As someone who's played turn-based games to hell and back since I was a kid, Brutal Orchestra was one of the most refreshing experiences I've had in a long while. I haven't had this much fun with an RPG since Mother 3 and LISA; and saying that should mean a lot to anyone familiar with the genre. I'm going to preface this review with a simple statement: Pick up this game. It's worth the price even when it's not on sale.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2787571142
As the title already hints, purely from a gameplay perspective, this is my new favorite RPG. A unique battle system, real strategy, interesting items and movesets, and dozens of party members all combined to make some of the most memorable combat from a turn-based game. The number of systems and status effects may seem daunting at first, but if you take just a teensy bit of time to read, it’s very simple. Originally, I thought the pigment system was going to be a pointless gimmick, but I quickly realized the amount of depth involved in its design. Enemies and party members may require different strategies just because they don't use the most common color of pigment. Pigment overflow exists to punish bad pigment management with a slight health penalty. Additionally, calculating the risk versus reward with using pigment of the wrong color is always a fun gamble. However, what took me away the most was the lack of random crits. For an RPG, this is a huge distinction that I welcome with open arms. Alas, no more randomly taking or dealing double damage; Brutal Orchestra has full faith that its combat is engaging enough to not rely on an outdated gameplay mechanic. Although the combat is turn-based, it's still fast-paced. Once you fully understand what you and your enemies are capable of, battles will be over in a breeze. Even with attack animations turned on, battles will regularly last a little over a minute with total turns in the single-digits.

Some of the items get really creative like giving your party member an extra turn, but they act of their own volition. Other fun ones include doubling your gold at the cost of severely crippling your party member's movement or gaining extra turns but with a 30% of having the item break. The Fishing Rod was a personal favorite of mine and I will not elaborate on that one. The party member variety is possibly the best there is. There’s a party member with an absurd amount of health capable of resurrecting dead party members, but he can never be healed. There’s a Shedinja-like girl who can’t be hurt and redirects all the damage to her party members. She can deal absurd levels of damage, but she’ll make her party members take double the damage if you play poorly. There’s a party member who lights every enemy on fire, but he’s always on fire. There’s one that trades health for extra turns, one that does random amounts of damage and randomizes your stored pigment, and even ones entirely focused on managing pigment. With 20 total party members that have different movesets every time you encounter them, the party members easily carry the replay value with the variety they offer. And the party members wouldn’t be nearly as fun if it weren’t for the outstanding boss fights. There’s one boss that constantly changes attacks when you hit him with one of them leading to an instant kill. The game teaches you restraint, and then uses that against you when encountering a different boss that effortlessly sweeps your party. But then you find out that if you attack that boss he loses one of his attacks. Every boss has their own abilities, strengths, and weaknesses offering a unique challenge for every boss.

The art direction is phenomenal as well. Maceo's art style is so distinct you can tell he's the artist of a game just by looking at it. And ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ does the game look gorgeous. I particularly like the environmental design of the three major areas. The Far Shores being a dried-up ocean filled with enemies inhabiting fish carcasses, The Orpheum and its rather unique take on a Greek amphitheater with a perpetual rainstorm and fleshy instruments, and the literal Bosch painting that is the Garden all made incredibly unique locations. In addition the enemies are just so expressive and vibrant. I love how every enemy has an idle animation, it really says a lot about the genre when this is a rarity. The attack animations are all wonderful too. Some of them are actually pretty disturbing, especially for the unique boss animations. There's one where a baby gets torn apart by its parents and then there's stuff like whatever the hell Come Home is.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2773168757
And oh my God the soundtrack. I have regularly listened to Brutal Orchestra's OST outside of the game. Every enemy and boss also has a unique battle theme and you have no idea how happy that makes me. I think the Persona series comes to mind when I talk about this problem, but a lot of RPGs don't really care about battle theme variety. Most games would just put one song for normal enemies, one for bosses, and one unique song for the final boss or rarely a special encounter in the story. It is so refreshing to have almost every encounter play a different tune. Nearly every song in the soundtrack is amazing, but if I have to pick a few favorites I'll have to go with Osman, Then Nowak, Teach a Fish to Man, and The Other Escape. I think my favorite song of them all has to be Feel the Rhythm, the Music Man theme. Though this is partly because I like the reactive elements the soundtrack incorporates. The Music Men are enemies that transform into fleshy instruments and when they do, that instrument gets added to the song. The soundtrack reacts right on cue to the changing battlefield and I love it. There are other examples of reactive songs, but the Music Men are the big standout. The sound design is also surprisingly good. The bizarre screams coming out of some moves are pretty unsettling at times.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Urv4LIFEUQ
Here's my main problem with the game: The story. Now, this has absolutely nothing to do with the story being bad. Far from it. The issue is how much just isn't in the game. There are plenty of funny lines and examples of good writing, but there just isn’t enough of it. A lot of the bosses just sorta exist with no in-game backstory. This is especially confusing for one of the final bosses which has a very clear motivation and connection to the plot, but without even a sliver of explanation. The devs have talked about adding a bestiary, more NPCs, and generally more dialogue in the game, so this issue might be resolved in the future. I think more party member interactions would be a nice addition personally. The party members are colorful characters before you recruit them, but when they're in your party they might as well all be statues. LISA had these short blips of end-battle dialogue that showed up all the time and I think Brutal Orchestra could use the same system. That and actually allowing me to talk to them outside of combat would be pretty neat. It would add more to the game's lore and story but without breaking the pace of gameplay. And on an unrelated complaint, there’s a major exploit that allows you to reset the fight by going to the main menu. Patching that should be a priority because it does remove a lot of the difficulty.

Overall, I greatly enjoyed my time with Brutal Orchestra. For $15, it is well worth every penny. I’m currently giving it a 9/10, but the game’s probably going to go up to a 10/10 for me in the future. The developers have promised free updates, with one in the near future including a bunch of new enemies. And with new enemies means more strategies, new songs, new art, and just more in general. Pick this game up if you’ve got the time and money. I’m very much looking forward to the bright future of this game.

[h1]The best turn-based combat I've played in years.[/h1] As someone who's played turn-based games to hell and back since I was a kid, Brutal Orchestra was one of the most refreshing experiences I've had in a long while. I haven't had this much fun with an RPG since Mother 3 and LISA; and saying that should mean a lot to anyone familiar with the genre. I'm going to preface this review with a simple statement: Pick up this game. It's worth the price even when it's not on sale. https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2787571142 As the title already hints, purely from a gameplay perspective, this is my new favorite RPG. A unique battle system, real strategy, interesting items and movesets, and dozens of party members all combined to make some of the most memorable combat from a turn-based game. The number of systems and status effects may seem daunting at first, but if you take just a teensy bit of time to read, it’s very simple. Originally, I thought the pigment system was going to be a pointless gimmick, but I quickly realized the amount of depth involved in its design. Enemies and party members may require different strategies just because they don't use the most common color of pigment. Pigment overflow exists to punish bad pigment management with a slight health penalty. Additionally, calculating the risk versus reward with using pigment of the wrong color is always a fun gamble. However, what took me away the most was the lack of random crits. For an RPG, this is a huge distinction that I welcome with open arms. Alas, no more randomly taking or dealing double damage; Brutal Orchestra has full faith that its combat is engaging enough to not rely on an outdated gameplay mechanic. Although the combat is turn-based, it's still fast-paced. Once you fully understand what you and your enemies are capable of, battles will be over in a breeze. Even with attack animations turned on, battles will regularly last a little over a minute with total turns in the single-digits. Some of the items get really creative like giving your party member an extra turn, but they act of their own volition. Other fun ones include doubling your gold at the cost of severely crippling your party member's movement or gaining extra turns but with a 30% of having the item break. The Fishing Rod was a personal favorite of mine and I will not elaborate on that one. The party member variety is possibly the best there is. There’s a party member with an absurd amount of health capable of resurrecting dead party members, but he can never be healed. There’s a Shedinja-like girl who can’t be hurt and redirects all the damage to her party members. She can deal absurd levels of damage, but she’ll make her party members take double the damage if you play poorly. There’s a party member who lights every enemy on fire, but he’s always on fire. There’s one that trades health for extra turns, one that does random amounts of damage and randomizes your stored pigment, and even ones entirely focused on managing pigment. With 20 total party members that have different movesets every time you encounter them, the party members easily carry the replay value with the variety they offer. And the party members wouldn’t be nearly as fun if it weren’t for the outstanding boss fights. There’s one boss that constantly changes attacks when you hit him with one of them leading to an instant kill. The game teaches you restraint, and then uses that against you when encountering a different boss that effortlessly sweeps your party. But then you find out that if you attack that boss he loses one of his attacks. Every boss has their own abilities, strengths, and weaknesses offering a unique challenge for every boss. The art direction is phenomenal as well. Maceo's art style is so distinct you can tell he's the artist of a game just by looking at it. And God damn does the game look gorgeous. I particularly like the environmental design of the three major areas. The Far Shores being a dried-up ocean filled with enemies inhabiting fish carcasses, The Orpheum and its rather unique take on a Greek amphitheater with a perpetual rainstorm and fleshy instruments, and the literal Bosch painting that is the Garden all made incredibly unique locations. In addition the enemies are just so expressive and vibrant. I love how every enemy has an idle animation, it really says a lot about the genre when this is a rarity. The attack animations are all wonderful too. Some of them are actually pretty disturbing, especially for the unique boss animations. There's one where a baby gets torn apart by its parents and then there's stuff like whatever the hell Come Home is. https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2773168757 And oh my God the soundtrack. I have regularly listened to Brutal Orchestra's OST outside of the game. Every enemy and boss also has a unique battle theme and you have no idea how happy that makes me. I think the Persona series comes to mind when I talk about this problem, but a lot of RPGs don't really care about battle theme variety. Most games would just put one song for normal enemies, one for bosses, and one unique song for the final boss or rarely a special encounter in the story. It is so refreshing to have almost every encounter play a different tune. Nearly every song in the soundtrack is amazing, but if I have to pick a few favorites I'll have to go with Osman, Then Nowak, Teach a Fish to Man, and The Other Escape. I think my favorite song of them all has to be Feel the Rhythm, the Music Man theme. Though this is partly because I like the reactive elements the soundtrack incorporates. The Music Men are enemies that transform into fleshy instruments and when they do, that instrument gets added to the song. The soundtrack reacts right on cue to the changing battlefield and I love it. There are other examples of reactive songs, but the Music Men are the big standout. The sound design is also surprisingly good. The bizarre screams coming out of some moves are pretty unsettling at times. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Urv4LIFEUQ Here's my main problem with the game: The story. Now, this has absolutely nothing to do with the story being bad. Far from it. The issue is how much just isn't in the game. There are plenty of funny lines and examples of good writing, but there just isn’t enough of it. A lot of the bosses just sorta exist with no in-game backstory. This is especially confusing for one of the final bosses which has a very clear motivation and connection to the plot, but without even a sliver of explanation. The devs have talked about adding a bestiary, more NPCs, and generally more dialogue in the game, so this issue might be resolved in the future. I think more party member interactions would be a nice addition personally. The party members are colorful characters before you recruit them, but when they're in your party they might as well all be statues. LISA had these short blips of end-battle dialogue that showed up all the time and I think Brutal Orchestra could use the same system. That and actually allowing me to talk to them outside of combat would be pretty neat. It would add more to the game's lore and story but without breaking the pace of gameplay. And on an unrelated complaint, there’s a major exploit that allows you to reset the fight by going to the main menu. Patching that should be a priority because it does remove a lot of the difficulty. Overall, I greatly enjoyed my time with Brutal Orchestra. For $15, it is well worth every penny. [b]I’m currently giving it a 9/10, but the game’s probably going to go up to a 10/10 for me in the future.[/b] The developers have promised free updates, with one in the near future including a bunch of new enemies. And with new enemies means more strategies, new songs, new art, and just more in general. Pick this game up if you’ve got the time and money. I’m very much looking forward to the bright future of this game.