Ever since it’s inception, Digimon has always been some sort of foil or ripoff to Pokémon. But everybody that gave it a chance knew it was its own thing with its own charms. While Digimon games have struggled critically over the years, Digimon Story: Cybersleuth represented a turnaround in 2017. Now, with Time Stranger, Bandai Namco might have something that actually stands up to the best of the Pokémon spinoffs despite some of its rough edges which, interestingly enough, are a result of the times.
You don’t need any Digi-knowledge to have an understanding of Digimon Story: Time Stranger, and you don’t need have to have played any of the gamer either. Being a fan of the source material helps with monster recognition and understanding of the digital world, but it does a solid job of pulling you in whether you know who Agumon is or not. I personally only watched the first two seasons of the anime as a kid in middle school, and I wouldn’t say any of it was necessary to appreciate the game.
In Time Stranger, you play as your choice of a male or female agent of ADAMAS, a secret organization that investigates and resolves anomalous phenomena happening in the world, including mysterious explosions and sightings of outside life. It turns out that these situations are the result of things happening with digital monsters (Digimon) and their parallel world somehow intersecting with earth’s. During an investigation, Tokyo all of a sudden goes through a cataclysmic event, and the protagonist gets pulled eight years into the past, and it’s up to you and the characters you come across to figure out what’s happening.
Hey, I know these guys!
As I continued to play through the game’s campaign, I found out that various plot points were heavily based on Greek mythology. It became a dead giveaway when you actually get to the Digital World and find out it’s called the Iliad. As I began to outline this review, I also learned that “adamas” was Greek for unbreakable, unconquerable, or invincible. All that aside, Greek mythology represents some of the best stories of all-time, so when it comes to the story department, Time Stranger didn’t have many weakness aside from the fact that it does take a while for the important beats to hit and keep things moving.
That’s where the game’s issues begin to really show up. It took like four hours before the title sequence even happened, and it took more than 10 hours of gameplay to get to a point of actual time travel. While the game does have a lot of anime inspirations (that’s what this is, after all), it really could’ve been tighter, but as anime filler does — it’s great for character growth. To say the game is a slow burn would be an understatement, but at the same time, once you get to that point where the time travel plot and mechanics begin to unravel, you get to experience some great payoffs. Unlike the Pokémon games, character progression through the plot actually favors the Digimon. Since they speak English, you can actually relate to them and their emotions, and it brought a smile to my face exploring places in the past, and then seeing the Digimon I helped Digivolve and take on roles that showed actual growth and maturity. The party you’re with, primarily Inori and Aigiomon, really stands out from the actual protagonist, and it was great seeing how their relationship grew. It’s a common thing with most anime, but it doesn’t make sticking through it any less rewarding.
Old anime-style pacing aside, the main issues that prevent Time Stranger from being mentioned alongside the best RPGs of the year is the fact that there aren’t a whole lot of quality of life features that make this feel like it was meant for 2025. Fast travel, for example, exists but you have to jump through all sorts of hoops to make it happen. Once you’ve visited enough places, you have to either find a taxi in the human world, or ride a Digimon in the Digital World, and each of those solutions actually requires you to manually look for them. That should’ve just been a menu item from the start, like in Persona, which oddly enough feels like one of the main inspirations for a lot of Time Stranger‘s gameplay elements.
The (silent) protagonist doesn’t actually do much, but they do have a Skills tree that increases the depth of battles as you continue to play.
Speaking of menus, there are all sorts of them. The main menu alone has six submenus; Digimon–where you manage your combat lineup and Digimon inventory, Mission–where you choose to follow a specific mission or side mission, Digiline which houses every piece of written and spoken dialog if you have to refer back to it, System–where you can save or load and things like that, Item–for your item inventory, and Agent–where you can manage your skills, apparel, and things of that nature. JRPG players expect this kind of stuff, but the lack of organization or even button shortcuts (System is the only one you can bring up without going through the main menu) makes the experience way more cumbersome than it could’ve been. Even typical traversing felt annoying having to press the menu button in order to bring up a map, which ends up overlapping the entire screen instead of just on a corner of the screen.
If you’re able to stomach all of that, there’s a heck of a game here that’s highlighted by its turn-based battle system and monster management tools. Time Stranger employs a CTB combat system, where turns are calculated and listed in order on screen based on every character’s stats happening one after the other. It’s typical turn-based fanfare here as Digimon can either attack physically, guard, or use abilities that have varying forms of effectiveness depending on the type of ability they are and enemy weakness. The good thing is once you’ve beaten any enemy, you have their information and weaknesses logged, so when you inevitably fight them again, the game does show which attacks work best. It’s only a guessing game if you come across a Digimon you’ve never seen before, unlike Pokémon where they just assume you know types.
One cool thing with Time Stranger is there’s no “catching” mechanic. Digimon that have been scanned enough times can be recruited to your lineup, and you can add them to your party for them to gain experience, or leave them at the Digifarm, which feels like a separate meta entirely. The cool thing about all this, depending on who you talk to, is since there’s no “red” or “blue” version to speak of, you don’t have to worry about trading, going to real in-person events, or doing anything unnecessary to build your Digimon dream team. There are over 470 Digimon in the game with more to be added via DLC, but Digimon isn’t really about “catching ’em all,” so it’s all at will.
Yes, that woman in scantily-clad armor is a Digimon.
Early on in the game, thankfully, you’ll have access to this world between worlds, and entry to this place is scattered along convenient places in the story. Here, you’ll be able to do things like buy items, or as mentioned, make use of the Digifarm. The Digifarm is essentially a planet to travel to where you can drop off your Digimon and have them train or change up their personality, which is probably the main reason anybody uses it. Outside of that, it’s really just a place to kind of turn your Digimon into virtual pets while giving you the ability to customize the Digifarm planet to your liking, since building and customizing content is so in demand these days.
The Digifarm itself is pretty cool, though I didn’t spend too much time on it because I was just more concerned with getting through the campaign and rolling credits. Getting through the game’s campaign shouldn’t take more than maybe 30 hours, which is actually much shorter than the previous game, but I also felt like there was still a lot of padding to even get to that hour count. As I mentioned, the first few hours of the game feel like they take forever, and it’s mostly because most of your time is spent exploring an underground sewer that wasn’t interesting. The game also kind of insists that you do its sidequests and again, they have their payoffs, but with fast travel being so archaic, they also felt like padding which affected the pacing in an unideal way.
To wrap this all up, Digimon Story: Time Stranger is a very good game. In fact, this is the route that I’ve hoped the single player Pokémon spinoffs (like Pokémon Legends) went as far as both storytelling and its slightly more complex monster-taming system. Not to mention it looks absolutely fantastic (it looks and plays like a dream on Steam Deck) and has a plot that isn’t the typical one you’ll see out of a children’s anime game. I just wish its overall feel was more streamlined; the story takes too long to get going, the fast travel is archaic, and there are too many menus to scroll through. Fans won’t mind getting used to all that, but with so many great options in the genre available, you would think a game about time travel would do better getting with the times.
Ever since it’s inception, Digimon has always been some sort of foil or ripoff to Pokémon. But everybody that gave it a chance knew it was its own thing with its own charms. While Digimon games have struggled critically over…
Ever since it’s inception, Digimon has always been some sort of foil or ripoff to Pokémon. But everybody that gave it a chance knew it was its own thing with its own charms. While Digimon games have struggled critically over the years, Digimon Story: Cybersleuth represented a turnaround in 2017. Now, with Time Stranger, Bandai Namco might have something that actually stands up to the best of the Pokémon spinoffs despite some of its rough edges which, interestingly enough, are a result of the times.
You don’t need any Digi-knowledge to have an understanding of Digimon Story: Time Stranger, and you don’t need have to have played any of the gamer either. Being a fan of the source material helps with monster recognition and understanding of the digital world, but it does a solid job of pulling you in whether you know who Agumon is or not. I personally only watched the first two seasons of the anime as a kid in middle school, and I wouldn’t say any of it was necessary to appreciate the game.
In Time Stranger, you play as your choice of a male or female agent of ADAMAS, a secret organization that investigates and resolves anomalous phenomena happening in the world, including mysterious explosions and sightings of outside life. It turns out that these situations are the result of things happening with digital monsters (Digimon) and their parallel world somehow intersecting with earth’s. During an investigation, Tokyo all of a sudden goes through a cataclysmic event, and the protagonist gets pulled eight years into the past, and it’s up to you and the characters you come across to figure out what’s happening.
Hey, I know these guys!
As I continued to play through the game’s campaign, I found out that various plot points were heavily based on Greek mythology. It became a dead giveaway when you actually get to the Digital World and find out it’s called the Iliad. As I began to outline this review, I also learned that “adamas” was Greek for unbreakable, unconquerable, or invincible. All that aside, Greek mythology represents some of the best stories of all-time, so when it comes to the story department, Time Stranger didn’t have many weakness aside from the fact that it does take a while for the important beats to hit and keep things moving.
That’s where the game’s issues begin to really show up. It took like four hours before the title sequence even happened, and it took more than 10 hours of gameplay to get to a point of actual time travel. While the game does have a lot of anime inspirations (that’s what this is, after all), it really could’ve been tighter, but as anime filler does — it’s great for character growth. To say the game is a slow burn would be an understatement, but at the same time, once you get to that point where the time travel plot and mechanics begin to unravel, you get to experience some great payoffs. Unlike the Pokémon games, character progression through the plot actually favors the Digimon. Since they speak English, you can actually relate to them and their emotions, and it brought a smile to my face exploring places in the past, and then seeing the Digimon I helped Digivolve and take on roles that showed actual growth and maturity. The party you’re with, primarily Inori and Aigiomon, really stands out from the actual protagonist, and it was great seeing how their relationship grew. It’s a common thing with most anime, but it doesn’t make sticking through it any less rewarding.
Old anime-style pacing aside, the main issues that prevent Time Stranger from being mentioned alongside the best RPGs of the year is the fact that there aren’t a whole lot of quality of life features that make this feel like it was meant for 2025. Fast travel, for example, exists but you have to jump through all sorts of hoops to make it happen. Once you’ve visited enough places, you have to either find a taxi in the human world, or ride a Digimon in the Digital World, and each of those solutions actually requires you to manually look for them. That should’ve just been a menu item from the start, like in Persona, which oddly enough feels like one of the main inspirations for a lot of Time Stranger‘s gameplay elements.
The (silent) protagonist doesn’t actually do much, but they do have a Skills tree that increases the depth of battles as you continue to play.
Speaking of menus, there are all sorts of them. The main menu alone has six submenus; Digimon–where you manage your combat lineup and Digimon inventory, Mission–where you choose to follow a specific mission or side mission, Digiline which houses every piece of written and spoken dialog if you have to refer back to it, System–where you can save or load and things like that, Item–for your item inventory, and Agent–where you can manage your skills, apparel, and things of that nature. JRPG players expect this kind of stuff, but the lack of organization or even button shortcuts (System is the only one you can bring up without going through the main menu) makes the experience way more cumbersome than it could’ve been. Even typical traversing felt annoying having to press the menu button in order to bring up a map, which ends up overlapping the entire screen instead of just on a corner of the screen.
If you’re able to stomach all of that, there’s a heck of a game here that’s highlighted by its turn-based battle system and monster management tools. Time Stranger employs a CTB combat system, where turns are calculated and listed in order on screen based on every character’s stats happening one after the other. It’s typical turn-based fanfare here as Digimon can either attack physically, guard, or use abilities that have varying forms of effectiveness depending on the type of ability they are and enemy weakness. The good thing is once you’ve beaten any enemy, you have their information and weaknesses logged, so when you inevitably fight them again, the game does show which attacks work best. It’s only a guessing game if you come across a Digimon you’ve never seen before, unlike Pokémon where they just assume you know types.
One cool thing with Time Stranger is there’s no “catching” mechanic. Digimon that have been scanned enough times can be recruited to your lineup, and you can add them to your party for them to gain experience, or leave them at the Digifarm, which feels like a separate meta entirely. The cool thing about all this, depending on who you talk to, is since there’s no “red” or “blue” version to speak of, you don’t have to worry about trading, going to real in-person events, or doing anything unnecessary to build your Digimon dream team. There are over 470 Digimon in the game with more to be added via DLC, but Digimon isn’t really about “catching ’em all,” so it’s all at will.
Yes, that woman in scantily-clad armor is a Digimon.
Early on in the game, thankfully, you’ll have access to this world between worlds, and entry to this place is scattered along convenient places in the story. Here, you’ll be able to do things like buy items, or as mentioned, make use of the Digifarm. The Digifarm is essentially a planet to travel to where you can drop off your Digimon and have them train or change up their personality, which is probably the main reason anybody uses it. Outside of that, it’s really just a place to kind of turn your Digimon into virtual pets while giving you the ability to customize the Digifarm planet to your liking, since building and customizing content is so in demand these days.
The Digifarm itself is pretty cool, though I didn’t spend too much time on it because I was just more concerned with getting through the campaign and rolling credits. Getting through the game’s campaign shouldn’t take more than maybe 30 hours, which is actually much shorter than the previous game, but I also felt like there was still a lot of padding to even get to that hour count. As I mentioned, the first few hours of the game feel like they take forever, and it’s mostly because most of your time is spent exploring an underground sewer that wasn’t interesting. The game also kind of insists that you do its sidequests and again, they have their payoffs, but with fast travel being so archaic, they also felt like padding which affected the pacing in an unideal way.
To wrap this all up, Digimon Story: Time Stranger is a very good game. In fact, this is the route that I’ve hoped the single player Pokémon spinoffs (like Pokémon Legends) went as far as both storytelling and its slightly more complex monster-taming system. Not to mention it looks absolutely fantastic (it looks and plays like a dream on Steam Deck) and has a plot that isn’t the typical one you’ll see out of a children’s anime game. I just wish its overall feel was more streamlined; the story takes too long to get going, the fast travel is archaic, and there are too many menus to scroll through. Fans won’t mind getting used to all that, but with so many great options in the genre available, you would think a game about time travel would do better getting with the times.
by Danreb Victorio
