Tactics Ogre: Reborn is a tactics RPG developed and published by Square Enix. Tactics Ogre: Reborn keeps the story of the original game while changing many of the gameplay systems, some of which improve upon the original experience, while some that make it extremely challenging.
The story of Tactics Ogre: Reborn is set on the Valerian Isles, whose different ethnic factions were once united by a single king. When the king died without an heir, an era of civil war began, which resulted in bloodshed among the civilian population. The player takes on the role of Denam, a member of the oppressed Walister faction, who soon becomes the face of the resistance and is caught up in the deadly web of Valerian politics.
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The gameplay in Tactics Ogre: Reborn involves turn-based battles. Reborn uses a character class system, six different elemental forms of magic, and each class his own special skills which can be equipped, with the restriction that only four spells and four skills can be equipped per character. There are a ton of options available to the player and customizing the team is as much fun as seeing their performance in battle.
Tactics Ogre: Reborn uses the Chariot System, which allows the player to go back in time and play turns over again (like an expanded version of Fire Emblem: Three Houses' battle system) giving them the chance to see how different scenarios play out. The combat system in Tactics Ogre: Reborn is fantastic, and the Chariot System gives the player lots of opportunities to test out strategies and work out their own path to victory.
The biggest new change in Tactics Ogre: Reborn involves how character leveling up works. In Tactics Ogre: Reborn, characters level up individually and their class level stays the same. The game now imposes a party level cap that slowly rises over the course of the story. This forces the player to engage with the game on its own level, as they cannot level grind. Players must use smart tactics and prepare their team, so that they can come out victorious.
There are two problems with this system and they weigh down the game. The difficulty hampers the experience, like with Bravely Default 2. The level cap raises incredibly slowly compared to the number of battles that the player takes part in, which means the group will quickly hit the cap, and will only receive items as a reward for battle. This makes a lot of the battles in the game feel inconsequential, as what cash/extra gear the player finds is usually spent on party-wide upgrades when the Shop adds new stock. This makes progression feel slow, even if the battles themselves are fun.
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The other issue with the level cap is that it makes some of the story battles incredibly difficult, due to the fact that the game doesn't play by its own rules. There are story battles where the enemy is allowed to field more units than the player, or the goal is to defeat powerful NPC units that come prepared with buff spells or charged MP meters at the start of the battle. These fights are not insurmountable, but they require turning the Chariot System into save scumming to win battles. In other games, the player could go and grind for experience points and gear, but this option is limited by Tactics Ogre: Reborn.
Tactics Ogre: Reborn's best feature is easily its speed-up option, which drastically increases the flow of combat in what would otherwise be a slow game. The orchestral soundtrack and voice acting are also fantastic and add a great deal to the experience also. The shift to HD visuals results in the graphics looking muddy when viewed up close, but in a sprite-based game, this is easy to ignore.
Tactics Ogre: Reborn has some great updates over its predecessor, but some changes work to the game's detriment, and concepts like the level cap would have been better served as the basis for a higher difficulty mode. Tactics Ogre: Reborn can be a punishing and sometimes unfair experience, but those who rise to the challenge will find a lot of content to explore, an engaging story to experience, and a fantastic battle system to master.
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Tactics Ogre: Reborn will be released for Nintendo Switch, PS4, PS5, and PC via. Steam on November 11, 2022. Screen Rant was provided with a digital code for the Nintendo Switch version of the game for the purposes of this review.
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