Moon Chronicles Review

Moon Chronicles is an FPS title bought to the 3DS by Renegade Studios, apparently happy to live up to their developer name.


Published: May 15, 2014 9:00 AM /

Reviewed By:


Moon Chronicles - Key Art

Renegade Kid goes where not many people go.... no not space or the moon...but by releasing a First Person Shooter for the Nintendo 3DS.  Moon Chronicles is a remake of the original Moon on the DS but moves towards an episodic release with the first episode launching on May 15, 2014, for $8.99.  So is the rare FPS on your Nintendo handheld worth it??

Moon Chronicles - Story

Moon Chronicles Episode 1 starts out with the discovery of a strange hatch on the moon and you and your team are sent in to investigate.  The cut-scenes bring you up to speed that we know that we aren't alone, but we have no idea what is in this hatch.  Immediately things go bad, and you are sent in to investigate.  Now right away, I was aware that this plays much more like an adventure game than a shooter, with a lot of Episode 1 involving investigating and trying to figure out what exactly is going on.

Moon Chronicles Episode One brings a variety of control options; whether you use the stylus and circle pad, buttons, or circle pad pro, you will find a play style that fits you best. (I used the stylus and tried the buttons, but the stylus felt way more natural to me)  Most impressively, the game moves at 60 frames per second, even in 3D.  3D, from a first-person perspective, really looks good.  There is a pretty large map, and levels feel "spacey" enough to pass; the 3D is the real shining part of the graphics.

Moon Chronicles - Gameplay

Game play starts out a bit slow but gradually builds up, and by the end of Episode 1, it will feel more like a shooter with a good bit of action and boss battles.  Throughout Moon Chronicles, there is a good mix of level design involving finding items, shooting, and using your RAD (remote access droid) to explore by driving it around smaller areas and opening up doors to help move about the levels.  

Your map is very metroidvania-ish, with downloading information from terminals and giving you a marked area to explore. Enemies early on are a tad annoying, with little flying robot sentries constantly moving around, and your assault rifle's recoil really hurts the accuracy of hitting them. The game really picks up halfway through and you can check out some of that action in the video below.

The Verdict

Moon Chronicles brings a lot at you setting the ground for what you are to expect from the other episodes.  I was highly impressed at how fluid the game played in 3D, and the graphics were impressive for a 3DS title.  The story slowly builds up throughout episode 1 and comes to a good stopping point. My only complaint would be the early enemies are more annoying than they probably should be.  I am looking forward to future episodes and seeing exactly where they go with the story and what more they will add to the gameplay. Moon Chronicles goes where not many games go, in a gorgeous 3D first-person perspective with a great variety of gameplay.


TechRaptor reviewed Moon Chronicles on 3DS with a code provided by the publisher. This review was originally published on 05-08-2014. While care has been taken to update the piece to reflect our modern style guidelines, some of the information may be out of date. We've left pieces like this as they were to reflect the original authors' opinions, and for historical context.

Review Summary

7.5
Despite some slightly annoying enemies, this is a great start for Moon Chronicles, and a good sign of things to come in the future. (Review Policy)

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