Accel Knights 2: Full Throttle (3DS)

First, I'll point out that though this is a 3DS game, I haven't bothered to stitch the top and bottom screenshots together, since the bottom screen is mostly unused and doesn't have anything interesting on it. But anyway, Accel Knights 2 is a game with an amazing premise: it's about knights on motorbikes jousting in a fantastical future world. Also, the motorbikes can transform into power armour. Obviously, this game never got released in the west, presumably due to some market research by the publisher that told them that people outside Japan weren't interested in buying games where awesome stuff happens. It's also the sequel to a Japan-only DSiWare game, but getting hold of such a thing in this day and age  is currently beyond me.

Anyway, these jousts don't take the form of real time action, instead being a kind of strategic rock-paper-scissors arrangement, albeit one where you can see what your opponent is picking. The battles take place in rounds, and each round has two parts. The first part is the RPS bit, where each knight decides to charge a low, middle, or high attack by holding X, A, or B to fill a meter. High beats middle, middle beats low, and low beats high, and you can see what your opponent is charging. However, you can change which one you want to charge at any point in this very short sequence, and I think the last one you press is the one that you use. It's really best to just pick one and charge it all the way, which gives you a two-out-of-three chance of winning.

The second part of the round is a much simpler rhythm-based affair: there's a bar with some lines along it, another line moves along the bar, and you press A whenever the moving line meets one of the stationary ones. Being successful in either part of the combat builds up your MP, which you then allocate between rounds. The aim of the battle is to be the first one to fill up your final charge meter, which transforms your motorbike into power armour so you can dleiver your final attack and win the fight. You can (and should) also use MP to charge up your two engines (one for each part of the combat round), though, as doing so significantly increases the amount of MP you build up in future rounds, and charging the final meter takes a lot of the stuff.

Accel Knights 2 is definitely a case of style over substance, as the battles are very repetitive, and once you've won a few and figured out how it all works, it's also incredibly easy. But, the game's style is cool enough to make up for the lack of substance, and it's definitely an enjoyable experience (for maybe two or three battles at a time, at least). If you are able to attain access to this game, I'd recommend you do so.