At the point I've gotten to in the Phantom Trigger alpha it has pretty well sold me on the final product fully, and I get the sense that there's quite a bit more to see and do still. It also looks and feels quite polished for an alpha. I've seen just enough of the story to be very curious about what's been happening in the real world, and to then understand how the in-game action relates to it. It's an interesting and unexpected hook in a game of this type.

Though the final product may attempt to do more to explain the game systems, I was obviously able to make my way through them and come out the other end at least capable of pulling off combos. While you can dispatch the menagerie of odd-looking enemies with standard attacks, it is the variety of elemental combos you begin to learn that are meant to be where you place your focus. With some attacks that freeze and slow and others that burn for extra damage there are a number of ways to deal with your enemies, and you'll need to use them effectively since even early on the game is more than happy to give you several to manage fighting at once.

It feels as if, having made it through the first world, the table has been set with the basics and now I'll be able to dig into the meatier challenges the game decides to throw at me. Very early in the second world the first signs of that challenge have made themselves clear: enemies that are in some way elemental, and can only take damage from specific types of attacks. Just to throw in a curveball some of them also rotate which element they have a weakness to. There's nothing like a game that is sure to keep you paying attention to details.

Phantom Trigger was only announced for the Switch a couple of weeks ago, and there's no currently-known timeline for its release. Even with the promising gameplay I've already encountered I'm intrigued by the developer description for the game including the term roguelike. As a fan of that type of game I'm eager to see how that may play into things, though at the point I'm at in the game I haven't seen any signs of it. Regardless, what I've seen is quite promising and I look forward to the final release of the game.

This preview was prepared based on the current Alpha Build of the game released to the PC platform. Changes to elements of the game may be put in place by the time of release.