I was always a bit more of an outlier on the playground back in the day, preferring tales of destined children contending with trauma alongside digital monsters than everyday pre-teens leaving home to collect pocket monsters. Years later, Digimon still has my heart in a way Pokemon never will. The one area of the two respective franchises where I’ve enjoyed Pokemon more than Digimon is the video games. But I continue to hold out hope, dreaming of a Digimon video game that can rival how much I enjoy Pokemon Platinum, Omega Ruby, Legends: Arceus, or Scarlet.
I’m still not sure if Digimon Story: Time Stranger is that game. The latest in the Digimon Story series, you play as a secret agent in Tokyo, Japan who witnesses a city-leveling disaster and then suddenly travels eight years into the past. With your knowledge of what’s to come, you have to investigate the mystery surrounding the coming disaster. Your actions twist the world and reshape history, plunging you and your allies through alternate timelines. Your investigation also leads into the Digital World, a parallel reality where Digimon live–you can befriend and train these digital monsters as partners to use while in conflict with Digimon that mean you harm.
As you might have surmised given the name, the Digimon Story series has regularly told their stories very well–the focus of the series has been to submerge the player in narrative-rich experiences. Gameplay has been the part of this series that can be very hit-or-miss, and I’m not sure Time Stranger bucks that trend.