Rune Factory: Guardians of Azuma - Nintendo Switch 2

This is my first ever Rune Factory game - I've heard amazing things about the series but have never really gotten around to purchasing any of the entries. The Far Eastern aesthetic grabbed my attention quickly for this particular entry, and since starting it I've struggled to put the game down! The balance between the sim aspects and the action rpg elements is spot on, and it's easy to get sucked into both aspects of the game. After such a phenomenal experience, I'm definitely going to have to spring for future entries into the series, and maybe even go back to play previous ones!

I love this ruin factory spin off! The story is interesting and fighting style is so dope.

This has been an amazing game in the two or so weeks so far with my Nintendo Switch 2. I am a long time fan of the Runefactory series, having started with Runefactory: A Fantasy Harvest Moon on the DS, and this game may just be the best of them all! New city-building mechanics are super fun and all the characters and voice acting just make the game amazing in my opinion. 5/5!

Marvelous improved a lot from 5 on this one. If you don't already know Rune Factory games are basically fantasy farming games with RPG elements. The leveling system has changed from every skill having its own level to a skill tree you spend xp on. Village management is a lot more polished though farming is in my opinion simplified, this isn't a bad thing and some things are definitely improved about ( one seed does a square instead of needing 4 seeds per square when the seeds can only stack up to 9 per stack). Items that are stackable can stack much higher (old limit was 9 for most things). Hard to tell until 6 comes out how many of these changes are due to Guardians of Azuma being a side game or not. The game has an autosave feature now but still uses save points to manually save which might be a stylistic choice at this point because its an odd choice, I also wish when developing villages I didn't have to physically move my character between different development zones in a village. Mouse mode is supported when developing but I personally don't use it much for the above reason. Another thing to note is this is technically a switch 1 game with an optional download (included) to upgrade it to a switch 2 version so it can theoretically work on a switch 1 even though its a red switch 2 cart. Overall highly recommend if you like farming and rpg games.

Guardians takes the normal Rune Factory formula and builds on it with a multitude of new subsystems. Rather than managing a single farm you now manage multiple villages. Farming elements remain but are only one small portion rather than a major timesink from your in game days. Construction being able to be done in an over the shoulder camera or top down feels smooth with the ability to work on d pad style grid navigation or use the new switch 2 mouse controls. The story and characters are solid with plenty of voice acting. Combat also feels smooth and the skill tree xp system feels like a great natural power progression without the need to grind to use it.