Daemon X Machina

Daemon X Machina goes that extra robo-mile, with one of the best player creation tools we’ve seen in a long while.

Daemon X Machina has a lot of personality when it comes to moment-to-moment action, but everything else sometimes feels like an afterthought. [Issue #42 – October 2019, p. 72]

There’s much to applaud about Daemon X Machina. The third-person mech action game delivers an experience unlike any other on Nintendo Switch, thanks to the striking mech designs and red-drenched world merging with combat that can readily thrill in the game’s many large-scale encounters. However, shortcomings such as the convoluted plot and repetition let it down – holding it back from reaching the brilliance that Marvelous nearly achieved.

What Daemon X Machina gets right is the feeling that you're in control of a huge mech and wrecks havoc on the battlefield, and that's certainly no small feat. Unfortunately, developers seem to have focused on refining the combat mechanics to perfection but forgot that the game does have other parts that need their attention too. If you can get past all the negatives, Daemon X Machina is a very refined mecha game that truly catches the spirit of the genre but falls flat when it comes to narrative and characterization.

Daemon X Machina scratches an itch only select titles can alleviate. It shines through its cel shading aesthetic, but suffer from a bad control scheme and a horrible camera design that will cause you to miss the action in the game. Piloting a mecha is the best feeling it has to offer, but the game stiff mission scheme turns boring quickly.

Mecha genre fans will find a lot to love in Daemon X Machina, but those hoping for more mainstream appeal might want to stay away. The game features an overabundance of options, mechanics, and customizations that will give it longevity, but only if you clear the initial hurdle set in front of you.

Considering the dearth of Mech games, Daemon X Machina is bound to get anyone's attention. Rather than allow itself to serve as mere niche fulfilment, this rises above through a solid balance between accessibility and depth. With just a little effort, you can make the battlefield your own, cutting through countless enemies like… *sigh* a hot knife through butter. The variety of armaments, armours, and skillsets allow veterans to create a thoroughly customized experience. Of course, they'll have to deal with a rough frame-rate, as well as a dreadful last boss. In the long run, those are small fees to pay.

It's a good Mecha video game, hindered a bit by an overly convoluted story and a very slow pacing to its gameplay and world building.

The missed potential of the story and minor issues with mech-vs-mech combat and multiplayer loadouts make Daemon X Machina fall just short of its potential, but the foundation is strong. As a total package, it’s on the verge of greatness; it just needed a little more time in the shop tinkering.

Quotation forthcoming.

There’s plenty of content to wade through with the lengthy story, assortment of side missions, and multiplayer options with friends or strangers (strictly co-op not versus).

With an intriguing story, pretty solid gameplay, vigorous customization options and a promising online component, Daemon X Machina is a welcome addition to the arsenal of third-person shooters on Nintendo Switch. All in all, it’s a fresh take for Nintendo fans and – for the most part – an enjoyable experience.

The sum total of my experience with Daemon X Machina is positive. The combat is amazing, the game is bright and colorful, the framerate mostly holds up in either docked or handheld mode, and the hangar is great to tinker around in, checking out all the different configurations of my mech. That's what I'm going to remember out of all of this, which is safe for me to say because most everything else in this game is pretty forgettable.

Daemon X Machina is an edgy and well designed work that puts the player at the centre of a detailed experience, where mission planning, strategy and customization make a major contribution towards building this into more than a mere action game. If the plot is not its greatest asset, the overall experience is fun and involving and anyone who enjoys action with strategic planning will find a very satisfying time around Daemon X Machina.

At its core Daemon X Machina is a solid mech action game that controls well and gives the player a generous helping of customisation options. Its mission structure can get repetitive, and its plot is so difficult to grasp it may as well be soaked in grease, but as long as you’re willing to put up with these and get through its initially bewildering array of gauges and icons you should have a good time with it.

At the end of the day DAEMON X MACHINA is a mixed bag where where is a lot of content in here but with the lacking variety and tedious loading it feels repetitive just like reading this review! Why it still holds my attention is with fun core gameplay that feels like a good game with the wrong kind of structure. But if you really want a mech game and my criticisms do not apply to you then you’ll have a good time with DAEMON X MACHINA but for others you should try the eShop demo first.

When it’s great, Daemon X Machina is a fast and frenetic mech action game with deep customisation options and a killer artistic direction that sets it apart from the rest. But when it’s not, it’s repetitive mission structure, nonsensical story and facile combat stop it from being the best it could be.

Daemon X Machina has an attractive approach, with a striking technical and artistic execution, a careful history and a very convincing manganime audio-visual section. However, it fails in the basics: the gameplay.

Despite what Nintendo has tried to sold us, Daemon x Machina is a low budget game that have potential, but its lack of ambition is the reason for not being successful.

Like a mech without a pilot, Daemon X Machina is a beautiful shell with not enough to fill it. It’s a frustrating thing - simultaneously proving that there’s life in this old genre, but failing to inject much of interest beyond the base level. I was thrilled enough by the opportunity to truly micro-manage a mech for the first time in a while, but there just wasn’t enough to do with my creation once I was done tinkering.

Daemon X Machina is clearly trying to replicate the formula of Armored Core, but it suffers from an uninteresting plot and weary dialogue. On the other hand, it offers a careful artistic direction and advanced personalization of mechas. Unfortunately, as the missions progress, Daemon X Machina loses its rhythm and the interest of players, due to too many similar objectives and a blatant lack of inventiveness related to the repetition of quests. It's a shame, too, as it's a title with such a beautiful color palette and controls that are so accessible.

The single player campaign is a bit of a wash, but your experience depends on what you want from the game. Daemon X Machina excels at playing against skilled human opponents and taking the time and care to customize your arsenals. I enjoyed it for what it was, but I don’t think it will be a game I want to play again, at least not for a long while. I’m glad I played it, though. I needed that giant arsenal-sized hole in my heart filled once more, at least temporarily. Also, there’s a really bizarre ice cream-based mini game. I’m not sure what they were thinking with that one.

Daemon X Machina offers the Nintendo Switch a chance to delve deeper into mecha games, but misses the mark in challenging missions and captivating story. Still, it’s animation style and customization options make for a bright, colorful game.

The combat is a lot of fun and the visuals are dynamic and exciting, but repetitive missions and dire storytelling ruin what is otherwise a mechanically superior giant robot game.

Daemon X Machina is a frustrating game. Because, on one hand, it has everything a real robot anime lovers is looking for. But most of the time, the game is sluggish, with terrible gunfeel and repetitive missions.

The biggest problem is the game just doesn’t offer enough variety. I’d have gladly traded 10 missions for 3 more Colossal Immortal fights. About a third of the way in things started to click, but for the last few hours I was more than ready to see the plot conclude. Fans of Armored Core should look past my concerns, and give the game a go. People who want to take the controls of a mech and shred a bunch of underpowered foes will have a good time. The general public should probably give it some extra thought.

Daemon X Machina has some great aspects and some others… are not so great. Repetitive missions, slow combat and an unbalanced difficulty make it a little bit disappointing.

In full flow, Daemon X Machina can be exceptional... But it’s a thrill that fades with repetition, in a structure that falls uncomfortably between a Platinum style linear action game and the long haul loop of a Monster Hunter.

Daemon X Machina can really look visually stunning and sound amazing. But when playing the game, I just can't shake a feeling of disappointment. Daemon X Machina can be beautiful and ugly, and only the biggest mech fans will be able to look past the less flattering half of the game's visage. Great music and a great sense of style can't mask the fact that this game feels either boring or frustrating to play.

Daemon X Machina is an underwhelming mech game that offers too few enjoyable qualities to recommend, even for the fans of the genre. Fleeting fun from the action is buried beneath a poorly told story, lackluster presentation, and barebones mechanics.

I kept waiting for Daemon X Machina to pull the curtain back and reveal some sophistication in its gameplay, or some narrative twist that might make the uninspired combat worth slogging through. Those things never arrive. While the game ostensibly scratches the itch for players who have longed for something like Armored Core on the Switch, it’s a model that feels out of step with recent innovations in the sphere of action games. There are better worlds to save than this benighted future.

Early on, we wondered why they don't make games like this more often. Within a few short hours, we were grateful they don't. [Issue#338, p.120]

Far too flawed from a technical point of view, Daemon X Machina is also quite redundant in the long run. The Arsenal is really enjoyable to control but that's pretty much it.