Demonschool was provided by Ysbryd Games for review. Thankyou!
Demonschool is a game that completely slipped under my radar. I played the demo during Steam Next Fest a while back and enjoyed myself, but with so many games out, I lost track of it. This incredibly stylish tactical RPG was originally going to launch on September 3, which would have been incredibly unfortunate given that Hollow Knight Silksong came out September 4! Fortunately, the game has been pushed back to November 19, giving myself even more time to play and enjoy it. In general, Demonschool oozes character and has fantastic gameplay to complement it. To add that icing on the cake, it is also nearly perfect on the Steam Deck.
Developed by Necrosoft Games, Demonschool takes on a tasty blend of visual novel and turn-based RPG gameplay, and the premise is fascinating. The game takes place on a university campus teeming with strange things, occult horrors, and a group of bizarre gangsters determined to ruin everyone’s day. Make note of the occult horror part, because an apocalypse is coming, and it is your job to stop it!
Players take on the central role of Faye, a demon-obsessed new student who instantly makes her presence felt on everyone around her. I must commend the developers at Necrosoft Games for the way they have developed the cast. Faye might be one of my favorite characters I’ve played as this year. She is hilarious, without the horrible Marvelization that has plagued the media, always willing to get into a fight, and proactive throughout the story. All this combines nicely, and it has been a refreshing experience.
From the beginning, when on the ship to the university, Faye had me cackling at her attempts to socialize with people who thought she was an oddball, and starting a fight within seconds of arriving. That sounds like a usual first day on campus. She gathers a group of fellow misfits who might find her weird, but her sheer enthusiasm and the growing threat bring them together. The other characters are great too. Destin is as obsessed with fighting as Faye, while Namako and Krute are quieter individuals. As the story progresses, you get to know them all, and the writing is solid all around.
Between missions, you get to explore the hub map that has plenty of locations to rummage around, and while I wish the world had more things to do, it is a great way to showcase Demonschool’s visual design. Everything feels like a stylized Saturday morning cartoon, with the vibrant parts of the campus and people going about their daily lives. The map layout and day/night cycle remind me of the Persona series, although Demonschool handles time management much better.
While the world is static, there are still some fun secrets to find. The entire island has a deeply sinister vibe going on with students going missing, local gangs and police working together, and the constant threat of prison hanging over people’s heads. It is a fantastic atmosphere, made even better by the great music. I did find the exploration lacking in some areas, as the spaces are pretty small, but it doesn’t detract from my overall experience. There are even some nice minigames to get involved with.
The big draw to Demonschool is the combat. The core of the combat system is simple. Do not let your team die, and do not let demons break the barrier guarding the passage into the real world. You’ll usually have to kill a certain number of enemies to seal the boundary that the demons are using to invade. You get a team of four pretty quickly in the game, and their abilities complement each other well. Faye and Dustin are the heavy hitters of the gang, while Namako and Krute offer support with debuffing enemies, healing your team, and powering their attacks. Even though the latter two can’t damage enemies directly, you can combine attacks with other teammates for additional damage.
The turn-based combat reminds me of Tactical Breach Wizards with the free turn rewinds, and you can research a bunch of additional tools that add buffs for the characters. The combat is simple, but the extra toolbox provides enough depth to keep things interesting. The enemies have some nice variety, and the boss battles are also creative.
Although the combat is enjoyable, I did encounter some bugs. This was something I was aware of from my prerelease guide, but it was still a little annoying nonetheless. A couple of times, the game forced me to reload a save without any indication of why. Once the game froze after I finished a battle, I had to perform a hard reboot on my Steam Deck. During long conversations and combat sequences you cannot save, so it got frustrating when I had to reload a save and go through the whole dialogue chain again. The developers are working on a patch for this issue before launch, so hopefully, you will not encounter this problem.
There's a lot to like about Demonschool. The production quality and atmosphere are exceptional, and the turn-based combat offers enough to set the game apart from its competitors. Combine that with excellent writing and fun characters, and we have an awesome little game on our hands!
Demonschool has already been rated Steam Deck Verified by Valve before its launch, and I would consider the badge worthwhile here. While Valve’s track record with verification can be patchy, Steam Deck fans will be happy to know that Demonschool is pretty much perfect on the device.
There aren’t many options for us to tweak apart from some shaders and the screen resolution, but with fully controller support available out of the box and Demonschool’s lightweight footprint, I had no problem playing the game on the Steam Deck. The game looks great with its vibrant backgrounds, and the controls feel snappy and responsive. Some of the text size may be a little small in some instances, but none of this felt like an issue for me. Besides the pre-launch bugs I encountered, the experience on the Steam Deck has been positive.
The game is very light on the Steam Deck as well, and even with a full TDP and 60 FPS, you aren’t going to wreck the battery with this game. I saw a power draw of just 11 watts in the worst-case scenario, translating to nearly 5 hours of battery life on the Steam Deck OLED. The game also scales very well on low TDP, and I found that you can almost double the battery life by locking the game to 30 FPS and setting the TDP to 4 watts. For the smoothest experience, however, I recommend just keeping things on stock settings.
Demonschool is currently available in English, Japanese, Simplified Chinese, French, and Spanish (Latin America).
The game offers numerous accessibility options. Players can toggle screenshake, change text speed and autoplay, adjust keyboard and gamepad axis, toggle the camera between dynamic and stationary, toggle portrait shake during combat, and there is an almost invincible gameplay toggle if you're having trouble in combat sections. Overall, this is a fairly comprehensive suite of tools, although I was unable to find a way to change the keybindings.
Demonschool has been a delight to play, and while it launched later than I would have liked, the game has been worth the wait. I wish there were more exploration in the world outside of missions, and the pre-launch bugs I encountered with the review build were a bit frustrating at times. However, the vibrant visual design, combined with solid gameplay, makes Demonschool a stylish turn-based RPG that ticks nearly all my boxes.
このレビューはPC版に基づいています。
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Demonschool blends style, a great gameplay loop, and awesome characters into a smooth package that plays great on the Steam Deck.
