Mirror: The Lost Shards is a two dollar DLC that introduces four new girls into the mix, each featuring their own storylines and combat abilities. They are not unlocked as soon as you purchase the DLC. You, in fact, need to beat the base game before being able to have a chance at battling them. It is a strange decision as they are not any tougher than the base game characters, so locking off purchased content seems unnecessary. Once you pick one of the new girls, you’ll soon notice that the visual novel segments in between the fights are far lengthier than those found in the base game. While the base game features eight overall characters, it may take you a similar amount of time getting through these four if you take the time to read.
Every girl is fully voice acted and the choice system to either give your enemy a buff or debuff depending on how you answer things at critical moments also makes a return. Some of the background assets have been reused, though it does feature a fair new amount of them with high-quality CG artwork being far more common. While the characters do feature more screen-time, they are still not necessarily well developed. They all feature interesting quirks to them, though the time you are given with each is nowhere near enough to get attached to them. Their storylines have nothing to do with one another either, so the sudden shifts in themes and people do no favors to that specific issue. It was also present in the base game, though having only four characters, it felt like a lost opportunity.
Having unrelated plots for each girl does have its advantages however. Each are in far different situations from another and it does explore some rather cool themes. You play as a plethora of different characters throughout as you fight the girls, ranging from knights to bandits. Some bear no relevance to the story, while some fights do actually have meaning. There is no new additions or features to the combat itself, you’ll still find yourself using your same gear and tactics. Especially since these characters are rather on the easy side compared to some of the girls in the base game, as they mostly inflict straight damage and don’t mess up your board by locking icons in place. It does make it less difficult, though it was very overused in the base game and these new foes do pack quite a few tricks up there sleeve.
Hill, the slave girl is easily the most interesting enemy to fight. She has low stats all across the board, yet she has insane speed and has a chance to counterattack you every time you cause her damage. Her strikes are nothing to fear, though you’ll find that they quickly add up. Getting a combo on her is a risky ordeal that may see you just as tattered as she is. This punch for punch style of hers was a nice change-up of the gameplay. Another girl known as Leah has pepper spray that will blind you for five turns and leave you unable to use your items. That in combination with her devastating groin attack, makes her ability to keep you from using your healing items or other gadgets a truly dangerous one. The other two I’ll leave you to discover on your own.
Possibly the biggest change is that once you beat them in a battle three times, you will not only tease them with sex toys like the original, but will have intercourse afterward. It is more interactive than having a set amount of turns to do something to her, I wouldn’t call it riveting gameplay. You will either have to move your mouse around slowly or quickly flail it around like if you were trying to carve a hole through your desk. If you want to see the lewd scenes as intended, you will need a separate uncensor patch from the one you used from the base game. Whether you choose to do so or not is completely up to you. The sex scenes are still an optional mode so if you simply feel like playing through the game, you are free to do so.
There is not much more to be said about this DLC really, aside that it costs the same as the game itself. It is not as bad as it sounds however, the base game costs a mere two dollars and while this does feature less content, that still amounts to less than five dollars overall. Since it can’t even be played until after you beat the original content, this will be something one would purchase to get more gameplay out of a title they’re already certain they like. The Lost Shards is a more than reasonable bargain for fans. It may not change much, but the four new girls offer up quite a bit more content to bite into.
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