The time has come, The game that I praised so much last year has finally released in the West. Did anything change? Do I still praise it? Do you want to look at a bunch of text and pretty pictures? I think the answer to all of those questions are.. Yes… Just keep reading? Or just go down to the bottom and read those last two sections that start in bold.. You could be playing Monster Monpiece right now..

Last year a little known Japanese game hit the vita and it became a bit of a cult hit. The game was called “ 限界凸騎 モンスターモンピース” aka Monster Monpiece. From the view of the outside it looked just like any other pervy Japanese games.. A game most said would never make it to the west because of the content of the game. But then they announced a English release… and everyone.. Just freaked out.. One little Card Battle Game and the gaming community goes on a melt down.. The news of certain cards being edited/censored created a hype for this game that was on a entire new level. ” I don’t support censorship!” was said by one side.. Even though most had never even heard of this game nor seen what cards would be censored.

But the time has come, The game is out.. and I have been playing it for the last week or so.. So lets get on with the show shall we?

Monster Monpiece is a card battler. Yes the game has a story line.. a bit of a generic story line but it does have one.. All you need to know is you have to defeat your enemies.. Yea it has more of a story line then that but again.. The Heart is all in the cards and building up your deck. The more you advance in the world the more chances of getting better cards and money to buy booster packs.. to get better cards.. You also get Rub Points to upgrade those cards.. But I will talk about that later..

So your thinking ” Ok.. Card battles.. Like Magic the Gathering or Hearthstone?”… Well kinda..  You play this game on a grid and your objective is to get your character on the other side to attack your enemies Base/HQ/Castle. Each round you gain 3 Mana. From here on out it kinda does work like other card battle games. You look at your cards.. If you have the mana you can summon it. You pick where you want to place it on your blue spaces and then your turn ends. Only one card can be summoned at a turn.. So no building up mana and putting out 3 or 4 cards at once for you.

As you can see from my bootleg pictures, The top left hand corner of the card is the Mana cost. The bottom left is the attack and the middle is the health. Now you will have more information on some other cards but that is your basic info. Some cards will automatically move up a spot when you summon them. Some can give + affects to all cards or even attack back when hit. All cards auto attack and move every turn.. So your job is just to put your cards out and play.. After you have this little bit of info know you also have to pick up on the different types of cards and classes.

Yep.. Bootleg picture again.. You can not take screen shots in the English release… So bootleg camera shots! But yep that is your 4 Unit types. Also when they are on the board they are these little nendroid looking characters… Don’t expect verity here.. They mostly look the same.. just with a little different clothing.. After that you have different class types like Hybrids, Undead, Demi, Dragon and a bunch more. So if you wanted to stay with a one type in your 40 Card Deck.. You can.. but it is really all up to you and I would suggest just mix and matching. The more variety.. the better and you can also Place a card of the same class on a card on the board and combine them.. but you can only upgrade them once…

Look at the bootleg picture… Lets say if I put a Undead out for the cost of 2 Mana, Well the next turn I can put the other on top of that one and make it a 2/2.. Simple? Got It? Yep you can do this from the start and really pull off some brutal stuff using this method.  This really works wonders with people who do range attacks. But what happens when you get all the way over and attack the castle? Well your character attacks and then is gone.. Then you have to get someone else to attack again.. So once they get into that far right.. The enemy can not do anything to stop them.. So in a way you only have 5 spots to work with.. So using something as a wall on the back space becomes extremely useful.. Or just bottle necking them.

Once you win you can travel to the next spot where you can get a random booster pack/money/fight.. Or you can go to your HQ where you have the option to play online around the world or by local multiplayer. You also have the option to save.. Remember to save because even though it says it is saving after a match.. It only saves your card data.. It does not save your story progress.. I got hit hard by this one time before.. It was not pretty..

Card Gym is where you will spend most of your time when your not in battle. This is where you can make your deck and even upgrade your cards. But be warned you wont be able to upgrade any cards until you get past the first chapter. So you are going to have to use what you got for awhile. Or you can just buy a booster pack if you have the money.. Get you a few cards.. Switch them out..

Organizing your deck is a bit weird at first but you can pick everything up quickly.. and most likely if you have played other card battle games.. You wont have any problem with this.. I do wish they would of included some feature that was a auto best deck builder.. but sadly they did not.. So you will have to do all that work yourself..  You can only have 3 of the same card but if you have upgraded one you can have another set from each upgrade. Hell you can just sort it by Rarity and build that way if you want.. Yes your cards have a Rarity to Common Scale and this over all will give your deck a Grade on what cards you have.

Once you do have the opportunity to rub your cards, You will be able to sort and pick what cards you would like to upgrade. Each card has select point number that it uses to upgrade.. The rarest the card.. the more points it takes.. You can also select how many of the cards you would like to upgrade at once to save you time. When you get into this mini game.. All you have to do is rub the screen and back touch pad together.. Find the heart spots or shock spots and get the meter all the way up.. Simple? Not really.. This can be a pain in both ways.. But I have a solution.. So what do I say you do? Just tap the front screen.. Hunt and peck and you will fill it up in no time.  And then you will get your outcome. Some times it is good.. Some times.. Not so good.. I have seen some cards get major boost and some.. not much at all.

The opinion part of the review?

To me, Not much has changed at all.. Yes a few cards have been edited but it is not that bad and most will never notice. I did notice a few little irks while playing the English release. The soundtrack is a bit repetitive because it is the same track played over and over again.. The Game is Voiced in Japanese only with english text from the start.. Not including DLC.. It wasn’t much of a problem to me but I just like to point it out. The online was insanely brutal from the start.. Yes you can pick regular, beginners or a No DLC allowed area.. But I found so many people that was way over powered on day one.. I seriously think the US/UK Release shares the same server as the Japanese.. So your better off just getting a friend to play or prepare to be destroyed.

The story mode has some length * around 9 chapters or so* and it is pretty deep. With a ton of cards to collect you will have a bunch of play.. Once you are done with this and have a killer deck you can try out the online again with the randoms.

The art works for the game, yes it is a bit pervy at times but what do you expect.. Even MTG has cards that are pervy.. The rub mini game to level up your cards is kinda not needed.. It is funny the first time but I just feel it can be pointless at times specially when you can just buy better booster packs and pull better cards. I do think they could of done a bit better on the variety of  characters for the board but it is nothing that really should bother anyone.

The final Verdict?

Overall I still really like it and I am still happy with my decision of including it in my GOTY list for 2013. If you own a vita.. This needs to be on it ASAP.  I highly suggest it. It is super easy to pick up..but is a challenge to master. For $30 it is a really solid choice.. You should just be playing it now.. Just go buy it.. Rub one out.. Get it out of your system and have a ton of fun.

Monster Monpiece Developed my Compile Hearts and Published by Idea Factory International is out now on the PSN for $29.99.. Go Buy it now!

Disclaimer! The nice people at Idea Factory International gave me a review code to review this for you nice people to read.. It was nice of them. Also if you seen my last review.. I said I jammed my finger at the end of that Disclaimer.. Yep.. Jammed my finger playing this game.. I was rubbing to hard from the back.. Now you know.. Now you Know..