The Hundred Line: Last Defence Academy Review

The Zero Escape and Danganronpa series are both top notch in my book, so when a new visual novel tactics game was released with both creators serving as directors, I had pretty high expectations. Somehow, this game managed to exceed them. 

The Hundred Line: Last Defence Academy feels very familiar at first, it almost feels like a sibling to Danganronpa. The artist and composer from Danganronpa are here as well, and so the look and sound matches, and even the initial premise feels very similar. 

After a brief look at our protagonist’s normal life, everything changes when mysterious monsters attack. At the urging of our new mascot character, he is able to unleash a unique power and fight them off. Soon after, he is whisked away to an unknown school, alongside several other whacky teens, and tasked with defending the school. 

The story here is a rather difficult one to talk about. After a pretty strong intro, the story seemed to lose a bit of steam. Every time I felt like I was going to learn more about the world and the larger plot, it seemed like it was withheld from me. The drip feed of information felt a little thin, so it was really up to the characters to drive the story forward.

The characters start off pretty trope heavy. Within your initial introduction you can probably nail down each character's quirk or trope, and it can feel a little grating. Since I’ve played the Danganronpa games, which have a similar pattern, I had a feeling there would be more to the characters that would be revealed over time, but that didn’t stop some of them from being annoying in the meantime. 

I liked it all well enough, and barreled forward to the final day, hoping for answers and a satisfying resolution. Once I reached that goal though, the big twist of this game came into play. Not only are there 100 days spent at this school, but there are also 100 different endings, not including the first hundred days you were just playing. 

I’ve gotten a few endings so far, but the routes for those endings are night and day. As I started making choices and watching the possibilities branch out over and over again, the scale and ambition of this game is finally becoming apparent. 

I wanted to try and finish this game before writing out a review, but after maybe 30 hours, I can see “finishing” this game is nowhere in sight. I have a feeling this will be a game I keep handy, slowly chipping away at the breadth and depth of story that’s available. The story is a large chunk of this game, but it’s certainly not the only element. 

The tactical role playing component of The Hundred Line is surprisingly strong. Often, the second part of a visual novel can feel tacked on to break things up, and I’m glad that’s not the case here. In most battles, your goal is to defend an object from advancing invaders, while either wiping them out, or defeating key enemies. 

You have a limited pool of AP, a shared resource between all characters that is expended for every action. You can move several spaces before taking your first action with a character, but each subsequent action you can only move a single space. Defeating some enemies will replenish your AP, prompting you to make strategic moves. 

Each character has a varied kit, allowing them to fill different roles, and each character has a passive that using effectively will let you use them to their full potential. At the end of the player turn, all enemies will advance towards their goal, while surrounding and attacking your allies along the way. 

However, once your characters get low in health, they can unleash a powerful final attack at the cost of being removed from battle. Each character returns at the end of each wave, and there is no permadeath, giving you interesting strategic incentives to sacrifice characters to achieve victory. 

As far as tactics games go, it borrows some ideas I’ve seen before; but manages to feel unique in the way it blends them all together. I never felt railroaded into one specific tactic, and since all available characters are deployed to every battle, I was always encouraged to use each character in my strategies. 

During my second run of the game though, the battles themselves lack a bit of variety. The game allows you to skip battles you’ve played in other routes, which is a welcome addition, but I do wish there was a bit more variety, since I quite enjoy what was on offer. I started to recognize the same patterns of enemies, and began to play the battles on auto-pilot. 

As a whole package, this is a tough game to review. As for the main plot, I’m still woefully in the dark. My second run of the game has only introduced questions I didn’t even know to ask. I’ve found myself in events completely unique to the previous 100 days. I’m both impressed, and a little afraid of this game. 

I had expected minor variations that would lead me towards a definitive ending of the plot line introduced in my first 100 days. Instead, I find the story to be taking huge swings, changing the genre and tone of the story to go down what feels like completely unrelated rabbit holes. This game doesn’t have a “golden” route, the creator has stated that if you find an ending you like, that’s the ending. 

I wonder if a more traditional approach would have made this game go down a bit smoother, but I also can’t help but applaud its boldness. It feels like a game without an editor, where two artists got to pour every idea and tendency they had into a masterpiece of a game. I haven’t quite decided how I feel about it, but I’m endlessly compelled to dive back in.