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When given a choice, will you choose the bitter truth? Or will you choose to ignore them and prance away in blissful ignorance?

Caligula Overdose… Boy, I've been looking forward to playing this remake for quite some time. Especially since it was a console exclusive, which I had none back then. From a glance, the combat mechanic looks interesting, and the story sounds promising enough to satisfy my itch for some good old high school fantasy. However, after actually playing the game, while it had its moments, the overall experience left me with mixed feelings.
Now, about the game
In a nutshell, the reasons I'm not particularly fond of Caligula Overdose are these:

Sidequest alongside Causality Link (akin to bonding feature) was a convoluted mess
The level design was horrible, especially true for the 4th dungeon – Never again!
Every grunt has an almost identical design, and it is on the rough side
Combat can be a hit or miss, with the addition of awful grinding experience
The main story didn't leave much of an impression



🙆The Okay Part


On the other hand, they absolutely nailed the boss OST – my personal favorite were Love Scope and Cradle. Additionally, the new side stories about The Ostinato Music Club (enemy faction) were a great bonus as they elaborate on the relationship between each character even more. Plus, the achievements are pretty easy; is it time-consuming? Yes, but easy nonetheless.


High school fantasy in a nutshell
When I pick a game, I tend to pick ones that include a fantasy aspect as it is one of my all-time favorite genres and something that got me into gaming in the first place. And when I think of high school fantasy, things like edgy-related stuff and magic come to mind. Cause you know, it's high school. Get it? As in you're hi- my brilliant pun attempt aside, Caligula Overdose tells a story about a ragtag group of "teenagers" set in Mobius, a virtual world governed by a haywire AI that gained sentience. And this AI, μ (Myu), has one purpose, to take away all the pain that every user is going through and let them live their ideal life as a high schooler, hence the high school fantasy.
What I love about this remake is that it made several improvements and changes to the original game, namely new casts of characters, an additional arc, and so on. But! the best thing about it was the option to experience both sides of the story. As you finish a particular chapter, one of The Ostinato Music Club will approach you and ask whether you want to learn the truth. Accepting the offer allows you to become a double agent for both sides and have an understanding of their reasons for rejecting the real world. There's also an additional ending, which I highly recommend giving a shot; spoiler alert! It'll break your heart.
Causality Link is a flawed and tedious system
Just like many other JRPGs with a high school setting, Caligula Overdose also features a bonding system that allows you to unlock character perks as you grow closer. That's where the game shines the brightest. Historia, the developer, had outdone themselves with the individual stories, as they were compelling, and the character growth was apparent. However, they decided to take one step further and expand the bonding system to over 500 NPC; little did they know that it was a horrible mistake.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2828165931
Causality Link is a feature that allows you to bond to any in-game NPC you find as you traverse the world of Mobius, and there are plenty of them; however, it is not without issues. The first, and probably the least troublesome issue, is that they are scattered throughout the overworld and dungeons with no way to summon or to know their exact position – some have a fixed position, but most are walking around. Additionally, before you can talk to most of them, you must befriend their buddies first. So yeah, have fun hunting NPC with identical character designs where the only way to differentiate them is through their name tag.
Once you maxed out your bond, you'll have access to NPC sidequests, which leads to the second and most significant offense for me, godawful backtracking. The game features many quest types; however, some require you to backtrack plenty of times. Usually, I'm cool with doing that, but not here! Imagine backtracking into some of the most horribly-designed dungeons multiple times.
Unless you're going for total completion, I suggest you avoid this. The reward is not that worth it anyway.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2828165890
Unique battle that falls a bit short
Combat-wise, I have mixed feelings about Caligula Overdose. While it has this mechanic called Imaginary Chain (prediction + combo system) that adds a unique element to the basic turn-based combat system the game uses, the overall battle experience is not what I'd call challenging, even on a harder difficulty. It's missing this sense of emergency during dungeon exploration. And the reason for that is because each time you win a battle, your HP and MP fully recover. So basically, you can plow through your enemies one after another, making things dull real quick.
The other thing that bummed me about the battle is the fact that the regular fight OST sounded so out of place and repetitive at times, which is weird considering the whole theme revolved around evil musicians. They did, however, nail the boss fight OST with flying colors.
Additionally, grinding can feel tiresome and bland in Caligula Overdose, as every enemy you face has little to no difference from another. The only noticeable difference is floating weapons following them, and I'm not kidding.
However! I find the weapon idea to be fresh and edgy, in a good way. Each member of The Go-Home Club carries a trauma of some sort, and accepting it allows you to enter a "Catharsis Effects" – in a nutshell, it materializes your pain in the form of a weapon. Generally, as you explore dungeons, you'll find new weapons along the way, but not here. Instead, you collect accessories dubbed in psychological terminology that drop randomly from mobs or as a quest reward. If that doesn't scratch your itch for high school fantasy, I don't know what will.
I highly recommend playing the game on hard difficulty as that's the sweet spot where you can fully utilize the game mechanic and not breeze through the game.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2828165942
Overall
Caligula Overdose had the tools and making of a great JRPG; a colorful cast of characters with a personality that screamed individuality, a somewhat unique combat mechanic, and a euphonic soundtrack. However, there were just too many flaws that offset all the good things about it. If you're into character growth and interaction between friends, you might find Caligula Overdose enjoyable; otherwise, it’s best to wait for a sale.
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