Review | Beast of Reincarnation

A beastly review

Beast of Reincarnation is an action role-playing game developed by Game Freak and published by Fictions. You might've heard about Pokémon games? This is their very much different attempt, and considering they have, like, an unlimited budget, a lot is to be expected. It is best described as a "one-person, one-dog action role-playing game," and it was released on August 4, 2026, for PlayStation 5, Windows, and Xbox Series X/S.

Now, how was the launch? Well, on my PS5 Pro in the Enhanced Pro preset, which works like balanced mode, it works quite OK. There are some hiccups here and there, but considering the game often looks like a PS3 game, I've expected an experience without heavy motion blur and at least responsive commands. What we've got here is a game that requires, like, a year of polishing and changes to make it a great one, but I doubt anyone will care at that point anymore.

When you enter the first area and start using clunky controls, when you see the world... I doubt any of you will be thrilled

Story and the characters

This will be quick...

The game is set in Japan in the year 4026, and the story follows Emma the Sealer and her dog Koo as they navigate a post-apocalyptic land ruined by corruption. Emma contains blight powers that can manipulate plants to traverse and fight enemies. Her companion is a stray dog known as Koo, as they work together to free post-apocalyptic Japan from a corrupted creature that has blighted the natural world. I've seen the comparison with Studio Ghibli works such as Princess Mononoke, but I just don't see it here.

When it comes to the overall plot and the characters, I can't remember a game with a more shallow crew, no charisma whatsoever. The whole game is traveling with Koo and a few other characters in your ship, while navigating through around 10 semi-open-world maps. It's the same stuff throughout the whole game, and that wouldn't be an issue if there were something to cling onto. But the way the story is being told is boring, it has pacing issues, the characters are lifeless... There is nothing except the awesome music, similar to the NieR games, but this as well is limited to only a couple of tracks, with one of them being the main theme for every map you traverse. Even the bits in the ship where you get to bond with the crew are pointless and boring.

It feels really unpolished and like AA quality, which I don't mind, but this is just plain bad and boring. I liked the ending, though.

The good thing is that the equipment... It doesn't matter, and it's not a good thing

Game design, exploration

Like mentioned, you get to explore semi-open-world areas, collect treasures (armors, weapons, upgrade points), and complete quests. There is not much in terms of quests and lore, but the exploration was fun, if you ask me. The emphasis is on the verticality, and by holding the jump button after a jump, you kind of double jump, although the vines carry you in the air. It's somewhat weird, and you feel like you'll not reach what's in front of you, but exploring worlds in this manner is really refreshing.

The problem is that the world feels empty, ugly, uninspired. It's a mash of green areas combined with facility-type structures that are falling apart, as well as the deteriorated buildings all over the place. I don't mind all of this, but after half of the game, you will have almost everything you use upgraded, so the rest of the game becomes pointlessly bloated 10 hours that feels unfinished and untested properly.

Boss battles are mostly fun, but in the above-mentioned 10 hours, you get to redo them, and it really feels like a chore that you need to finish to see the ending. I don't even know how they mean to patch this up, it's a broken game design on the grand scale, so, good luck to them.

Even though everything feels so clunky, I was having fun reaching high areas and possibly hidden ones. Too bad it's not important at all.

Combat

Combat feels like Stellar Blade and Sekiro, and in a weird, fun way. The problem is that the moveset of each enemy type feels the same. Even boss fights have slight variation when they start the combo. I had my share of fun somehow, the combat feels juicy, the parry (deflect) is satisfying, but you know, having to battle like 6+ enemies through the whole game is just lacking.

Another major issue is the camera, man oh man, how it changes direction when you jump and you have the enemy in focus (lock on). Boss fights are against mostly big creatures, and the camera is off the charts. The bull boss is probably the worst one, although the birds get pretty close. I do like the moveset that you can use, and the ability system is the only system in the game that works, where you can actually develop the skill tree as you see fit. But every enemy has the same moves, so everything feels a bit pointless.

Armors don't change visually (which would be neat to have), but weapons do - the problem is, the weapons have almost exactly the same stats even when upgraded, so the only difference is the visual one, plus some elemental perks.

I did like using Koo's attacks, which stop the time and feel like Final Fantasy combat (Remake and Rebirth), but it also feels underutilized. Everything feels shallow and unfinished in this game, and the worst thing is that every inspiration that this game took feels mediocre at best.

Grow crops to expand your stats when eating the dish for the first time? Sure, but it doesn't even matter.

Side Content

Side content is basically upgrading weapons, collecting crops and eating dishes, plus learning skills with your companion. You get to search for ingredients and spend time learning the recipes you find, but at the end of the day, nothing feels important. It's advisable to bond with Koo so it gets more skill slots, but you can do even without that.

I feel like they just added stuff to expand the playtime, and all of that doesn't matter. I really dislike when something makes no sense. There are like 100 recipes, and eating raises your stats for the first time when you eat that dish, but that's it. The gems you can find and equip on Emma also don't matter much, so, what's the point? Everything feels pointless, especially this part in the ship, which should, I guess, serve as a relaxing point and for bonding.

There are higher difficulties and NG+, but I doubt they can fix all of the bad stuff in, like, a year, so I don't really see myself playing the game again. It was somehow still a fun experience, but with many, many flaws.

Some locations are cool, and almost all of them are fun to explore. But the rewards usually don't matter, especially when you're upgraded and you still have 10 hours of the game left.

Conclusion

Beast of Reincarnation is an unfinished game with really fun exploration and decent combat that kind of grows on you. I was not bored in my 35h of gameplay time (although you can do it in 20-25), but I constantly felt like this game needs more development time. It would fit in 10 hours easily, without all the bloat, but they wanted to prolong the game, so they've just added more maps and recycled boss fights.

The combat is enjoyable, the verticality in exploration is refreshing, and there are moments where you can see the game it could have been with more time and care. That’s probably what makes Beast of Reincarnation so frustrating. There is a good game buried underneath all the half-baked ideas and unnecessary padding.

And the good thing is that the game is not full price, but the bad is that it's not worth the current full price tag. Companies should finish their game before the release, what is the point if they change the game in a year, what should we who've played it at launch then think and do? And considering the Pokémon Company has so much money, and they do this... Disappointing, to say the least.