Fate EXTELLA/Link Review

It is only March. We are in the third month of 2019, the year in which Sony seems hellbent on nailing down the lid of the Vita’s coffin while the console is still kicking and screaming from within, and in my opinion there have been as many killer releases as there are months.

The first was Necrosphere a super hard 2D Metroidvania, that made me emit noises the neighbours must have found questionable. The second was my intense love affair with Catherine: Full Body  for its incredible puzzles and nuanced new story line. Now for the third time this year the Vita gods have blessed us with Fate EXTELLA/Link.

The Fate series is a fairly long running and well established series, so its not really a surprise that this one is pretty good too. If you like Musou games Fate EXTELLA/ Link has an absolutely huge range of varied characters to play as, coupled with multiple layers of strategy both on and off the field. Off the field you choose skills, bonds and link similar kinds of passive abilities for huge boosts. On the field, there are 6 different kinds of special attack which you can utilize strategically with your regular attacks. Sections which can be dull in Musou games, such as running between sectors has been completely removed and replaced with a kind of quick travel. As for content there are 27 missions in the main campaign and plenty extra aside.

For those who have never tried Musou before Fate EXTELLA/Link might be the perfect introduction. There are varying levels of difficulty and the Easy option paired with bashing straight through the main missions could see you complete it in hours all the while feeling like a god as your attacks rain down. The fun in Musou is in feeling all powerful while trying out the varying characters. The ability to level up characters easily to the same level as your strongest character was a godsend in terms of fun light hearted gameplay. I could change character with every mission and still have a great time handling it all until I found my main.

As my first entry into Fate I didn’t find the story all that compelling, but much like Hyrule Warriors, another Musou game I love, you don’t really need to. The gameplay is just that good. It’s all so perfectly balanced that I would recommend anyone studying game design to look into a system such as Fate/EXTELLA Link’s if you are trying to figure out how to build something which is vast in options but that couldn’t really be broken or abused by the average player.

The fact that I actually talked about the game so much in one of my reviews is a testament to Fate EXTELLA/Link’s strength. I couldn’t believe I was playing a game so technically advanced and with such in depth strategy on the Vita. If you have the means buy Fate EXTELLA/Link you will have a whole lot of fun.

My copy was provided as a courtesy.