ONINAKI's greatest strength certainly comes from its universe, which gives pride of place to the principle of reincarnation. The theme of death, omnipresent in the screenplay, therefore seems both dark and hopeful. The game thus gains in singularity and can allow itself to serenely approach subjects as delicate as mass suicides or the death of children. Kagachi, the character you play, holds a central role in all matters of this type since he occupies the function of Guardian of the Veil, and is therefore responsible for maintaining order between the world of the living and the Other. of the. In particular, he must find the Lost, souls who cannot detach themselves from their former life and therefore find themselves reduced to the state of powerless specters. Several quests will lead Kagachi to solve the problems of these lost souls, so that they can find inner peace and begin a process of reincarnation. Admit that such stakes are worth much more than all the usual stories of rescuing princesses or kingdoms put together. Moreover, this relatively particular universe extends into the gameplay. Our hero can thus pass at will from the world of the living to the Beyond, in particular in order to be able to distinguish the Lost and converse with them. The colors then become colder, the living that populate the central city are only represented by silhouettes, while new monsters and teleportation points appear in the dungeons. You still have to be careful in a hostile zone, because going to the afterlife is synonymous by default with game over at the slightest blow received.
THE MIDNIGHT DEMONS…
To avoid this slight inconvenience, you must first find a particular type of monster, called Sight Thief. By defeating it, you "secure" a predefined area of the Beyond and it becomes possible to fight the monsters that populate it in a much fairer and more serene way. In addition, the death of the Stealer of Sight triggers for the area of the afterlife concerned Precepts, which correspond to small changes in gameplay of different types (all hits are critical, attacks push enemies back a large distance , the further the hero is from his target, the more powerful the attacks, etc.) This navigation between two parallel realities could have been pushed even further and give rise, for example, to multiple small puzzles to solve, but Oninaki prefers to concentrate before all about fighting. Action-RPG requires, these take place in real time. These are clearly not the most dynamic on the market, but they have the merit of involving relatively original demon-weapons. Kagachi indeed possesses several demons, which belong to a special category of Lost. They not only lost their lives, but also their memory. It is through them that the hero fights, since these demons have several skills and wield precise weapons. One is adept at the spear, another at the sword, yet another at the crossbow, etc. At any time Kagachi can zap between four demons, which themselves can call on four skills each. You must therefore constantly adapt your style of play to that of the enemies, especially against bosses. In addition, the combat system offers a whole range of debuffs, awakened skills, crimped weapons, talent trees, and experience gains for both the hero and the demons.
...OR THE GHOSTS OF BOREDOM?
We also have a rather interesting affinity system. This affinity, which represents the temporary link between a demon and the hero, increases during combat and decreases when using a skill. It increases the power of attacks, but above 150%, it also reduces defense. In addition, from 100% it is possible to "manifest" this affinity, in order to benefit from some combat bonuses for a certain time. But this principle of demon-weapons is also interesting from a scriptwriting point of view, since it is possible over the course of the adventure to discuss with them and awaken their memories in order to learn more about their past life. So far, you would think that Oninaki is a very good game, even a must-have. Alas, we are quite far from the mark, because Tokyo RPG Factory stumbles on questions of realization, both general and technical. We can thus point the finger at some rather badly done menus, a staging which sometimes falls flat and a rather poor level design, which pales in comparison to the open worlds or the sometimes ingenious levels of the competition. The graphics also lack modernity and remind us more of the year 2010 than 2019. This is particularly the case on Switch, of course, because the low power of the console limits the resolution of the game. And it even limits the framerate at times , since we are entitled to some totally unexplained slowdowns during certain camera movements. The PC and PS4 versions of Oninaki are therefore to be preferred as much as possible.
