There are so many games that release every year in the Metroidvania genre that it’s honestly tough to keep up with them all. Case in point is Frontier Hunter: Erza’s Wheel of Fortune, a game that made its way to consoles in 2024 following a couple of years in early access on PC. Never heard of it? Well, most probably haven’t, but for fans of Metroidvanias, it’s worth checking out.
Like many Metroidvania titles, Frontier Hunter: Erza’s Wheel of Fortune is a 2D action-adventure game with a sprawling map, multiple upgrades scattered about, a whole host of bad guys to defeat, and the occasional big boss to fight. The graphical style is reminiscent of something like Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night in that it uses 3D models on a 2D plane instead of more traditional pixel renders. It may not be everyone’s cup of tea, but the animations are decent and the main character models are pretty detailed overall. It’s not going to blow anyone away graphically, but it does get the job done.
In Frontier Hunter: Erza’s Wheel of Fortune players take control of titular character Erza, along with a small party of teammates that are switchable on the fly while exploring an expansive map. Each character has certain strengths and weaknesses, with Erza being a more well-rounded character to help new players learn the ropes of combat and exploration, whereas the first companion that’s added on, Ciara, is more range focused with a large gun to mow down enemies from a distance.
Right from the jump this party system helps make Frontier Hunter feel a little more unique than other Metroidvanias, helping to give the game some sense of identity early on. However, it isn’t shy about borrowing liberally from the games that inspired it, as experienced players will likely have no trouble acclimating to the majority of the mechanics. Most of the abilities found in other Metroidvania titles are present here, including the ability to double jump, air dash, dodge, and so on.
One area that Frontier Hunter: Erza’s Wheel of Fortune does try to expand upon is combat. Along with having the ability to swap between characters that have different playstyles, there are also unique skills and abilities that can be discovered, a number of which are optional and completely missable throughout the adventure. These skills require inputs similar to fighting game combo strings, and can often lead to powerful attacks that will quickly outclass basic combat commands. It’s easy enough to just hack and slash through most encounters, but picking up and equipping these skills certainly helps with the more challenging boss encounters, and provides some additional variety to the gameplay that is much appreciated.
Frontier Hunter: Erza’s Wheel of Fortune also has an expansive crafting and upgrade system. Enemies will drop multiple materials, which can then be taken to different vendors and used to craft a variety of weapons, armour, and other useful items. There is a remarkable amount of crafting options, with various weapon types for each character, along with a laundry list of stats to improve and upgrade by equipping new armour and weapons.
Enemies can also drop unique perks that can be slotted into equipment, providing additional effects like damage over time, increased health points for the equipped character, the ability to negate certain status effects, and so on. There is a remarkable amount of variety to this system that manages to outclass most Metroidvanias with similar concepts.
On the story side of things, Frontier Hunter: Erza’s Wheel of Fortune fails to impress. The core idea of being on an expedition to a previously unexplored region isn’t particularly new of course, but where the story really falls apart is in the poor dialogue and translation work found throughout the game. There are often noticeable errors in text boxes, characters spend more time fawning over Erza’s looks than they do developing real character traits, and after a while it’s easy enough to lose track of the main story beats as the game meanders into a number of different directions. It quickly becomes one of those titles that players will just skip through the story cutscenes in order to get back to the gameplay, and it’s hard to fault anyone for doing so. 
