General gaming discussion

One of the best story-focused games ever IMO - extraordinary, vibrant writing and memorably strange, haunting presentation. Also a very smart modern take on some old point 'n click norms, with lots of funny and unexpected little details that emerge as you interact with the world.

It won't be for everyone - it's defiantly literary and political in its approach to its story, and it takes some wild narrative swings at times. I personally loved it. A rare game that operates in similar territory to the transcendent Kentucky Route Zero - I'd give KRZ the priority if you haven't played that, but they're both fantastic in their own ways.

Just finished it on the hardest difficulty the other day, where you instant fail if your combo meter drops below D 😅 It’s actually barely a restriction in most standard fights, but the ones where there’s some obstacle or delayed pattern before you can properly get into the flow of comboing are the hardest ones to deal with.

I’m generally fairly good (but very rarely great) at rhythm games and think this one’s very accessible and easy in terms of following the beat in normal gameplay - I was almost always 85% or above in terms of beat timing. But some of the ‘call and repeat’ boss battle sequences and elite enemy finishers are definitely tricky to nail. Though when you get one of those finisher combos perfect and Chai just slickly slices through one of the enemies to finish the fight… that’s the beauty of a good game rhythm game to me.

Alas there’s not much advice around the set piece parry / dodge bits as it’s just down to hitting those beats - easier said than done for sure! But if you’re struggling to get through the phases to even get to that point…

Equip the chip that increases the drops of battery charges if you have it.

Try to finish combos with heavy attacks as that will increase the amount of reverb / battery energy the enemies drop. You want that so you can…

Use jam combos (when you summon in a companion on a beat hit) instead of special attacks if you’re struggling to build up enough energy for powerful specials. Macaron and Korsica do much longer jam combos than Peppermint so use them if you can. These are invaluable IMO for doing lots of damage very quickly with small energy requirements - essential as there are only narrow windows to deal damage in that fight. Didn’t really use them on my normal difficulty playthrough but were gamechanging and essential for harder modes.

If you can get the one-beat timing down for parry and dodge counters they can be handy to do some cheap extra stagger damage. TBH I still struggle with this at times after playing through the game twice so don’t worry about it too much.

Specifically for the first and third phases of the fight as they’re the trickiest (second phase is just about using the right companion to break the shields so it shouldn’t be too much hassle):

Better to take your time and do small amounts of damage safely than trying to rush to do as much as quickly as possible.

There’s no point really using powerful jam combos or specials until the boss is stunned / exhausted as he shields most or all damage until then. Focus on breaking the shield by repeatedly using Korsica, Peppermint and Macaron’s standard attacks (in that order) and get in attacks when you can. Then do jam combos when he’s stunned to do max damage in a short space of time.

When he summons a big circle around him he’s going to do the lightning fire attack. The lightning strikes always hit on the same beats so I actually found it *much* easier to just step away from the main circle and parry the lightning strikes rather than trying to outrun them. Get the timing down and it’s a super handy way to buy some time to do some good, solid stagger damage.

When he goes into the corner and summons little circles around him (last phase only IIRC), he’s going to do a massive three hit sweeping attack. I found it easier to just double jump into the air and mid-air dodge *just* before the first hit and that cleanly avoids the attacks with time to do some damage.