Chroma Squad

Is it the next Final Fantasy Tactics? No. Is it a fun, light tactical RPG with a great, peppy chiptune soundtrack and enough clever writing and genre nods to keep me interested until the end? Yes.

The game takes a tried & true basic tactical squad simulator and then enhances it by adding a dimension of "show" - you do flashy moves that bring more audience; worry about advertising and salaries; craft your team's suits and props from cardboard and duct tape :). They managed to do it well - the two worlds (tactical RPG and "tv series tycoon") blend nicely and the mechanics work as expected. There is some light humor about your squad talking in and out of character and some team dynamics - nothing that would leave you rolling on the floor, but it fits with the general theme. I had really good fun with it - the game is colorful, the music alternates between classic sentai soundtrack and peppy chiptunes, the episodes are about as varied as the classic TV shows they try to emulate - defend a science lab, rescue a hostage, smash some goons and defeat a boss. Oh, and sometimes the enemy GROOOOWS and you get to jump in a giant mecha! Worth the money definitely, for the entertainment I had :)

I went through the whole game and I enjoyed it all the way, often playing longer than I had initially planned. It's a tactical RPG where you play a team of stuntmen friends who leave the sentai TV show they were working for to make their own sentai TV show with their own studio and the borrow a warehouse from a family member and find a big prop of a giant brain in jar that they decide to use in their show. the story is enjoyable and lighthearted. It has all the elements you expect from a sentai show: team of hero, different kinds of monsters, weird bosses, defeated bosses having a second life as a giant version of themselves that the hero fight in a giant mecha, etc. The team has to make money filming the show so you have unlockable options to improve the studio which gives various bonus, a marketing panel to help with audience, fans and conversion into money, a shop to buy armors and weapons, crafting to make your own or recycle those you do not need. Each character is played by an actor (chosen at the beginning), has a role and gains a new skill each season. I played in challenging difficulty but it was not that challenging and I only failed a couple episode when close to the end of the game, because I didn't take enough time to plan my tactics and kinda rushed. There's a choice of items to buy and craft, marketing campaign to run, mecha upgrade but I only used a few as you do not have enough resources (money, crafting material) to make one of each. I did not really understood the fast forward option of custscenes as even the slightest press of the key seemed to skip the next dialogue even if released ahead of time, I also encounter a slight visual glitch during the elevator level when the pointer got to the bottom of the screen the screen got all shaky. when my scout reached 100% dodge it was decreased to 95% on the next episode and stayed capped there but nothing serious. chroma squad is a game that does not take itself seriously and I recommend it.

Really charming. Really simple... But good fun, and a great pickup on sale, especially if you watched a lot of Power Rangers growing up. Nowhere near as in-depth of a tactical game as XCOM or Obsidian Brigade, but it's about on par with Mutant Year Zero, but I enjoyed Chroma Squad far more. Whereas MYZ had more effort put into graphics, Chroma Squad had more effort put into charm and deeper customization options (your fighters, your megazord and your film studio can all be customized as you see fit). Not super deep, but I think the devs nailed what they were aiming for. Looking forward to a sequel for sure.