Card En Ciel Review (Nintendo Switch OLED)

by Jim Smale · Published October 21, 2024 · Updated October 7, 2024

Card En Ciel Review, In the world of the “full-dive” VR game Rust Tactics, characters from other video games have started to appear, complete with wills of their own. When a member of the dev team, Ancie, reaches out for help, “Gaming Chair Detective” Neon springs into action to solve the mystery in the digital world. Venture through the games turned into dungeons, encounter heroes and heroines, make friends, and save the gaming world!

Card En Ciel Review Pros:

Decent anime-like graphics.
3.1GB download size.
English or Japanese voice choice.
You can remap the controls.
Still art cutscenes with pop-up speech bubbles and voice.
The log button lets you re-read or see the conversations so far.
You can skip through the interactions and conversations.
Opening and ongoing tutorial pop-ups that also contain a video that can be put in fullscreen.
Card battler gameplay.
You have a set amount of power and each card has a power cost so you have to manage how you spend the power.
Combat is turn-based.
Easy to get into initially.
At the end of a round, you top up your hand by how many cards you played.
You can end your turn whenever you want even if you have power and playable cards.
Cards are used for attacks but also for defense and moving.
Each card will show a power cost if applicable and a move icon. The red part of the icon shows where you will move on the board when played.
Dungeons carry the roguelike DNA as you get a random deck and have to find better cards, decode tokens help with permanent unlocks.
Daily dungeon quests.
Fast pace to it all from the loading times to the combat.
Every time you enter a new dungeon your full deck of cards gets reset every time.
When not fighting you will be in dungeons in a third-person view, you can see a map and travel around as you like or can.
Full deck management system and you can view individual cards and abilities.
Each dungeon will have its own set of additional rules and difficulties of matches.
If you see enemy timers then you have that many actions before they can attack you instantly.
When in the dungeons you can see enemies walking around and coming into contact with them triggers a battle.
You and the enemy can summon characters with your cards and they are still with you until defeated or when you finish the dungeon.
At the end of battles, you can choose a reward card from a random set of three cards.
It’s not always a simple one-on-one fight every time.
Find treasure chests for bonus rewards instantly.
When in combat you see where the enemy will be attacking next turn.
A lot of strategy is needed.
Your health is the same throughout the dungeon so if you lose some health it’s still gone on the next fight.
You can banish and trash unwanted cards.
Muses are made aware by their singing, they have negative effects on ally units in range. Once defeated you can recruit them to your side.
Fast loading times.
It’s very quick to get you into the action and introduces new mechanics at a steady pace so as to not overwhelm you.
Dungeons and fights all take place on grids.
Special skills are where you basically power up a card but do so right under the card unusable afterward.
Muses are passive for you so it won’t take up deck space, each Muse has a unique song attached to them and that plays when they are in your team.
When a Muses power triggers it allows you to play a special skill without ruining the card.
You can find cards that will upgrade or change current cards.
Break cards can be played to lower enemy attack power.
Cheat code attributes are rare and powerful as these add an effect to all cards with the same name.
Unlock the ability to play PvP online.
Breakdown is an effect you can dish out that gives you a power cost back and renders your enemy unable to move or act for one round.
A subjugation bonus is where you clear out all enemies in an area and can choose to heal.
Each card is also a character in that they will talk throughout the dungeon crawling.
Enemies can respawn in already cleared areas.
You can Reroll reward cards.
Playing a special skill triggers a cutscene but you can skip it.
Enemies can throw trash and bad cards into your hand.
Yellow cards can be used with other cards to negate attacks and damage.
Once it all clicks the game is very satisfying to play.
End of dungeon breakdown showing rank (determined by amount of turns) and score (more score means more decode tokens).
Decide tokens are used to permanently increase the chances of certain card types appearing, more health, etc.

Card En Ciel Review Cons:

There is a lot to take in overall as it feels like it’s always got something new to tell you.
Takes a while for the cards to change up enough that you feel like you are seeing new cards and abilities.
You do need to try and remember what all the icons mean.
I wish you could highlight any part of a card to get a breakdown of what it all means.
Surprising an enemy in a dungeon doesn’t give any bonus like first strike or bonus damage etc.
The music is sometimes an acquired taste.
I found the English dub to be lackluster compared to the excited upbeat Japanese version.
It does get annoying when your character keeps repeating the same bits of dialogue over and over when in the dungeon.
Your cards also repeat lines way too often.
No auto scroll or skip for the longer interactions.
You cannot save when you want so you never know when you are actually saving.
The daily and PvP modes are locked away.