The beginning of the Black Rock Shooter franchise is quite peculiar because it was never planned and was born out of “coincidence”. It all started in Pixiv at the hand of the Japanese freelancer illustrator huke in December 2007, after the publication of his masterpiece, the original illustration of his star character: Black Rock Shooter. This illustration ended up inspiring a song of the same name, written by Ryo from Supercell, and performed by Hatsune Miku. Its growing fame gave way to a whole franchise, an anime series, and now a mobile game!
Developed by G2 Studios and published by Good Smile Company, the core gameplay of Black Rock Shooter Fragment is similar to a classic tower defense game. Players will control a team composed of six units to defeat waves of enemies while making use of their skills and combat styles to accommodate strategies for the battle. Each unit can be moved to a new position, without spending costs, and can be placed anywhere on the field, adding elements of real-time tactics gameplay.
Before you dive into the global version of Black Rock Shooter Fragment, which is planned for a spring 2023 release, check out our game review to see what this game has to offer and who knows, it may help you make a better decision!
▍1000 Stories Dwelling in Those Blue Eyes
Black Rock Shooter Fragment story takes place in a post-apocalyptic world and at each moment the setting always remains with marked dark tones. Honoring everything that the franchise is, the plot begins by telling us how in the mid-22nd century, the Innocent Cloud, an information life form, suddenly appeared on the network.
After taking over everything from factories, power plants, and public transport systems to military weapons, it began to attack humanity with overwhelming power. The use of a highly lethal viral weapon has made the situation even worse. Humanity, which had lost its advanced information and communication network, was separated and spread across the world.
Eventually, humanity began to fight back, making use of older and less electronic weapons. A team of virus-immune warriors called “Synthetics” was also developed to fight Innocent Cloud. Without the necessary resources and with no way to contact others across the planet, the long and drawn-out war came to a stalemate.
The player is involved from the start within the plot at the very beginning of Black Rock Shooter Fragment. Set in the year 2209, the player is injected with an antivirus vaccine and leads a group of synthetic soldiers called Bunny1, as a commander to invade the enemy’s facility. There, you see an amnesiac black-haired girl connected to a huge machine with eyes that glow like flames.
A new weapon goes out of control, and you are transported along with the girl to an unknown space. This is the beginning of a long journey of battles that involve several…. “worlds”.
The plot of Black Rock Shooter Fragment is original but does not connect, at least for the moment, with any other project in the franchise. It is also set in an alternate universe to Black Rock Shooter Dawn Fall, as announced by the game’s official Twitter account after the game’s first revealed in December 2021.
▍A Satisfying Fusion of Tower Defense x Real-Time Tactics
Many times, something simple at first glance can hide a great level of strategy to explore. Let’s take a look at what Black Rock Shooter Fragment has to offer.
In battle, the player will control a team of six units. You can use 1 support from another player as well, for a bit of a co-op game feeling.
Moving one of your units is as simple as clicking on it and dragging it to its new position, while you have them selected you will see their attack range in yellow. As soon as an enemy enters its range of action, your units will automatically attack it with their basic attacks.
This simple and particular element brings great excitement to every battle, and will surely keep you alert to the movements of each opponent as a simple oversight in the field can cause one of your lonely or misplaced units to fall easily.
Enemies also have their own attack range, being shorter for the weaker ones and much wider for the stronger ones, although this varies according to their type. This adds an interesting level of strategy, making us think carefully about different formations to face different challenges.
The key to victory is in the use of the “Kill Zone,” which is formed when the attack range of your vanguard units (Medium and Short Range) overlaps with that of your rearguard units (Long Range). These zones are identified with blue color on the map at all times, allowing you to clearly identify the areas where several of your units will attack at the same time. When attacking an enemy within these zones, your units’ Death Zone Ability will be activated, which is unique to each unit and has different effects and fit their battle roles perfectly.
A common element in strategy games is the use of special abilities, something that could not be missing in Black Rock Shooter Fragment. In addition, we can also make use of the “Kill Ability”, which is a powerful trump card that allows you to activate said ability for all your units. It’s a mechanic that players would find similarity in almost every game that includes strategy in its gameplay.
The focus of Black Rock Shooter Fragment is on the use of all the different types of skills. In fact, each unit has a kit of abilities that helps them perfectly fulfill their role in battle. It can be a plus if you are the kind of player who loves to take care of every little detail in order to perfect your strategy.
However, when each unit is designed to fulfill a specific role, it limits your options in team-building. Missing one of the roles would make your team impossible to overcome a certain fight, or on the other hand, end up investing all your resources in one particular team.
Too much of something can get tiring, that’s why Black Rock Shooter Fragment offers us different game modes, with different victory conditions, to bring out the unique characteristics of each unit and weapon. Since the approach of each mode is different, it makes us plot different strategies for each and every one.
For example, sometimes you need to focus on a solid defense in defensive battles, while sometimes you will have to worry about the mobility and adaptability of your team on the field in order to take down enemy bases in assault battles.
The battles and game mechanics feel particularly fresh, sending a breath of new air to the mobile market with games that share a similar gameplay. While it is not the first time we see this kind of element mixed, Black Rock Shooter Fragment stands out by mixing it with the popular IP and addictive tactics gameplay. This, in my opinion, is a big plus, because, in a world where everything is more of the same, it’s the little details that bring out the best of each work.
▍Prepare Your Team for the Challenge Ahead
Each unit has special features, that affect their play style and how they perform in battle, they can be either, vanguard or rearguard (remember that Kill Zones are formed when the attack ranges of two units of each of these types converge, so it is important to carry at least one of each in our teams).
The units of Black Rock Shooter Fragment also have different classes, that represent the unique characteristics of each unit:
- Breacher: They have high defense, HP, and fight while protecting allies on the front lines.
- Destro: Specialize in ranged attacks and excel at annihilating enemies.
- Ravager: Units that stand out for their power, with high attack power and short action intervals.
- Enforcer: Their attack speed and defense are not high, but they attack devastatingly. Long-range attacks and high power.
- Yaeger: Units with a lot of agility and fast mobility, their level of response in battle allows them to respond to various situations quickly.
- Specialist: Excellent for providing support to allies and weakening enemies with a large number of skill effects.
You can also set the armament of each of our units, which will provide multiple advantages and increase battle statistics, with a maximum of three can be equipped per unit. The main weapon will increase the attack power, and up to two sub-weapons, which provide different benefits such as increasing HP or defense.
Equipping the weapons on your girls will give them chances to activate a unique ability during normal attacks. So equipping a suitable weapon according to the features of the girls becomes crucial in your team-building. The equipment also has a changing characteristic, which can be swapped between equipment to add the stats that best suit each unit and its battle styles.
The whole gameplay revolves around the performance of each unit on the field, encouraging players to try different combinations. Thanks to the wide variety of strategies that can be born with a few changes, you will surely spend a lot of time thinking about the little details you can improve to find the perfect combination.
▍A beautiful dark fantasy world full of unique characters!
Personally, I loved the designs of the characters and their personalities, which intrigue you to learn more about their backstory. Both the setting and the plot, are well thought out and do justice to the previous works of the Black Rock Shooter franchise. The character design is simply eye-catching and leaves you with that feeling of wanting more… it’s simply addictive!
But not everything is the color of roses, it is a bit disappointing to find that the main story has no voice dialogues and ADV elements in general. This makes it difficult to immerse into the world of the Black Rock Shooter Fragment even though it has a solid sci-fi setting. But it doesn’t stop you to collect the attractive characters as they just have the magic to intrigue you to ask for more.
▍Black Rock Shooter Fragment is a Supernova in Strategic Game Genre
Teaming-building is fun in Black Rock Shooter Fragment, which charms with strategic yet addictive gameplay that asks you to constantly find a better solution to tackle the enemies. The game mechanics are easy to understand but complicated to master. The plot, the setting, and the soundtrack immerse you into its gigantic world paying tribute to the Black Rock Shooter franchise. Whether you are a player looking for new challenges or just looking for a casual game with cool character designs, it fits right into your pocket!
