Nexomon: Extinction, developed by VEWO Interactive and distributed by PQube, on PC, PlayStation 4, Xbox One and Nintendo Switch is the sequel to Nexomon, a title released a few years ago for mobile devices. Nexomon: Extinction is a return to classic monster trap games, complete with a new story, more peculiar characters, and more than 300 exclusive Nexomons that we must capture and tame.
The sory
The Tyrant, a very powerful group of Nexomon led by their ruler Ominicron, began to threaten life on the planet. For this reason, a brave group of humans, known as the Tamers, opposed their king and defeated him. It's been 1,000 years since Omnicron's fall, but unfortunately this threat is far from over and only meant the beginning of the end. Without a leader, the tyrants began to fight for the throne. In this war, which has been going on for years and has destroyed everything in its path, humans have been involved. Now the world is on the verge of extinction. Our adventure begins in an orphanage where our protagonist lives and our goal is to get our first Nexomon (there are 9 available to choose from) so that we can join a group of Tamers whose premise is to ensure peace in the several cities known as the Guild. Therefore, for the whole adventure on the one hand we will be immersed in the war between the different Tyrant and in the clashes between our team and a group of people known as the Forsaken, who fight alongside the Tyrant and destroy everything.
As you can see, this is an epic adventure to restore balance before all hope is lost. It should be noted that the story is very interesting and contains moments of humor, moments of tension and even interesting twists. But of course I will not reveal it to you, as the grace of all this is that you discover it for yourself as you advance on this magnificent adventure. Nexomon: Extinction is an RPG that never hides that it is inspired by one of the most successful sagas in the world of video games: Pokémon. However, this does not mean that it does not have its own characteristics, being a title with its own personality and where we will have to take into account different aspects and use different strategies if we want to be able to advance in the plot. The first thing to note is that despite its good looks, this is not a simple title, in which we can advance quickly, as we will have to invest time in capturing, training and obtaining certain items to make our task easier. In our team we can carry a maximum of 6 Nexomons, which can be of 9 different types (normal, water, fire, plant, wind, electric, mineral, psychic and ghost) while fighting they gain experience points and when the experience bar is at most, you level up. This makes them get stronger and they can also learn new moves. Furthermore, some of them when they reach a certain level can evolve.
Each Nexomon can have up to a maximum of 4 moves and if they want to learn a new one, we have to replace it with another one they already have. We can also use different items during the fights. In this sense it is very similar to Pokémon, but at the same time Nexomon: Extinction has important differences that make it stand out from this saga. For each Nexomon there are two bars available. The first is green and indicates its life and the second is yellow and indicates its endurance. This second bar runs out as we perform the different attacks and it is important to never lose sight of it, since once empty, although it will recharge a bit, during that turn we will be exposed to enemy attacks. It should also be noted that we will lose a turn every time we change Nexomon or if our creature is weakened.
In this title we have no objects to be able to teach our Nexomons new movements, but we do have tools that we can equip to increase the attack, defense, stamina or experience gained, among other parameters. These tools can be obtained by talking to characters, completing missions or creating them in a laboratory. In the latter case, to do this we will need splinters. To get the fragments we will need a pickaxe (which we can get at the beginning of our adventure). With it we can break up the different minerals that we find both along the paths and in the different caves we visit (they regenerate over time). These fragments can be sold in stores to get money, but it is recommended not to, as it is more interesting to use them in crafting. We can also use them to create NexoTramps.
Gameplay and more
Nexotramps are the objects with which we capture the Nexomon and, like them, they can be of different types (water, fire, wind, plant, rock, etc.), depending on the type of fragments we use. This is another big difference from Pokémon and is that to be successful when it comes to capturing the Nexomons, we need to look at the capture opportunity that the screen gives us. Undoubtedly one of the goals of the game is to try to get all the Nexomons and we have a total of 381, which is not bad. Once captured we can give them a Nickname (if we want), include them in our team or send them to the warehouse. In this title the creatures do not appear in the world, but we can find them in two different ways.
The most common will be in the herbs of the different routes, outside the towns and cities. In them we will only have to watch those that move (they change every few seconds) and when we touch them they will appear in front of us. The other is through casual encounters within certain buildings, caverns and caves. Of course we will also have the option of escaping if we don't care about facing the Nexomones that appear, or because we already have them and we don't care about catching them, because we don't care about fighting them or we have our team very weakened. For the latter case, we will find a building in each city where we can quickly heal all our Nexomons, as well as access the warehouse and select one of those we have previously captured to incorporate them into our team. There will also be typical shops where we could buy everything.
Obviously one of the fundamental pillars of this title are the fights. Many will be mandatory to advance the storyline, but others will be optional although it is advisable to do them to train our Nexomons. To know if a character wants to fight, it's as simple as noticing if he has the symbol of two crossed swords on his head. If so, it means they want to fight and like Pokémon, if they see us pass by them they will challenge us to a battle. Above all, once defeated, after a while, we will be able to challenge them again and their creatures will have become stronger, making it always interesting to fight against them again. Most will be found on the different routes connecting the cities. As we progress through the story, our character will rank up within the Guild. Another fundamental pillar is exploration. The game features an open world, albeit divided into several medium-sized sections that we can explore however we want from the start. This means that we can go to places that for history we should not go, but of course it will not always be recommended, as the Nexomons may appear with too high a level for our team or simply places blocked, because we need a key or because it It is necessary to possess certain skills that our protagonist will acquire during the adventure.
Last but not least, I would like to point out that Nexomon: Extinction features humorous dialogues. In most cases, the responsible is Coco, a cat boy who will accompany us throughout our adventure and who undoubtedly is the protagonist of many of the funniest moments in the game with his comments (our character is mute). The characters do not hide comments such as "the developers of this game must have a limited budget" or "we are inside a Nintendo Switch or PS4", thus breaking the so-called fourth wall.
As you have seen in the various videos of the title and in the images that have been shared in recent months, Nexomon: Extinction has never stood out for being a technical marvel, and of course it is not. Its graphics section is very simple, reminiscent in many respects of titles for mobile devices. However, that doesn't mean it's ugly - quite the opposite. This is thanks to its beautiful 2D art design, which makes it a very colorful and attractive title. The characters, scenarios and fights are well animated and all the movements look very good, as well as the different environments we will visit: forests, arid deserts, a frozen tundra, etc. Each route, town and city is very well represented and makes us want to explore every corner. As for the designs of the different creatures, as usual in any game of the genre, there are designs of all kinds. Some are rather poor and uninspired, while others are just awesome. There are also some that will inevitably remind us of some Pokémon. However, whether or not we like a Nexomon more or less will depend on each player's tastes. The title comes in perfect Italian and lasts about 15 hours in terms of the main story. As always, this section will depend a lot on whether we stop to explore or fight or, conversely, move on.
Our verdict
Nexomon: Extinction stands out for being a breath of fresh air within RPGs, featuring a fascinating artistic design, a beautiful story loaded with epic moments and humor, many side missions and a large open world to explore with multitude of secrets to discover. Therefore, if the proposal appeals to you, it is a highly recommended title, as entertainment and fun are guaranteed also because the budget price is around 19.99 euros.
Vote 8,5/10