Mugen Souls is an over-the-top Japanese RPG about the domination of a universe of seven inhabitable planets; and when I say over-the-top I mean it, but we’ll get into that soon enough. The game was developed and published by Compile Heart overseas, but was later brought to North America by NIS America. Honestly, I owe Compile Heart for revitalizing my faith in Japanese Role Playing games and allowing me to have the amount of fun I had with this Sony exclusive.
Mugen Souls mainly centers on a female protagonist that goes by the name Chou-Chou, however, she refers to herself as the “undisputed god of the universe.” She has a diabolical plan to take over the universe and turn everyone into her faithful peons. Chou-chou isn’t on this trip alone, as she has the companionship of two characters named Altis and Ryuto. She will also be accompanied by the monsters that she has already encountered, as she can turn them into her peons by transforming them into something called a shampurus.
Altis is an ex-demon who was banished from the underworld and turned into an angel due to all her diabolical plans going awry and actually becoming helpful actions. Ryuto is just a young man who used to operate the airship they travel on before he became a faithful servant to Chou-chou. You may ask why she has this world domination plan, and that is answered within the first few moments by the sheer fact that she thought the planets were such pretty stars from a distance.
Chou-chou may find her mission to take over the seven worlds a little more challenging than she first anticipated as she finds out more about the universe. Each planet is broken up between two to three continents, and each world has a hero and a demon lord she must first turn into her peons, which adds them to the party selection.
Chou-chou has more than a few tricks up her sleeve — one of which is the ability to change form into several different types of character tropes which are currently found in the anime circuit. Not only does she change her personality, but she changes her physical form to compensate that particular type of person. These personalities include ego, masochist, graceful, hyper, terse, ditz, bipolar, and sadist. Chou-chou will have to use all her forms in order to take over the universe. You’ll mainly use this ability to transform to use an ability called Moe Kill, but it’s also a lot of fun to hear all the different dialogue.
Gameplay mainly functions around exploration and turn-based combat, but it’s not as basic as many turn-based combat RPG turn out to be. You won’t be pressing the action button to repeatedly use the same attacks while hoping for a critical. Mugen Souls makes a few innovative changes to the normal combat to keep the game refreshing and interesting; some of which actually require some attention to pull off. One ability is a team member combo.
If you have two characters that are next to each other in the attack sequence and within the same range of an enemy, you can pull one of these off. Not only do they generally do more damage, but they make combat a little more interesting with a funny cut scene attack. In one of the attacks, the members of the team combo (which can range from only two members to four members of your team) all hop into tanks and open fire on an enemy. Each of these team combos is chosen at random so you never really know what will happen when you set these into motion.
Another interesting change to combat comes into play when you begin to use skills and magic. When you use skills you have the option to turn on a mode called blast off. When you have this mode enabled, not only will you hit the enemy with your chosen area of effect spell or distinctive physical skill, you will be able to launch them away from you. The next choice is whether you want to launch them into other enemies in the battle area or into your companions so that they will be able to damage the enemy even more. Using this was mode was a lot of fun, but at the same time it seemed to make my battles a little harder from time to time. I would accidentally launch enemies behind some of my companions allowing the enemies to get a better chance of a hit.
The most interesting ability that you’ll get to use in Mugen Souls, in and out of combat, is called a Moe Kill. The Moe Kill ability gives you the chance to turn your people, monsters, and things into faithful peons. However, there is a small chance that you’ll fail; activating a couple of different consequences. In battle is where you’ll use the Moe Kill ability the most often. Using both the Moe Kill ability and Chou-chou’s ability to transform her personality, you’ll have to pick phrases that will appease the enemy monsters. If you succeed in filling one of the meters that make the enemy happy you will either transform them into a peon (shampuru) or into a possibly rare or strong weapon or item. If you fail, however, you have the chance of enraging the enemy — making them much stronger in both their attacks and the amount of health they have. You’ll also use Moe Kill outside of battle a specific points around the world you’re exploring. When you succeed in a Moe Kill against these master points, you will make a portion of the continent your peon; which literally allows Chou-chou to move the entire continent.
All of that is just the tip of the spear when it comes to gameplay and combat in Mugen Souls, but this game has much more to offer then just sheer enjoyment out of fun combat. There is also a great amount of loot collecting. I never saw an inventory cap as far as the amount of items you can carry, but I found myself picking up and buying so much that it was just easier to sell the things I didn’t plan to use. Not only is there a lot of loot to find, but some of it is pretty unique. You’ll find plenty of uniquely-named armor and weapons throughout your time with the game. You’ll be using armor called Used Panties and New Bra, and you’ll be equipping items like Oven Mitts, Rusty Swords, and Galactic Hand Cannons. Each item in the game also has a goofy little description to go along with the humorous name.
On top of all that, this game is outright adorable. Mugen Souls features great anime-style art for the characters and a wonderful amount of set pieces for the various worlds. All the characters you’ll play as or come across (including each of the seven personalities Chou-chou harbors) all have a different look and type associated with them, making it a game with a large cast of interesting personalities and character stories. Similarly, none of the worlds look the same. The continents on all the planets have a different feel as well. Visually, you always feel like you’re progressing and exploring somewhere new. Compile Heart also uses a good number of visual tropes and cues in each world. For instance the Sun World is a fantasy based world. Not only can you see an oversized castle in the distance, but there is a large sword sticking out of the ground, fortifying the fantasy aspect of the world.
If you don’t usually play RPGs, this a great place to start. The game features great tutorials that teach you the basics of each new addition to the game. When you’re used to new features you can go in and explore even more complex and interesting aspects of it, so you can use them in new and interesting ways. The first tutorial teaches you how to use your airship in combat. The tutorial doesn’t take control away from the player, and is also filled with the same humorous dialogue that you’ve already seen. Also, the tutorials will have a few pictures and diagrams explaining the new feature, and how to take advantage of using that new feature.
For example, while using your airship in combat with approaching enemy airships there are three basic attacks that you can chose from to damage the enemy: attack, pierce, and reflect. You could probably make it through the first few battles choosing any random basic attacks you wanted. However, as you get further into the game choosing the right attack becomes essential. You will start being able to estimate what the enemy is going to do so you can use your reflect attack at the right time, and also guess when the enemy is planning on using their shields and know when to use your pierce attack to break through.
Honestly without the tutorial there in place the first time you entered this sequence you’d be looking at a screen with two ships and a list of commands that you could only guess what they actually did and when you should use each one. Since the tutorials felt somewhat natural and they were filled with good dialogue they didn’t really seem like a hindrance. There are so many systems in the game that you need some way to explain them, and Compile Heart did a great job structuring the tutorial system to be just as interesting and funny as the rest of the game.
Mugen Souls has a lot to offer RPG fans with fun combat, interesting loot, and a great story that continuously gets better with each additional party member, but it also offers entry level RPG players to enjoy in a lot of the fun. There is large universe just waiting to be conquered, so my advice would be to go explore and take over those darned purty planets.
