Fernz Gate
KEMCO November Sale 2023 #1. Played in 2024. Published by EXE-Create.
Life sucks in Fernland, a previously-peaceful crossroads of dimensions. An evil overlord has seemingly killed the local goddess and is now killing people or turning them into monsters and getting more powerful as he conquers. And Alex has just been mysteriously transported here from our world, but he overcomes his fears and joins the battle against the overlord.
A KEMCO/EXE-Create game that feels (and looks) very similar to <i>Miden Tower</i> but pulls in system pieces we've seen in lots of places. (And honestly, this is another game where there are too many damn systems.) To start, there’s no MP, and instead all abilities are on cooldown timers. HP refills after battles; the limit break meters are the only thing that persists battle to battle. The big change to the battle system from other games is adding "buddies," so you only have three active party members at a time but can have three more "sub members" who use your items for you and bolster attacks. (One is always your fourth human party member; the other two are monsters you get from rings you find in chests and as random drops.) Your human characters learn magic by fighting with elemental rings equipped. Each character has a unique limit break attack and a set of personal non-elemental skills. There are combined skills you can learn by having the character and their buddy use certain spells on the same turn, and shared special abilities you learn from NPCs during sidequests.
Battles randomly feature giant enemies (extra powerful), metal enemies (high defense and flee easily but give lots of XP) and bomb enemies (explode after several turns, potentially giving a game over). There are also random encounters with stone blocks and jars you can open with special items for prizes. There are “curio” spots at the beginning and end of dungeons that you can use to change the encounter rate and summon monsters instantly. Dungeons aren’t really big on puzzles (there are a few sliding-ice and directional arrow bits, and a couple of switches to pull, but nothing particularly challenging) though they’re pretty good with the overall design and about not making them identical straight lines.
The IAP "gems" drop every couple of battles, but you get 1,000 for buying the full version of the game, and that seems to be sufficient to unlock a selection of the various gated features. You’ll need to buy more if you want to use the good version of the lotto system for weapons and accessories (as opposed to the crappy weapons lotto, played with random-drop tickets). There’s a crafting system for combining the overabundance of weapons. There's a "secret house" area where you can grow seeds in real time, send your excess monster buddies on errands, and put the monsters on “stands” for small battle bonuses.
The quest log is excellent, including all the details of side quests that you get from from crabby townspeople. (You revisit the dungeons a LOT to do the sidequests, but the “curios” that turn on and off encounters and let you call them at will make it a lot more pleasant.) Maidame Curie (who appears in numerous games) and her Maids are running the arena (where you can also win and use Maid Coins to trade for other bonus items). I’ll admit that I’ve never understood the maid fetish that somebody at EXE-Create apparently has, but here it seems to be more of a nod to the series than any kid of crude joke, so that’s fine.
Oh, and characters have “ability levels” you can increase by making the right choices during cutscenes, which allow them to unlock doors/solve puzzles/hop over stones/climb weak ladders and get some bonus items periodically. Just in case you needed yet another system.
Spending your gems on the key for the Forbbiden Lab is very much worth it, because completing that extra dungeon gets you the “Maid Head” buddy, which is impressively overpowered. Combining the Flash Flood skill with it can wipe out bosses in a single hit.
Side note: This was technically on sale in December, but it was easier to group it with the other late-2023 sale games in my queue. The important point was that it only cost me a buck.
The characters aren’t quite as interesting as the ones in Miden Tower, but I give them credit that the main cast and a lot of the side characters have actual motivations and there are a lot of cute side bits.
Overall: While this is overly-packed with systems and stuff, the game itself is pretty breezy and the plot kept my attention. Upper-tier KEMCO game, recommended to fans of Miden Tower specifically.
KEMCO November Sale 2023 #1. Played in 2024. Published by EXE-Create.
Life sucks in Fernland, a previously-peaceful crossroads of dimensions. An evil overlord has seemingly killed the local goddess and is now killing people or turning them into monsters and getting more powerful as he conquers. And Alex has just been mysteriously transported here from our world, but he overcomes his fears and joins the battle against the overlord.
A KEMCO/EXE-Create game that feels (and looks) very similar to <i>Miden Tower</i> but pulls in system pieces we've seen in lots of places. (And honestly, this is another game where there are too many damn systems.) To start, there’s no MP, and instead all abilities are on cooldown timers. HP refills after battles; the limit break meters are the only thing that persists battle to battle. The big change to the battle system from other games is adding "buddies," so you only have three active party members at a time but can have three more "sub members" who use your items for you and bolster attacks. (One is always your fourth human party member; the other two are monsters you get from rings you find in chests and as random drops.) Your human characters learn magic by fighting with elemental rings equipped. Each character has a unique limit break attack and a set of personal non-elemental skills. There are combined skills you can learn by having the character and their buddy use certain spells on the same turn, and shared special abilities you learn from NPCs during sidequests.
Battles randomly feature giant enemies (extra powerful), metal enemies (high defense and flee easily but give lots of XP) and bomb enemies (explode after several turns, potentially giving a game over). There are also random encounters with stone blocks and jars you can open with special items for prizes. There are “curio” spots at the beginning and end of dungeons that you can use to change the encounter rate and summon monsters instantly. Dungeons aren’t really big on puzzles (there are a few sliding-ice and directional arrow bits, and a couple of switches to pull, but nothing particularly challenging) though they’re pretty good with the overall design and about not making them identical straight lines.
The IAP "gems" drop every couple of battles, but you get 1,000 for buying the full version of the game, and that seems to be sufficient to unlock a selection of the various gated features. You’ll need to buy more if you want to use the good version of the lotto system for weapons and accessories (as opposed to the crappy weapons lotto, played with random-drop tickets). There’s a crafting system for combining the overabundance of weapons. There's a "secret house" area where you can grow seeds in real time, send your excess monster buddies on errands, and put the monsters on “stands” for small battle bonuses.
The quest log is excellent, including all the details of side quests that you get from from crabby townspeople. (You revisit the dungeons a LOT to do the sidequests, but the “curios” that turn on and off encounters and let you call them at will make it a lot more pleasant.) Maidame Curie (who appears in numerous games) and her Maids are running the arena (where you can also win and use Maid Coins to trade for other bonus items). I’ll admit that I’ve never understood the maid fetish that somebody at EXE-Create apparently has, but here it seems to be more of a nod to the series than any kid of crude joke, so that’s fine.
Oh, and characters have “ability levels” you can increase by making the right choices during cutscenes, which allow them to unlock doors/solve puzzles/hop over stones/climb weak ladders and get some bonus items periodically. Just in case you needed yet another system.
Spending your gems on the key for the Forbbiden Lab is very much worth it, because completing that extra dungeon gets you the “Maid Head” buddy, which is impressively overpowered. Combining the Flash Flood skill with it can wipe out bosses in a single hit.
Side note: This was technically on sale in December, but it was easier to group it with the other late-2023 sale games in my queue. The important point was that it only cost me a buck.
The characters aren’t quite as interesting as the ones in Miden Tower, but I give them credit that the main cast and a lot of the side characters have actual motivations and there are a lot of cute side bits.
The big twist is that all of the main characters (and the other “outworlders”) are all dead, and Fernland is an in-between space for souls that have regrets about dying. The overlord stole their memories of their deaths to make them more willing to fight and generate mana he could steal. (And all of the regular Fernlanders are just constructs of the Goddess, there to serve and shepherd the outworlders to their next destinations.) This actually makes the bits about how no one actually needs to eat and no one seems to age make more sense. Oh, and the fluffy “anima” companion was secretly the weakened Goddess the whole time, so she’s been a part of your party for most of the game.
When you beat the overlord, you get the basic ending where the characters move on to the afterlife. Then you can save a clear file and there’s a postgame segment with some bonus dungeons and a few more sidequests. And you can grind well past what’s necessary to beat the regular game if you want to brave the extra arena fights and challenge areas (I didn’t even reach level 100 to beat the true final boss, and there’s a level 900 bonus dungeon!), but that seems unnecessary to me. Beating the overlord the second time gets you the true ending, where you can choose to move on, stay in Fernland, or return to life. I chose to let the characters return to the living with their new resolve.
When you beat the overlord, you get the basic ending where the characters move on to the afterlife. Then you can save a clear file and there’s a postgame segment with some bonus dungeons and a few more sidequests. And you can grind well past what’s necessary to beat the regular game if you want to brave the extra arena fights and challenge areas (I didn’t even reach level 100 to beat the true final boss, and there’s a level 900 bonus dungeon!), but that seems unnecessary to me. Beating the overlord the second time gets you the true ending, where you can choose to move on, stay in Fernland, or return to life. I chose to let the characters return to the living with their new resolve.
Overall: While this is overly-packed with systems and stuff, the game itself is pretty breezy and the plot kept my attention. Upper-tier KEMCO game, recommended to fans of Miden Tower specifically.