Loop8 is a game by Sieg Games and the most notable thing about is that, it has some of the staff who worked on Lunar Silver Star Story and to more obscure than that, Elemental Gearbolt and the Gunparade games too.
From what I've looked up online they’re relatively a new company in the Japanese gaming scene, but one that’s also involved in nft related games and that of itself is a red flag too I have no issue with the a.i stuff but the crypto and nft stuff is pretty sketchy ngl.
Its set during the early 80s In the summer where humans are fighting against demon like beings known as Kegai. Now the nostalgic atmosphere itself especially since the designers were from a time where 90s ps1 jrpgs were at its creative peak was amazing.
The characters were not anything that special and the voice acting too yeah below average at times. To be honest here I couldn’t really feel that well connected to anyone because of how boring they were in a time of close character relationships in Japanese video games like Danganronpa and Persona and Final Fantasy 7 remake this really was not acceptable.
Now its name is focused on time loops and yep, get ready for it to be as repetitive as the infamous endless 8 arc in addition to the later parts of steins gate too.
You gotta manage time wisely as the game runs by the clock so every few minutes can literally be life or death almost like in devil survivor.
Other than that, theres quite a bit of social sim elements too similar to the modern persona games where you can spend time with friends or extracuricular activties too.
You have about 5 days specifically to stop kegai to possessing their potential target since they feed off certain emotions.
The game like chrono trigger is as long as you want it to be depending on the actions you took during the week.
The stats reset at its default if the loop resets same goes for relationships too but blessings are carried over and stats are doubled too if you choose to revist them again.
Theres an exploit where you can make the game even easier without having to deal with much of the hassle of the stats reset by revisiting the blessings area once per day to gain more stats and the last jrpg that had that kind of grinding exploit feature I've played minus the annoying time loops would probably have to be the last story on the wii and that game on its own was a way better game than this one.
Now that can be really annoying at times.
Theres demon sight too where you can mind read others similar to the world ends with you, to see how they are feeling and decide for yourself how would you like to interact with them for special bonuses and perks in battle.
The graphics were generally okay.
Honestly the game kind of run pretty sluggish and the animations just pretty stiff at least for me on the switch yet.
Combat was turned based and like in omori each mood affects your actions some being weaker or stronger than others and your bonds during your time affects combat on how well you do.
The artstyle too was pretty fine too especially since Kizuna AI’s character designer worked on it.
The music was good.
Ironically theres quite a bit of replay value in it but I really wouldn’t recommend replaying it again because of tedious this game can be.
This was not a good jrpg not the worst like lunar dragon story or even point and click stuff like flower sun and rain on the ds but still not the best either like the world ends with you or steins gate.
I wouldn’t be surprised either if this goes on clearance soon enough actually wait scratch that, I've seen it go on sale already at some of the video game stores I've visited lol. So overall it gets 2 out of 5 stars.
I’m honestly not really surprised this game wasn’t really that great especially like I mentioned with the nft related games they’ve worked on and its really sad to see from going to classic jrpgs from grandia and lunar to something like nfts. Really hope game developers in Japan snap out of that trend chasing phase they’re in and really focus on quality game development again or else we’ll back to another gaming crash.
Here's the locations of the blessings that I found from looking up online credited to nook gaming.
Middle Small shrine on right (Shrine)
Small Shrine (Giant Tree area behind the main shrine)
Small Shrine (Main Street)
Rock in bushes where the road splits (Road to School)
Rock with a rope around it (Beach)
School Store (School – First screen inside school)
Desk (Classroom 1-A, only when in Yomotsu Hirasaka)
Teacher’s Podium (Classroom 1-B, only when in Yomotsu Hirasaka)
Stall on the left (Night Market, only when in Yomotsu Hirasaka)
Oh to end this review, daily reminder its morally correct not only to pirate anime/manga but also morally correct to drive cryptocurrency to the fucking ground too peace out ya’ll.
