Tokyo Xanadu Review – Bright Lights in the City

<p>It&&num;8217&semi;s kind of funny how high school students fighting monsters from another dimension has become somewhat of a cliche in modern gaming&comma; particularly in JRPGs&period; It takes quite a bit for a game to really stand out in the genre these days&comma; and <a href&equals;"http&colon;&sol;&sol;www&period;aksysgames&period;com&sol;products&sol;tokyo-xanadu-vita&sol;"><em>Tokyo Xanadu<&sol;em><&sol;a>&comma; from the creators of the <em>Ys<&sol;em> series&comma; does its best&period; The action is fast paced&comma; the relationships fly fast and loose&comma; and of course&comma; there&&num;8217&semi;s a city to be saved by some young heroes&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>https&colon;&sol;&sol;www&period;youtube&period;com&sol;watch&quest;v&equals;CF3dJDXKnYw<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>The key protagonist in <em>Tokyo Xanadu<&sol;em> is one Kou Tokisaka&comma; a high school student who has a decent social life&comma; but tends to occupy his free time with working a number of part-time jobs&period; Kou is a resident of this particular&comma; fantastical version of Tokyo&comma; and lives his life like any other high school student&period; One day when he follows some creeps who are after a friend of his&comma; named Asuka&comma; Kou comes across these nefarious fiends trying to have their way with her&period; A gate opens up&comma; soon to be known as an Eclipse&comma; and it sucks&comma;&comma; Asuka and the other two in&period; Kou&comma; of course&comma; follows after them&comma; only to find out that she knew all along that the Eclipse would appear&comma; and had lured the men to their dooms&period; It&&num;8217&semi;s a pretty rough start to the game&comma; and probably one of the more intense moments&comma; story-wise out of the whole game&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure id&equals;"attachment&lowbar;129721" aria-describedby&equals;"caption-attachment-129721" style&equals;"width&colon; 1000px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><img class&equals;"wp-image-129721 size-large" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2017&sol;09&sol;19123036&sol;tokyo&lowbar;xanadu&lowbar;1-1024x576&period;jpg" alt&equals;"" width&equals;"1000" height&equals;"563" &sol;><figcaption id&equals;"caption-attachment-129721" class&equals;"wp-caption-text">Tokyo Xanadu&comma; Aksys Games<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>Kou soon finds that he has the ability to wield a Soul Device&comma; and even though Asuka is hesitant&comma; she starts to work with him as they fight the Greed &lpar;the name of the monsters in the alternate dimension&rpar;&period; The game slowly builds from this beginning&comma; and plays out in chapters&period; Early on&comma; each chapter is basically focused on one of Kou&&num;8217&semi;s friends that he works to enlist into his party&comma; and eventually you will have a full party ready to adventure through a number of dungeons and fight some impressive bosses&period; The beginning parts of the game definitely felt a little slow due to the drawn out chapters focusing on Kou&&num;8217&semi;s friends&period; I think that Nihon Falcom could definitely have done a better job of streamlining the earlier parts of the game&comma; and really get the dungeon-crawling going just a bit faster&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Generally most of the days early on in <em>Tokyo Xanadu<&sol;em> follow the same kind of pattern&period; You start at school with Kou&comma; chatting with your friends and then you can do little side quests before starting one of your part-time jobs&period; Later on there&&num;8217&semi;s a bit less structure in the days&comma; and there is a much bigger focus on grinding Eclipse dungeons&period; One interesting aspect of the game is the shards that you acquire after finishing dungeons&period; These allow you to do loyalty missions with the friends in your party&period; Usually&comma; these side events are little mundane activities&comma; but do allow for more insight into the relationship between Kou and his friends&period; However after a point in the story&comma; these side quests become locked&comma; and it would have been nice to see more variety and repeated missions to further enhance the friendships these kids have&period; While Kou is a fairly bland hero&comma; the assorted friends that join you as well as other characters in the game are generally fantastic&comma; and really add to the charm of the game&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure id&equals;"attachment&lowbar;129722" aria-describedby&equals;"caption-attachment-129722" style&equals;"width&colon; 1000px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><img class&equals;"size-large wp-image-129722" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2017&sol;09&sol;19122938&sol;maxresdefault2-1024x576&period;jpg" alt&equals;"" width&equals;"1000" height&equals;"563" &sol;><figcaption id&equals;"caption-attachment-129722" class&equals;"wp-caption-text">Tokyo Xanadu&comma; Aksys Games<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>So while the characters and the story are fairly typical as far as modern JRPGs go&comma; the combat is really what excels here&period; Nihon Falcom are generally regarded as one of the best developers in the JRPG world&comma; as is displayed in their <em>Ys<&sol;em> games&comma; and their skill shows through in the combat and dungeons of <em>Tokyo Xanadu<&sol;em>&period; Each of the characters have their own Soul Device and weapon set up&comma; and elemental setup&period; Before you do an Eclipse&comma; the game will tell you what elements you will encounter&comma; so you can prepare appropriately&period; When you&&num;8217&semi;re playing&comma; there is only one character displayed&comma; and they have a basic attack&comma; as well as a ranged and charged one&comma; and you can lock on and dodge&period; Your party however includes three characters and you can press triangle and change characters on the fly&comma; mid-combo even&period; This is where the action really shines&comma; and the combat is incredibly satisfying&semi; finding the best characters to use in an Eclipse is key and rewarding&period; While the variety of monsters isn&&num;8217&semi;t that diverse&comma; it doesn&&num;8217&semi;t matter much when combat is as fun as it is in this game&period; Bosses also are very impressive&comma; and some of my favorites out of any Vita RPG in recent memory&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p><amp-youtube layout&equals;"responsive" width&equals;"500" height&equals;"281" data-videoid&equals;"lGiR&lowbar;VpWpYk" title&equals;"Tokyo Xanadu Launch Trailer"><a placeholder href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;www&period;youtube&period;com&sol;watch&quest;v&equals;lGiR&lowbar;VpWpYk"><img src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;i&period;ytimg&period;com&sol;vi&sol;lGiR&lowbar;VpWpYk&sol;hqdefault&period;jpg" layout&equals;"fill" object-fit&equals;"cover" alt&equals;"Tokyo Xanadu Launch Trailer"><&sol;a><&sol;amp-youtube><&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>In general&comma; the character designs in <em>Tokyo<&sol;em> <em>Xanadu<&sol;em> are very well done&period; The characters&comma; main and supporting&comma; all have very crisp designs&comma; and even static images of other NPCs look great&period; Sadly&comma; the city itself looks fairly lifeless and bland&comma; and wandering through the streets isn&&num;8217&semi;t that exciting&period; Even the dungeons start to look the same after a few hours of grinding them&period; I understand that this is a Vita game&comma; and maybe when the PlayStation 4 release comes out&comma; the graphics will be updated and varied a bit&comma; but it just gets very repetitious after a short while&period; The soundtrack however is great&period; There are a lot of really upbeat tracks and somber numbers&semi; the right song for the right moment always seems to play&comma; and it really helps the overall tone of the game&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>At the end of the day&comma; <em>Tokyo Xanadu<&sol;em> is a decent action-RPG&period; While the lead protagonist is nothing to write home about&comma; the supporting cast of characters really helps to round out the story experience&period; The combat however really stands out&comma; and if you are looking for a game that has one of the better combat systems on the Vita&comma; then look no further&period; It&&num;8217&semi;s a shame that the story is just a little too generic&comma; especially when games like<em> Persona<&sol;em> do the high school students versus monsters trope better&comma; but thankfully the combat really helps make the game stand out in a cluttered sea of Vita JRPGs&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p><strong>A PlayStation Vita code for Tokyo Xanadu was provided by Aksys Games for the purpose of this review&period;<&sol;strong><&sol;p>&NewLine;