Famed for its 100+ hour anime tactics RPGs, the Disgaea series is getting an action-centric spin-off

I have a soft spot for the Disgaea games. The molasses-thick anime trappings aren't appealing to me, but I'm drawn to the joyful excess of the things: In Disgaea 6, for example, the player cap for a character is 99,999,999, which is 99,990,000 more than the Disgaea 5 level cap of 9,999. Even thinking about Disgaea makes me want to type numbers rather than words. You can play them forever, to a point where they basically become idle games.

In true Disgaea spirit, a new action-centric spin-off doesn't have one name, but three: it was released in Japan last month as Kyouran Makaism, but is also known as Makaism: Frenzy of the Netherworld. When it releases on Steam this coming summer, it'll be known as Disgaea Mayhem.

I'm not going to pretend I know anything about Disgaea lore because I wilfully ignore it. Maybe I'm missing out. But from what I can gather from the Disgaea Mayhem Steam page, protagonist N.A. is a mercenary tasked with keeping a princess well-fed with flan. To do so he must make money, and in order to make money, he must kill things.

The gameplay looks muzou-inspired, and adopts the almost overbearingly colourful art style of Disgaea 6. It sounds like most of the weapons in the tactics games will feature, and grinding is—don't you worry!—definitely an important element. The Item World from the main games, which are randomly generated dungeons you can beat to level up weapons and gear, will feature in this action outing.

Here's the trailer: