As someone who grew up loving role-playing games, it has been frustrating to see the genre become largely stagnant over the past decade. For every high-profile success like Persona 5 there are 15 other RPGs that don’t bring a single original idea to the table either mechanically or thematically. Thankfully, a lot of recent innovation has come from the indie scene as Undertale notably managed to subvert expectations and deliver a wholly original experience.
The latest indie RPG to bring something new to the table is YummyYummyTummy’s Fallen Legion, which is launching on both PlayStation 4 and Vita (we’ll have a review for that version tomorrow) as two separate titles. Players are given an incentive to check out both versions as each display a different side of the overall narrative. The game’s structure isn’t the only area where it’s unique, as it features an original battle system that assigns each character to a different face button on the DualShock 4 controller. This isn’t a game that attempts to play off the nostalgia of players, as it has grander ambitions. Fallen Legion wants to bring something new to the genre and in that aspect it’s a monumental success. There’s definitely a learning curve to coming to grips with its battle system (one that I was more familiar with than most thanks to the developers walking me through an early version of the game at PSX 2016), but any frustration that occurs early on quickly...