Review: Alice Gear Aegis CS is Solid, Aside from Its Story

Ladies sporting mecha elements. That’s the core idea of “Mecha Musume,” and love for the concept lies on the very core of Alice Gear Aegis CS Concerto of Simulatrix. The sport is a spin-off of the (Japan-exclusive) Alice Gear Aegis cell sport, bringing its characters and world to consoles.

Like the unique, Alice Gear Aegis CS takes place sooner or later, centuries after humanity was pressured to desert Earth as a result of invasion of the Vice, an alien race. The remnants of humankind have taken to the celebs, inhabiting “Shards,” spacefaring replicas of Earthbound life constructed into floating items of what was the moon. Defending these colonies are “Actresses,” younger girls who can channel a mysterious vitality to energy the titular Alice Gear. A collection of highly effective weapons worn and wielded by every Actress in battle, they’re the one efficient weapons towards the Vice. This Actress system’s confirmed so profitable that protection towards the aliens has been privatized, with up-and-coming Actresses working for numerous businesses like weaponized idol items.

Concerto of Simulatrix flips the script on the cell sport’s alien-shooting setup. As an alternative of combating the Vice, the 22 playable Actresses of Alice Gear Aegis are taking intention at one another. The situation is the testing of a brand new simulation expertise and the accompanying match to popularize it. For 3 weeks, buddy will struggle buddy, teammate will struggle teammate, and the Actresses will likely be (non permanent) adversaries within the pursuit of fame, glory, and fats stacks of money.

That’s truly in regards to the extent of the story. There’s not a lot of a central plot in Alice Gear Aegis CS. The story mode performs out like many a combating sport’s arcade mode. You choose a personality, and play a dozen or so fights with them, seeing a number of story scenes centered on them or their workforce earlier than it’s over. Then you definitely’ll purchase some new gear or beauty equipment with the cash you earned combating and choose a brand new character to do it over again.

The story path is represented as a grid of hexes gamers have to navigate. Every hex on the map is among the 21 days of the match, and most hexes characterize a one-on-one struggle with one other Actress. Just a few instances over the course of the three-week run, you’ll tackle a workforce battle that options your Actress and two teammates towards a workforce of three different Actresses. In story mode, all of the groups and alliances are locked in: Yotsuyu will at all times struggle alongside her pals Sitara and Fumika, and Meika will at all times be accompanied by her ingesting buddies Anna and Mari. These workforce battles characterize the majority of Alice Gear Aegis CS‘ storytelling, since they contain bits of dialog and some scenes between the character, their teammates, and their opponents.

Every character has a singular story path, however none of them are significantly concerned. The sport is clearly supposed to be a type of fan-service title for gamers aware of the core Alice Gear Aegis cell sport. Other than a number of capsule profiles and detailed merchandise descriptions, the writing and dialog are written presuming gamers know who these characters are and why they’re linked to one another.

Sadly, the general public taking part in the English model of Alice Gear Aegis CS are prone to be experiencing the sequence for the very first time. The cell sport is Japan-exclusive and apart from an animated sequence set to debut in April 2023, there’s mainly no different media capable of inform the core story or do the heavy lifting of introducing the world and characters to the viewers.

That’s a disgrace, because the characters appear enjoyable, if not significantly novel. I’m significantly amused by the antics of Meika Yorozuba. When not flying round as an Actress, Meika is the CEO of one of many corporations that manufactures Alice Gears and sometimes makes use of her battles to indicate off new merchandise. The twist is that Meika is the stereotypical “gyaru” archetype, a party-girl character who revels in tanned pores and skin, dyed hair, garishly trendy clothes, and an virtually incomprehensibly thick, slang-laden road dialect.

If Alice Gear Aegis CS isn’t as well-supported by its writing or storytelling, its simple-but-solid mechanics make the expertise of taking part in it pleasantly partaking. The transition from a microtransaction-based cell sport to a single-player area fighter has confirmed to be pretty easy. Alice Gear Aegis CS performs like a simplified model of Digital On or the Gundam VS sequence. Gamers can transfer their characters backwards and forwards, and are robotically locked onto a hostile goal. They’ll then hearth their weapons, most of which have automated intention and a few degree of homing or monitoring motion. They’ll additionally use completely different talents relying on their geared up Alice Gear. Totally different gear units have completely different talents, starting from homing lasers to missile barrages to ring-shaped floating traps.

Being based mostly on a 2018-era title meant for smartphones, the sport’s visuals aren’t top-of-the-line, however they run and not using a hitch on even the growing old {hardware} of my launch-model Change. I solely detected drops in efficiency when taking part in the six-player Battle Royale fights in handheld mode. In any respect different instances, gameplay was easy and responsive. I sadly wasn’t capable of take a look at on-line multiplayer, however Alice Gear Aegis CS helps each informal and ranked matching. Just like the free battles, multiplayer permits way more freedom in workforce compositions, letting you experiment with one of the best mixtures of ladies and equipment.

There’s additionally a wealth of various gear choices to earn for the characters. Other than a pool of frequent gear anybody can use, every character has two Alice Gear units distinctive to them. One is a less expensive “low-tier” set that anybody can use however is tailor-made to its assigned character, and one is a high-tier unique set that solely they’ll use. That’s just about their greatest gear set, which tends to obviate the necessity to take into account different in-game elements like elemental properties.

The story mode, the place most of your cash will likely be earned, will normally hand out sufficient cash in a single run to purchase up each of a characters’ distinctive gear units and get a head begin on a set for a brand new character. Nonetheless, gamers with a have to unlock every part, significantly costumes, ought to count on to grind the story at the very least twice on each character. This may be fairly repetitious, since even equipment that aren’t character-specific must be purchased for each particular person character. That is one facet the place the cell game-like grinding may stand to be toned down.

Although Alice Gear Aegis CS Concerto of Simulatrix gained’t wow mecha followers with its storytelling, its substantial content material base and interesting characters make it a pleasing distraction, and a showcase for top-notch mecha musume designs.

Alice Gear Aegis CS is offered on Nintendo Change, PS4, and PS5.