Children of Zodiarcs

It’s surprising how something so basic makes leveling-up feel rewarding, and how it’s been removed from many other RPGs.

An in depth RPG that brings together the best mediums within the genre.

Children of Zodiarcs sits you down, makes you feel at home, and presents you with bite-size mechanics that anyone could understand. However, behind the cutesy graphics, and the diorama board-game aesthetic, it is a surprisingly merciless tactical RPG.

At twenty-some hours to completion, Children of Zodiarcs can feel like a long row to hoe. The weight of the story drags it down a bit, as it increasingly becomes obvious that the only character who isn't fundamentally broken in some fashion is the weird foreign kid who only appears in the side story. Everyone else is a bundle of neurotic fears and psychotic motivations, shaken hard and unleashed on an unsuspecting narrative. But negatives for characters aren't always negatives for the game as a whole, and Zodiarcs puts it all together well. It's a good game, and I'm glad to have finished it, but I cannot stop wondering if certain points weren't actually branching paths or plot flags in disguise, if there weren't some way to eke out a happier ending from it all. That may be wishful thinking on my part, but it's a small hope nonetheles. In a city as messed up as Torus, we need all the hope we can get.

Combat sequences can be a bit long, The text story is slightly on the dull side. But it really makes up for it's challenging and engaging combat style.