In the video above, Idea Factory community manager Zanda Ra plays through Death end re;Quest, showcasing the game's combat, party management, and boss battles. A mixture of two different game genres, re;Quest changes styles as you switch between the title's dual protagonists. For this gameplay clip, Ra focuses on the action-RPG side of the game.
Death end re;Quest's main heroine, Shina Ninomiya, is a game director who wakes up trapped in World's Odyssey, the VRMMORPG she never finished. As Shina, re;Quest is an RPG with reactive turn-based combat. Shina can also explore and interact with or recruit the NPCs she meets. In her effort to escape, Shina manages to connects with Arata Mizunashi, the lead programmer on World's Odyssey. When you switch to the real world and Arata's perspective, re;Quest changes to a visual novel that follows his conversations and actions as he tries to free Shina from her virtual prison. Death end re;Quest allows you to switch between Shina and Arata at almost any point, and actions taken in one world can influence the story in the other.
Because World's Odyssey was never finished, the world Shina finds herself in is filled with bugs and glitches. Although some can corrupt Shina and her allies, they can be used to her advantage as well. During combat, Shina can force enemies to run into bugs so that they become corrupted, and her and her teammates can utilize their own corruption--provided it doesn't grow too severe--to become more insect-like and gain new attacks and abilities. Relying on Arata is perhaps the best use of the bugs that Shina finds, as he can exploit them to temporarily reprogram the game. For example, if Shina's sword is having trouble keeping up with a group of enemies, Arata can reprogram World's Odyssey to become a third-person shooter or a fighting game.
Death end re;Quest is scheduled to release for PS4 in the U.S. on February 19 and in Europe on February 22.