Chrono Ark

a super fun and new way to play the roguelike card games out there. With a Anime art style that pop this is a must buy for folks that like games like slay the spire but with a difrent twist

I rarely Play Roguelike Deckbuilders (rarely mainly I've played this game and Phantom Rose on my phone). So my opinion on this might not be as reliable.

Personally, I recommend this game who are new to the genre. it's not as complex as say slay the spire but it has unique features that make it really fun and mechanics to have some difficulty in keeping the brain chugging for strategies.

The Party making mechanics allows for multiple strategies.
each character has unique mechanics and deck to make them feel amazing ang unique, making each party combination fun and or difficult depending on the cards chosen and party created

This is hands down the best turn-based deckbuilding JRPG roguelike around.

CONS:
I will say the only 2 things that irk me a little are the bugs (sometimes skipping dialogue can bring a permanent black screen) and 2 of the boss fights are incredibly annoying. One has a mechanic that just pans the fight out for a long period of time by requiring players to attack themselves first. On some builds, this just becomes increasingly frustrating. The other boss fight has a move that when they reach a low HP they just wipe your entire team. I survived it a couple times by pure luck, but I still don't understand how or why it works.

PROS:
Literally everything else.

The story... The gameplay... I was heistant on purchasing this game but I honestly think you get your money's worth and then some.

The story and music is fantastic while the combat is solid and challenging. The game starts off pretty simple but gets more and more complex as you find out everyone's past and hints of intrigue and mystery behind the ark project. It will be time consuming but is very worth the time for how cheap the game is. Try to max out everyone's friendship, you won't regret it and is a requirement if you want the full picture and other endings. Won't spoil it any further than that.

One of If not the best deck building rouge like ever, My boy Azar did nothing wrong at all, and you should buy the game to find out.

I was not expecting to enjoy this game this much.

The combat is definitely the high point here. Each character has their own unique mechanics and roughly 2-3 potential builds, so there can be a lot of variability between runs. Additionally, the boss mechanics are also equally as unique while not feeling unfair or like they're just build-checks. On top of that, the music goes surprising hard, and it's a damn shame the soundtrack isn't being sold yet.

That said, the story is presented largely through dialogue-heavy cutscenes and lore dumps, which seemed to drag on far too long for my liking. The story isn't necessarily bad per se, I just felt like there was way too much unnecessary dialogue that you were expected to read through.

I also wish there was a better way to hone in on the cards needed for a build faster. This is mostly a nitpick on my part, as I have had instances where I felt it was taking to long to get a good build for a character due to RNG.

Still, this is probably one of my favorite roguelike deckbuilders and an easy recommendation for anyone even marginally interested.

Absolute fucking cinema. Perfect mix and match of Darkest Dungeon and Slay the Spyre

=== PROS ===
- Good, balanced gameplay
- Good amount of content, infinite modding potential
- AMAZING art and great soundtracK
- The best story I've seen in a roguelike yet. The presentation is superb

=== CONS ===
- Might feel a bit tedious to do many runs just to level up character friend points
- Some mechanics are not explained well, or not explained at all
- The story, as great as it is, isn't particularly long (~15 hours) if you know what you're doing

Gameplay

As a rougelike deckbuilder, this is already a pretty solid game to other ones in the same genre, the layout of the battle is in first person like in Earthbound, or with a more modern example; Undertale. Lots of tons of playable characters in a party based system, which leads to a lot of possible combinations, and covers a lot of content. The game also has a lot of unique mechanics that might get some getting use to during the first couple of hours. There is also a lot of difficulty options, so players that feel like they need more of a challenge, this game has you covered.

Story

With that out of the way, this is one of the only rougelikes I've played that actually has a proper story. Usually the story is merely tacked on, or can only be read through logbooks. Here it is one of the main selling points, and it's pretty good and engaging. They integrated the elements of a rougelike (dying and restarting)
well enough into it to make sense. The game doesn't tell you much at the start on what is happening in the world, and it's up to you to uncover the mysteries, and boy there are a lot of plot twists every time you progress. After finishing the entire thing, this is a very depressing story that I did not expect at all when I first started playing it, and I feel like this game is missing is a "psychological horror" tag.

Art Direction and Music

I am in love with the soundtrack of this game, it fits the tone really well, and I can listen to it all day. Something they did during the the songs, is that when you are walking around a stage, it's a somewhat calm music, but when you enter a battle, it seamlessly transitions to a song that has the exact same melody as the regular overview song, but it sounds a lot more intense and sometimes even anxiety inducing.
I like all of the character's designs, and feel that most of the enemies look alright as well, while the game has minimal animation, there are certain moments when you can feel like there is a lot of movement and impact in some moves.

Summary

If you are a fan of any of the following, I would highly recommend giving this game a try:
-RPG
-Rougelikes/deckbuilders
-Deep story
-Mystery
-Creepy and melancholic atmosphere
-Anime-esque art and tropes

I was unsure about this game when I first got it, and also unsure during the first few hours. However, as I started to better understand the mechanics and story, I was rapidly drawn into the game and its world and highly recommend it both as a roguelike and an RPG.

The story is very solid, and while the characterization and interactions aren't as complex as a game like Hades, the plot itself is much deeper and more interesting, as are the motives and actions of the major players. While you get enough of the story through regular gameplay, the "archive" features additional cutscenes that happened prior to the events of the cataclysm that provide important additional background to flesh out the characters. I definitely recommend reading those every once in awhile.

I will say that this game is surprisingly hard, but still pretty fair. Usually if I died it's because I didn't understand how to use my characters or how to deal with the gimmick from a boss. I think only a handful of times I died due to bad luck. As I started to understand the characters and enemies better, I was able to clear runs with remarkable frequency. The variety of mechanics keeps the game engaging across multiple characters and there are some truly unique ones especially near the end of the game. Deflecting ultimate illusion sword is honestly awesome.

The music is fantastic and the art is pretty solid throughout. A few specific cutscenes near the end of the game take a unique approach with how they are presented and leave quite an impact as a result. I was on the edge of my seat during the final fights, both from the gameplay and the story tension.

There are only two things I consistently didn't like.

1. "Hidden map tiles" are too well hidden. I eventually had to look up the "proper" way to find a story-specific one, although the game does blessedly let you take a shortcut to the destination if you are unable or unwilling to complete the series of events to find this. Allegedly there's a special hint for this one, but even knowing the hint I couldn't find it casually.
   
2. It is difficult to know a character's preferred gifts. This is important if you want to max out their friendship level efficiently, otherwise it takes about 3 times as long. Some of them you can kind of guess, but there are plenty I've ended up maxing out without ever finding their preferred gifts. It would be nice if you could at least see the gifts you've already tried to give them so you know what not to try again.
   

Otherwise, there are only a few other "neutral" points worth touching on.

• A full run is fairly long, maybe a couple hours or so. There are save points at regular intervals so it's not a blocker to enjoying the game, but keep this in mind if you're the kind of person that likes to do things in the increment of a full run. There are also cutscenes afterwards if you're not done with the story
  
• The story segments are actually pretty difficult. There are a few story-specific runs/battles/sequences you have to do and during these you will automatically get 3 free retries so you can start from the beginning of the battle instead of losing the run if you fail. This is pretty important because again, these are actually quite difficult most of the time, which surprised me.
  
[*] Some characters are very complicated to use. They are all different, and you might not like all of them. The game even rates their complexity, which I find to be accurate.

All of that being said, the complaints I have are minor, and even at full price this game is well worth it. My playtime at review includes some extra runs I did to try and finish the game with different characters or increase friendship with them. I would guess that if you try to be efficient about it, you could probably beat the main story in about 20 hours. Still, you'll most likely get much more time out of the game than that given the depth and variety it has.

very unique battle system compared to other turn-based systems, also the music is really good.

i want to get amnesia to experience the story again.

A genuine underrated gem - if you ignore the slight translation hiccups and sometimes confusing ability descriptions. Recommended for anyone itching for a solid deck-builder with party based combat.

Chrono Ark is a fun deckbuilder roguelite. While the mechanics initially seem complex, I found the difficulty to be fair, especially if this is not your first entry into the genre. The position of cards in your hand matters a lot more than in other deckbuilders I've played, but you're also given tools to manipulate your hand. The game sports a great soundtrack and a large variety of investigators to build your team with, each with their own special mechanic.

As this is a Korean game, the English version is a localization, which i found to be pretty good, though not entirely flawless. There are in-game tooltips and an encyclopedia explaining all the special card terms, though they omit some key descriptions like what "overheal" is (helps you restore lost max HP). The roughest part is probably the interface, but don't let that stop you from giving the game a try.

The deck building is fun but it feels like it leans more into building constructed strategies instead of finding random synergies. It's had to explain but i'd say you'd really enjoy this game if your invested in any tcg. also big breasted anime women and MEN.

very very very good game. If you're a fan of roguelite deckbuilders I highly recommend. the story is bat@#$@ crazy but very interesting. gameplay is fun and has got me hooked. if you're on the fence about it, definitely pick it up.

Amazing Rouge like game with amazing story. This is probably the best game with rich story-telling that actually explains why you can play the loop infinitely.

You can play with additional mods that adds more playable characters. The replayability is very high.

Nothing less than an underrated master-piece. Great mix of roguelite card-battler and visual novel, filled with a lot of replayability.

And btw. the best boss battles I had of all the card-battlers I have played!

Finished the main-story in ~45h.

This game is incredibly enjoyable! Easily one of the best games I’ve played in years! Combat and gameplay is easy to understand yet difficult to master. Lots of new characters (decks) to unlock and learn and addictive enough to make me always say “one more level.” I normally don’t ready a lot of storyline stuff but this was one is different. It’s fun and interesting. Sometimes there are large story sections though so I’m glad the Steam Deck can suspend!

Also +10 points for colorblind modes!

Imagine slay the spire with over 20 characters, team building and good story.

Super fun game with nice cast of characters. Each character plays very differently and that makes them so unique. It's always fun to come up with new team compositions. Also, the story is really interesting and engaging, I was caught off guard at how invested I got. Would definitely recommend it to both people who like turn based rpgs and roguelikes.
PS: workshop has plenty of great content and creating mods is not as complicated due to the in game mod editor

This game is awesome! That being said there's a couple things that might initially rub you the wrong way, the first being this weird mechanic, which basically punishes you if you don't heal people quickly, let me explain.

Let's say you have 30 hp and take 10 damage, your standard life bar color is red (this is usually associated with low or empty hp) so that's a little weird, then when you take damage your lost* HP color is green (this is usually associated with full health or good HP standing) so that makes it a little weirder, anyways, if you don't heal that character before they get hit again, then upon next hit (let's say 5hp), then that green lost hp vanishes to empty for that 20 hp you lost previously (the empty hp color is like a checkered grey) so even more strange, and the new 5 hp you just lost turns green, and you actual HP at 15 is red.

Now besides the confusing counter intuitive colors they chose, you fresh lost HP bar (green) gets full heals, meaning if you heal for 10, you get the 10, however if you wait to heal after a 2nd hit, that 10 hp heal will not give the full amount, so healing is nerfed if you wait. I realize that sounds like a mess, and perhaps my explanation makes no sense until you play the game, but i wish i would have had this before i started playing because although they do explain this in the initial tutorial, the color options representing the life bar just really confused me and gave me the feeling that i didn't know what was going on half the time. you're welcome.
The music specially in the later stages is amazing, they basically have 2 versions of every song a mellow and an upbeat version, when you enter combat it seamlessly switches between the mellow to upbeat no matter where you are in the song, and switches back after combat to the mellow, this gives it a real immersion effect.
There's a lot of unlock-able characters , each one has their own cards so replay ability is very high, it took me about 45 hrs to unlock all the characters and get the true ending, i haven't tried hard mode or any of the real challenges yet so that's cool.
The story is.. there, it's long, fleshed out and entertaining, that being said i don't care about story i only care about gameplay, and this has plenty of it. you will have to beat it a few times before anything really happens, the first time it almost feels like nothing is different, and the game just glitched, it's intentional.

This game is CRIMINALLY underrated. Even though I'm not a huge fan of deckbuilder games I enjoyed the gameplay a lot. The way the story is presented is also really clever and makes it stand out much more. And man the OST... it's seriously amazing, both field and battle themes are incredibly good. I seriously can't recommend this game enough, definitely worth trying

Rougelike Deckbuilder with surprisingly good wordbuilding and visual novel style story. Characters are likeable. Story takes many turns with different endings and choices. Props to the in battle special dialogues as well because some of them are very optional but is consistent to the story, especially at the true ending. Only con I would know is that there is no voice for any of the characters. But that's where workshop and mods come to place, there's mods for more characters, QOLs, and voiceovers (only for females now).

Absolutly outstanding card/rpg-roguelite. Uses a lot of cool mechanics not often seen in your typical SlayTheSpireButNotReally#1249 (Death door, big focus on in-combat healing, full hand retain) and mixes them with some amazing boss and encounter design (which feel less like common build-checks and more like some intricate older Megaten fights). Despite the simplicity of the RPG mechanics the overall game captures a mix of satisfying in-run progression and climactic and complex "70 hours into an epic saga"-type bosses that make your blood pump even after you've beaten them many times.

As far as metaprogression goes the game has a typical get credits for killing bosses->unlock stuff at shops loop with some unlocks being gated behind achievements/challenge modes/story progression. Not a bad system but will deffinately take quite a few runs to unlock everything (is is a plus or minus - deppends on personal prefference).

The soundtrack is goated. Studio EIM just can't stop making bangers.

As far as story goes it certainly is a big part of the game. I am quite biased in my love for time loop plots, so i can't really critique it in a way that wouldn't just sound like fanboying (even more so than everything mentioned above). The good news is that cutscenes and dialogues are skippable and mandatory story progression does not require anything beyond just clearing the game (which is what you'd be doing anyway), so anyone who couldn't care less for the story can play it without needing to trudge through a visual novel (tho i still do recommend it a lot). On the other hand if you mostly wanna expirience the story the game does feature an easy mode that let's you respawn at floor start after dying (tho i can't really vouch for how much easier it makes the game).

My main issues with the game are all pretty minor:
A typical run usually takes about 3 hours (without rushing nor afking) which is on the longer side compared to other games in the genre and a bit too long for a single session.
The balancing is not perfect (a character is slightly underpowered here - a boss is somewhat overtuned there).
The artstyle is a bit bland and the game doesn't visually stand out in your memory (the chibi card-art is really cute tho)
Somehow drains laptop battery like it's Cyberpunk on max settings (not sure if it even applies to other people/steam deck users).

Overall this is an amasing roguelite with great gameplay and design, plenty of content and some banging soundtrack and story. A real must try if you like StS-likes or older (-ae Nocturne era SMT) JRPGS or ambitious indie korean story-focused takes on turn-based gameplay (you ow it to yourself to play this if you liked Library of Ruina)

Great gameplay loop but takes a while before you start to enjoy it

- Convoluted mechanics (so much reading)
- Convoluted story (so much reading)

Once u get through the tediousness, it's a great game HOWEVER it's not as polished as STS surely

Story has so much potential going for the meta-sci-fi-mindfuck-vibe but it's kind of just all over the place...they were too ambitious with it

This is an incredible deck builder on the level of Slay the Spire. It has some weaknesses compared to that game. Building decks is a lot less intuitive, the text doesn't always do the best job of explaining what things will do, and it has some unintuitive mechanics like needing to put relics into a relic box for their effect to become active. Runs also take a lot longer, around 3 hours give or take 30 minutes.

But once you get past that increased complexity you're met with a very interesting story, and incredibly fun deck/combo/party building. If you don't bounce off the game right away, I think you'll like it.

The gameplay is fun and all but everyone should play this game for the story. You'll never see a triple A game being able to pull something insanely creative like this off. Getting to the true ending can be quite arduous, but once you've gotten there you've seen something you'll never forget.

The question you're all thinking is: "What does Chrono Ark offer that other games in this genre don't?"

Let me break it down:
- A cast of characters that initially seem shallow and archetypal but rapidly drag you in with narrative arcs that are easy to get emotionally invested in - which given that there are 16 or so characters is honestly pretty impressive.
- Unique mechanics for each character that lend themselves to be used in a variety of ways. You can play a beatstick character as a DoT, a DoT character can be a healer, a healer can use her baseball bat to smite enemies like the fist of an angry god, and all can synergize in ways that you might not expect. No matter what there's enough RNG mitigation (and free deletion of cards from your deck) that you will always end up with the build you want, with only a handful of exceptions due to extreme rarity. Alas, sometimes the stars do not align.
- A surprisingly compelling narrative. Not gonna lie when I first played the game I skipped the intro, fast forwarded through chunks of it, until I started encountering dialogue and cutscenes that got me curious. Then I started over again, from scratch, and while some of the early stuff is a bit dry they kept finding new ways to intrigue me as the campaign progressed, with new developments, twists, and reveals until it finally reaches a climactic finale.
- The music... goes surprisingly hard at times. I usually don't pay attention to the audio in games like these but even lowered in the background I ended up muting other stuff just so I could listen to it. It's subjective, ofc, but it's impressive one the less.
- Pluck. Okay, so maybe this one isn't so tangible, but basically it's pretty clear that they were working with a fairly limited budget - I mean obviously there's no hundreds of millions of dollars pumped into a neat indie game - but they make that money work. Whether it be animatics, simple 3d backgrounds or even little text comments during a fight there's always something charming going on. Something a little "extra" stuffed into every element of the game. As a result you just want to help the developers because they clearly knew what they were doing, at least with the main game.
- Mechanics that force you to adjust your plans. In a lot of these games you just sort of... have the same goal every time you run into a fight. Get max stacks, do a turbo hit, etc. That stuff is still in Chrono Ark, but the bosses and even some regular enemies often interfere with certain tactics so you'll often find yourself having to adapt to situations where your typical strategy might dramatically backfire.
- When you die you aren't necessarily dead. Basically we're going on Darkest Dungeon rules where once you hit the end of your HP you go into negatives and every time you're hit you have a chance to go down. Healers can heal you out of that and get you back up and running, but it also means that sometimes you just get lucky and dodge an incoming attack that should kill you, or have a resilient tank who has just soaked like five deathblows in a row and still isn't giving up. It adds an interesting dynamic to the fight where HP isn't just a hard line - it's a flexible one that sometimes works in your favour.

Now, that's just the stuff that makes it stand out from its competitors. In addition to that it has solid, satisfying combat, extensive lists of cards, relics, and equipment that do everything from making DoT turn into burst damage to making it so you accumulate crit chance/damage and crit chance against you with every attack you make until unleashing it all in one terrifying strike. Sure, mostly it's less awesome stuff, but it's nice that the awesome stuff is there. There are also items that, well, you're going to inevitably learn to use if you want to survive the endgame. Even though your characters can usually heal/use status effects/etc., during a fight, sometimes you need to use an item to have what you need right now rather than waiting to draw it.

So, all that gushing aside, what's the negative?
Well... The DLC.
For how polished and great the core game is - and how much the DLC does add some neat cards and effects - it feels like they haven't quite figured out what they want to do with DLC and sort of extending the life of the game. For the most part the DLC adds relics, new Lucy cards and new animations, along with a new boss that... well, honestly isn't very fun (Beach DLC). I feel like they'd be better served creating a new character, adding new cards to existing characters, adding levels that can replace existing ones (so instead of the carnival you head to, I don't know, a ruined city or something with its own enemies/bosses), and stuff like that. Adding a swimsuit flair to the existing game isn't as fun as actually adding new content to the runs themselves - much as I do love the sex appeal. That said DLC is also entirely optional so it's up to you whether the content is worth buying so that's not really a negative if you just want to enjoy the main game.
- Pressel is spooky AF. I may love her but she's got big serial killer vibes. Lady needs to chill.

All in all Chrono Ark is one of the highest quality games in this niche subgenre of ours and it's clearly got a fair bit of passion put into it. If it looks even remotely interesting I'd strongly recommend giving it a shot.

Chrono Ark is a unique take in the ever increasing roguelike deckbuilder field that leans more to RPG sensibilities. Rather than playing as one character, you pick 4 to form a party from a selection of about 20, and each character has unique cards/styles of fighting that can really change how you approach certain fights. The enemies themselves can get pretty complicated, with bosses becoming elaborate puzzles to figure out rather than straight sacks of hp and damage.

The presentation of the game is stellar, with certain attacks getting super stylish cut-in animations that are always a treat to see. Story is a huge part of the game, and with fantastic music and a solid artstyle you'll want to see where it's going.

A few minor quibbles: Runs can be a bit on the longer side for the casual player like myself (about 2 hours?), which didn't bother me but for some it might be an issue. The difficulty can spike hard at certain fights, but you'll have the tools to get through (think tense, not impossible)

Overall, a solid game, and I'm really looking forward to the team's next project!

Bought this game on Early Access in 2020, played for 2hrs and found it confusing and hard before picking it up last week. Cleared game in normal and unlocked different endings.
The game play is fine - single run is on the slightly long side for rouge game (90mins). Character balance isn't great, for attacking character, there are really strong ones and weak ones.
Storyline is rich but confusing, as the character logic is somewhat flawed, didn't particularly understood phoenix's stance.

Overall good quality art and game play.

A really amazing game, was finally able to get both endings. Waiting for the next dlc to drop.

Although the story is over, I'll still probably play this game a lot because there are still many things to do like unlock things and experiment with the teams.

Cannot say it enough, really wonderful game.

Lots of bugs (especially controller-related bugs), mediocre translation with plenty of typos, and the game is absolutely terrible at explaining crucial mechanics. Sometimes they don't even explain. (wtf is vitality, overheal, etc.) I had to join the discord so I could look up information on some of the mechanics since the game just doesn't explain stuff well or at all.

But the story, music, and gameplay were all really damn good. Bosses were very creative too. I guess all things considered it's a net positive for me.

The three complaints I had at the beginning should be easy to fix, I hope they fix them in a later update.

On the whole, I tentatively recommend this game. However, as this was the first time I played a roguelike game (other than Angband), here are a few points to consider:

- The game consists of "run"s - fighting your way through different stages, defeating enemies and bosses to advance to next stage
- The length of each run is quite short
- Resources are limited, and there is no grinding in each run
- There is a resource that persists between runs, which can be used to buy some permanent upgrades at the start of each run and unlock some items. But the number of permanent upgrades is low
- Some of the later bosses are quite challenging
- There is a "hope mode" which does the following - in normal mode, dying = run ends and you start a new run from scratch; in hope mode, dying = you start the current stage with your current characters and remaining items, with a slight boost (which stacks up if you die again) - useful if you want less of a challenge. Normal / Hope can be selected at the start of a run
- The deckbuilder system I feel creates nice synergy between characters, and the bosses and enemies have their own unique abilities - with this combined with the RNG, despite repeating runs I did not feel like each run was the same.

The gameplay is in my opinion quite good.

I found the story to be average to above average, I guess it did not click with me.