The DioField Chronicle Review:

Review based on patch 1.02.

Gameplay:

The gameplay is real-time strategy with pause (RTwP), although you only really 'pause' when selecting unit paths or rolling back an action. The deployable unit size is abnormally small at just four main units, each with its own backup member that can be swapped out a set number of times per battle. This limits what you can do strategically, and besides deciding what order to target enemies in and sometimes what direction to approach them from, there isn't any real tactical depth. There are no terrain hindrances or elevation to consider, no shortcuts to open up. Every mission has optional goals that are almost always to keep every unit alive and to finish in 6 or 8 minutes. The actual main mission goals are equally static, being to kill all enemies or on rare occasions to guard a barricade or protect a wagon.

On the battlefield units auto-attack and will do additional 'ambush' damage when positioned behind an enemy, but this can be hard to control as the game may think that you are at the 'side' of an enemy rather than the 'rear'. Your units move around and clump together as well, making it hard to select the one you want. Their auto-attacks are supplemented by powerful weapon skills that can heal units, inflict status ailments on enemies, hit multiple targets, and disrupt heavy attacks. Each skill uses a set amount of EP (mana) and if you run out of it that's it. You can drink a potion to recover EP but you are limited to carrying only 3. EP management is further complicated by the fact that new enemies regularly spawn on maps, so you never know exactly how many enemies you will face. You also have no way of knowing what those enemies will be: human, animal, mini-boss. This makes it easy to burn through all your EP and potentially end up in an unwinnable situation.

From what I have heard this game was extremely easy until an update over-corrected by nerfing a lot of the stats and so much of this game relies on raw stats over strategy. I started out by playing on normal and found it decently challenging until around chapter 3 and the "Reclaim Teggaria" mission which had a massive spike in difficulty that forced me to turn the difficulty down from normal to casual. Even then I still got slaughtered despite being over-leveled with the best gear available. From then onwards certain missions would be relatively easy while others in the same chapter would wreck me despite being above the minimum recommended level. At some point I just gave up on trying to keep all of my units relevant and benched everyone except for my main four, which I stuck with until the very end. This greatly over-leveled them to where the game felt balanced by chapters 6 and 7.

Whenever a mission is replayed you have to watch the cutscenes and dialogue again.

Story:

The story is centered around the Blue Fox mercenary group and their involvement with various employers on the island of DioField, which is ruled over by the Kingdom of Alletain. The Kingdom is currently at war with the invading Trovelt-Schoevian Empire and maintains an uneasy peace with the Rowetale Alliance. The Blue Fox base acts as the player's hub area in-between missions where Andrias (the protagonist) can shop, upgrade, and replay old missions for experience and cash. It is also where Andrias can talk to members of the team who are all varied in personalty but don't have much going on beyond that. They do not interact with each other outside of missions and they do not have any Fire Emblem type supports. Naturally, this made it hard to get attached to any of them, and their deaths were likewise inconsequential on a personal-level but important in terms of how they impacted the power balance of the nations and their conflicts.

Whenever internal conflicts between party members with opposing views did arise, those themes were never explored or resolved in any meaningful way. Major story events were equally vague or hand-waved away as all the important events are told through a narrated summary rather than being shown. For example: alliance talks break down, invaders seize land, pro-democracy advocates upset the ruling class, and the church is caught harming orphans. All this happens off-screen with few details given. It is a type of storytelling that left me feeling detached from the conflict, possibly by design. You see, the story isn't quite as shallow as it initially appears; there is actually a lot of interesting stuff going on behind the scenes, but you never get to see the setup to most of it. To really understand what is going on you need to beat the game and then read the library codex entries. Considering less than half of the people who purchase a game are likely to beat it (according to trophy / achievement statistics), how many of those gamers will then choose to read optional text after the credits have rolled? It is a really odd design choice, and I wish these story elements had been incorporated into the actual gameplay instead of being relegated to text.

For those curious, here are the details you only get by reading the character profiles after beating the game (highlight to reveal):

• Andrias, Umarida, and Duke Hende are Empire spies.
• Andrias was likley neutral on the war because he wants people who are altruistic and capable in power - no matter the nation. Neither 'rightful heir' to the Alletain Kingdom was ideal, so Andrias had Fredret, who seemed virtuous, pose as the deceased fourth-child Levantia Shaytham. And regardless of the outcome, Andrias was likley going to slay the Empire's ruthless general Zevatian no matter what.
• How Fredret faked the divine mark is never explained, but Princess Hezeliah knew he was a fraud from the start. She went along with the scheme anyway in order to be freed from her captivity.
• When the power went to Fredret's head, Andrias had to put him down in order to hand the Kingdom over to the Empire or allow the remaining heir Hezeliah to take over; likley as someone's puppet given how easily she is pushed around and manipulated.
• After leaving the Blue Foxes, Iscarion is killed by a thief or possibly an assassin sent by Andrias. Yulzim's killer in chapter 2 is also never identified, but could possibly have been Umarida acting on Duke Hende or Andrias' orders as they were all working together by that point in time and had the most to gain from his death.

Conclusion:

While the balancing is an ongoing issue for DioField Chronicle, the foundation for a better sequel is here. The gameplay is easy to grasp, there is great artistic direction and some interesting ideas. It just needs fine adjustments. I really like where they went with the ending and would be curious to see where a sequel goes with it.

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