Tokyo Valkyries

Introduction

Tokyo Valkyries casts players as the commander of a squad of card-wielding heroines defending the city from an "Underworld invasion," building decks and battling through a map in the well-worn Slay the Spire mould. Developed and published by qureate, it released 8 July 2026 to a "Positive" reception on a small early sample: 16 of 20 total reviews recommend it, and this review reads all 20 in full. The sample is young and thin compared to bigger releases this lane has covered, but it converges clearly enough on both what works and what doesn't to support a confident read.

A familiar card battler with heavy fanservice on top

Reviewers are consistent about what Tokyo Valkyries actually is: a card battler built explicitly in Slay the Spire's shadow, dressed in visual novel scenes and heavy anime fanservice. "It's essentially an anime Slay the Spire... with visual novel elements that you can completely skip through and get right to the gameplay if that turns you off," reads one representative review. The sample's positive reviewers consistently credit the combat itself as solid, if unoriginal, and several specifically praise a gentler difficulty curve than genre touchstones like Slay the Spire, calling it "a great entry point into the genre" for players who find other card battlers too punishing. The art and character writing draw similarly consistent praise from the audience this game is aimed at, with reviewers repeatedly calling the presentation "charming" and "colourful."

The fanservice itself is described by the sample as pronounced but not explicit, with one reviewer noting the game "toes the line" without crossing into an Adults Only rating, and another appreciating that the developer chose a specific, consistent tone for its cast rather than chasing the more extreme end of the genre. Reviewers who came for the deckbuilding rather than the aesthetic generally say the two layers coexist without friction, thanks in large part to the skippable dialogue: several specifically mention buying the game for the card combat and simply clicking through the visual novel scenes without feeling like they lost anything essential to the run itself.

A short story with little reason to run it back

The sample's most detailed and substantive complaint concerns structure rather than combat. "Story quite short, only 4 chapters... also with no replayability as a roguelike game," reads one extended negative review, which goes on to note that the story content — rather than the card-battling runs themselves — appears to be the game's real focus, an unusual design choice for a genre typically built around repeated, varied runs. This is a meaningfully different complaint from generic "it's short" feedback: reviewers on both sides of the recommend line describe the same structural shape, they simply disagree on whether four story chapters plus solid combat adds up to enough content at the asking price.

Two specific mechanical gripes

Beyond structure, two concrete complaints recur across negative reviews. First, a bleed effect that damages the player's characters before they can respond, which one reviewer compares directly and unfavourably to how similar damage-over-time effects are telegraphed in Slay the Spire. Second, a side mini-game that cannot be skipped or disabled — a notable inconsistency in a game that otherwise lets players skip all dialogue and story scenes, and one multiple reviewers single out as the low point of an otherwise-skippable presentation layer. One reviewer describes it bluntly as "in 20 minutes of yapping... there is about 1 minute of gameplay," a specific complaint about pacing that stands in some tension with the praise other reviewers give the game's combat loop, and suggests the mini-game and dialogue pacing are a bigger drag on the early hours than the core card battling ever becomes. A further, smaller complaint notes the game only auto-saves, with no manual save slot offered, which one reviewer flags directly as a missing quality-of-life feature relative to other genre entries.

What the achievement data shows

Tokyo Valkyries tracks 21 achievements. The first sits at 90.4%, consistent with an easy, guided opening most buyers reach, while the majority of the remaining achievements cluster in the 28-50% range — a distribution that fits a short, largely linear story mode rather than a sprawling roguelike with many distinct branches to chase. The rarest achievement, at just 3.2%, likely marks a genuine end-game or mastery milestone, but the overall shape of the list — a steep early cliff followed by a wide, relatively even middle band — corroborates the review sample's account of a compact story with limited structural depth beyond its main chapters.

Value

At NZ$28.99, Tokyo Valkyries sits toward the higher end for an indie deckbuilder, and the sample's central complaint is fundamentally a value question: is a four-chapter story plus solid but familiar card combat worth that price without the replay value the genre usually offers. One reviewer frames it directly: "Recommend if it's on sale, or if you are ok with paying more for a game with a bit more quality/polish." For the specific audience this game is built for, that's a fair summary — the fanservice and combat land for the right player, but the content-to-price ratio is thinner than most deckbuilder fans are used to.

Final Verdict

Tokyo Valkyries delivers a competent, approachable Slay the Spire-style card battler wrapped in heavy anime fanservice for players who want exactly that combination, with a gentle difficulty curve and skippable story scenes that respect players who just want to fight. What holds it back is structural: a short, four-chapter story that functions as the game's real content rather than its wrapper, minimal roguelike replayability, an unskippable side mini-game, and a couple of specific mechanical rough edges around damage-over-time effects. For its target audience it's a reasonable, if pricey, pickup; for deckbuilder fans expecting deep run variety, it's a much thinner game than the genre's best.