''The Diofield Chronicle'' is a strategy role-playing video game co-developed by

Square Enix is a Japanese Multinational corporation, multinational holding company, production enterprise and entertainment conglomerate, best known for its ''Final Fantasy'', ''Dragon Quest'', ''Star Ocean'' and ''Kingdom Hearts'' role-playing video game ...

and Lancarse. It was released in September 2022 for the

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PlayStation 4 The PlayStation 4 (PS4) is a home video game console developed by Sony Interactive Entertainment. Announced as the successor to the PlayStation 3 in February 2013, it was launched on November 15, 2013, in North America, November 29, 2013 in ...

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Xbox Series X/S The Xbox Series X/S are home video game consoles developed by Microsoft. They were both released on November 10, 2020, as the fourth generation Xbox, succeeding the Xbox One. Along with Sony's PlayStation 5, also released in November 2020, t ...

, and

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platforms.

Gameplay

The game plays as a strategy role-playing video game. It is not tile-based in its movement, like ''

Final Fantasy Tactics is a 1997 tactical role-playing game developed and published by Square (video game company), Square for the PlayStation (console), PlayStation video game console. Released in Japan in June 1997 and in the United States in January 1998 by Sony ...

'', but instead allows for more free directional movement like ''

XCOM ''XCOM'' (originally called ''X-COM'') is a science fiction video game franchise featuring an elite international organization tasked with countering alien invasions of Earth. The series began with the strategy video game '' X-COM: UFO Defense' ...

''. The game features

real-time strategy Real-time strategy (RTS) is a Video game genre, subgenre of strategy video games that do not progress incrementally in turn-based game, turns, but allow all players to play simultaneously, in "real time". By contrast, in Turn-based strategy, turn ...

elements, with the battle system being named the "Real-Time Tactical Battle System", an allusion to the

Active-Time Battle In video games and other games, the passage of time must be handled in a way that players find fair and easy to understand. This is usually done in one of the two ways: real-time and turn-based. Real-time Real-time games have game time progres ...

system. The player controls a party of characters to engage in tactical battles, completing missions such as vanquishing enemies, defending a stronghold, escorting an ally, or capturing points on a map. Similar to ''

Fire Emblem is a fantasy tactical role-playing game franchise developed by Intelligent Systems and published by Nintendo. First produced and published for the Famicom in 1990, the series currently consists of sixteen core entries and five spinoffs. Game ...

'', the viewpoint shifts as the battles themselves play out. The party earns skill points at the end of each mission, which can be used to upgrade different character abilities.

Plot

''The Diofield Chronicle'' takes place on a fictional war-torn continent, where the Kingdom of Alletain sits in the close vicinity of a conflict between the Trovelt-Schoevian Empire and the Rowetale Alliance. When the Empire ends up defeating the Alliance, they turn their attention to Alletain. The game follows the mercenary group related to the Alletain called the "Blue Foxes". The four heads of the group are Andrias Rhondarson, a royal bodyguard who knows ancient sorcery, Fredret Lester, his childhood friend, Iscarion Colchester, an archer and former noble, and Waltaquin Redditch, a mage noblewoman.

Development

The game was first announced on March 9, 2022, as part of

Sony , commonly stylized as SONY, is a Japanese multinational conglomerate corporation headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. As a major technology company, it operates as one of the world's largest manufacturers of consumer and professional ...

's "State of Play" presentations outlining future games coming to their

PlayStation is a video gaming brand that consists of five home video game consoles, two handhelds, a media center, and a smartphone, as well as an online service and multiple magazines. The brand is produced by Sony Interactive Entertainment, a divisi ...

platforms. It was one of two games announced by

at the presentation, alongside '' Valkyrie Elysium''. While the latter was only announced for

, and

, ''The Diofield Chronicle'' was later revealed to additionally be coming to

, and

platforms. The game has character design by Taiki (character designer on

Lord of Vermilion is an arcade-based fantasy collectible card game developed by Think Garage and distributed by Square Enix in which players control combat cards on an arcade play surface. The objective of the game is to destroy the enemy team's Arcana Stones and e ...

series) and also features character art from designer

Isamu Kamikokuryo is a Japanese video game artist who worked at Square Enix until his resignation on March 31, 2017. He is known for his work on the company's role-playing video game series ''Final Fantasy'', for which he designed locations and characters. Amon ...

, who previously did art for ''

Final Fantasy XII is a role-playing video game developed and published by Square Enix. The twelfth main installment of the '' Final Fantasy'' series, it was first released for the PlayStation 2 in 2006. It introduced several innovations to the series: an open ...

'' and ''

Final Fantasy XIII is a role-playing video game developed and published by Square Enix for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 consoles and later for the Microsoft Windows operating system. Released in Japan in December 2009 and international in March 2010, it is the ...

'', and was noted to have an art style similar to ''

Final Fantasy is a Japanese video game, Japanese science fantasy anthology media franchise created by Hironobu Sakaguchi and developed and owned by Square Enix (formerly Square (video game company), Square). The franchise centers on a series of fantasy and ...

'' at times, though the game share no official ties. Square Enix is co-developing the title with Japanese studio Lancarse, who had previously co-developed '' Shin Megami Tensei: Strange Journey'' with

Atlus is a Japanese video game developer, publisher, arcade manufacturer and distribution company based in Tokyo. A subsidiary of Sega, the company is known for video game series such as ''Megami Tensei'', ''Persona'', ''Etrian Odyssey'' and ''Trau ...

. Music is composed by

Ramin Djawadi Ramin Djawadi (, fa, رامین جوادی; born 19 July 1974) is an Iran, Iranian and Germans, German film score, score composer. He is known for his scores for the 2008 Marvel film ''Iron Man (2008 film), Iron Man'' and the HBO series ''Game o ...

and

Brandon Campbell Brandon Campbell is an American music composer for film, TV and video games and is best known for his music contributions to TV series' like '' Game of Thrones'' and '' Person of Interest'' and movies such as '' The Thinning'' and '' The Great Wal ...

, both of which had previously worked on the ''

Game of Thrones ''Game of Thrones'' is an American fantasy drama television series created by David Benioff and D. B. Weiss for HBO. It is an adaptation of ''A Song of Ice and Fire'', a series of fantasy novels by George R. R. Martin, the first ...

'' television series. The game was released worldwide on September 22, 2022, following the release of a demo on August 10.

Reception

''The Diofield Chronicle'' received "mixed or average" reviews for the Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 5 and Windows, and "generally favorable" reviews for the Xbox Series X/S, according to

review aggregator A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews of products and services (such as films, books, video games, software, hardware, and cars). This system stores the reviews and uses them for purposes such as supporting a website where users ...

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that review aggregator, aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted arithmetic mean, weighted average). M ...

. The Nintendo Switch version of ''The Diofield Chronicle'' sold 6,415 physical copies within its first week of release in Japan, making it the eighth bestselling retail game of the week in the country.

Manga adaptation

A manga adaptation by Minori Tsukahara and Ataru Arata began serialization in

's '' Manga UP!'' website and app on September 8, 2022.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Diofield Chronicle 2022 manga 2022 video games Fantasy video games Gangan Comics manga Japanese webcomics, Japanese role-playing video games Manga based on video games Nintendo Switch games PlayStation 4 games PlayStation 5 games Real-time tactics video games Single-player video games Square Enix games Tactical role-playing video games Video games developed in Japan Video games scored by Ramin Djawadi Xbox One games Xbox Series X and Series S games War video games Windows games