Talkin bout MONARK.

MONARK... I like it!

MONARK, I first heard about this game back when it was announced in 2021. I heard it was a new RPG experience by ex-ATLUS employees, and whaddya know? I like ATLUS, and this was being sold to me as an ATLUS-esque experience that would evoke the feelings of old SMT.

Fast-forward to something like... early 2022? or late 2021. I get the game... for PS4, now let me tell you something about the PS4 release real quick. It runs ehhhhhhh... And the more you play the worse it runs? Now, performance is not the biggest deal breaker and I'm happy to say, overlooking the performance, I enjoyed the game, loved it in some regards too. 

So welcome! On this long post, MONARK! And why I actually like it.

So let's start at the beginning, the idea of the game is... uh, dare I say it. Persona-esque. Not like modern Persona though, I would liken it to Persona 1 and SMT if, believe it or not. I thought huh, this was kinda cool, especially the little quiz at the start of the game that determines your EGO thingies.

And about that... In MONARK (I will always spell it in CAPS.) you have 7 EGOs which all correspond to a deadly sin each. You start with a certain amount of EGO depending on what you answered in the personality quiz at the beginning of the game. The EGO that you have the highest points in at the beginning determines which Fiend you get--Fiends are basically like a party member--and the first one I got is Wrath. (Going thru a second playthrough with the fiend of Lust as my first rn.)

The battle system is sort of like a strategic roleplaying game, SRPG, because positioning REALLY matters. I'd say actually it's close to Trails of Cold Steel (Not a SRPG... I think.) with it's movement mechanics in battle.

The game is eh, it's not that difficult I think, I mean I had my fair share of problems but I realized that this game is a... GRIND game and I quickly overcame any issue just by grinding a bit. I find that you don't exactly get the levels you need, I would assume at least speaking from my own experiences, from normal progression through the battles you do. That is because you do like 4 battles in a normal dungeon clear. Which segues us over to...

Dungeons. So the dungeons are simple, you start at the 3rd year building and well I won't spoil what happens in the others, but you go through a library, the 1st year building, the 2nd year building, the club building, the archives, and the old school house. You have 3 objectives in each dungeon, which is full of puzzles, and is covered in MAD inducing mist/fog. (Speaking of MAD I'll get to it later.) Your 3 objectives are to break what's known as Ideals, I wont spoil any further but all you need to know is that they progress the dungeon. After breaking 2 Ideals, you get to the boss fight which also includes the 3rd Ideal. There's an optional fight that you do to stop Death Calls, which are forced high-level battles, but I found that it doesn't matter too much since I haven't come across one yet on my second playthrough where I tried to skip these optional battles. (Don't @ me on this, your experience may be different.) All in all, the dungeons are fine, I thought they were inoffensive and did their job.

Back to MAD, MAD is a gauge that slowly fills up either in the mist/fog that appears in dungeons or in battle when using Authorities. (Magic skills basically.) 100% MAD in the dungeon crawling sections, instantly sends you back to the infirmary. (Which I'll get to when I cover the locations in depth.) 100% MAD in battle makes your character/s go into Madness, which renders them uncontrollable and extremely prone to doing very high damage friendly fire. In Madness the MAD gauge slowly decreases from 100%, if it reaches 0%, your character dies.

Now here's where it's interesting. Madness has a counterpart called Awakened. The AWAKE gauge only appears in battle and is increased by taking damage or using the skill Resolve, which raises it by 25%. 100% AWAKE makes you Awakened, it raises your in-battle stats such as damage and defense. And also, if unlocked, allows you to use Awakened Arts, which is basically a super move that does different things depending on the character.

Important to note that enemies and fiends can be Awakened or in Madness, but do not have Awakened Arts. 

Even more interestingly is that if you go MAD and AWAKE at the same time you become Enlightened. (Also can happen to enemies and fiends.) And allows you to do Enlightened Arts. Which are just better/more beneficial super moves.

Only characters have Awakened Arts and Enlightened Arts, not fiends nor normal enemies. By characters I mean the party members that aren't fiends, or the bosses.

Characters. Now I actually like the characters of the game. I think they're interesting--Mind you this is coming from an SMT IV Apocalypse lover--and I enjoyed their company. I won't spoil anyone but I was thoroughly delighted by the party members and absolutely entertained and/or enthralled by the antagonists. Most of the bosses and party members, including you even, are known as Pactbearers, humans who made a pact with a powerful demon known as a Monark, which gives them access to Authorities and other powers. Authorities change depending on the person and there are 7 Monarks that correspond to the deadly sins. Each Pactbearer has 3 Ideals that give them and their Monark power, destroying all 3 erases a pact and puts the Pactbearer in a coma of sorts, usually with a piece of their memory or self (In terms of mind.) missing.

In terms of locations the library, the 1st year building, the 2nd year building, the club building, the archives, and the old school house, are all of them. The infirmary of course where you heal and obtain Mental Stabilizers, which lower the MAD gauge. The TSC (True Student Council, I'll explain it yknow how it its here.) room which is basically your base of operations. And lastly, the fog cleared zones where you can talk to students and staff.

The students and staff are interesting, they all have backstories, and a lot of them are connected to EGO/Stat raising diamond things,(I don't remember what they're called.) that unlock hidden information about that person as well. Talking to students and staff unlock profiles about them.

Relating to this all is the skills and skill tree system that the game uses to determine your skills and level. You level up with SPIRIT currency earned through battles or dismantling items and gear. Gear is used for Fiends (You can even customize Fiends.) and Items are self-explanatory. SPIRIT is also used in Vanitas' item shop. (Vanitas is technically the Monark of the main character, I won't go further with that.) Skills are not one and done, by that I mean you can unlock a skill and it will still have more to offer by levelling it up. If you have enough grit and patience you can reach level 99 before even defeating the first boss.

I recently got a PS5 and a free upgrade with it, and I've been playing a second playthrough. I'm enjoying it way more now that I can experience it at intended performance lol.

Finally I want to talk presentation!!! Which includes music, art direction, and voice acting.

Music is good, I like it, I have the songs on the deluxe edition OST in my playlist even, and I find myself humming the BGM from time to time. The BGM evokes a sense of being trapped, bored, and fighting for your life. The OST songs that were sung by vocaloids (IIRC)is so catchy for me and I can't help but do a little dance every time listening to it.

Art direction is great, I loved the character design, the main character is my favorite in this regard. The art style is nice, I quite liked it's look. It reminds me of something you'd find in a mystery Visual Novel. The UI though... leaves quite a bit to be desired. I thought it was functional and passable, but nevertheless boring. (Least insane P5/R fan take.)

Voice acting was actually pretty good, I played the entire game in English and then switched to Japanese for a bit. I'd say that the actors played their characters well and with good tone and emotion. I liked Shinya's voice actor. WHICH MAKES IT A SHAME THAT HE "ALLEGEDLY" (And I'm not going to say whether he did it or not but I will assume that he did for the sake of not supporting a maybe sexual offender.) DID SOME FUCKED UP SHIT LIKE MAN COME ON! But I digress, whatever he did, I still enjoy his performance as Shinya and I will still quote Shinya.

To bring this to a close I will say that I enjoyed MONARK, I'm looking forward to more by the team behind it, and I hate these damn Pactbearers. 

Did it live up to the ATLUS-esque, Old-SMT advertising, yeah a bit, but I think that MONARK can stand on it's own two feet. Thanks for reading!

-Z