First impressions matter, don't they? Full Metal Schoolgirl throws you into a third-person shooter soon after a lightning-fast anime-style intro to the tune of a J-rock banger. It immediately shows off its irreverent attitude and goofy anti-capitalist satire in a futuristic world where robots are exploited and called “working dead” – and with the goal of taking down the villainous CEO, I thought to myself, “Hell yeah.” But about halfway through my second playthrough of this roguelike, it dawned on me that there wasn't much to Full Metal Schoolgirl; it's a boring and repetitive shooter whose core gameplay isn't good enough to save it from a largely tedious and futile 100-story tower run.
During the opening sequence where you invade the evil corporation Maternal Jobz, you choose to play as Ryoko or Akemi, two cyborg anime girls who are functionally and aesthetically human: the one you choose becomes the protagonist, while the other is captured and plays into the story as you progress. They want revenge on the company and its CEO for driving their father to death, and the initial disdain for corporate bullshit in this story is so jarring that it reminded me Hi-Fi Rush. However, that's all it takes before things devolve into annoying jokes and a lack of real intrigue motivating each run; like most of Full Metal Schoolgirl, it's not driven by good ideas, and its shallow execution wears thin rather quickly.
I have a high tolerance for anime tropes, and here it oscillates between charming and eye-rolling, leaning more often towards the latter. It's not just the crude innuendo, but also the incessant yapping that doesn't add any memorable personality to its interesting premise. I'm not here to dismiss the attention that a skirt brings or the creepy actions of a doctor who enhances your skills – that's simply not necessary. The moments where his images really work are at the very beginning and at the very end, and it feels like everything in between has been overlooked in the process and is where you'll spend most of your time.
Each floor consists of a series of narrow corridors filled with enemy fodder and environmental hazards, as well as square office building spaces that function as small combat arenas. The latter throws you additional challenges, such as clearing a room within the allotted time or without using healing for extra money for upgrades. But this general formula does not fundamentally change across all 100 procedurally generated floors. The scenery may change slightly for each floor block, but the structure remains the same. While they can throw different types of enemies at you, such as drones, bomb-wielding robots, turrets, and mechanized dogs, no amount of mixing and matching can make up for the mediocre implementation.
It's easy to see how procedural generation conflicts with itself when certain doors lead to a completely empty room or combat challenge prompts simply don't match the way battles are designed. This haphazard level design feels very basic at best and frustratingly cluttered at worst, and it persists throughout most of the 14 hours I spent finishing the campaign. Boss fights act as floor block fillers, and while they're relatively refreshing after playing the same areas over and over again, their attack patterns are fairly clearly defined and easy to overcome. However, I prefer dodging area of ​​effect explosions and throwing my ultimates (or Punish as it's called) at the sponge boss instead of mindlessly repeating the same floors with enemies, so I wish these battles weren't so few and far between.
Defeating a boss gives you a key to start a subsequent run through their floor, which is a real godsend for avoiding unnecessary repetition, but they are meant to be used once. If the run goes sideways after using the key and you don't beat the next boss 20-something floors up to get the next key, be prepared to start at a much lower level, buddy. While it ups the stakes, as any decent roguelike should, the frustration of having to wade through the most boring parts to get back to where you left off doesn't feel worth it. While it's made easier by upgrading your stats and abilities through materials and the money you earn each run, climbing chunks of floors still takes a long time.
I was excited that it was at least an anime style shooter and that's what I've been looking for ever since. Freedom Wars And Sword Art Online: Fatal Bullet (who didn't quite take advantage of this premise). More often than not, Full Metal Schoolgirl felt tedious to play, but I can appreciate the mindless fun its mechanics offer at times. With a few specific weapons and melee weapons that I used, I was able to get into a rhythm, turn off my brain, and just mow down hordes of enemies. While most weapons are fairly counterintuitive in terms of battle design, a high-end electric machine gun mount or a massive plasma ball mount has the weight and feedback you want from a shooter. However, the movement itself is too difficult for this style of game, especially when there are annoying platforming sections. And melee attacks and jumps are a bit lackluster, even though cutting through a crowd with a katana dash or Labrys' ax thrusts can be satisfying.
It was moments like these that began to shine, albeit more frequently, on the final stretch of floors. The speed at which truly challenging battles occurred and the combination of weapons that were fun to use allowed Full Metal Schoolgirl to end on a higher note than the absolute slog it took to get here. It hasn't exactly flipped the script or strayed from the conventions established at the beginning, but it has started to make the most of its core parts, throwing almost everything at you at a brisk pace.
As I progressed, I naturally figured out what types of weapons suited me: slow shotguns and rifles never made sense to use, but a powerful submachine gun that overheated quickly became a favorite. Learning to manage your energy meter for big axe, dodge, and dash combos has become more important in the late game. And using the auto-attack drone (which you summon during cooldown) was key to saving a few runs. Learning to use your meager battery supply (which is your healing item) also impacted how I approached combat.
The rarity of the gear you receive in challenge rooms is random, leading to moments of pointlessness where I found myself clearing a challenge room only to encounter common tier rares that pale in comparison to the rare and legendary gear from much earlier floors. At the very least, this makes modifiers meaningful since they can affect how your health, energy, movement, and damage work, especially when the shields you equip have a significant impact on your survivability.
.jpg.png?w=150&resize=150,150&ssl=1 "Your Weekly Horoscope: October 26 to November 1, 2025")
