiting for a long time. Despite the crazyness of some of the characters, I felt like I wanted the humans to defeat the witches because they are pure evil. They enjoy killing humans, and it’s just sickening to play as them.
The goal of the game is to defeat all the enemies with traps. Included with the over 180 traps available are: a falling pumpkin mask to confuse humans into walking in a specific direction, a swinging axe to slash enemies, and a springboard, which can help combo an enemy into another trap. Every stage, in addition, has a triggerable trap, which can be activated — like a statue with a heavy sword in hand or a mechanical knight and horse striking those who pass by. These specific stage traps are the most interesting part of Deception IV: The Nightmare Princess, but they’re the most difficult to trigger.
While all of that sounds creative, the execution (pun originally not intended) is lacking. The way the traps are triggered are by enemies following your character, and with a slow camera and your enemies’ abilities, it’s difficult to keep track. With specific trap types like the Swinging Axe, you have to be very accurate, as there is a slim window of opportunity. This, along with the enemies’ ability to stun you with lightning/fire spells, long range arrows, and elaborate sword swings, makes it very difficult to accomplish. These attacks also interrupt my train of thought, as I try to figure out how the traps will connect with each other and when to activate each trap. An ability called Auto-defense does help with this at times, but you can still get interrupted.
The traps can hit you as well, so if you’re trying to leash your enemies towards the area you set your trap at, it can get frustrating, because you can get hit accidentally if you’re trying to get them to turn into a specific trajectory to confirm with the next trap on your list, or you are trying to confirm a hit. The ability of being able to kick later in the game is a blessing, as you can set up traps more proficiently, but it’s still difficult to handle multiple enemies of different classes at once. It’s also easy to walk into interactables on the stage with the camera being so slow. What makes it worse for the player is that enemies can be invulnerable to specific traps, so you are limited at times with what set ups you can create.
The AI is also dumb to what’s going on around them. Time and time again, they will fall for the same tricks you create. They avoid whatever stage hazard that comes towards them, but they do not avoid the same area you placed the traps at. The tutorials, on the other hand, do a great job at explaining the game’s unique mechanics so you will not be as dumb as the enemies you are fighting against.
To be completely transparent, the whole idea of this game to me is just too morbid. While it will not affect the score of the review, killing others for sport and hearing what they say before they die like “I wish I told her how I felt” or “I want to see my village again” upset me, especially when a character’s lover came to the house to find out what happened after my character killed him. This aspect of the game and the comical nature of some of the traps included just didn’t sit well with me, and overall, Deception IV: The Nightmare Princess doesn’t know what it wants to be. If it was a look into a crazed set of witches’ psychological factors, it would be fine, as it’s offering an interesting perspective on the narrative — but with the over the top Looney Tunes-esque comical nature of the pumpkin mask, for example, the theme doesn’t make sense.
For those who think they would enjoy Deception IV: The Nightmare Princess‘ strange mix of trapping humans and comedy, there is a cool creation tool for making levels for others to play. It’s not in-depth and doesn’t offer you the chance to create your own stages (you have to use existing areas), but it’s a good addition none-the-less, and there are further unlocks you can get as you play through the story mode to make more elaborate levels. You can even create your own characters for the mode. The free mode, in addition, has every stage from the game available, so you can play to your hearts’ content without completing the story mode. For those who like to speedrun, there is also a leaderboard available. There’s even a Replay system that can help you rewatch your mistakes so you can improve your time and rating.
As well as the story mode, there is the Quest Mode, which has you try to succeed in the challenges, like perform a 3-hit combo. Each quest unlocks a new item or key to the next area. The game is difficult to progress through as it’s unbalanced towards the computer, but unlocking each trap and area is satisfying to complete. There is also an element of story within this mode as you play as Velguirie, one of the devil’s daughters who has to have Laegrinna submit to her, so she can bring back The Great One herself.
This is one of the least impressive looking games on the PS4. The models and environments are lacking in detail. However, except for the initial levels of the game, the areas have personality and continue with an interesting theme. The colors look dull and gray, and whether or not it is intentional from the theme they are trying to bring to the game, the running animations from enemies look like actors running off of a stage during a pantomime as an intermission begins. This game feels like it should be on the PS2 or a mobile device rather than the PS4, but at least the art design does not disappoint.
The sound work does not fare that much better. The voice work is subpar, with the multiple generic characters featured in the game, and when there is a crazy character, the voice becomes extremely irritating. While this is a matter of preference, I would have preferred to have English voice acting over Japanese voice acting; both would have been great to have. Yep, this game only has Japanese voice acting. The music is just like the voice acting. It sounds like a generic action theme similar to the PS2 movie tie in games from way back, and the songs just loop over and over again, making it annoying to listen to. The sound effects match with the traps and sound correct in every way to the point of them being a bit creepy.
Overall, the graphics are outdated, the gameplay is unbalanced by enemies who have abilities that can stun you, and the sound work, despite the well crafted sound effects, is average at best. The variety of traps is fantastic, with over 180 at your disposal, and the environments are well designed, but like the humans you are fighting against, Deception IV: The Nightmare Princess a nightmare to play.
A code for Deception IV: The Nightmare Princess was provided by Tecmo Koei for the purpose of this review.