Yokai Art: Night Parade of One Hundred Demons is a Tower Defense Strategy game with Adult themes layered on top (or bottom) with card game elements that requires some level of grinding as it plays surprisingly challenging.
After your grandfather had an accident, Hiro (you) came over to watch over his home (or him?), one night you heard some noises in the basement, only to find a glowing book. As you picked it up you unknowingly broke the seal on this mysterious mythical book that held magical powers that allowed the user to control any Yokai. This release of power in turn attracted all the Yokai which you now have to defeat and contain.
I’m The Captain Now
The main game takes place in the battle screen where you fight off waves of Yokai and try to survive. Upon beating a special Yokai you will then get to control them as one of your units in the battlefield. You start each level with a certain amount of Fragments, which are currency you’ll spend in order to place units on the tiles laid out in lane format. You gain fragments by killing off the enemies.
Pick Your Cards Wisely
You can bring up to 6 Yokai to fight for you in battle. In order to strengthen them, you have to spend the same fragments to level them up (in battle only). What you choose to level up depends on the cards you draw. You draw 3 cards and from there you decide whether you want to spend your fragments on those. If not you can either redraw (which spends fragments) or wait for the deck to reshuffle. This deck is random up till the point you maxed out on a Yokai’s stat (hit points or attack or attack speed, upgrade), once a stat is maxed out, it will not appear anymore.
I’ve Got Soul
You also have souls which auto generates as the battle goes on. You can spend souls on Yokai Arts which are essentially abilities that you can use to attack on the enemy or further improve your Yokai. Apart from attacks for Yokai Arts, you can Evolve your Yokai to its final form, from then you can use a Power Stone (Yokai Art) to perform their special skill against the enemies. By evolving and using the power stone, it will increase Yokai’s affinity to you outside of battles.
Same Tree, Different Branch
The enemies you face vary on the level you are at according to the level’s theme. Some enemies have variations of a type ie. Spear Samurai, Arrow Samurai etc. Each enemy has their own weaknesses which you will learn after defeating them a set amount of times.
A Stuffed Yokai is a Happy Yokai
Sometimes during battles, some enemies will drop random items which are used for crafting items such as foods. To cook/prepare these foods you will need certain types of ingredients depending on the dishes. These foods can be given to your Yokai outside of battles to increase their affinity with you. Each level opens up a costume (or lack of) for them. Reaching level 3 will unlock the gallery and H-scene for the said Yokai. The scenes are acceptable in terms of art and everything else you’d expect from an adult game and they are voice acted. However to get to level 3 requires quite a bit of grinding (gameplay grinding, not the other type).
Grinding Needed
You’ll get coins when you finish levels which you use to level up your Yokai’s stats, such as firing rate, attack, cost etc. Leveling up is essential as you will find levels that will halt your progress unless you do so. So you have 2 reasons to replay levels you’ve won over and over, to progress your Yokai’s affinity and to progress the game itself as it is a challenging game.
Final Thoughts
It’s quite grindy and challenging that at times you’ll forget that this game has adult themes to it. So if you’re in it for the TD gameplay and challenge (on normal) then you’ll find plenty of game time here, but if you’re here for the H-scenes then prepare to work for it, just like how you work through pages and pages just to find the right video to get off to.
Purchase Yokai Art: Night Parade of One Hundred Demons on Steam!
Nice, looks like this game has actual decent gameplay!
Indeed it does! Quite challenging & engaging one too