JRPGs have been the de facto kings of the RPG space for decades, but without DRPGs, this popular genre wouldn’t exist.What started decades ago with titles like Ultima Aimed at translating the traditional D&D gameplay experience to the screen, gave way to more approachable dungeon crawlers like Labyrinth of the World Tree and Demon Gaze. In 2018, Nippon Ichi had a fun experiment with sub-genres. Labyrinth of the Labyrinth: Gathering of Twilight, and now Labyrinth of Galleria: Meeting of the Moon, chose to follow up that experiment. Although clearly designed for a relatively narrow audience, many I love the Labyrinth of Galleria.
Labyrinth of Galleria puts you in the role of Eureka, a bright-eyed girl replying to job postings visiting a sketchy abandoned mansion in the woods. Here she is welcomed by the wizard Madame her Malta. Madame Marta quickly bonds her with a cute green ghost whom Eureka names “Fanti”, and uses her eerie new friend to explore the vast labyrinth beneath her manor in Galleria, where powerful magic can be found. Look for artifacts in The mansion’s mysterious owner wants. Since a human cannot enter a labyrinth and return unharmed, Marta teaches her how to use the power of Fanti to bring various dolls to life and direct them to explore the dungeon on her behalf. Thus, Eureka embarks on a compensatory quest into the depths below, slowly learning about her eccentric employer.
The narrative doesn’t feel central here, but the various visual novel-esque cutscenes at the major milestones still help instill a fair amount of charm into the Labyrinth of Galleria. The voice acting is hammy without being cringy, with some really dark and abrupt twists that help elevate the story beyond the simple window dressing of dungeon action. No, but suffice it to say that this plot goes to places you wouldn’t expect.I applaud developers for trying to shake convention and keep players guessing.
Labyrinth of Galleria’s gameplay follows the typical DRPG structure of exploring a grid-based dungeon from a first-person perspective. Each step advances him by one unit in time, which usually means the enemy takes one more step. Gradually filling out a dense yet simple map makes revisiting easier. Along the way, you’ll find stairs to take you to different floors filled with treasure to build your party, enemies to overcome, and all sorts of good and bad things.It’s a pretty simple setup, but it’s consistently compelling, especially when you factor in the special abilities. can break cool aid manand this creates all sorts of new strategies for evading enemies or discovering new and more convenient routes through dungeons.
Or in another example, some sections require you to use the ability to be able to go underwater where you need to manage the air. , it always feels like there’s something dangerous around every corner, whether it’s the pitfall traps that cripple most of your party.
Enemies are fought every few minutes (and can be avoided if necessary), and combat here follows a standard turn-based approach. The main gimmick is the Coven system. This allows you to ultimately control dozens of characters at once by allowing smaller parties to be slotted into each party slot.Covens act as a sort of formation for a group of characters, allowing them all to act as if they were one character. These can be tuned and experimented with to accommodate a range of roles and action types. Sometimes you want all her DPS crew, sometimes he wants to mix one or he two tanks for added options and increased survivability. There’s a lot to figure out, but I felt that this unconventional take on extended team building added a lot to otherwise straightforward combat.
In fact, it’s easy to see the influence of Disgaea in Galleria’s Labyrinth when you actually get down to weeds. Unbelievably Thorough character customization. Every character you create draws from the same expanded pool of base classes, but can be differentiated by altering things like ‘Stance’ and ‘Tactics’ to alter parameters such as certain stats and XP gains. increase. From now on they can be assigned to her Coven. The Coven can determine which active skills are available and assign Pacts that level up independently of them. Final Fantasy game.
Therefore, building an effective team requires trial and error to find the niche each character wants to achieve. This goes beyond the general broad decision of whether a character should be her DPS or a Tank, as there are many different types of her DPS or Tank units that can be created.
Luckily, most trash mobs don’t put your team composition to the test that hard, but each boss acts as a rough skill check and will gladly kick you back every time you fail. Grinding can also soften the lack of planning, but it’s not as sure-fire way to force progress as it is in other RPGs. Labyrinth of Galleria is most similar to Disgaea in the sense that its gameplay is about as much (if not more) than what Team He’s Building’s menu actually does. playing game. Few things are more rewarding than watching a well-oiled team overwhelm an opponent after countless painstaking attempts to compare equipment stat tables. If you’re not so into RPG min-max, you might feel left out. Labyrinth of Galleria is for people who like to stare at spreadsheets and adjust numbers to see how they affect other numbers. If that’s not you, this title will probably struggle to hold your interest.
Even if you’re used to a more analytical approach to RPGs like this, one of the big complaints about gameplay loops is that some mechanics and progression-based milestones are a little too opaque. For example, one early quest required finding and retrieving a specific treasure. I didn’t know what floor this treasure was on. after 1-2 hours the way I got too deep into the dungeon at that point in the story, so I eventually resorted to an online guide to show me that the treasure is hidden in a secret room behind a perfectly unmarked normal wall.
I really appreciate that Labyrinth of Galleria is a very detailed and complex game, but it’s not uncommon to come across examples like this. This is the kind of game that expects you to try to break every wall in the dungeon until you find one that allows you to go further. It could be argued that it’s a “tutorial” for, but if you’re unprepared and unwilling to approach it on that terms, Labyrinth is unwieldy and sometimes confusing for Galleria.
In terms of presentation, Labyrinth of Galleria applies Takehito Harada’s signature anime art style to brilliant effect, with all character sprites sharply drawn and vibrantly colored. Plus, in various cutscenes, the backgrounds feature gorgeously detailed locations, often with perfect otherworldly spookiness. But it still does a great job of projecting an oppressive, boundless presence to the player, which adds to the mystique and intrigue.
The soundtrack is perfectly matched with these visuals and a special brand of goofy Halloween-inspired tracks that help set the tone for good effect. Stupid rather than stupid. I also feel like some of these tracks can get a little repetitive given how much time you spend crawling through some of the dungeons, but overall the music serves a purpose. I felt that I had achieved it.
Conclusion
Labyrinth of Galleria: The Moon Society does a fine job of providing a dense and devastating journey deep into the dungeon, but it also sacrifices accessibility. The engaging art style, expansive team-building options, and a truly amazing story all combine to make this one worth recommending, but if you don’t enjoy RPGs and Minimax, much of its appeal is There is a big caveat that you will lose the . I don’t have the patience to fully digest and understand all the systems. Even if that sounds like your street, Galleria’s Labyrinth is worth your time and money.