DEMO-lition Derby: A Review Of The Demos For XenoFeels and Echoes of Aincrad

Hello everyone, and welcome to the latest edition of DEMO-lition Derby with me, ZombiePie. For those unaware, in this feature I check out a handful of game demos publicly available on Steam and discuss whether they provide a positive or negative outlook for the main game they're trying to hype up, and muse about specific groups of people who should consider checking out the demos in question. For each entry, I'll break down the game in general while also discussing the demo's scope and any noticeable stumbling points. This time around, I'll be checking out two games rather than my normally promised three because I went a tad bit harder than expected with one of the entries in this feature. The games I'll be discussing are:

• XenoFeels

Also, there are minor spoilers for both of the entries in this article. Nothing in this article goes into the specifics of the games in question that should be considered major spoilers.

And if you missed last week's edition of this feature, here's a handy link just in case:

• DEMO-lition Derby: A Review Of The Demos For Culdcept The First, Pixel Washer, Hack '95, & About Fishing

XenoFeels

What is it?

XenoFeels is another friendly reminder that Papers, Please clones are still a thing. The premise this time around is that you are the sole guard at an outerspace or interstellar checkpoint leading to a planet, and the vehicles, occupants, and documents you will need to review all have a sci-fi or alien-related bent. And much like Papers, Please, XenoFeels starts fairly simple, with you only needing to check the physical appearance of those that come to your gate before you also need to check people's licenses, vehicle registrations, and the make and models of their spaceships. Also like Papers, Please, XenoFeels is structured around days wherein you complete sessions in a day-to-day format, where after completing a half dozen or so checks, you get a break where the game provides a little bit of storytelling you may or may not have picked up with your interactions with the people that graced the checkpoint you worked at. However, XenoFeels diverges from Papers, Please in that a single error boots you back to the start of a day or a checkpoint, rather than deducting a point or giving you a strike and letting you carry on with your day. Likewise, the game features voice acting from the aliens who cross your border post. While their comments and quips are almost always referential and humorous, they also provide a bit of worldbuilding that is later explored in the cutscenes that follow every mission.

And if there's one hilarious throughline about this game and its participation in the June 2027 edition of Steam's Next Fest event, it's this. After the demo for XenoFeels went slightly viral and more people saw the game's bawdy humor play out, especially its "spicy" cutscenes, the Steam community, being the degenerates and pranksters they tend to be, decided to tag the game with the "Hentai" and "Sexual Content" labels. This action briefly locked the game and its developer into Steam's R18 category, and Steam's failure to do its due diligence in maintaining standards with its own tagging system resulted in the developer publicly begging the community to reverse the tags and try to correct the record that the game did NOT have explicit sexual content. While there are plenty of sophomoric sensibilities in XenoFeels, there's nothing in it that should be interpreted as overtly "pornographic." The big gag about the boss slowly taking off her clothes culminates in a twist near the end of the demo that suggests a more sinister pivot rather than a sensual one. Nonetheless, it ended up being another eye-rolling example of Steam's community tagging system being a mess, with its complete lack of reliable moderation being one of the dumber changes to the marketplace in our lifetime.

What's in the demo?

The demo showcases what I assume is the main game's first "act." During the demo, you learn of the basic responsibilities of operating the checkpoint from an assistant that usually introduces the new mechanic or gimmick of the day before your main task starts. Each day takes about 10 to 15 minutes to complete, depending on how vulnerable you are to analysis paralysis. If you tend to be overly cautious in games of this sort, then the days might go longer than my estimate, but there's some good news if that's a worry for you. At least based on the demo, there doesn't seem to be a timer to XenoFeels, and that aforementioned assistant even makes the point at the start of every day that you should err on the side of caution. The challenges aren't too imposing, and unlike in Papers, Please, you don't need to worry about your performance affecting your final wage. Lacking Papers, Please's oppressive nature, the game coasts on vibes and risqué humor, which it really ratchets up by the end of the demo. By that point, you'll have already seen the cutscenes in which a far-off higher-ranking officer, through a television screen, fawns over your accomplishments as they shed off a new layer of their clothing. However, right when you think you're about to be treated to a strip-tease, you find your shoebox-like studio apartment covered in demonic symbols, which signals a hard tonal pivot. Is this another fourth-wall-breaking affair like Inscryption, where the game possibly changes its genre, or a clearer-cut example of XenoFeels harboring a darker undercurrent, like the game it's clearly pulling inspiration from? As of now, the jury is still out, and only time will tell. But I should note that right before that twist, the game gave me an alien to check that was an overt reference to Rick and Morty.

Nonetheless, the bigger conversation about XenoFeels is one I have brought up before in discussions of previous Papers, Please clones. And it's a fairly direct question to raise: is it morally responsible to make a Papers, Please clone? Especially if your game is a more mechanics-focused affair with only fleeting surface-level trolley problem dilemmas at best; is it okay for these sorts of rips to exist? There's a brief hint at the end that XenoFeels possibly understands what the core purpose and message of Papers, Please was when things finally go quiet and get spooky, but I have a hard time giving the game its due when just before that I had two days where I saw characters that were clear references to Futurama, Family Guy, and Rick and Morty. Last year's Static Dread: The Lighthouse did a largely respectable job of taking the gameplay structure and format of Papers, Please while also putting its own twist and maintaining its tone throughout. Its only stumbling block is that it tries to be more of a traditional game, with different gameplay hooks and a difficulty curve aligned with orthodox game design principles. As you may recall, when things feel impossible in Papers, Please and you dread that you won't get a mission done, that's the whole point, and you know that; none of these rips seem to understand that concept, though. And while I'm no prude and do think this game has a sense of style, the stripping police captain at the end of every chapter is just too much and is actively off-putting, even if it is in service of a plot development we don't yet know the full details of.

Will I buy the full game when it's released?

Maybe, but I'm erring on the side of "probably not." There's no doubt that the production values of XenoFeels really carry a simple premise far. When a new alien or android approaches your checkpoint, you do tend to find yourself listening to their little speeches about why they want to go to the planet you're assigned to protect. Some of these interactions are zany and downright surreal, and I digged that. Nonetheless, I honestly have my doubts about how long this game can maintain its simple premise for more than one or two hours unless it completely shakes things up following its hard twist at the end. By the time you reach the end of the demo and you're checking the make and models of spaceships along with ID cards and license plates, things felt more annoying than anything else. So, unless the game completely pulls the rug from underneath you, I don't know if I actually want to see how things look and feel while you're going down a checklist of eight or nine things with every person that graces your station.

Echoes of Aincrad

What is it?

HOT DAMN, Sword Art Online is back, but this time, Bandai Namco came out swinging! Or, that's at least what they wanted you to think when this game was first revealed. When Echoes of Aincrad was first announced, one of the first things they said was that the game, taking place in SAO's Aincrad story arc, would employ an actual version of the "death game" wherein if your character died in-game, that playthrough was entirely over, and your save data would be deleted. Say what you will about SAO being the blandest, most nothing light novel sci-fi fluff, but that's the sort of bonkers gimmick that got me to at least bat an eye. Then when I found out the game was ditching venerable anime shit boy, Kirito, in favor of you being a rando trying to slum it while the actual Aincrad death game was in full effect, I was even more interested. To me, it seemed like the game was going to do some interesting worldbuilding like Star Trek's Lower Decks. Like, what are lower-level players just getting their feet wet doing when this shit goes down while other people are being dicks and going full Battle Royale? I wanted to know the answer to that question. And to be honest, I thought the game looked reasonably good in the trailers during Summer Games Fest, and with Aincrad showing some Bamco soulslike ARPG grit, I was thinking it would at least shape up to be more than B-tier anime game slop. Now, I was clearly wrong, but hear me out: there was a time when this game looked cool and neat at least on paper.

Back to basics, Echoes of Aincrad is an action role-playing game with some soulslike trappings. There's an Estus Flask equivalent, and you're capped on how many times you can use them unless you rest your character at a safe zone. There's a crafting system that requires you to use raw materials as well as a way to synthesize and merge low-tier weapons into higher-tier ones to add buffs and additional levels to the latter. In the demo, you only have one AI companion that permanently tags along with you, and you can level up his main weapon. However, two secondary temporary companions tag along with you as well, and all of these AI companions are genuinely helpful in combat to the point where they're almost too good. You have special moves that are tied to which weapon type you're using, and you gain additional ones as you become more proficient at using those weapons. These special moves can inflict debuffs on enemies or positive buffs on you, and there are ways for you to do moves with your companions. There's even a very basic command system that lets you direct their AI protocols and behaviors. The parry has a fairly generous window outside of the bosses, and the dodge mechanic is incredibly easy to pull off as well. By the time you reach the end of the demo, there are more difficult encounters that require you to observe specific attack patterns as well as consider your location in a combat area. I will note that, during the entire demo, I died once, and it was against an electricity-themed mini-boss who did a big AOE attack before the final dungeon in the demo.

What's in the demo?

So, the demo is the entire prologue of the main game, which is an odd choice for several reasons. First, you aren't able to customize your character's avatar and instead play most of the demo wearing the same basic starting armor and equipment until you complete the first mission. There are no character creation tools to play around with, even though there is one when you start chapter one in the real game. Second, the possible equipment and items you can craft when you're in the hub town are seriously curtailed to only the most bare essentials, and blueprints for better equipment are locked behind random treasure chests found in the combat areas. And third, the variety of environments and enemies isn't the best. The dungeon at the very start has about four to five enemy types excluding the boss, and that doesn't get all that much better as you progress to the open world environments where most of the demo takes place, as well as the final dungeon, which rather insultingly recycles the same enemies you have already seen before but with palette swaps that signal they have more HP and hit harder. Also, that death game variant is something you have to unlock and enable AFTER the prologue, so you can't even get a taste of Aincrad's most audacious creative choice in the demo, even if there are narrative reasons for that to be the case. The one positive thing to note about this demo is that it is long. If you have any doubts about whether this is in your wheelhouse, the demo will certainly settle that.

It's worth noting that this demo runs like dogshit. It's fine when you're in the underground dungeons where all you need to do is move forward in narrow linear corridors, but when you reach the part where you complete missions in an open-world environment, the demo runs like absolute shit. Now, from what I have gleaned from fellow Giant Bomb user valorianendymion, the full release runs noticeably better than the demo. However, there are still some hitches in the open-world environments even there. The game feel is also off in Echoes of Aincrad. The crafting system is a cluttered mess even by Bamco standards. With you needing to worry about over a half-dozen weapon types, your crafting and synthesis possibilities become way too overwhelming, and most of what you experience in the demo feels too incremental for your interaction there ever to feel like it is worth your time. The way the game displays stat differences is nice and user-friendly, but there are too many numbers to process, and if you thought Team Ninja ARPGs/soulslikes had too much loot trash and junk, then buckle up, because it's a million times worse in this game! Every step you take when you're in one of the combat arenas is littered with foliage, cairns, or tumbleweeds that end up being raw crafting materials. Oddly enough, the game is highly restrictive on the amount of items, especially healing items, you can take into combat sessions, which undermines the whole purpose of interacting with the crafting mechanic in the first place. Also, there are so many optional treasure chests across all environments that it is dizzying. And because the setting is Aincrad, there's no magic; this is a sword-and-board world where you are stuck using martial abilities and just that.

The gameplay is simple enough, with you having the expected dodge and parry in games of this sort. However, and this is all too common in Bamco ARPGs, dodging is far easier than parrying and equally effective, so I ended up doing that 90% of the time. However, Aincrad isn't my first ARPG soulslike rodeo, so I can't help but wonder if there will come a point when the game starts throwing encounters that force me to start parrying. Otherwise, while there are some trickier bosses near the end of the demo, the combat is completely mindless, with you rarely needing to use any of the more complex moves in your repertoire. For hours upon hours, you're pretty much fine mashing away on the most basic attacks and having your AI companions, who are shockingly competent in combat, pick up the slack. I will note I played the game on the default difficulty and had to double-check because I felt like I had enabled the game's easy difficulty or "adventure mode." Worse, the combat doesn't feel great. You see the same kill animations with every finishing blow, which gets tiresome real quick. Furthermore, the lack of enemy variety really adds to how much of a slog everything feels by the end. The final dungeon is completely procedurally generated, which the game notes is a recurring mechanic in certain areas, and it's the worst part of the demo, bar none. In that environment, the already useless minimap is even less helpful, and you end up running around in circles more often than you'd like.

When it comes to the story and characters, your mileage is going to come down to your feelings about Sword Art Online. Sure, Kirito isn't here to grace us with his awkward romance with Asuna and weird relationship with his cousin-sister. But make no mistake, this is still Sword Art Online, so there's still anime bullshitery to be had. Your party members fill the typical anime trope roles. There's a data-driven rogue, and she's a cat-girl. Your first real companion is the brash, muscular best-friend type who lets their emotions get the better of them. Near the end of the demo, there's an androgynous femboy twink that may or may not be played by a girl, and everyone loves him because he's an all-star player near the top of the leaderboard. And each time you have adventures with these characters, the story always ends on the same goddamn note. Whoever it is, they come to you grateful they got to play with your character, say they normally don't play with other people, and would be really appreciative if you accepted their friend request. Every single time there's a cutscene, the game hammers away about the power of friendship and how co-operation is the best way to survive in Aincrad. Now, remember, the demo takes place during a prologue which the characters reveal is the beta release of Aincrad, so no one knows they're about to get trapped in a death game. But, fuck me man, this game bludgeons you over the head with its simplicity just like mainline Sword Art Online does, and I just don't know if I can stomach that anymore. The voice acting is genre- and context-appropriate, but the script is atrocious, with plenty of unintentionally hilarious lines. If you can't tell already, I think this demo is FUCKING AWFUL, and I'm shocked the people at Bandai Namco approved it for public release.

Will I buy the full game when it's released?

No! Personally, I look at Sword Art Online objectively. There's no denying that for a solid two-year period, while the shonen genre was in flux and transitioning from "the big three" (i.e., Naruto, Bleach, and One Piece) to the popular works of recent memory (i.e., My Hero Academia, Jujutsu Kaisen, and Demon Slayer), it was the most watched anime in the world and its popularity genuinely broke the dam that got people outside of Japan to give light novels a shot. It was an interstigial transitional work before the anime industry righted itself and got to where it is today, but make no mistake, Sword Art Online was huge. Which is why it continues to perplex me that SAO's video games always seem to tap out at the "fiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiine" level, with a consistently sad habit of bottoming out in the Blight Club-worthy category; I'm looking at you, Lost Song and Hollow Fragment. And even if you're in the mood for a mindless ARPG set in the world of SAO, consider how Bamco has opted to monetize this game. This starts at $70, with the launch-window DLC costing about $55 as of this article's publication. The "Ultimate" version of this game costs $110. They've priced Echoes of Aincrad as if it's comparable in quality to GTA VI, even though there are times, at least in the demo, when it looks like an Xbox One/PS4 game. This next point might come as a shocker, but I don't think Aincrad is a compelling value proposition for most people.

If there's one takeaway that does warm my heart, it's that this type of B-tier anime tie-in game isn't dead. Twenty-five years ago we got an anime tie-in game on PS2, Xbox, or GameCube every other week, and while most of them were terrible, at least they weren't all gacha-slop or Fortnite guest appearances. People keep telling me that anime is more mainstream today than it ever has been. So, where's my shitty 3D platformers or bad Pokémon variants based on anime IPs?! Now all we get are mid-to-mediocre arena fighters from CyberConnect2 and flashy anime fighters from Arc System. If anime is so big, why is it that games based on anime are only allowed to be one of two possible genres? Remember when we got a .hack JRPG every year? Man, those were the fucking days! So, while I don't find Echoes of Aincrad to be an especially compelling value proposition, let alone a good video game, I appreciate the fact that it's at least something outside of the mold anime-based video games have consistently been locked into being.