Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE

 Wii U
User Score
7.9

Generally favorable reviews- based on 410 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 314 out of 410
  2. Mixed: 33 out of 410
  3. Negative: 63 out of 410
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  1. munir
    Jul 1, 2016
    5
    I can't connive with this kind of censorship, it's not a good message for future western releases of Japanese titles. This is a good game that doesn't deserve to be remembered by their cuts and changes, but Nintendo of America isn't actually helping by making we feel like back to the old cartridge content butchering days.

    For someone who has been watching trailers, gameplays and demos    I can't connive with this kind of censorship, it's not a good message for future western releases of Japanese titles. This is a good game that doesn't deserve to be remembered by their cuts and changes, but Nintendo of America isn't actually helping by making we feel like back to the old cartridge content butchering days.

    For someone who has been watching trailers, gameplays and demos from the original game these last months, it became easy to spot what have been changed in the west: from removed bikinis to altered CG cutscenes. Because of sexiness, no less.

    Seems "Japanese versions" are keeping their charm even today, aren't they? 30 years later and "Western version" is still a synonymous of a lesser thing.    … Expand
  2. Lazy_Fish
    Jun 24, 2016
    6
    [This is a review of the US release, not JP!] Its nice to see the wii u get a new game, a crossover between two great games into one. At first when this was announced it sounded like it was going to be a much better game. It changed into an idol game and while I was upset at that, the game isn't that bad in game play. The game play is closer to SMT than it is fire emblem. Its fun, has[This is a review of the US release, not JP!] Its nice to see the wii u get a new game, a crossover between two great games into one. At first when this was announced it sounded like it was going to be a much better game. It changed into an idol game and while I was upset at that, the game isn't that bad in game play. The game play is closer to SMT than it is fire emblem. Its fun, has flashy effects in battle, and is somewhat difficult, and is pretty lengthy. The music is pretty good too. Though I don't understand japanese at all it was nice to hear. Characters are also well done. But the flaws are really holding it back from being a great game. The story i'd say is okay, but not great. The animations outside of battle are akward to watch. You'd be speaking to a character and they'd never blink or they will keep their mouth open for a long time. some animations to animations are also choppy. Legs will be more spread out in one, then the other will instantly snap them closer. I'd say the biggest flaw is the localization however. If I were reviewing the Japanese version this review may be a 7. It made me a upset that they didn't get English voice actors for this game. Id much rather have English than Japanese so I can understand it easier. This may leave most who don't know a thing about Japanese confused on how the pacing of songs or dialogue goes. Censorship made some laughably bad changes, such as changing a wedding dress to be completely covered. The changes seem unnecessary and the game would be great without them

    I would recommend this game to those who are really into anime and SMT. Not so much for fire emblem fans since the game play is more like SMT, but if you liked characters from awakening and shadow dragon, then give it a try.

    Not as terrible as it seemed at first, but localization changes do suck alot.    … Expand
  3. HardeesEom
    Jun 24, 2016
    6
    Its a playable game but the localization team should be fired as theres a bunch of dialogue that you cannot understand due to lack of subs. Where did this game go wrong?
  4. ricklongo
    Jan 3, 2017
    7
    Initially announced as Shin Megami Tensei x Fire Emblem, Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE is an Atlus JRPG that mixes several elements from those beloved franchises. Luckily, the result is a game that's very much its own idea.

    The protagonist is Itsuki Aoi, a high school kid who finds himself involved in an interdimensional war with mythical beings of another world. The force that allows    Initially announced as Shin Megami Tensei x Fire Emblem, Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE is an Atlus JRPG that mixes several elements from those beloved franchises. Luckily, the result is a game that's very much its own idea.

    The protagonist is Itsuki Aoi, a high school kid who finds himself involved in an interdimensional war with mythical beings of another world. The force that allows humans to fight those beings is called 'performa', which gets more powerful depending on each person's artistic talents. As such, the cover-up for Itsuki and his ever-growing group of comrtades is Fortuna, a developing talent agency.

    In his quest, Itsuki roams Tokyo to find special gates to another dimension (called the Idolosphere), where colorful turn-based battles take place. Exploration of the overworld is very limited, as the game's Tokyo is made of several self-contained spaces instead of a single open world. Each of the game's several Idolosphere-based dungeons, however, offers more secrets and hidden passages to uncover.

    One of the game's best traits are the battles, which are extremely colorful turn-based affairs. They're technically deep without being overwhelming, and require players to carefully choose between several attack types and magical elements in order to maximize combo sections. The enemies are all based on the Fire Emblem universe, which adds a great layer of fan service.

    Equally interesting is Tokyo Mirage Session's focus on the Japanese music industry. As the story progresses, Itsuki and his friends go through several side quest to awaken their performa, which invariably lead to music videos showcasing their development as artists. Now, I don't really know the first think about J-Pop, nor am I really interested in it, but even so I though this was a pretty nifty idea. The music itself, while not my cup of tea, should be pleasant to fans of the genre, and the insight into Japan's ubiquitous idol industry makes for a novel background.

    There's also a weapon-crafting side that's vital to progression in the game. Each character has their own weapons, and each weapon offers different attacks and static abilities to learn. There a lot of depth here, and I often spent many minutes lost in the intricacies of transforming hard-earned loot into fine new swords, lances, and axes. The one problem is that the process is a bit obnoxious, as you're forced to skip the same animation every time you make a new item.

    Finally, there's the elephant in the room: the censorship. This is something that almost never bothers me, and sometimes it even rids otherwise fine releases of cringe-worthy sections. (Hey there, petting minigame in Fire Emblem Fates!) But here, there's no two ways about it: it's a problem. It gets to the point that whole plot points stop making sense altogether until you search the web and discover that critical details were censored. It's a bummer, and makes it harder to actualy care about the story.

    TL;DR:
    TMS has all the characteristics of a classic Atlus RPG, which means satisfying turn-based combat, but also some anachronic conventions (such as limited exploration and animations that get repeated over and over). Although marred by censorship of critical plot points, the final package is a fun adventure with a music industry-based background that I hadn't seen in a game before. It's admittedly a niche title, but if you're a fan of JRPGs, or Fire Emblem, or J-Pop (or all of the above), this one should be right up your alley.

    Rating: 7.5    … Expand
  5. dmzv92
    Jul 15, 2016
    7
    Pros:

    - Combat is great. This probably the best version of the press-turn system I've ever played. Hopefully they implement similar mechanics for Persona 5. - The character customization system is really simple but enjoyable. Upgrading your Carnages until mastery was pretty addictive. - The OST is amazing. I'm not a huge J-pop fan but some songs are really catchy. - I thought the way    Pros:

    - Combat is great. This probably the best version of the press-turn system I've ever played. Hopefully they implement similar mechanics for Persona 5.
    - The character customization system is really simple but enjoyable. Upgrading your Carnages until mastery was pretty addictive.
    - The OST is amazing. I'm not a huge J-pop fan but some songs are really catchy.
    - I thought the way you use the gamepad as a cellphone for text messaging was actually a nice idea.

    Cons:

    - Unnecessary and inconsistent censorship. Seriously, if they really had to censor the game they could have done a better job at it. In some scenes you will see cleavage censored and next minutes, you can the characters **** (ie. in the Tsubasa's "Feel" video her boobs are covered but then you can see her in her Pegasus form and her **** are popping out, also in the Aversa bossfight they censored her breasts in the cutscene but in the actual battle they're uncensored, etc...)
    - The story is horrible. Really generic stuff. The characters are really plain as well. Itsuki is the typical aloof guy who is really dense, Tsubasa is the clumsy but cute girl... I have already seen that before. Come on Atlus, you could have done a better job here.
    - Since the characters are so plain most sidequests are really boring, unless you're really into that kind of romance/slice of life anime stuff...

    Bottomline: really decent effort by Atlus that was brought down by the stupid censorship Nintendo put on them and by a bad story and characters. If Persona 5 fixes the issues this game had we could have a masterpiece in our hands.    … Expand
  6. WookieWill
    Mar 6, 2017
    5
    I truly did want to enjoy this game, but it has an overly generic story, bland characters, and a leveling system that promotes far too much grinding. The way to mitigate the abundance of time that will be needed to properly level your characters is to have the DLC for the game and that grants the player too much exp and gold, but still not giving them the items necessary to level up, soI truly did want to enjoy this game, but it has an overly generic story, bland characters, and a leveling system that promotes far too much grinding. The way to mitigate the abundance of time that will be needed to properly level your characters is to have the DLC for the game and that grants the player too much exp and gold, but still not giving them the items necessary to level up, so there is still an overwhelming amount of fighting the same palette swapped monsters to obtain a fissure claw so you can craft a sword so you can kill more stronger monsters, etc. etc.… Expand
  7. PlayorNaygames
    Jul 15, 2016
    6
    Don't let all the 9's and 10's fool you, this game will not appeal to everyone. As others have stated, this is a Persona game much than a Fire Emblem game. The Persona (or "Performa" in this game) you get are FE characters and there are some neat sound effects and weapons from FE, but that's about it.

    The story and setting are VERY cheesy and Japanese (they're scenes where the    Don't let all the 9's and 10's fool you, this game will not appeal to everyone. As others have stated, this is a Persona game much than a Fire Emblem game. The Persona (or "Performa" in this game) you get are FE characters and there are some neat sound effects and weapons from FE, but that's about it.

    The story and setting are VERY cheesy and Japanese (they're scenes where the characters spin around naked and equip armor like in Sailor Moon ffs and not just the women). Also, this is the 3rd or 4th game now that I have played that takes place in photo-realistic Tokyo. setting and it's getting old. It's cool to walk around Tokyo if you haven't in other games though, so try it out if you haven't before. There are many other settings Atlus come on. I swear it borrows the map engine from Digimon Cyber Sluth, but I cannot confirm that.

    From the opening cinematic and dialog, you're thrust into the games first dungeon and acquire you powers, with no real setup like in a true Persona game. It's ridiculous, but if you can buy into the story, good for you. Atlus doesn't take the time to develop the characters enough to make me care about wanting to save this world. The spend about 30 min. in the beginning with uninteresting dialog before you even get to play. They do try to develop the characters, but most it standard ra-ra go team believe in yourself cliches from many other animes. They're are some funny dialog choices though, but they're very rare.

    The visuals are nice and the art style is fantastic as one would expect from an Atlus RPG. It's very colorful and may get you into these types of games if you felt Persona was too dark. The character animations are good, but not great and honestly need to be better for the West because the game only has English subtitles, but no dubs sadly, which greatly reduces my enjoyment of the game.

    The music is typical JPoP fare that one would expect from Atlus. It's good, but repetitive in places. You will have to endure quite a few musical numbers that are skippable thankfully, but skipping these scenes means you're missing out on a large chunk of what the devs put a lot of production in. The singing isn't bad per se, but being mostly in Japanese, it's hard to get into. It's a double edged sword.

    The battle system is good as others have mentioned, but not amazing by any means, if you have played Persona, you've played this before. The key difference is instead of "knocking the enemy down" whne you exploit the enemy's weakness like in Persona, your allies get a free attack if they have an attack of the same type you used. It feels quicker and works well. Persona vets will find battles easy, as enemies have many weaknesses, however, when the enemy finds your character's weaknesses, they still deal tons of damage and can KO them very easily. Sadly, characters are not brought back after the battle ends and you don't get a revive spell until later in the game, so you are forced into loading up on revival items, which are expensive and this makes some enemies fell cheap or unfair (just like in Persona, but even worse because the "strong" enemies level with you, even in old dungeons). You start with full control of your party member which is great . Chaining attacks together is cool at first, but you see it so often it gets old and also later in the game they get longer.

    As long as you defeat enemies, you will unlock new weapons for free, so the only thing you need money for is accessories (and new costumes for you team, if you want, they're cosmetic only). Persona is already a game without many armor slots, so with only one piece of armor to worry about, this is a very light/casual RPG.

    Unlike Persona, there are no social links and no school, but of course your character and friends are high schoolers. This trope has been done to death and it's really stale imo. Maybe that's what sells the best in Japan, but everything about the story is cliche in my humble opinion. Heck one of the characters you get in the beginning feel like a reincarnated Junpei from Persona 3, same moves, stats, and strengths/weaknesses. Another character looks like a clone of the main character from Persona 3. Their personalities are different though.

    Dungeons are big and empty (other than the shadows or "mirages" as they're called in this game. Their are now puzzles though, because the dungeons are no longer procedural, they are the same each time. The puzzles are stupid easy and essential involve flipping a switch. The dungeon themes are interesting to look at, at first, but they really feel like a PS2-era dungeon design still, 2 generations later.

    Overall this is a good game, without many bugs or technical issues and improves some areas from Persona 4, but I would only recommend it to hardcore JRPG fans, who probably did a majority of the reviews on this site. The game is cheesy and basic. With less content and things to do than Persona 4, it's almost a step backward for the series. Thank you.    … Expand
  8. Phantomkid
    Jul 6, 2016
    6
    Playing this game only one thing comes to mind and it's "grind". Most of your time will be spent trying in dungeons and fighting monsters. Although combat feels fast and unique it become bored and stale once the game begins to catch it's stride. The moments where i had fun playing were the sub stories where you spend time with the cast of character in your party and learn about them seePlaying this game only one thing comes to mind and it's "grind". Most of your time will be spent trying in dungeons and fighting monsters. Although combat feels fast and unique it become bored and stale once the game begins to catch it's stride. The moments where i had fun playing were the sub stories where you spend time with the cast of character in your party and learn about them see them change and grow as people. But the thing that takes away from this fun is the stage rank which allows you to get to see and participate in sub stories . Stage rank can only be achieved through combat and is not tied to exp gained through enemies , but rather characters working together such as using buffs or chaining attacks. I'd spend up to an hour trying to get one character to rank up once. You should only play this game knowing you'll be spending time grinding in dungeons.… Expand
  9. HexDrain
    Jun 27, 2016
    5
    Ignoring the ongoing war between "censorship no" 0 and "censorship yes" 10.
    This game is frankly mediocre it tries to please so many people at once and with that pleased nobody but very devoted fan(atics).
    This is not persona, shin megami tensei or Fire Emblem only an empty shell of a game with name recognitions. The story is clichy but works if you don't want anything special. (it    Ignoring the ongoing war between "censorship no" 0 and "censorship yes" 10.
    This game is frankly mediocre it tries to please so many people at once and with that pleased nobody but very devoted fan(atics).

    This is not persona, shin megami tensei or Fire Emblem
    only an empty shell of a game with name recognitions.

    The story is clichy but works if you don't want anything special. (it wants to be 16+ stays 12+)
    The music is very good no complaints here, it has alot of variety.
    The graphics are "wii u" standard- take away from that what you want.
    Fighting is easy to understand maybe to easy for veterans.
    The difficulty is frankly to low.
    If you're into the social link/Support systems then sorry to say but this is not here.

    Even tho that sounds not to bad we talk about a game that is really only ok/good.
    nothing more.

    I gave this game 2 points less for the excessive censorship btw
    (yeah I am not a fan of that as well.)
    if your the kind of guy that doesn't care for this it is a 7 at best.    … Expand

Awards & Rankings

7
#7 Best Wii U Game of 2016
4
#4 Most Discussed Wii U Game of 2016
6
#6 Most Shared Wii U Game of 2016

Critic Reviews

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Metascore
80

Generally favorable reviews - based on 62 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 48 out of 62
  2. Mixed: 14 out of 62
  3. Negative: 0 out of 62
  1. CD-Action
    Oct 14, 2016
    70
    Atlus does not step outside safe territory charted by Persona. #FE will mostly be appreciated by people interested in the Japanese idol scene and those of you who need some more Persona right away. [10/2016, p.55]
  2. Games.cz
    Sep 19, 2016
    70
    Pop and RPG mixture. Certainly we cannot say that this game has no style ... and an incredible amount of fights.
    Read full review
  3. Game World Navigator Magazine
    Aug 23, 2016
    78
    Story and setting were made with absolutely no pandering for western tastes. Not everyone will find such a dose of pure, undiluted anime to their liking, but RPG and fighting system make it worth a try. And for hardcore fans of Japanese culture Tokyo Mirage Sessions may very well become one of the best games this year. [Issue#211, p.66]
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