Most folks in my generation fell into one of two camps: The Digimon camp or the Pokémon camp. I personally was square in the middle, loving both Digimon and Pokémon. As such, I have kept up with both over the years, and the announcement for Digimon Story: Time Stranger excited me greatly. Now, having played it for a while, it is easily the best RPG from the franchise to date.

In Digimon Story: Time Stranger, you play as a member of a mysterious organization called ADAMAS. The organization tries to resolve paranormal anomalies caused by Digimon, and while following one anomaly, you witness a world-ending event and wind up 8 years in the past. This leads to a journey that crosses both the human world and the digital world, in what is described by the developers as “A story of connection.”

Time Stranger plays similarly to a Shin Megami Tensei game. You explore the environment, solve quests, and collect/strengthen a team of Digimon. The way Digimon hunting works is brilliant, since you are able to collect/scan Digimon just from fighting them in combat. The more you fight a certain Digimon, the higher your scan rate goes. Once it is at 100% you can use that Digimon in battle. However, if you raise it to 200% before you scan it, you’ll be able to enhance its stats.

As you progress, you can also increase your Agent Rank by doing side quests, regular quests, or other things around the game world. Your Agent rank allows you to buff Digimon stats and fill out a skill tree with all sorts of helpful nodes. The side-quests are fun and interesting, so this isn’t too much of a pain. There are some fetch-quest type things, but most of them have at least somewhat interesting elements.

Digivolutions are interesting too, as they are tied to either the Digimon’s stats, temperament, or by fusing them with other Digimon. The Digimon’s temperament is interesting too, as it can be changed by talking to them and answering various questions, as though you are raising them. You can see silhouettes of each Digimon’s possible evolutions in the menu, allowing you to try and aim for specific ones if you want.

Digimon have different types, as well as elemental abilities. They come with specific “special skills” that can be learned as they level, but you can also equip them with other abilities to build them out however you want. The progression systems are interesting and deep, but also allow you to take your time without pushing yourself too hard.

Overall, Digimon Story: Time Stranger is a lot of fun. The soundtrack is great, the voice acting is fantastic, and the world design is great. However, I do have one small complaint. There are a few sections in the game with level designs that have a lot of bright, shifting colors. If you have issues with light sensitivity, migraines, or (potentially) seizures, you might want to be careful with Digimon Story: Time Stranger.

I can’t say for sure how much of a problem it’ll be for you since I don’t experience seizures, but I can say that as someone with light sensitivity, certain areas gave me a small headache. Luckily, the areas are relatively small, so it isn’t something that plagues the game for long periods.

Aside from that, Digimon Story: Time Stranger is one of the best RPGs I’ve played all year. Nothing beats Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, but holding anything by that standard is just unfair. If you’re a Digimon fan, a fan of Shin Megami Tensei-esque RPGs, or just an RPG fan in general, you’d miss out if you sleep on this one.

A PC Review Copy of Digimon Story: Time Stranger was provided by Bandai Namco for the purposes of this review.

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Digimon Story: Time Stranger

$69.99 USD

9

Score

9.0/10

Pros

• Great Progression Systems
• Fun Story
• Great Soundtrack
• Engaging RPG combat

Cons

• Possible Risk of Seizure in certain areas
• Certain areas gave me headaches