Utawarerumono: Mask of Deception Review (Wysaw)
Disclaimer:
Completed on Normal difficulty in just under 45 hours on steam deck. Ran flawlessly.
Make sure you play "Utawarerumono: Prelude to the Fallen" BEFORE playing this game.
Short Review:
This series is a masterpiece unlike anything else I have played. Its truly amazing from start to finish.
It has everything: Times of joy and sadness, mysteries and big reveals, it takes itself seriously then its both ridiculous and hilarious. All the characters are well written and the story never gets boring.
Personally I played this for 1-2 hours most nights before bed and found it hard to put down.
I doubt its the sort of game you want to no life though, think of it more like a TV series and watch an episode at a time. Space it out a bit, its a perfect game to finish the day with.
More details, no spoilers:
Do not skip the prequel game: "Prelude to the Fallen". I won't say why but just do yourself a big favour and play that game first.
I want to talk about how great the story, setting and characters are here but I don't want to spoil anything, just go in blind, if you liked the prequel game then its just as good.
I'm gonna say mostly the same as I did with the first game: the presentation is the only thing letting the game down. The drawings are excellent but that's all you get 95% of the time. Its very much a visual novel with some combat. There's nothing wrong with that because the writing carries it but, if it was fully animated it would have elevated the experience significantly.
The combat was harder than the first game, I had to turn it down to Normal because on Hard mode the enemies were quickly out levelling me and the only way to beat it would be to grind so it didn't seem worth it.
That's it really, I just hope we get a full remake some day. It's too good to remain as a mere visual novel.