Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE is a future classic.
I first picked up Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE for the Wii U on its North American release date of June 24th, 2016. I was fully aware that what I was getting into was not the dark crossover between the universes of ATLUS’ Shin Megami Tensei games and Intelligent System’s Fire Emblem games that much of the fan base of these types of RPG’s was hoping for. I knew I was getting into something that would probably be more comparable to a stripped down Persona game than to a mainline Shin Megami Tensei or Fire Emblem title. Unlike most, I welcomed this. Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE was, along with Xenoblade Chronicles X and Super Smash Bros, one of the few games that I had purchased a Wii U to be able to play. I was fairly excited for it and I wanted something to hold me over until I would have my hands on Persona 5 the next year. On launch day, I purchased Tokyo Mirage Sessions and then spent the night at a friend’s apartment, leaving me unable to play until the following day. Once morning arrived however, I stepped outside only to discover that my car had been broken into- my copy of Tokyo Mirage Sessions missing, much like my humanity an hour or so later when I went back to the same store and purchased a 2nd copy of Tokyo Mirage Sessions from the same store associate who had sold it to me a day prior. Now four years later in January of 2020, I have purchased Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE for a third time. This time, as an ever so slightly enhanced port on the Nintendo Switch. I left the title screen up for a few moments, in which my Portuguese speaking partner remarked that “Fe” means “Faith” in Portuguese. She said that the title screen, in this context, looked like some sort of religious propaganda. Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE is, in fact, a religious experience.
Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE Encore is spiritual in the same way that a psychedelic trip is spiritual. Your sight is immediately bombarded with bright, vibrant colors and your ears enveloped in mysterious, yet beautiful sounds as soon as the title screen stylishly splashes on the screen. It’s as if you just ingested drugs maybe a half hour ago and you’re rapidly coming up into this bizarre slice-of-life fever dream of the Japanese entertainment industry. Tokyo Mirage Sessions is a turn based, dungeon crawler RPG in which you play as Itsuki Aoi and his friends as they strive to rise to fame within various fields of Japan’s entertainment industry. During your friend Tsubasa’s audition to become an idol, Itsuki and Tsubasa learn about the existence of Mirages, which are this game’s version of the demons from Shin Megami Tensei, and they discover the power of Performa, which is all but a few letters away from Persona (Nice one, ATLUS). Their Performa, a type of energy manifested through creative performance, allows them to become Mirage Masters. Each character has a Mirage counter-part taking on the likeness of a Fire Emblem character that can literally transform into the various party members’ weapons. Together with your buddies and your Mirages, you will make your way through various Idolaspheres, which serve as the game’s dungeons.
Itsuki is a voiced character with lots of his own lines of dialogue but when it comes to how he’s written, he’s pretty much a blank slate. It’s kind of odd- It’s like they couldn’t decide whether they wanted you to self-insert or not. There are even multiple dialogue options throughout the game but these serve little purpose other than to provide some optional humorous interactions between the cast of characters. Now this may sound like I am ragging on Itsuki or the writing, but I personally love this about his character. It’s too easy to just write him off as one dimensional. He is so one dimensional that it creates a funny juxtaposition between him and the rest of the cast, who are all brimming with personality and have different detailed back stories, motivations, and aspirations. There was criticism at the time of the game’s original release that the cast of character’s felt “trope-ish.” The other characters do, at times, feel trope-ish but in a way that, to me, feels tasteful more than uninspired. It makes sense that this set of characters would behave according to the archetypes that they do, given the story and setting. In this regard, it is a perfect execution of anime tropes within a video game.
Tokyo Mirage Sessions takes place in modern day Tokyo. While you’re not exploring dungeons and engaging in combat, the game has you going around and checking out various parts of town with a menu based exploration system that feels very similar to the exploration found in various other ATLUS titles. You can view and select various locations from a sleek map screen and once you’ve selected one, you’re taken to a 3D space where you can run around, talk to people, and buy all sorts of items, accessories, and costumes. The world, much like Itsuki, can feel very static and one dimensional on the surface but, unlike Itsuki, this game’s version of Tokyo oozes charm with its vibrant colors, upbeat music, and its various residents, all with different things to say and some with side quests for you to undertake. The version of Tokyo presented here perfectly suits the lighthearted, leisurely nature of the story being told and helps everything feel cohesive. In a pre-Persona 5 world, this was about as good as it got. In a post-Persona 5 world, it’s still pretty great.
The other half of the game is the dungeon crawling and combat. The Idolaspheres are fun to traverse and are all themed to the game’s different story beats. The dungeons also provide some puzzles here and there that don’t necessarily require you to think too hard to progress but are still a step up over Persona 3 and 4’s randomized dungeons. The combat system itself is turn based, not too dissimilar from your standard SMT or Persona affair. Your spells deal elemental damage and your enemies have elemental weaknesses. But now, in the place of standard physical attacks, you now have the weapons triangle from Fire Emblem. Aside from this, the other difference in the combat system here is what occurs when you take advantage of an enemy’s weakness. As your party levels up they will gain Session Skills and striking with an enemies physical or elemental weakness will trigger a Session. Sessions are combos that Itsuki and the other party members can perform based on the Session Skills they’ve acquired. These have the opportunity to deal massive damage, often to more than one enemy. It’s a great added layer of depth to an already tried and true combat system and is one of the game’s strongest features.
If there was one word I could use to describe Tokyo Mirage Sessions, it would be bizarre. It’s so strange that this game exists. Seriously. It’s an extremely well-made RPG about J-pop, acting, and modeling. I have no idea who this game was made for, and it comes as no surprise that the Wii U version did not sell particularly well and truthfully, I do not see the Switch port selling particularly well either. Considering what a niche game it is, I don’t see it attracting many newcomers and the re-release adds very little to the original game to entice those who have already played the Wii U version into double dipping. But this, to me, is an absolute travesty as Tokyo Mirage Sessions was certainly among the best games to be released on the Wii U, and it’s one of the strongest RPG’s available on the Switch. Even if the breezy, fun story and colorful cast of characters don’t appeal to your sensibilities, there is still a fantastic dungeon crawler with engaging turn-based combat to be enjoyed. You may be surprised at how much you enjoy this future cult classic.
Coyote B
Staff Writer at The Papermaker Mag