PAX East 2016: THE METRONOMICON

Publisher Kasedo Games and developer Puuba gave con goers a taste of their Rhythm/RPG love child set to debut in the Fall of 2016, and The METRONOMICON is sure to beautifully meld the two worlds together.

Even though I tore up my own personal DDR mat back in the early 2000s, I am relatively new to the rhythm game scene. Up until the last year I wasn’t even aware that there was a dancing game other than Dance Dance Revolution. Oh, there most certainly is, and don’t let an avid rhythm game dancer hear you confuse them. Rhythm games are quite literally that–the game requires a specific rhythm to be kept for points, whether you’re dancing to the beat or using your fingertips to touch notes as they pop up one by one. One of the games I was lucky enough to try out at PAX East 2016 was a new kind of rhythm game that I haven’t seen before.

My gaming forte lies in RPGs, so I was excited to see how it fit into this equation. The game Metronomicon combines the fantastical core elements of an RPG with the beat keeping nuances of rhythm games; one of the guys at the booth even referred to it as, “Dance, Dance, Tactics.” You are in control of four characters which embody the typical characteristics of your favorite RPG characters. There’s a tank, a healer, a ranged dps, and a guy with a big heavy weapon ready to dish out his own heavy deeps. You cycle through the characters with the top bumpers, and use the D pad of a controller to match the notes as they slide down the screen. Keeping rhythm sends off specific moves of each character, and you have to utilize the special set of maneuvers of each character to deal damage, or heal up.

All of this is done to a list of songs, one of which is Shiny Toys Guns that I got to play, while beating down the big bad boss. I am absolutely in love with the immersion of a rhythm game with an RPG. It embodies something I already love, with something I am just beginning to truly explore. Its quirky, colorful cast is a banquet for the eyes, and the combination of rhythm and RPG elements is sure to please both sides of the genre fence. I look forward to see how the game incorporates weaponry and stats to truly make it RPG immersive.