Disgaea 5 Complete Switch Review

With a series of games known to demonstrate how to hit over one quadrillion damage and that allows its characters to grow up to a max of level 9999, you can probably tell that the Disgaea series is something a bit more…well, crazier than your typical strategy RPG. The series began on the PS2 and since then every sequel brings new mechanics embedded into its original tactical foundation to enable even more madness on the battlefield of squares. Disgaea 5: Alliance of Vengeance was the last game released, back in 2015, and it brought with it all the stuff hardcore strategy RPG fans have loved since its incarnation. Now Nintendo Switch owners can experience all this madness with Disgaea 5 Complete, the ultimate version of the latest release in Nippon Ichi Software’s most well-known franchise.

The Complete in its title is to signify that the Switch version contains the main release of Disgaea 5, but now comes with every single downloadable content (DLC) that was available to purchase on the PlayStation Network. This is actually a sweet deal in terms of cost, because Disgaea 5 on PS4 was a full priced title, and buying all the DLC for the game came in a season pass for £28.99, much more than the recommend retail price of the complete package on Switch. The latter version also comes with the added bonus of being on a device that can make the game portable.

It’s downloadable content included additional classes, fan favourite characters from other games in the series and from some other Nippon Ichi titles (The Witch and the Hundred Knight), and story chapters that adds a few more hours to an already lengthy game, especially if you aim to explore all aspects of Disgaea 5 Complete. A warning for newcomers – the DLC brings some very strong characters that make the early game rather easy to power through, which helps people who aren’t strategy RPG geniuses, but it can be easy to ignore the game’s mechanics and power through the game early on, then not grasp them when required in the more hardcore parts of Disgaea 5 Complete‘s content.

Disgaea 5 begins introducing us to Seraphina, the Overlord of Gorgeous Underworld, who is in a battle with The Lost – a demon army who belongs to the big villain – before being saved by the game’s other main hero, Killia, after he amusingly sits down in the middle of battle to eat a tasty bowl of grub. The two become acquaintances, as they both have a common enemy they want revenge on – Void Dark. In the world of Disgaea 5, Void Dark is an evil demon emperor in the midst of ravaging across various Netherworlds and taking them over for himself with his large demon army and a horde of overthrown overlords to do his bidding. Seraphina was suppose to have an arrange marriage with Void Dark, but ran away from her home to avoid it. Now she’s planning her revenge on Void Dark with the help of Killia, who has his own motivations for wanting the Netherworld conqueror dead, while a batch of quirky characters join in on the action that feel right at home in the Disgaea series.

Stories across all Disgaea titles have always been rather simple, going for more of jokey, light-heart nature that allows crazy character personalities to thrive, while the bizarre situations thrown towards the characters makes them entertaining scenarios to witness. Disgaea 5 is no different. You have Seraphina, who thinks every man only exists to bow before her and be her servant. Red Magnus, The Overlord of Scorching Flame, who is like a mix between Hulk Hogan and The Rock, and believes in strength above all else. There is a good cast that get to play out some unique chapters (even one dedicated to curry). One thing that is different compared the older entries is the main hero Killia – he’s vastly different to the past main characters, who before have always been the eccentric, loud mouthed type, but Killia likes keeping things balanced and lethargic, which even his voice actor is into, making Killia sound like he has no emotion behind his reposeful demeanour. He has characteristics that you’ll remember him for, like his endless eating on the battlefield, but he doesn’t touch some of the classic Disgaea characters, such as Laharl or Adell. Overall, the campaign’s story is a lot of fun to get through, propped up by a quality localisation that brings an amusing cast together across a fun and decent 45+ hour plot.

Moving passed the game’s comical presentation, fans enjoy playing Disgaea because of the variety of gameplay mechanics embedded in the strategy RPG DNA. Looking it on a basic level, Disgaea is similar to other tactics games that use an isometric view of the map, such as Final Fantasy Tactics or Vandal Hearts, with characters placed on a square grid that can move and attack per turn. Things begin to become a little different when you dig into the actual mechanics of the battles. For starters,the whole team – up to 10 units on the field from a pool of many – move and attack in the same turn, allowing players to move as many or as little characters desired, then activate an command, such as attack or use items, before turning over to the enemy’s phase. The positioning of characters is important to rack up bonus damage. Sticking two allies together enables them to attack together in flashy, dual combos, with overkills – damaging the enemy way more than they max health – awarding goodies for players who can smartly deal the best damage against all the enemies. Character placement can lead to some insane combos, we are talking over one billion of damage in the late game, yep, it’s that insane.

Each release of Disgaea brings something new to build on top of the many existing mechanics. This time around it’s all about revenge. The Revenge mechanic offers new skills for Overlords or stat boosts to standard class-based units when those units take too much damage or witness one of their buddies killed in battle. Another new addition is squads, where your units can be slotted into groups that give the leaders squad skills to call upon the units in battle to assist them in a special attack. Squads can also be sent on random missions to gain items, prisoners or experience while you’re busy with your own missions.

There is now a quest system in place to add more things to do in the game, such as get a class to a certain rank, destroy specific bad guys or beat so many stages. Quests are a neat addition to gain extra items and cash if you are willing to go out of the way to perform the required request. There are a few smaller additions, such as items with special powers called innocents that boost stats in various categories and the ability to imprison enemy units to use them to level up squads. They aren’t as vital to the core gameplay, but all these optional mechanics add incredibly depth to the game, and that’s just the new stuff.

Quality of life is improved with existing mechanics. Characters are now created with cash instead of mana, which the latter was previously gained by using the units in battle. Money also allows them to be boosted from level 1 to higher levels, making it much easier to create new characters and have them close to your current level without having to grind them in battle. The Chara World, a version of the Item World (a feature that allows your team to jump into any weapon or armour and increase its stats by beating 10 floors of a randomly generated dungeon) returns, but is no longer just a clone of the Item World, but now is a fun board game that makes it different.

Then there’s all the mechanics that return without much tweaks, such as the cheat shop, a way to mod the game to be harder or easier. There are sliders to give more cash in exchange for less experience, or vice versa. Another returnee is the series’ trademark Geo-symbols. Geo-symbols are coloured prisms that contain stat buffs or debuffs. Placing a Geo-symbol on a Geo-panel colour will force that colour to absorb its stats, meaning any enemy who is sitting on the same colour will receive that advantage or handicap. It’s a mechanic that can swiftly turn the tide of battle. If you’re fed up with the enemy overpowering you, due to how the battle is set up with Geo-panels, then you can destroy them, causing a chain reaction if the colour of the Geo-panel is different from the colour it resides on. This deals damage to all who are placed on the volatile colour. It’s possible to wipe out a whole team if you correctly set up the Geo-panels, which is an amazing visual to watch unfold in front of your eyes. There are so many mechanics in Disgaea titles that you could easily flood a page with just them and easily forget to be writing a review. Just be known that even when the story is over, Disgaea 5 Complete offers so many additional ways to keep on levelling up characters and battling in randomly generated dungeons to reach those incredibly hard optional bosses that in theory, you could keep this game lasting for thousands of hours if people are that deep into the game’s mechanics.

Nothing has been lost with Disgaea 5‘s move over to the Switch. It retains all the cutscenes, voice lines and the bonus of all the DLC being available from the get go. Nippon Ichi Software has also retained the idea of a trophy achievement system built into the game, cloning all the trophies from the PS4 title and allowing players to earn them, even coming with its own pop up notification and sound effects. It’s not a system wide feature, but it should scratch that itch for people who want to get the most out of their titles, even though Disgaea 5 Complete will last you a very long time to beat everything on offer. Performance is fantastic, no matter if you’re in Docked or in Portable mode. The game is 720p on the device’s screen and upscaled to 1080p when outputting to a display. The 3D backgrounds are clean, and the sprite work retains its gorgeous and colourful presentation, with only a slight hiccup in performance with slower loading times than PS4 and stuttering during highly populated maps, but these are very minor issues that don’t spoil the game. The portable aspect is a perfect fit for Disgaea 5 Complete, with each battle short enough to finish during a short train or bus ride, but this was proven already with the portable versions on DS, PSP and Vita of the first 4 games.

Disgaea 5 Complete certainly appeals more to people who have never played the game over the fans that jumped into it first on PS4. What is great is that nothing is sacrificed on it’s move to Nintendo’s new hybrid system, so those fans who like the idea of playing the game again with a portable aspect will be happy with the transition. For newcomers, what should be known is that Disgaea 5 Complete is a great strategy RPG with some unique features going for it that no other strategy RPG does (e.g. Item World). It also brings deep gameplay, fanatical characters and a silly story that makes Disgaea 5 Complete a fantastic additional to the Switch’s library, filling in a genre that the system doesn’t have at the moment, while being the best version of Disgaea 5.