13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim
13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim is a combination visual novel/giant robot tactics game for Nintendo Switch that I bought for sixty dollars based off of the quality of its art style and an offhand tweet by Mandaloregaming. It ended up being one of my favorite titles this year.
I’m usually pretty cold when it comes to puzzle box plots - in the 2000s people obsessed over Lost’s mysteries, only for the answer to end up being ‘the writers were just making it up as they went because J. J. Abrams doesn’t plan ahead ever’, but 13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim, by virtue of being a single product, is able to have a sprawling, nonlinear, conspiracy-laden narrative about teenagers piloting giant robots that ends up being internally consistent. Which characters know (or think they know) what and when they know it, and who is deceiving who and why, is important here, and the fun of the story sections is trying to put the pieces together yourself while also keeping it all straight in your head (though this is assisted by a handy, ever-expanding glossary of the game’s proper nouns in case you forget what the ‘Deimos Code’ is or whatever). This is backed up by some stunningly strong visuals and full english voice acting that, all in all, makes for a high-production-value package.
Also, it’s a mech tactics game, and a damn fun one at that. Combat takes place in real time, with the game pausing whenever a character needs a new order to execute. Much like Into the Breach, enemies telegraph their attacks, opening up options like knocking an enemy away who was about to hit a slower ally and redirecting that enemy into attacking another foe. Sadly, the visuals become iconographic for these sections, but the audio design more than makes up for it - 13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim’s tactical soundscape is crisp and bass-heavy, giving satisfying thumps to punches and explosions. Plus the music is pretty good, too. There’s even a climactic fight involving a diegetic vocal track. I love that shit.
The Bottom Line
Unlike Neon Genesis Evangelion, this story about teenagers piloting giant robots actually has answers for the weird shit happening.