Test – Mato Anomalies, an RPG with the false air of Persona 5

With its cel-shaded onions and a turn-based RPG, it does not take more to Mato Anomalies to get my attention. Skillful mix between visual-novel and RPG with a jagged scenario, Mato Anomalies stands as an experience to do if you liked games like Personas 5. Unfortunately, the software suffers from “too much emptiness”. Indeed, the city is beautiful but it lacks life…

Flawless aesthetics

Impossible to deny it, visually Mato Anomalies offers sublime images. They are reminiscent of the most beautiful Asian games like Personas 5 or Ni No Kuni. To achieve this, Arrowiz’s title uses the method of cel-shaded that gives an animated movie look. The story also takes place in a quality fictional neo-Shanghai. This imaginary city offers buildings flirting between the neo-futurist and the retro. Thus, if you can admire Chinese buildings with false airs of the civilization ofAge of Empire IIyou will also find a lot of holograms that animate the city.

In this adventure, you will play as Doe, a private detective who works for Belladonna. The investigation of the day takes you to discover a strange phenomenon near the ports of the city. A mysterious container contains a passage to a parallel dimension. There you will meet a certain Gram. The latter is a kind of exorcist who fights against the Marais Doom. These funny creatures look as good on the eye as the last generation of Pokémon. They clearly lack inspiration for some even if some monsters stand out a little bit.

A classic turn-based RPG

Mato Anomalies does not shine by the revival of the genre. In a classic turn-based RPG, we must navigate between combat and exploration. The battles take place in the parallel dimension. Besides, you will find your enemies in dungeons that are procedurally created. At first, Doe will be alone to face the monsters, but later many heroes will join your team.

No mana, no magic, but everything counts as “turns”. Indeed, each attack has a cool down of “X turns” before being reusable. In addition, each of your attacks increases a counter to deploy the special of your characters. It’s damn effective and quite pleasant to watch but unfortunately this attack is too long to be mounted.

Manipulating people’s psyches is possible thanks to Gram

Our dear exorcist is capable of many things. Indeed, he is accompanied by a somewhat special Android who is able to enter the psyche of enemies to convince them. Thus, with refreshing “card game” gameplayGram must make people talk by eliminating them in a different way always turn-based.

This gameplay changes from other fights and I found these moments very pleasant. This adds a lot of strategy and depth during battles. Indeed, an error is relatively punitive. I lost a lot of fights in my epic because of small mistakes.

Not free from flaws

Where the shoe pinches in this work is the lack of sound environment. The music is beautiful but not transcendent. As a bonus, it is difficult to say that the theme belongs to Mato Anomlies. Also, if you’re not a fan of French voiceless games, then you’re going to be put off. You only have the choice to play in English, Chinese or Japanese. Impossible to have a French dubbing. Nevertheless, rest assured, the whole game is available in VOSTFR. And I want to say “fortunately” because otherwise difficult to understand the scenario arising from a visual-novel.

I appreciated :

• The possibility of choosing the speed of the fights
• The interface entirely in French (Voice in English, Japanese or Chinese available)
• Cel-shading is pleasing to the eye

I least liked :

• Some phases are difficult
• Redundancy in some fights
• Music that seems a bit weak

Accessibility criteria

Test conditions