NSFW Review of "Eiyu Senki"

"Features":

Loli (skippable, except for 1), bondage (light), virgins

I will not be responsible for any offense taken for you continuing to read this if you do not like the above.

Eiyu Senki is a turn-based RPG made by JAST. The goal is to take over the world and meet the heroes that are fighting or hiding all over the world.

Grade:

Plot:
You play as the only male hero in the world, who appeared in there from our world (I know, pretty cliché, but bear with me). You can name him yourself and, after that, the story actually takes off.
You are first tasked to take over Zipang (Japan) as an introduction to the gameplay.
Afterwards, you move onto the mainland and start to take over East Asia. From that point onwards, you can choose what direction to take yourself, although it is usually made clear which country (or faction) is the easiest and the most difficult to defeat.
The goal is to take over the world using all the heroes you collected.
While doing so, you will meet more heroes who join you and a lot of events to get to know them.
The majority of the heroes have an H scene at or near the end of their events.

Gameplay:
The game is split up in turns. Every turn, you can take a certain amount of actions, which increase in number at certain story points. Every mission you do takes up one action point and you can replenish them by going to the next turn.
If you are at war with a faction when the turn ends, you can get attacked.

   Heroes:
Heroes are necessary for every aspect of the game. They are the fighters, the ones you speak with during events, and the ones that are needed to fulfill the requirements of non-attacking missions.
Getting heroes can be done in a variety of ways, but the most common way is by conquering territory. As a rule of thumb, you will get at least one hero when you beat a faction. The second best way is through introduction events.
Heroes can only be used once per turn, including with battles and can only be used again once the next turn starts. This means that, if you are at war, you may want to skip to the next turn earlier while keeping more of your heroes so that you can fend off attacks.

   Hero stats:
Heroes have 2 kinds of stats: Expert and battle stats.
Expert stats are necessary to fulfill mission requirements. These can not be increased in any way.
Battle stats are vital during battles and determine the amount of damage you do, the amount of damage you take, the waiting time in between skills, and the starting battle order.
Battle stats can be increased by using items and by battle effects.

   Missions:
Missions are divided into 4 main categories: Story, battle, character conversation, and item/money events. Battle events can overlap with character conversation and story events.
Battle events are missions in which you fight with a group of enemies. Battle events always have a sword icon. With battle events that are not specifically attacking a territory, only the selected heroes can participate in the fight.
Story events have a flag icon and will continue the story, either the main one, or the story related to the faction you are currently fighting.
Character conversation events have the face of the main hero involved as an icon. Completing these events requires that the hero in question participates and will reward you with items, money, additional item slots, skills, and/or a scene.
These events will get you to get to know the heroes and is certainly worth trying out, as some of them might actually surprise you.
Lastly, item/money events have a chest or a coin stash icon. Doing these events rewards you with items and money, respectively.

   Battles:
Once a battle starts, you can place up to 6 heroes on the left 9 tiles of the field. The enemy already has all their units deployed (except for very specific battles).
Every hero has their own moveset and and attacking range. Every battle requires placing your heroes in a way to maximize damage done and minimize damage taken.
The more troops your hero has, the more damage they do. This also means that if they lose troops during the fight, their damage output decreases as well. This also counts for enemies.
You can increase troop size by buying troops for them on the world map and you can replenish lost troops for any hero by using money as long as they have not been used this turn.
As such, troop size is both a measure of health and attacking strength. Defense has nothing to do with troop size.
Ancient heroes are different kinds of heroes that have HP instead of troops. They can not heal using money or increase their HP except by winning battles with them, but their damage does not decrease when they lose HP. Their HP regenerates when going to the next turn, even if they have been use this turn.
Troop and HP *can* go higher than 9999, but not by spending money, only by winning battles with them.
During battle, both sides get brave points. These brave points fill up the bar at the top of the screen and allows for the use of stronger skills by spending them.
Another aspect that is important during battles, is the "Hate" stat. This is a hidden stat that is (to my knowledge) never explained during the game and it works like a Aggro stat. The more Hate you have, the more likely the enemy is to attack you. There are items you can use to increase or reduce this stat.
After a battle, you will receive 10 troops or HP for all the heroes still standing and an additional 10 if the fight went very well.

   Skills:
Every skill has a target area, a delay, an effect area, and a type, . Attacking skills also have a damage multiplier and the stronger ones may also have a wait time.
The target area is different for every skill and is displayed in a 5 by 6 area.
The delay is the time it takes for the hero to get another chance to use a skill after using the current one.
The effect area is different for most skills and is displayed in a 3 by 6 area.
The type is one of the most important aspects (besides the damage multiplier) for attacking skills. Some types of skills are super effective (pokemon style) against certain enemy unit types. As an example, gun type skills are strong against melee type heroes. For the table, look in the tips and tricks section.
Lastly, skills usually have a number on them. This number signifies the amount of brave point needed to use the skill. When a skill has no number on its type icon, it can be used regardless of brave points.
Every hero also has a passive skill that unlocks when their character events reach their end and usually either increase allies' battle stats or reduce enemies' battle stats. This only works if the hero in question is in the right position, as specified in the passive skill description.

  Items:
Heroes can equip and unequip items on the world map when they have not been used in the current turn. Items can be gained during any kind of mission. The item description tells you what it does and equipping the right item to the right hero can make or break a battle.
Items are almost exclusively for use during battle and will never be consumed.
The only item type that does not have a clear explanation are the Hate items, which have been explained "Battles" category.

   Territories and factions:
At certain points, you can initiate war with a faction. Every faction has their own requirements to be taken over, but usually it requires you to take over a particular territory.
Every faction has their own average troop size and unit types, which also decides their difficulty when fighting them.
Once you declare war, you can not ask for peace anymore unless it is specifically story-related.
Any faction that is at war with you and has a direct connection to your territory, can attack you once you end your turn. In my experience, they can attack up to 2 times per turn per faction.
The less territories the opposing faction has left, the weaker their units tend to become.
If you manage to defeat a faction before certain requirements have been met, or you obtain a certain territory before certain conditions have been met, you can obtain an item. Accepting this item can increase the difficulty of the other factions and the game will tell you when accepting an item will have this effect.
As a rule of thumb, getting all the territories of a faction beats that faction.
Territories, once conquered, generate money for you every turn, which you can use to heal or strengthen your troops.

Voice acting:
This game's major story events and character events are fully voice acted (with the notable exception of the main character). Keep in mind that, since this is originally a Japanese game, the voice acting is in Japanese. If you do not like Japanese (for whatever reason), you can simply turn this off in the options menu.
And yes, the H scenes are also voice acted.

H scenes:
The scenes consist of still images with text and voice acting. The majority of heroes have H scenes.
H scenes can be re-viewed in the gallery accessed from the starting menu.

Graphics:
The graphics re pretty standard according to modern standards. Very much VN (visual novel) style, the characters and the environment are clearly drawn. The battles in particular give it more of a 3D feeling.

Tips and tricks:

• For a list of skill types and type advantages, look here.
• If you want to go easy mode, never accept items that increase difficulty.
• If you either want all the items, or want to go nightmare mode (maximum difficulty) you can find the conditions here.
• Rasputin, despite her type disadvantages, is an absolute tank when placed on the frontlines (especially if you give her the cauldron you get after her first character event).
• If you want to go for criticals, Goemon is your best bet. Load her up with critical damage increases to maximize her damage.
• It is recommended you do all the character events to get the strongest possible heroes.
• Do not fight more than 2 factions at the same time (excluding Babylon), unless you want to make it *incredibly* difficult for yourself.
• Can't conquer Babylon? Stay at war with them (they will not attack you) and come back after conquering some more.
• Do introduction events immediately when able. You will usually get a hero from it, but it seems like they can disappear after a while.

Good points:

• Strategic gameplay
• That feeling you get when you CONQUER THE WORLD HAHAHAHA (just kidding, but it is a good feeling)
• Deeper characters than most other games of this type
• Difficulty based on your performance, rather than a setting
• Voice acting

Bad points:

• Not always clear what you should do next
• No explanation about some smaller aspects of the game
• The basically useless gunner passives
• Ivan (personal issues)
• Ivan the TERRIBLE (still personal issues)

Conclusion:

A good and time-consuming game for anyone who likes strategy games, more interactive visual novels, interesting and quirky characters, or who likes to conquer the world for once.

Seriously, it is time-consuming if you really get into it, but it is a lot of fun.

Review of "Persona 4 Golden"

Persona 4 Golden is a turn-based dungeon exploration RPG with relation- and dating-sim elements for the PSVita.
The franchise is one of the biggest among Japanese RPGs and a lot of spin-offs have been made of this game and its predecessors.

Grade:

Plot:
The story is about Yu Narukami, a transfer student to a small village in Japan. Just as he arrived, weird things start to happen. Specifically, a string of murders that are rather bizarre because the bodies look like they have been dropped from the sky, and the fact that Yu can push his body through tv screens to enter another world.
Yu and his new friends, including a big toy bear called Teddie, then start to explore the tv world and find it has a relationship to the string of weird murders and decide they want to save any new victims.
They find they can use special powers in the tv world, called "Persona". Yu has the special ability to carry multiple Persona at the same time (but only use one at any given moment).
The rest of the story kicks of from there.
You, of course, play as Yu Narukami, who you can rename at the start of the game.
The story is very linear and is entirely based on the calendar. Because of this, time management is key.
At certain dates, new dungeons become unlocked, which you have to clear before a certain date or you get a game over.

Gameplay:
The gamplay is mainly split into 2 parts: The tv world and the real world.
Most things take up time and you only have 2 time slots a day, so choose wisely.
Going into the tv world will take up both time slots and can only be started in the first time slot.

   TV world:
The tv world is all about going into dungeons to level up, obtain items, save the person at the end (if applicable), and obtain Persona.
The dungeon's floors are randomly generated, except for a couple specific ones. Usually, these set floors have midbosses or dungeon bosses in them and an event to accompany them.
Bosses will not respawn once you beat them, but getting to the end of a dungeon you have saved the person of before CAN get you into another boss battle. You can get items, tons of exp, and a Courage increase if you beat them.

   Shuffle time:
When a battle ends, you have a chance to get "shuffle time". This event allows you to choose out of a set of randomly chosen tarot cards and can get you extra experience, a Persona, extra money, some healing, and a variety of other effects that the description explains very well. This is the main way to get more Persona in your team.
Clearing out a hand of "shuffle time" guarantees a "shuffle time" after the next battle and gives you an additional 2 card choices. This chain can be continued however many times you can get it to repeat.

   Persona:
To explore dungeons, you need to get, train and use different Persona or you will die very quickly.
Even more so, because you will get a game over if Yu dies.
Persona are the beings that allow you to use magic and other abilities in the dungeons. Every Persona has its strengths and weaknesses.
The game makes a distinction between 7 main elements. These elements are: Physical, Fire (Agi), Ice (Bufu), Electricity (Zio), Wind (Garu), Light (Hama), and Dark (Mudo). Having a combination of Persona with at least a resistance to every element is highly recommended. Having a combination of Persona with attacking abilities of each element is also highly recommended, as some enemies absorb every element but one and you can not beat them if you can not use that element to attack.
Persona can hold up to 8 different abilities at once and can get new ones through fusing or leveling up.
Keep in mind that only the Persona you have active when the fight ends and those with the "Growth" ability get experience from the fight.
Persona can be obtained randomly in dungeons, by buying them from the "Velvet room" or by fusing them.

   Velvet room:
The "Velvet room" is an area that can be accessed from both the real world and the tv world and does not take up time. It acts as a shop and a forge, if you were to compare it to other RPGs.
In it, you can record your Persona and buy them as you recorded them for some yen (Japanese currency and, subsequently, the game's currency) and talk to its residents.
You can also fuse Persona by offering up some of the Persona you have on you. The new Persona will get some abilities from the Persona you offered up, selected by you. This allows you to make insanely strong Persona if you know what you are doing. Fusing a Persona can also give it additional experience if the "Social link" of that type is high.
Lastly, you can give and buy skill cards. These cards can be obtained from the dungeons and allow you to give your active Persona the ability it corresponds with. Giving a skill card to the vendor in the Velvet room allows you to buy the skill card by unlimited quantities, so, if you have the money, it is highly recommended you give new cards to her immediately.

   Real world:
The real world is where you go to school, explore the town, level up your "Social links", generally continue the story, and a lot of other things. Going into everything you can do would make this review quite long and is not very necessary, as it is pretty easy to figure out for yourself. Suffice to say, is that there is a lot to do.
The 2 most important things to do in the real world is to level up your "Social links" and increase Yu's social stats.

   Social links:
Social links are the measure of how close you are to certain people or groups. Every social link stands for a tarot card and has a level of 0 through 10 (0 being "not found yet"). Once you found social link-related people and started a social link, you can increase it by spending time with them (usually 1 time slot) and making the right choices in the dialogue options that tend to pop up. Every Persona has a tarot card type as well, and carrying a Persona with a type that is the same as the person you are spending time with, will increase the amount of relationship points you get for your dialogue choices.
Some specific social links level up throughout the story or by doing certain sidequests. For these, carrying a Persona of that type has no effect.

   Social stats:
Yu Narukami has social stats. These social stats are a measure of how good you are at certain social aspects and you can increase them through a variety of activities, ranging from working and going to school, to folding origami and eating at a restaurant. Getting these stats up is sometimes necessary to complete sidequests or to start a social link.
Every one of the 5 stats (Courage, Diligence, Understanding, Expression, and Knowledge) can have up to 5 levels and you can never really see how far you are to getting to the next one. Just keep getting points for them and they will level up eventually.

   Sidequests:
There are a lot of sidequests in the game. Usually, sidequests require you to find an item in a dungeon and give it to the questgiver. Some sidequests are quite obscure and require some problem solving or exploring to get done.
Once a sidequest is done, you can get items, equipment, money, or a social link level increase.
Some sidequests also require you to have unlocked particular areas or dungeons.

   Equipment:
Every character in your party has 3 equipment slots and a costume slot. The equipment slots are for a weapon, some body armour, and an accessory. You can find these in dungeons, get them from sidequests, or buy them from a store in town. This store gets more equipment when you sell it particular sellable items. A message will appear once you have unlocked a new piece of equipment in the shop. These particular sellable items are regular drops from enemies in the dungeons.

Graphics:
The graphics are 3D and quite detailed. The movement of the characters is quite smooth, the dungeons each have their own style, and the town is pretty clearly a bustling town. Events with the characters have custom animations that fit incredibly well.
Sometimes, there are some 2D animations in an anime style. These are generally very short, but (again) fit very well. In fact, they grab your attention because of the difference in graphic style.
Conversations are usually in Visual Novel style, with text in the bottom and 2D characters on the side when they are talking.

Music:
The music is generally very instrumental. Barely any singing can be found in the music.
Battle music is fast and clearly present, helping you feel pumped for the fight.
Background music is different in every major area, including the dungeons, and usually supports the theme of every individual dungeon.
Boss battle music is clearly that: boss battle music. It makes it clear that this enemy is strong and you need to be careful, but it also pumps you up.

Endings:
There are a couple of endings in this game. There are a couple bad endings and a couple good endings. For the "true" ending you need to do very specific things during the course of the game, and for the bad endings it is usually pretty clear when you are heading for one. Generally, the bad endings are the result of a very stupid conversational choice, like choosing not to help people in the tv world.

New game +:
After a good ending (i.e. finishing the game), you can start a new game+ (henceforth: NG+). NG+ allows you to carry over your items, money, Persona records, and social stats. NG+ does not carry over your social links or character levels. For this reason, it is highly recommended you get a couple of good Persona recorded and ready, as well as the money to buy them, and to get your social stats maxed out in the first run.

Tips and tricks:

• Again, SuperButterBuns made an amazing video to introduce you into the game.
• For a social link guide, take a look here.
• Highly recommend using this (or any other) guide for all the tests and question in school in the game. The questions are rather random and you will most likely not know most of the answers.
• Are you low on HP or SP? Use a Goho-M or another such item to exit the current dungeon (and save the floor you were on) and go back to an easier dungeon to use shuffle time to heal up. Seriously, you can keep going forever using this trick once you have cleared the first dungeon.
• Clear a dungeon immediately if possible or take a few days to clear it as fast as you can.
• Do not forget to save and have multiple saves, so that you can easily go back to an earlier one if you mess up badly.
• The only social links that have additional effects are your team's social links, the Hermit social link, the Jester social link, and the Aeon social link, so focus on those first. Specifically the Lovers social link. Seriously, its effects are really good.
• Black Frost is OP. Get it. Specifically try to get it with the "Null physical" ability. Seriously, you will not regret it (I used Black Frost as my main Persona for the entirety of the game the moment I got it).
• Use Naoto once you get her. She is objectively the most versatile of your allies.
• For an additional dungeon, get the Aeon social link maxed out asap.
• You can romance multiple girls at the same time, but make sure you do not go on dates if you do. (Dates are not actually necessary to increase social links).
• If you try to open a chest and someone has a bad feeling, do NOT open it or you are in for a bad time, UNLESS you are extremely high-leveled. The creature in it may not be worth much money- and experience-wise, it does give you a really good weapon if you manage to beat it.
• Grind, grind, GRIND!

Good points:

• "Collect them all" vibe.
• Clear, but rather deep, battle system.
• Interesting and quirky characters.
• Solid story.

Bad points:

• VERY grindy.
• Only characters that fight with you gain experience.
• Very repetitive dungeons in the randomly generated areas.

Conclusion:

Most people who like Japanese RPGs have probably already played this, but if not, I highly recommend you do. Not many RPGs are as unique as the Persona series and the focus is (surprisingly) a little more on the story than the gameplay. For this reason, I would also recommend it to people who want to play games for the story or for getting to know the characters.

It has made me smile and laugh out loud very often and that is never a bad thing.