Digimon, Digital Monsters

This entry marks a huge leap forwards packed with improvements, flair, and production value but also a few questionable design choices that hold it back from true greatness.

From the moment you boot it up, you can tell Time Stranger is a huge improvement on previous entries such as Cyberslueth and Hackers Memory.

Fully voiced cutscenes, expressive character animations, and even Digimon shouting their move names adds a ton of charm. (If Digimon can manage hundreds of voiced attack lines, surely Pokémon can spring for some voice acting when it’s just the pokemons names right?)

The graphics are a massive step up everything from the overworld to the dungeons to the attack animations shows real love and care. Finally getting to explore a new version of the digital world is a major leap forwards from the bland floating corridors of previous games.

The open areas here are genuinely fun to traverse, especially since you can ride most Digimon around them. There are light traversal puzzles sprinkled in, nothing mind-blowing, but just enough to keep things engaging and allow you to interact with some of the local digimon in a better way.

The hub village is another highlight: bustling with life, full of animated characters, and brimming with that nostalgic “Digital World come to life” feeling fans have always wanted.

Time to Digivolve

Collecting and raising Digimon remains the heart of the experience, and it’s still as addictive as ever. Watching your partners evolve into iconic forms like Greymon or Garurumon, with their new high-quality models and move animations, is pure dopamine.

There’s a satisfying sense of discovery as you unlock new lines and experiment with builds. It’s clear this is still the soul of the series, and Time Stranger nails that loop beautifully. Unlocking all the possible combinations, DNA digivolutions and seeing the outcome is where the game shines most.

Combat & Gameplay

The combat plays like a “Persona-lite” turn-based system. It’s smooth, strategic enough to be interesting, but rarely challenging on Normal difficulty. The bosses offer some fun set pieces, though they could use more depth.

One thing I find myself asking out loud though is; can a game have too many quality-of-life features?

Auto-battle is great for grinding in the open world, but at times, it makes the game feel like it’s playing itself. On Normal, it’s practically cruise control; on harder difficulties, you’ll probably turn it off, which might make traversal feel tedious instead.

It’s a nice option to have, but it does undercut the satisfaction of combat, easily the weakest (but still fun) part of the game. I’ll definitely be trying New Game+ on a higher difficulty to see if that fixes the balance.

Not to say that the core gameplay is bad as I do really enjoy the loop of battles -> evolving -> Battles -> evolving. But it is the portion of the game which has seen the least improvement.

The Digifarm Dilemma

Oddly, where the game needed more convenience…the Digifarm, is missing it entirely.

You can’t see your Digimon’s evolution requirements while they’re training there, which means pulling them out, checking stats, and putting them back in… repeatedly.

To make matters worse, Digimon attitudes can shift during training, changing which stats they need to evolve, so you might train them perfectly, only to find the goalposts have moved. It’s a frustrating, unnecessary loop that clashes with the otherwise streamlined experience. It seems a really bizarre choice and hopefully its rectified in a patch.

Agency Ranks

Evolutions are now tied to your Agency Rank, which rises as you complete missions and side quests. It’s technically a way to gate progress and stop you from unlocking higher tiers of evolution early. Sounds good in theory but in practice I find it drags out the mid-game. I was stuck on Ultimate tier evolutions for a bit too long where the evolution dopamine had all dried up and I ended up with a huge backlog to evolve when I did finally hit mega. 

If you don’t complete enough side missions, you’ll fall behind and risk locking yourself out of higher-tier evolutions. Miss too many quests, and you could even lose access to Mega+ Digivolutions entirely. That’s exactly what happened to me, and the game’s misleading “finish the final fight first” message didn’t help as it lead me to believe i would return to free roam after the final boss. This was not the case..

Story & Characters

The story is a genuine highlight. It’s got more depth and emotion than past games, with standout characters like the Bearmon brothers, who have surprisingly well-developed arcs. The sidequests are enjoyable and add to the story. The main story is very well written and has a few twists and turns that you don’t expect. It all gels together to create a really good ecosystem of meaningful, rewarding quests,

The writing feels more confident, and the world-building has that Digimon charm seeing the friends you make progress through the game is a real highlight and it culminates with a brilliant ending that I won’t spoil.

Final Thoughts & Score

Digimon Story: Time Stranger is a huge step forward for the franchise, visually stunning, brimming with charm, and full of smart ideas. But it’s also held back by a few clunky systems and a battle system that could use a bit of an upgrade and some more strategic meat.

I love that the series is leaning toward a Persona/SMT-style direction. The foundation is here for a true Digidestined RPG, with school life in the real world and adventures in the Digital World.

Despite the flaws I have mentioned it’s worth noting none of it lessened my enthusiasm and I still had over 70 hours of genuine fun, which says it all.

Final Score: 78/100

A lovingly made evolution of the series, stylish, heartfelt, and deeply enjoyable. Maybe just a few tweaks away from becoming the definitive Digimon RPG.

Pros

• Massive leap in graphics, animation, and production quality
  
• Fully voiced cutscenes and Digimon attack calls add real personality
  
• Open world and traversal are fun and lively
  
• Great story with memorable characters (Bearmon brothers!)
  
• Deep and addictive Digimon raising system
  
• Tons of QoL features make grinding and exploring smoother
  

Cons

• Combat can feel too automated and shallow on Normal difficulty
  
• Digifarm management is clunky and frustrating
  
• Evolution gating and side quest lockouts slow pacing
  
• Missable content tied to confusing progression messages