When you’ve played as many RPGs as I have, you get pretty good at picking out games that stand out for one reason or another. It also gets easy to pick out the influences of some of the classic franchises as you dive into something new. This is especially true when playing Indie games since many Indie developers are either inspired by classics or have dev teams who may have worked on said classics. Mato Anomalies is an RPG that fits perfectly in the sweet spot of being familiar and enjoyable for RPG veterans and being friendly to newcomers.

Mato Anomalies is an RPG set in the city of Mato, a neo-futuristic fantasy city with an oriental flair and vibe to it. You’ll find elements of Asia-centric spiritualism, cyberpunk or neo-futuristic elements, and classic noir elements all rolled together to form the setting and characters. Gameplay takes place in two distinctive phases, an investigative phase that has visual novel elements (akin to a narrative RPG) and a dungeon-crawling phase similar to games like Persona and Soul Hackers.

In the investigative phase, you play as Doe, a private detective searching for the truth behind a mysterious (and dangerous) phenomenon known as the Bane Tide. This supernatural occurrence amplifies and feeds on the darkest emotions of humanity, creating “Lairs” (dungeons). This is where your second protagonist comes in. Gram is an exorcist by trade, who hunts the Bane Tide and is searching for the mastermind behind it.

As Doe and Gram work together, they’ll discover other people searching for the truth behind the Bane Tide, building up Gram’s dungeoneering party. Doe cannot fight within Lairs, so he provides intel as the others explore and fight the monsters within the Lairs. At the same time, Doe is searching for answers about a mysterious substance being distributed throughout Mato. All of these plot threads are woven together, with formidable foes seeking to stop their investigation.

Doe’s investigation sometimes leads him to perform Mindhacks on other characters. Mindhacks put you in a deck builder-style card segment where you must duke it out with the mind of the person you are hacking. Not only will the person’s mind show resistance, but they also have beings known as “inner demons” which can trip you up and change how the match progresses.

As far as combat goes, you’ll see a lot of inspiration from Shin Megami Tensei, Persona, and other similar RPGs. Each character can equip one weapon, which has a weapon skill, and usually falls in line with their build. Gram can use swords or spears, and the skills for each weapon type deal a different type of damage. It’ll be important to have a wide range of damage types as you play Mato Anomalies, and as your characters level, they’ll get skills and Talent points.

Talent points can be invested in three different skill trees for each character. There’s plenty of room for an array of character builds, and each character has multiple options for build setups. There is also the Gear system, which is both a method of strengthening your team and a puzzle of its own. By slotting Gear of the same type, you’ll get more powerful stat increases. However, each type of gear has its own connection points, so making sure they’re connected properly is important if you want those high-level stat buffs.

Mato Anomalies has multiple difficulty modes, which is important since there are a few things that make it tougher than other RPGs like it. For example, the party (or Team as the game calls it) shares a single HP bar. Each character’s max HP is added to the pool, and as the party levels the team’s max health increases. There are also points on each character’s skill tree to increase health and other stats.

However, I didn’t have too many issues keeping my party alive. The game is fairly forgiving with providing healing items, and one of your party members has access to a healing ability. Be careful though, your characters’ skills have cooldowns. That means that if your healing ability has been used recently, switch to using items so you can heal if you need to.

On top of side quests and main quests, you can engage in “Character Stories” which teach you more about your allies. Additionally, there are randomly generated dungeons known as “Random Lairs” that you can explore to level up and get more powerful weapons and gear. Overall, Mato Anomalies has a decent amount of content, probably enough for 30-50 hours for completionists.

If you like RPGs that do things a little differently, Mato Anomalies will scratch that itch. The visuals are interesting and have a unique vibe to them that really feels immersive. Combat and Investigative gameplay are equally engaging, but the Mindhack sequences can be a bit tough and unfair, even on easier difficulties. Story sequences are also done in a comic book style, which is an interesting stylistic choice.

The story takes some time to get going and the characters aren’t that memorable, so I’m sure not everyone will enjoy Mato Anomalies. I would say that if you like RPGs in the Soul Hackers, Shin Megami Tensei, or Shadow Hearts style of darker themes, Mato Anomalies will scratch that itch well. Just be aware that it has some roughness around its edges. If you’re new to RPGs and want something more story-focused and lighter on mechanics, Mato Anomalies has you covered there too.

A Nintendo Switch review copy of Mato Anomalies was provided by Prime Matter for this review.

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Mato Anomalies

$39.99 USD

8

Score

8.0/10

Pros

• Great for RPG Beginners
• Intriguing Mystery Plot
• Unique Visual Style
• Engaging Combat and Gameplay

Cons

• Story is a Little Slow
• Mindhack Difficulty is Inconsistent and Unfair