At the start of every The Legend of Heroes’ game I feel obligated to point out just how niche the series is and how it’s slowly being discovered by a whole new audience thanks to Aksys Games and NIS America’s efforts in localization, releasing new entries in the West with great consistency. But what would you say if I told you there’s yet another game that’s even less known than those?
That’s Tokyo Xanadu eX+ for you, originally released in 2017. Set in real world Japan, you take the role of a normal school student who stumbles upon an entryway to the netherworld, usually invisible to common people. Things only get weirder from there, as powerful beings both friendly and not suddenly start taking an interest in the poor kid. This is the company’s attempt at breaking out of turn-based RPGs, and in that, they certainly hit the mark.
The game is centered around much more action than you’re probably used to if you’ve only played the Trails games, and in that, is a breath of fresh air when it comes to NIS America and Aksys’ usual releases, not that it needed one, mind. Still, it’s an entirely different beast than even though it carries some of the same themes and overall anime-tropey themes as those releases, it feels like something else.
As you’d expect, Tokyo Xanadu eX+ is a game with a lot of bulk, requiring well over 40 hours of your time before you even catch a whiff of its end content. Dungeons are long, full of nooks and crannies, as well as plenty of fights, that albeit quick to get through are enough to keep you down there for a long while before getting back to the surface and to your ever-growing group of friends.
I would be lying to you if I said I’ve seen everything there is to be seen in this game. In a similar fashion to the Trails series, there’s a whole bunch to Xanadu that demands a lot of sidetracking on your part, especially if you’re the sort of player who strives to get all achievements/trophies and 100% your games. And what’s worse, plenty of it can easily be missed if you are not careful, like tracking specific enemies, for instance.
While Tokyo Xanadu eX+ in all extents and purposes is a 9-year old game, it still looks relatively sharp in 2024, even more so if you are playing it on a portable system like the Switch OLED. Characters are simply modeled as is the world around them, but its look and feel is in the same level as Trails through Daybreak, the last big release by Nihon Falcom from earlier this year. Performance-wise, it’s silky smooth wherever you plan to play it, even more so on Nintendo’s soon to be replaced hybrid console. If there ever was an epic swan song to be had, it’s surely the Switch’s!
Be as it may, it’s fantastic to see this game out on more systems so new players can see that there’s more than “simply” The Legend of Heroes to be had when it comes to Nihon Falcom. It’s an RPG that doesn’t go out of its way to deliver anything particularly new to the genre, but it’s competent enough, heck, a whole lot of fun when it comes to having you go through the ins and outs of dungeon crawling. For that alone, Tokyo Xanadu eX+ is more than worth picking up.
