what if you had at-home 4 player multiplayer of a diablo clone playing as digimon? Wouldn't that be so fun, with your other friends? And you're probably all 13 at the time of the games release? Well get fucked! Its not!
For anyone who's played a digimon game before, you won't be surprised when I say this game is chock full of arbitrary stats and grinding. Even combat and exploration ends up being more of a grind then an RPG. Enemies respawn every time you return to the over world, and I think the game really does expect you to fight them. Want to use that cool sword you found? Sorry! Your stab stat isn't high enough. Go fight mobs for 3 hours until you have enough Stab to use it.
Combat itself is also rather jank and dated.
Contact damage? ✅
Enemies getting long hit stun protection? ✅
Enemies can block attacks at complete random? ✅
Bosses have attacks that can 1 tap you? ✅
Dying sends you back to the starting location? ✅
You have to talk to an NPC to change your equipment? ✅
Playing DW4 reminded me a lot of Hades, if the game was less refined mechanically, and more of a world exploration game. To be clear, the story elements, world exploration, and graphics are all things I love about this game. The way it refers to creating a new save file as "Create an account in the digiverse?" is delightful. The game really does commit to the bit that you the player are joining the digimon world, and I love that.
But all that little charm can't quite save the fact that every weapon of a group has the exact same attack set, that the best weapons are all Slash because they have the largest melee range size and damage, that the only time you use Blast (guns) is for boss fights that can 1 shot you, and that every monster encounter is a time consuming mess of kiting and fishing for hits that don't get blocked.
And like always in a digimon game:
Spoilers
Leomon dies for plot purposes and dramatic effect, again. This bit of lore was something revealed to me in the OPENING CINEMATIC.Currently, I am at least 15 hours into the game, and I don't think I'll be pushing myself to complete it. As much as I would love to fall it to the end, it feels like a commitment of time that won't mechanically challenge me or reward me enough to make it fun.
