As outlined in a new overview trailer, Marona is separated from Ash and meets Apricot, a Phantom, on a new island. The latter’s father is a legendary pirate, and she’s keen on his whereabouts. By teaming with Apricot, Marona looks to reunite with Ash while bringing the legendary pirate crew back together to defeat the ghost fleet.

Confine returns from the first game and allows for confining Phantoms to objects for use in battle. Depending on the item, they may inherit unique properties and stats. However, there’s also Confire, where Phantoms merged with cannons can unleash powerful attacks. You can even use other gadgets like giant fans. Marona can also merge with Phantoms using Confriend, gaining a new form and powers to turn the tide.

The trailer also confirms features like random dungeons, side quests, letters and pirate ship customization, which we’ll likely learn about in the coming months. Phantom Brave: The Lost Hero launches in 2025 for PS4, PS5 and Nintendo Switch, with the PC version out later in the same year.

Marona and Ash return, and once again, the former can speak to, recruit and Confine Phantoms to different objects for use in battle. It allows for unleashing different abilities depending on the object, like cannon shots, giant gusts of wind, etc. A new feature, Confriend, sees Marona fusing with a Phantom for new powers.

The newest addition to the cast is Apricot, a girl with a pirate hat and jacket who seeks a reunion with her father. Marona can fuse with Apricot to take on some of her abilities, though what those are remains to be seen. Unlike the first title, Phantom Brave: The Lost Hero is fully 3D, like the contemporary Disgaea games. Stay tuned for more details on its release in the coming months.

The Legend of Heroes: Trails from Zero and its sequel The Legend of Heroes: Trails to Azure have both launched in the West in recent months, but in Japan, both games in the Crossbell arc have been available only on the PS4 up till now.

On August 31, however, Nippon Ichi Software will be launching both games for the Nintendo Switch as well, so those looking to continue their journey in Falcom’s long-running saga on Nintendo’s platform will soon be able to do just that. Check out brief new trailers for both releases below.

Also make sure to read our reviews for both The Legend of Heroes: Trails from Zero and The Legend of Heroes: Trails to Azure.

Set in the Hinomoto realm, the story focuses on Fuji, the samurai and otaku Pirilika, who must battle against a corrupt regime. There are over 40 classes (including new ones like Zombie Maiden, Maiko, and Bandit), online ranked battles, an improved auto-battle system, and brand-new mechanics like Jumbification and Hell Mode. Jumbification sees a character growing to a giant size and inflicting massive damage.

Along with the Standard Edition, a Deluxe Edition will be available, which includes the game, the digital soundtrack and a digital art book. There’s also a limited edition available to pre-order from the NIS America Online Store for $158.99 for PS4, PS5 and Nintendo Switch. It includes “The Art of War” hardcover art book, a steelbook, the Deluxe Edition, the “Songs of Honor” two-disc original soundtrack, the “Netherworld Warriors” yunomi teacup, a mini Byoubu art display, and a collector’s box.

The demo contains everything from the beginning to the second chapter. It’s possible to transfer save data when the game is out, though it’s unknown whether there are other benefits to playing it. Given how one can make an account on Nintendo Switch and access Japan’s eShop, it’s a good way for anyone to try out Disgaea 7 before its release.

Disgaea 7 is out on January 26th in Japan. It stars the ronin Fuji and Piririka, an otaku, as they deal with the trials inherent in the Hinomoto Netherworld Cluster. Along with various Netherworlds to explore and 45 generic characters, there’s the new Dodeka MAX system for turning characters into giants to wipe out several enemies simultaneously.

A release date for North America and Europe hasn’t been announced, so stay tuned for more details in the coming months.

Taking place in the Hinomoto Netherworld Cluster based on Japanese culture, it focuses on ronin Fuji and otaku Piririka. Hinomoto is impoverished, invaders are at the gates, and the Ooedo Shogunate is corrupt, so there’s a lot to deal with. Other characters include Ao, who claims to be Fuji’s daughter; Wey-yasu, an incompetent Shogun; Seefour, a thief and explosives enthusiast; the “humanoid weapon” Suisen, who can also see the future; and much more.

Interestingly, Hinomoto is composed of numerous Netherworlds including the Onsen Netherworld with evil spirits in its hot springs, Sardine Netherworld with an enormous space sardine, and Shikoku Netherworld with a massive whirlpool. Though everyone previously followed the laws of Bushido, the arrival of admiral Opener has resulted in “Hinomoto Destroy Hatto” laws, which are pretty repressive, to say the least (read: no love, no friendship, oppress the weak, etc.).

A new combat system has also been added with Dodeka MAX which causes characters to become giants. It allows for defeating multiple enemies at once and opening large treasure chests. Be careful – your enemies can use it as well. Character reincarnation returns, but items can also reincarnate to strengthen them. Some effects include swords that heal when eaten or slippers that can be turned into staffs.

Along with seven weapon types and skills, there will also be 45 generic characters, the most in the series’ history. Another first is the addition of Ranked Battles for playing PvP online (with stages seemingly rotating weekly). Features introduced in Disgaea 6: Defiance of Destiny like Auto Battles and even having characters fight through stages that have already been cleared using Masoline. You can also set up character AI using the new Machine Edit feature.

A Western release date hasn’t been announced yet, so stay tuned for more details. Check out the official Japanese website here in the meantime.

As its name might imply, Disgaea 6 Complete is a release version of Disgaea 6 that includes every DLC that has been released for the original Switch release so far. This includes all of the bonus characters and their missions, as well as extra colour schemes for characters, and other goodies.

Disgaea 6 Complete‘s story revolves around a zombie named Zed, who is on a quest to defeat the strongest God of Destruction the series has seen. Aiding him are a zombie dog named Cerberus, a host of wacky sidekicks, and the Super Reincarnation ability, which makes him reincarnate every time he dies, only stronger.

For more details on Disgaea 6 Complete, check out our full review.

Disgaea 6 Complete is no different in this regard: the numbers go up. They have to. It’s the basis for the entire franchise. Out of all the games in the franchise so far, Disgaea 6 Complete makes its “big numbers” the most blatant “big numbers” of all. Just going through the first fight will give your characters enough experience points to level up several times, and it just keeps going from there. This is all in service of Disgaea 6 Complete’s big new gimmick: Super Reincarnation. Before I get to that, however, let’s take a quick look at the story, just so that all the nonsensical words I throw out start having some semblance of meaning.

"Out of all the games in the franchise so far, Disgaea 6 Complete makes its “big numbers” the most blatant “big numbers” of all. Just going through the first fight will give your characters enough experience points to level up several times, and it just keeps going from there."

Much like all other Disgaea games, Disgaea 6 Complete focuses on a God of Destruction. This time around, the God of Destruction is said to be the strongest one that the franchise has ever seen, and our protagonist—a lowly zombie named Zed—has taken it upon himself to kill him. Despite just being a zombie—or rather, thanks to the fact that he is just a zombie—Zed has the uncanny ability to just never die. Instead, death causes him to undergo Super Reincarnation. In story terms, this means that Zed ends up stronger every time he dies. In gameplay terms, Super Reincarnation allows you to reset Zed to level 1, all while keeping all of his techniques and stats gained by leveling up previously.

Considering just how much fun Disgaea stories end up being, I’m hesitant to say much more about Disgaea 6 Complete’s story. It’s a lot of fun, and the writing is as clever as it has ever been. The first few minutes alone were enough to make me chuckle a number of times, from just breaking the fourth wall by mentioning enemy levels, to conversations with Cerberus, it’s all pretty funny. Thankfully it’s not just all jokes all the time. Disgaea 6 Complete also has serious moments and character motivations where the comedy takes a back seat.

Now, with that out of the way, let’s talk about the ‘game’ part. Like I said earlier, Disgaea 6 Complete, more than any of its predecessors, is all about making numbers go up. The level cap for every character is 99 million, and you’re encouraged to hit that level cap multiple times on the same characters through Super Reincarnation. Every single item has its own randomised dungeon that you can enter to grab special buffs that can then be applied to other items you own. Disgaea 6 Complete is truly a dream come true for every min-maxer out there. I’ve always loved the Disgaea franchise for this kind of nonsense, and Disgaea 6 Complete does not disappoint in that aspect.

"With its switch to 3D, Disgaea 6 Complete has a lot of the charm in presentation that its predecessors—and especially Disgaea 5 Complete—had. The character models are all pretty low in the polygon count department, and while that can often lend itself to great art styles, Disgaea 6 Complete fumbles in its execution."

Super Reincarnation is an interesting mechanic. It essentially acts as a level reset, but depending on the type of Super Reincarnation you choose, it has the potential to make your character much stronger at level 1 than they were at level 9000. Not only does it allow you to keep your leveled up stats and abilities, it also has the potential to give you more stat points to raise. It sounds pretty stupid on the surface, but Super Reincarnation is actually a clever way of throwing in something like the “Prestige Level” system from a Call of Duty game into an RPG while having a reasonable in-universe explanation for it. Super Reincarnation is encouraged, and should constantly be something you strive to do for all of your characters. The real puzzle is figuring out the right time to do it.

That’s not to say it’s perfect. With its switch to 3D, Disgaea 6 Complete has a lot of the charm in presentation that its predecessors—and especially Disgaea 5 Complete—had. The character models are all pretty low in the polygon count department, and while that can often lend itself to great art styles, Disgaea 6 Complete fumbles in its execution. Something about its 3D character models just feels off in the way they animate, and I much prefer the high quality 2D sprites from earlier Disgaea games. Ultimately, you can see that this is the same problem we had with the original release of Disgaea 6 on the Nintendo Switch, but thankfully, the PS5 version of Disgaea 6 Complete didn’t suffer the performance and frame rate issues of the original Switch release.

Let’s talk about DLC, because ultimately, that’s Disgaea 6 Complete’s main selling point over its original release. Disgaea 6 Complete packs in all of the DLC that the game got since its original release on the Nintendo Switch. This means that in true Disgaea fashion, just about every major protagonist from previous games will be available to add to your party, be it Adell and Rozalin from Disgaea 2, or Killia and Usalia from Disgaea 5, they’re all here. The only catch is that to add them to your party, you have to partake in a special fight that will likely test your tactical capabilities. Considering the absurdity of the Super Reincarnation system, however, it becomes surprisingly easy to take on these special characters relatively early on, and even out-leveling them is a real possibility. It is somewhat disappointing to see the protagonist of Disgaea 2 go down in 2 hits.

"Our other major problem with Disgaea 6’s original release also still exists: the number of possible character classes for additional party members is considerably lower than its predecessors, giving build variety a major hit."

Our other major problem with Disgaea 6’s original release also still exists: the number of possible character classes for additional party members is considerably lower than its predecessors, giving build variety a major hit. Classes for both humanoid characters as well as monster characters have been severely cut down. Sure, it doesn’t hurt the absurdity of Disgaea 6 Complete’s game balance, but I personally found it a lot of fun to figure out how to use some of the goofier character classes. It’s sad to see that I can’t make an entire party out of nothing but Maids and Wrestlers anymore.

So… does Disgaea 6 Complete’s inclusion of the DLC content make the game any better than its original release? Not particularly. The absurdity is still there, so that’s still good. The DLC doesn’t really do much to remedy other issues, however, like the downgrade in art style with the shift to 3D, or the rather lacking options in character classes. Despite all of this, Disgaea 6 Complete is still a good time. The writing’s genuinely funny at times, Super Reincarnation is a clever mechanic that makes level grinding less of a chore and more of a minor puzzle to solve, and most importantly, the numbers go up, and they can go up higher than ever before.

This game was reviewed on PS5.

This is mainly due to strong sales of Disgaea 6: Defiance of Destiny, which launched last year for the Nintendo Switch in North America and Europe. Repeat sales for past titles in the series also helped. Nihon Falcom titles, which NIS America published, did well with Ys 9: Monstrum Nox contributing to its profit growth.

The company is currently forecasting net sales of 6,378 million yen ($49,883,466) for fiscal year 2023, which closes on March 31st, 2023. However, it’s projecting final profit to be down by 26.5 percent year-on-year at 935 million yen ($7,312,800). It currently has Disgaea 6: Complete coming to PS4, PS5 and PC in June while The Legend of Heroes: Trails from Zero launches in September for the West on PS4, Nintendo Switch and PC.

Currently available for Nintendo Switch in the West, Disgaea 6: Defiance of Destiny is the first fully 3D entry in the series. Its story is about a zombie named Zed who embarks on a journey to take down the God of Destruction, using Super Reincarnation to enhance his strength. Various new features are also introduced like a level cap of 99,999,999 along with auto battles.

One can also use Retry and Replay to tackle tough fights again. For more details on Disgaea 6: Defiance of Destiny, check out our review here for more details.