Incarnations

Incarnations is a turn-based RPG with roguelike elements heavily inspired by Persona Q: Shadow of the Labyrinth and the Etrian Odyssey series. Like most umbrella games, it features an Author Appeal roster.

Story
The game's story follows the exploits of a large cast of heroes and ruffians alike who, after being torn from their stories, band together to delve into their distorted worlds of origin, stopping their former allies and longtime enemies from abusing the bridges between worlds to wreak havoc and destruction, all the while trying to discover what cataclysmic event caused their worlds to get pulled together in the first place.

A more in-depth description of the story can be found here!

Gameplay
The game follows a party of up to five characters from various forms of fictional media inside of a sprawling labyrinth. The player has to guide them through the labyrinth and into its deepest floors while fending off powerful monsters.

General Information
When outside of combat, most of the gameplay consists of exploring maze-like Labyrinths. This maze is viewed from a first-person perspective, and most of its detail comes from descriptive events. Certain points on the map can be used for gathering resources, while others are events that can rejuvenate the party. A rough version of the map is created automatically as the player explores the labyrinth, but only the locations of the walls and floors are recorded this way, so it is up to them to perfect it by adding notes on special locations or secret passages.

F.O.E.s
F.O.E.s are powerful enemies that, rather than being encountered randomly, exist on the map itself. They are incredibly powerful, and players are usually much too weak to defeat one when they first cross paths; but by staying wary and moving carefully, the player can usually avoid having to confront them in battle. Once they're strong enough, though, players can challenge them to obtain rare materials, unique items, or skills for Reincarnation.

General Information
While exploring, an indicator at the bottom-right corner of the screen will slowly change color, indicating how close the player is to the next enemy encounter. Once it's red, they will soon enter a random encounter with monsters. Combat is turn-based, and players can command Fighters to Attack, Guard, use Skills or Items, or attempt to Flee the battle. There are two "rows" in combat - the front row, and the back row. Back-row fighters get damage penalties to their melee attacks, but also take less damage from enemies' melee attacks. Three fighters can be in one row at any time, but the player's party can only be five characters maximum, so there will always be at least one empty slot. Certain skill effects, like Zer0's Decepti0n and Rydia's Summon Eidolon, can summon computer-controlled allies for a single battle, which occupy special "Summon" character slots that are treated as being part of the front row. Some story and quest events can add a computer-controlled character to Summon slots, too.

Boosted
Upon hitting an enemy with a critical hit or an element that they are vulnerable, the attacker becomes Boosted. Boosted characters act at the very start of the turn, and can use any skill that they know without spending any HP or SP. Additionally, Boosted characters' usual weaknesses are completely ignored. The Boost status is lost upon taking damage or using an attack. Both playable characters and enemies can become Boosted.

Leader Abilities
When setting up a party, one party member must be designated as the Leader. The Leader gains the temporary privilege of wielding their Leader ability - a special passive boon that affects all party members, usually in a completely unique way. Your Leader also determines miscellaneous minor details, such as which character appears on the victory screen after battle, or which character participates the most in cutscenes.

Ailments vs. Binds
There are two types of status conditions - Ailments and Binds. Ailments are general conditions that debilitate the fighter. They are massively varied, but each fighter can only have one condition at a time, and attempting to inflict a second one will always result in failure. Binds, on the other hand, are a group of three special conditions that prevent fighters from using specific abilities and options. What makes Binds particularly dangerous, though, is that it is possible to inflict all three of them and an ailment on an enemy simultaneously. A list of the game's Ailments and Binds, as well as their effects, can be found below.

Stats
Each character possesses five stats: Strength, Vitality, Magic, Agility, and Luck. Strength affects the power of physical attacks and physical skills. Vitality affects defense and maximum HP. Magic affects maximum SP and the power of magical attacks. Agility affects turn order, hit rate, and evasion rate. Luck affects hit rate, critical hit rate, and ailment affliction chance. These stats rise upon leveling up.

Leveling Up
Winning battles and completing quests will grant characters Experience Points, or XP. Once they've gained a set amount of XP, a character will gain a level. Every time a character levels up, they will gain eight points in their stats. Five of these points are distributed automatically based on the character, and the remaining three can be spent on whatever stats the player likes. The maximum level is 10, and characters that reach this level will stop receiving experience. Characters that level up usually also obtain a new skill.

The Reincarnation System
One of the key mechanics of the game is the Reincarnation System, which allows the player to sacrifice a Lv10 party member's experience (referred to in-game as Reincarnating them) in exchange for an opportunity to equip allies and enemies' skills to them. In other words, the Reincarnation System gives the player "wiggle room" with their builds, allowing them to create unique team compositions that would not be possible normally. A character can equip a maximum of six extra skills using Reincarnation, bringing the maximum number of skills each character can have up to 14. Each skill can only be equipped to one character at a time, most skills with identical effects cannot be equipped simultaneously, and certain skills can only be used when the character reaches a certain level.

It should also be noted that skills must be obtained before they can be used for Reincarnation. There are three ways to obtain skills for Reincarnation: All Reincarnation System services are handled by Rohan Kishibe at the Mangaka's Mansion location.
 * 1) Certain quests reward Reincarnation skills upon their completion.
 * 2) When Reincarnating a character, the player can also select one of their three Reincarnation Skills (listed with bright blue backgrounds in that character's skill tables) to make available for Reincarnation.
 * 3) Defeating powerful enemies like F.O.E.s or bosses will sometimes make one or two of their skills available for Reincarnation.

Equipment
Each character has four equipment slots. The first is devoted exclusively to their Weapons, and the second to their Bodywear. The last two are "blank" slots. Headgear, Armwear, Footwear, or Accessories can be equipped to these slots, but each character can only have one of each type equipped at a time.

Party Members
The main heroes of Incarnations, and the characters that the player controls during gameplay.

Locations
Traverse Town serves as a hub. Through it, the player accesses all the shops and labyrinths in the game.

Skills
A list of skills in Incarnations can be found here!

Weapons
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 * -|Club=


 * -|Glove=


 * -|Hammer=


 * -|Handgun=


 * -|Katana=


 * -|Knife=


 * -|Longsword=


 * -|Rifle=


 * -|Scarf=


 * -|Short Sword=


 * -|Staff=

Armor
Light Bodywear=


 * -|Medium Bodywear=


 * -|Heavy Bodywear=


 * -|Headgear=


 * -|Armwear=


 * -|Footwear=


 * -|Accessory=

Quests & Requests
Quests are the main drivers of the game's story - objectives that must be completed in order to make progress through the Fused World. Requests, on the other hand, are more like sidequests - optional missions that can be completed for special rewards.

Trivia

 * The game's original name, Monstrous Index, was in reference to its creator's original wikia username Monstermanchego. After their name change to IncarnateParanoia, the title was appropriately changed to a name suggested by to reflect this.
 * Both of the characters in the WildKat Café, Sanae Hanekoma from The World Ends With You and Elizabeth from Persona 3, appear as optional superbosses both in their original appearances and in Incarnations.
 * All of the "cups" in the Pit of Tartarus are named after evil god-like figures.
 * The character icons use the backgrounds of Shin Megami Tensei: Strange Journey 's character icons.
 * The artwork used for Ralsei's icon was done by Chikuto, and can be found on Twitter here!