Ever since Idea Factory/Compile Heart started to publish their own games through Idea Factory International,they’ve been pumping out tons of games, some of which are new IPs in addition to the Neptuina series. One such game is Trillion God of Destruction for the Vita and PC.
Bad is the new good
End of days story- With a title like Trillion God of Destruction, you would think that the story would be about either a hero fighting off an evil god or a war between the forces of good and evil, right? Well wrong, sort of. See the story takes place in the Netherworld, where the hero is actually the Demon King Zeabolos. One day Trillion appears out of nowhere and starts to trash his way through the Netherworld. Zeabolos, along with his brother Astaroth the Demon Lord of melancholy, attempt to defeat Trillion but fail massivly. Astaroth is killed and Zeabolos is on the verge of death when he is saved by strange girl named Faust. She proposes a deal with Zeabolos that she will help defeat Trillion in exchange for his life. Zeabolos agrees and is brought back to life, abit with a few replacement parts. He calls upon the six underlords of the Netherworld to help combat Trillion. Now what makes this story pretty interesting is that usually these end of days scenarios usually happen to the good guys and heroes. You rarely see villains get their home trash by a bigger bad and see their side of the story. In Trillion we get to villains get to taste a bit of their own medicine and see that when they are not waging war on the forces of good, that they are just normal people just like us. Except evil.
Sinfully interesting cast- Even though you are cast in the role of Zebelos, you actually don’t use him in battles and dungeon exploration. That honor goes to the six sinfully moe underlords. What’s really cool about the girls is that they are representations of the deadly sins and their character design matches their sin perfectly. However don’t get too attach to your favorite girl as there is a high chance that she will die during her battle with Trillion. Fear not, there’s always new game plus.
Mix of gameplay genres- Like most IF/Complie Heart titles, Trillion has a mix of various gameplay genres/features built into the game. At the core of it is a Visual Novel/dating sim, as there is a ton of story, dialogue, and you get very close to each of the six underlords during their training. This leads into the training sim/rougelike aspects of the game. Here’s the break down on the two: In order to fight against Trillion you must train the chosen girl. To do that you have to train and raise one of several attributes that the girls have. If you need weapons, items, money or additional XP, you can head into a dungeon and gather said items. Be careful though, if you happen to die in the dungeon, not only you get a penalty when facing Trillion but you also lose any loot that you may have picked up. Finally you can test your abilities in a mock battle with a dummy Trillion. Here you can test out any stratagies that you may have, see how up to snuff the girl battling Trillion is and get a feel for combat.
New game plus/multiple endings- Once you’ve beaten Trillion and your love to your favorite girl, its the end right? But then you start to wonder, “What if I would have went another girl? What would have happened?” Well wonder not as once you finish the game, new game plus opens up and allows you to go through the game again, with stats carried over. This encourages multiple playthroughs as there are multiple endings for each girl.
Just one of those days
Constant time/stat management- Now unlike other turn based RPGs, you can’t just power level one character to beat Trillion. You have use all six girls in order to take him down. Which means you have to use your time wisely in order to power up your chosen girl as much as you can. However with each action you take is a count down to Trillion waking up. For example having your girl rest takes up time, training take up time, going into the dungeon take up time and etc etc. You have to manage your time strictly as you can or risk on your girl getting some time of debuff. Time management wouldn’t be as annoying as it is if it wasn’t for the following…
Stat increases are random- When training the girls, there is a section that lets you power up a specific attribute stat or stats. Each girl has a specific group of stats that they are strong in, so its up to you to decide where should they level up. Instead of tallying experience earned in the dungeon or adding on any multipliers that get added if there are other girls on that stat, the numbers are random each time. This annoying very quickly due to the fact that you have limited stamina and you do not want to over work the girl since there is a time limit.
Trillion: God of Destruction is one of the stranger JRPGs from Idea Factory/Compile in terms of story and gameplay. However its in that strangeness that give the game its charm. It nice to see that even villains can also have random evil god beings crash their home and try to destroy their lands. The mixing of sim, visual novel, dungeon crawling and turn based RPG elements spiced up gameplay and made things more tactical. However the fact that you have to manage both what stats your girls will level up in with what activities to do before the day is up can be daunting. Not to mention that even when you level up a stat, that number is randomized each time. Regardless, Trillion was a fun blast to play through and with new games plus you can get to know all of the girls.
