REYNATIS Review (Switch)
Shibuya blues
by Ethan Zack · Nintendo LifeHere’s a riddle for you: What do you get when you blend the complex, character-driven narrative talent of Final Fantasy VII writer Kazushige Nojima, the epic, sweeping melodies of Super Mario RPG composer Yoko Shimamura, and an over-the-top action combat gameplay system?
You get Kingdom Hearts, of course. However, developer Natsume Atari has dared to attempt recapturing the lightning-in-a-bottle success of the iconic crossover series by combining those same ingredients into an all-new package: Reynatis. This fresh action RPG first hit the Switch in Japan in June 2024, and is now arriving overseas. We’d like to say that’s cause for celebration, but as enticing as a game that boasts some of the same key talent and gameplay underpinnings from Square Enix’s beloved action franchise may sound, we reckon this second go-around needed more time in the oven.
Reynatis introduces an alternate, modern-day Shibuya in which wizards and witches run rampant, elite magic-wielding institutions are vying for power, and sinister magic drugs plague the populace. Amid this chaos, you follow two alternating narratives: the story of Sari Nishijima, a prodigious witch officer who aims to restore peace to the city streets, and the story of Marin Kirizumi, an aloof wizard who aspires to become the strongest magic-user in the world for…reasons. While they start out separate, Sari and Marin’s parallel journeys soon begin to interweave and shake the foundation of wizard society.
Gameplay in Reynatis is split between exploration and combat. In battles, you take control of Marin, Sari, and a number of other playable characters. Each has a distinct standard magic attack, along with two assignable special attacks.
What primarily sets Reynatis apart is the ability to swap between two distinct combat modes. In Liberation Mode, characters wield their magic abilities and deplete MP with attacks. In Suppression Mode, they can’t attack but can perform special dodges that allow them to quickly regain MP, counter deadly enemy attacks, and even slow down time to gain the upper edge. Solid evasion is just as crucial as solid offence here, and mastering both tactics is key to success.
While there are some intriguing quirks to Reynatis’ combat system, it’s ultimately pretty simplistic and repetitive fare. That may disappoint players who hoped for more mechanical depth, but we don’t mind a good old-fashioned button masher that doesn’t require much in the way of technical dexterity. Battles are fast-paced and flashy, and each character plays uniquely enough to keep the action varied. There are some streamlined ways to customise fighters, such as obtaining basic upgrades for special abilities and reassigning abilities to any character based on your preference. You can also locate passive stat enhancements and more by exploring Shibuya and locating spots of magical graffiti called Wizart, which are unlocked by completing side quests and lowering the city’s Malice meter.
Exploration is similarly basic, though its few unique mechanics feel considerably more half-baked. While exploring Shibuya, you can swap between Liberation and Suppression modes, with the former allowing you to see hidden items but alarming the public and forcing you to hide in designated spots before you get reported. There’s also a Stress meter that ticks up when you speak with civilians and forces you to enter Liberation Mode when it reaches 100%. For reference, our stress meter never rose above 15%, and we found that avoiding getting reported amounts to simply standing out of civilians’ line of sight for a second or two.
The other component of exploration is dungeon crawling. By entering portals of fog dispersed throughout the city, you can access an alternate magical dimension known as Another. Much of the main story progresses by making trips into these portals and navigating to the end of labyrinthine forests while fighting monsters and picking up items along the way. All told, it’s just about as basic as dungeon crawling gets.
If there’s one part of Reynatis that could use more simplicity, it’s the narrative. Delving into urban fantasy and exploring a magic-tinged tale of crime, corruption, and social injustice is an inspired concept, but the game seems more interested in constantly tossing out cool-sounding exposition than developing an engaging story. You see, most magic users get their powers when they have a near-death experience — but they’re just Replicas. Wizards-by-blood are called Legacies, and they’re aligned with the Guild, which distributes an addictive magic drug to humans called Rubrum that turns them into monstrous creatures known as the Damned, which happen to be different from magical monsters called M. But the Damned able to resist the addiction are called Fools and…well, you get the point.
It would be easier to embrace Reynatis’ self-serious commitment to worldbuilding if the actual storyline had any emotional resonance, but it doesn’t. The plot is mundane and tropey, and it meanders along with no real sense of urgency despite how big of a deal the main cast’s actions are supposed to be. The characters themselves are wooden with muddled motivations and have a knack for remaining completely poker-faced through the game’s few emotional beats. There’s a scene early on where one character runs into his old friend while he’s out on patrol, only to discover he’s become one of the Damned. You then proceed to kill the friend like any other common grunt enemy. The entire sequence is over in about a minute or two, and it’s seldom mentioned again.
It certainly doesn’t help matters that Reynatis isn’t much of a looker. Some great art direction and character design are let down by the game’s otherwise underwhelming presentation. Environments give off a gaudy and unfinished vibe, character models are unpolished, and the in-game cutscenes have more stilted walking animations and awkward cuts to black than your average Pokémon game. It’s like everything is blanketed in an aura of cheapness that’s too heavy to allow for even a bit of suspension of disbelief. Outside of the odd pre-rendered cutscene and Shimamura’s stellar soundtrack, the game consistently fails to imbue itself with the feeling of spectacle one would expect of a game about a bunch of ultra-powerful wizards doing cool wizard things.
In its best form, Reynatis is an RPG with a dull story that only partially makes up for that fact with some serviceable action-based combat. Unfortunately, that’s where arguably the biggest problem lies, because the Switch version of Reynatis is far from the game in its best form. Even a considerable hit to resolution can’t stop frequent stutters and frame drops, especially during loading zone transitions. Ironically, performance during battles remains more consistent than anything else, but there’s no getting around the idea that Reynatis generally feels quite rough to play.
The game is also riddled with bugs, running the gamut from glitchy character models to outright crashes. Throughout our roughly 18-hour playthrough, the game crashed about nine separate times. Three of those crashes occurred during cutscenes immediately after defeating difficult bosses, forcing us to replay each fight from the beginning. By the time we beat the final boss, we were too busy whispering “Please don’t crash” over and over again at our TV screen to bother paying attention to the story’s resolution.
And, perhaps, that says it all. For as much as we can try to focus on the fun we had with Reynatis’ redeeming qualities, we were all too relieved to start seeing those credits roll.
Conclusion
It would be one thing if Reynatis was a decent enough action RPG to turn your brain off to and enjoy some simplistic, button-mashy battles with. The problem is that the creators behind this title so obviously wanted it to be more than that, but it doesn’t have the writing quality, the technical spectacle, or the mechanical depth to make it happen. Just like its co-lead Marin, Reynatis’ single-minded ambition to reach greater heights unveils its greatest weaknesses — a sense of aimlessness and a general apathy toward its own fantastical world. If you believe you can still find some enjoyment in Reynatis despite its failings, it might be worth a shot. Unfortunately, the performance deficiencies of this Switch release make it a game that’s best played on just about any other console you have available. With plenty of other great action RPGs out on the market, you have to wonder if it’s worth the trouble.
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