These days a big focus of the games that come out is on the developer. Back when the likes of Mario and Mega Man were being released, very few people were discussing the people behind the games. Now it’s likely you know at least one of the people working on any given game – as the industry grows in popularity, people are given clout based on their works. In a field that was often thankless, it’s nice to see the developers get the attention and credit they deserve, and it’s helpful to have an idea of what you’re getting into based on a person’s previous work. While Takeyasu Sawaki is not a household name, if you played his previous game El Shaddai: Ascension of the Metatron, chances are you’ll see a lot of similarities in this.

Starting The Lost Child, you’ll be treated to an intriguing tale of people committing suicide with a woman in purple always present. After almost being killed, Hayato is gifted with a device (from a woman in purple, what a coincidence) that allows him to collect and power up demons and other elevated beings like fallen angels. If you’re familiar with Sawaki’s aforementioned game, you’ll no doubt recognize some of the titular characters in this. Turns out The Lost Child is a spinoff, although anyone expecting another action based game is in for a surprise when they see this is a first person RPG in the vein of Shin Megami Tensei, Etrian Odyssey, and Wizardry.

As visually arresting as El Shaddai is, this may come as a disappointment. The game is presented in the style of a visual novel. That means characters may have a few different portraits for dialogue, but the designs are all pretty standard for this medium – nothing makes it stand out from other offerings on the market, which is what it needs. The one thing that most other games don’t offer is the strong religious themes and characters, and while Christianity appears to be at the forefront of Sawaki’s games, Lovecraft also plays a pretty prominent role here, although it’s really only in name.

The game consists of two real portions – Hayato works as an occult journalist and must complete investigations per his boss. These stories are often intertwined with moving the story along with Lua, an angel sent down from Heaven to help Hayato battle the demons, and eventually save all of humankind. As stated previously, the game is presented in a manner similar to a graphic novel. For people that have never played one of those, you’ll be treated to scenes of dialogue and you can make choices that may or may not hold consequence – in this the choice picked determines the type of karma you receive. You’ll follow leads, talk to people in different areas after selecting them from a menu, and learn more about the world around you in this portion of the game.

The second portion of the game is the dungeon crawling, which is arguably very basic. The mazes you traverse are hardly detailed and very generic, making it easy to get lost if the game didn’t provide a map for you. It’s possible that the environments don’t have much detail because it was expected you’d just follow the map, which is fine, but it doesn’t make the exploration very memorable. Each time I had to traverse another level before fighting the boss I noticed myself audibly sighing. The battles are all fairly simple, often times only requiring you perform normal attacks, although it’s in your best interest to use your Astral Burst to capture enemies before the gauge overfills and starts over from the beginning, making it impossible to use for a turn. At the end of a battle you’ll earn karma as well as experience for Hayato and Lua, who level up as you’d expect, allowing you to apply their newly acquired stat points. The karma is used to level up and purify the different beasts you capture, which you can eventually “evolve” if you max out their level and take them to a character that is only seen through a television.

The game starts off strong; reminding me of Persona with its mystery of suicides on the train tracks, but quickly dips off once it gets into the story proper. There are plenty of tropes here, and while many of the characters originate from different backgrounds compared to similar games, the overall depiction of everyone is still overly familiar. The fact that Hayato is referred to as the Chosen One in almost every scene between angels, fallen angels, and demons doesn’t make things much better. Knowing this was coming from Sawaki, I was expecting something a bit more special. It’s not that the game is bad, but it doesn’t do anything out of the ordinary.

If you’ve always wanted to jump into a first person dungeon crawling RPG but haven’t because of the difficulty, The Lost Child is a very welcoming game within the genre. The typically steep learning curve is not found here, although the boss battles can certainly give you a run for your money if you aren’t properly prepared. It also touches on some themes that games tend to shy away from, which is nice, but it’s hardly enough for people that are intimately familiar with the likes of Persona Q or Shin Megami Tensei IV.

6 out of 10

Pros

• Gotta Catch ’em All
• Some Fun Enemy Designs
• Religious Themes
• Easily Accessible

Cons

• Dull Environments
• Familiar Story/Character Tropes
• Mostly Mindless Battles

The Lost Child was developed by Kadokawa and published by NIS America. It launched on PS4, NS, and Vita on June 19th, 2018 for $49.99. The game was provided to us for review on PS4. If you’d like to see more of The Lost Child, check out the official site.

 

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