There are times when I’m not sure I enjoy playing Demonschool. The artistic direction is fantastic and I like the general idea. While not laugh-out-loud funny, sometimes the quips in it make me smile. Demonschool also feels like more of a callback to the classic PlayStation Persona games, which I appreciate. Unfortunately, the combat system never clicked with me, a lot of elements aren’t explained well, and the constant drive to force as many jokes into every conversation left it all feeling a bit offputting.
The world is about to end. Faye was trained by her demon hunter grandfather who passed down a prophesy that in 2000, demons would break through the barrier into the real world. It suggested she needed to be at a certain island at a specific time, ideally with some descendants of fellow warriors and supernatural families, to strike back. She even meets one of them, Namako, on the ferry to attend the university there. Something is clearly up there, and her and her Black Magic Club will need to balance assignments, assaults by gangsters and demons, and life to survive.
The tone of Demonschool is a little unusual, and I’m not sure it will suit everyone. It feels like characters sometimes fall into one of two categories: exuberant Shonen Jump protagonists passionate about everything and serious skeptics who maybe don’t want to be there. Like Faye, Destin, and Ti? They’d love hanging out with Luffy, Naruto, and Yuji. Knute, Namako, and Aina? I think they’d rather not. The story is interesting and concept is fine, but sometimes I wish there wasn’t constant attempts to pack as many one-liners as possible into every conversation. I get that it’s always been described as a “light horror” game, but the writing started to feel more like a sitcom than an RPG infused with humor at perfect moments. Because of that, I often felt like Necrosoft was trying too hard to make characters funny than offer actual development for any of them.
Like the Persona series, Demonschool follows a schedule leading up to this apocalypse over a series of weeks. Each week there’s an assignment, and not completing it by the weekend means being sent to jail and the world being in grave danger. Each day is split into morning, afternoon, and evening time periods, and you’ll be able to fast travel to spots on the map to talk to people, take on side quests, train, and advance the story. Areas of note will feature an icon reminding you that you can head there for a certain interaction or to take on a quest. While each week does feature the idea of getting an assignment done by the weekend, Demonschool involved more of the concept of time-sensitive pressure, rather than actual deadlines like the sorts found in Persona 3, 4, and 5 or the Atelier series. I never found myself in a situation where it seemed like there was any danger of not getting the campaign quest completed in time.
When you enter a side quest or campaign mission, it will typically involve some conversations and a battle. This involves putting four characters in your party into the field and fighting until X number of enemies are defeated or the boss is downed so you can “seal” things off. Each character has a designated role. So someone like Faye, Destin, and Mercy are going to be attackers. While Namako can attack, she is a debuffer that can freeze and weaken enemies primarily. Knute the pacifist doesn’t attack, but can heal allies (and also debuff if you buy and learn the right techniques). Characters can only move in straight lines a certain number of tiles from where they are, though you can sidestep to the left or right as essentially a “free” movement. Ideally, you want to use a debuffer like Namako to arrange enemies into the right positions and weaken them, then use someone like Destin to attack a whole group at once. If you’re especially lucky and an ally is nearby in the process, that can trigger them to attack too. When you hit the defeated foe quota, you can send one person to the opposite end of the map to start the “sealing” process to end the fight. (Boss fights end automatically once the big bad is defeated.) There’s no experience system or leveling up, so characters remain locked at three HP and stats won’t increase, but you can equip them with things like up to three Techniques that can grant them buffs like healing if they walk on poison or more rewards for beating enemies, the ability to push allies with attacks, or for a healer to debuff enemies with healing.
The thing is, I dislike the Demonschool combat system. It’s poorly explained, as you won’t realize it’s an immediate “game over” if enemies reach the “barrier” on your side of the field twice until it happens once. I might work out the “perfect” moves and approach for the first turn of a fight, but then the appearance of the next hordes would be such that nobody was in a good spot to set up solid combos after that. The nature of it also means everything often takes much longer than it needs to. Encounters usually are manageable and I’d even say easy, but because I’d be bumbling around the screen trying to reach enemies, buff attackers/debuff demons, and set up combos to take out as many as possible in one turn, it’d take forever. The first boss? Due to its teleporting mechanic every round and constant summoning of demons trying to reach the human world if I didn’t have someone back there to attack them, it took me over half an hour to beat. Some side quest missions will flood the map with foes, making it difficult to see where your allies or optimal targets are. And while we do get a wealth of allies, the “sweet” spot with a party seems to be two attackers, one debuffer, and one healer, which meant I tended to rely on the starting group of Faye, Namako, Destin, and Knute and didn’t really give folks who joined after like Mercy and Aina a chance unless forced since, unlike the initial four, Necrosoft doesn’t do as good of a job explaining those newcomers’ specialties and why they should be used instead.
At times, I felt like genuine difficulty was abandoned in favor of overwhelming a player with hordes of enemies without any explanation as to what some of them were capable of until they did it and ruined your plans. It never felt like it flowed well when I played. I never had these sorts of issues in games like Into the Breach, Fantaland, TMNT Tactical Takedown, and Fights in Tight Spaces, which all balance movement and defeating enemies in a similar sort of way. The best way I can explain it is that I felt like Necrosoft wanted each Demonschool battle to feel like a tactical puzzle with a correct “answer” for each encounter, but the execution usually makes that impossible. On the plus side, if you fail a battle, you can immediately opt to either replay it or skip it, so you get an “out” and can keep going regardless of your success.
It’s a shame the combat system didn’t click with me, as the rest of the execution of Demonschool generally feels pretty great and like the classic Revelations: Persona or Persona 2 perspective and atmosphere paired with some of the more modern entries’ relationship and character building mechanics. The environmental designs are fantastic, as are the character portraits. It really looks cool and, when I wasn’t fighting, I really enjoyed the “daily life/investigation” gameplay mechanics, even though I never felt any scheduling pressure since taking a side quest or engaging in a minigame or activity wouldn’t advance the time of day. Once you get past the first week, you start to get more side quests, relationship-building, and character building opportunities, which I enjoyed too.
There is a slight downside to that however, and it is again that I feel like certain concepts aren’t introduced well enough or sometimes at all. For example, we can assign party members to study certain abilities that can be equipped to do things like make a person immune to the “Tether” effect. A message will pop up saying when that unlocks. But… how to study isn’t explained well, leaving you to hopefully tab over to it in the menu and happen upon it yourself. You can buy better furniture for the club room, but it isn’t explained why you should. (It’s cosmetic.) There will be opportunities to do things like toss coins in a fountain or shrine! Why? Just do it for maybe a different response each day! (You can get techniques this way, so it is worth it.) You can fish and collect different fish, but why? (Types are added to a compendium and you unlock an additional fishing spot and quests in that line.)
Due to the nature of Demonschool’s release, I’ve also been playing it for a while. Primarily on PC, though I did play on Switch a bit closer to launch. Since the bulk of my time was on PC, this review is based on that. (It works fine on the Switch too, though the font is a bit small there.) I’ve seen a lot of bugs come and go, with Necrosoft patching a bunch of them along the way. But there are still quite a few in there. Oddly, one of the ones I found most annoying will put a “new” note next to a location even if there is nothing actually “new” there. So you might still see an issue or two too. I haven’t personally encountered it, since I didn’t get that particular ending on my playthrough, but I was warned one ending is in need of a patch due to a “loop” in it, so keep an eye out for that until the developer shares a fix for it. I was hoping that the delay meant all issues would be fixed by launch, but at least I haven’t experienced save issues in weeks.
Demonschool is definitely going to be a “your mileage may vary” kind of game, and I suspect fans of classic Persona games may end up appreciating it most. The art direction and design looks gorgeous. The concept is good, and handling demons each week leading up to a possible apocalypse is great. But it does feel more like the script takes more cues from sitcoms than dramas with occasional comedic moments, which may not appeal to everyone. This take on a tactical combat system also involves some design choices that might be off-putting and not appeal to everyone. It’s an interesting concept for a game, but also quite niche.
Demonschool will appear on the Switch, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X, and PC on November 19, 2025.
Demonschool
Demonschool is going to be a “your mileage may vary” kind of game, with classic Persona and Necrosoft fans probably appreciating it most. PC version reviewed. Review copy provided by company for testing purposes.
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Author: 360 Technology Group
