• Digimon World was one of the PlayStation games I got on birthdays, back when I was a big fan of the anime airing on Fox Kids at the time.

    Okay, to make it clear, this game is not based on the anime. While it does have Digimon appearing in the anime, the game does not have any connections to the anime. Instead, you play as a young boy who is transported to the Digital World by a Digimon keychain (as Digimon started out as a virtual pet like Tamagotchi). There, he meets Jijimon, and is told to get Digimon into File City, even being giving a Digimon that the player trains and care for. So the game follows an original story separate from the anime.

    So the gameplay is typical RPG flare, you explore the world, and fight enemies while trying to progress your story. But Digimon World also has virtual pet elements put in the mix. That means you need to keep it fed, make sure it gets to the restrooms, and get to sleep. This, and the training you have it undergo, will determine what it digivolves into, which is where the difficulty is, as certain Digimon are needed to access certain areas. Also, your Digimon can die (either by old age or losing its hearts when it gets defeated), but it will be reborn as a baby Digimon, which also adds to difficulty, as you will have to get your Digimon back up (thankfully, if it dies of old age, which is referred to as faded, you can actually choose what egg it will be reborn in, while losing three battles gives you a random egg).

    Other than that, everything else is good. The story is nice for an original work, the gameplay works well, and the world is worth exploring, as it has many secrets to find. Worth checking out.