Montabi Review: Creature Collecting Finds a Tactical Spark

Every enemy in Montabi tells you where it plans to hit before you commit your next move. That small rule does much of the work required to distinguish Mankibo’s creature collector from the growing pile of roguelike deckbuilders around it.

A glowing target on the grid can send a Montabi into reserve, force the trainer into another square, or convince you to spend precious Action Points on armor instead of damage. Losing rarely feels mysterious. Usually, you can identify the decision that caused it.

The surrounding premise is much less distinctive. A teenager’s companion is stolen by the X Gang, leaving the player to choose another starter and pursue the thieves through three areas while recruiting new creatures. The Pokémon lineage is obvious in the collecting and evolution, while the battlefield owes plenty to Mega Man Battle Network. Shops, branching paths, events, escalating encounters, and randomized rewards come directly from the modern roguelike deckbuilding family. What gives Montabi its identity is the way those inheritances meet on the same grid.

Cards With Coordinates

Combat takes place across two three-by-three fields, with the trainer fighting alongside up to two Montabi while others wait in reserve. Cards handle attacks, buffs, armor, movement, and status effects, each demanding a portion of your available AP. Some generate zero-cost follow-up cards, creating turns where one sensible play suddenly develops into a much larger sequence.

The creatures keep that system from becoming routine. One Montabi might apply bleeding, causing damage whenever an opponent acts. Another leaves objects on the battlefield that become stronger if they survive several turns. A discard-focused creature can turn unwanted cards into additional damage. These differences affect team construction in a way familiar creature collectors often struggle to achieve. Choosing a Montabi here means choosing another tactical language.

Positioning makes those languages interact. If three enemies are targeting the same creature, swapping it into reserve can erase much of their intended turn. Armor becomes valuable when movement is unavailable. A fragile trainer such as the fighter can operate like a glass cannon if defensive creatures keep pressure elsewhere. This resembles the planning associated with Fire Emblem or X-COM, compressed into short card-driven encounters where enemy intent is visible before the damage lands.

Elites and bosses expose how well the system holds together. Some bosses build toward enormous attacks if ignored, while others strengthen their own Montabi and create pressure from several positions. Their health pools can initially seem excessive, particularly when your creatures receive limited permanent health growth, yet telegraphed attacks create room for careful defense and incremental damage. The one thing you should never have to fight is the interface, so the cursor’s tendency to disappear against busy battle screens becomes surprisingly irritating.

Building the Run

The roguelike structure surrounding combat is conventional, though Montabi uses creature recruitment to complicate familiar choices. Routes pass through battles, elite encounters, randomized events, vending machines, and Gatchapon rewards. Recruiting a creature requires encountering it and having a Montabi Biscuit available, while the five-creature carrying limit means every addition has to justify its place within the current build.

Progression gives those decisions another dimension. Montabi gain levels through fights, events, and activities such as studying at the café. Evolutions arrive at levels five and ten, each offering a choice between traits that can steer a creature toward different roles. Stickers modify individual cards, equipment and charms strengthen broader strategies, and Legendary cards can turn a shaky deck into something capable of surviving a boss.

That progression recalls the best roguelikes because it encourages experimentation rather than attachment to one solved strategy. Unlocking new trainers, including the fighter and chef, can change how an entire team is assembled. A setup built around armor stacking behaves very differently from one designed around discards or battlefield objects.

Runs reaching the end take roughly 30 to 45 minutes, which keeps experimentation manageable. Failure also expands future possibilities by unlocking creatures, starters, equipment, and other options. Difficulty settings provide another useful adjustment, since the gap between standard enemies and elite encounters can become severe before the player understands which synergies produce truly powerful builds.

Nintendo Switch performance creates a less welcome kind of unpredictability. Slowdown can appear when several cards or status effects are being generated, and crashes have interrupted runs. Autosaving limits the damage by returning the player to the relevant node, but a tactical game built around careful planning benefits from technical reliability.

Creatures Looking for a World

The 22 Montabi themselves show considerably more imagination than the story containing them. Washette turns a washing machine into an adorable combatant filled with appliance jokes. Cabpod evolves from a small cab into a much grander taxi. Elsewhere there are skateboarding monkeys, walking goldfish bags, and traffic cones given enough personality through design to make discovering a new creature enjoyable.

That makes the lack of meaningful interaction outside combat feel especially noticeable. Pokémon built much of its appeal around the idea that creatures were companions living alongside people, while Montabi mostly communicates that relationship through background details and text. A beloved team member can easily become remembered as “the armor build” or “the discard creature” rather than as a personality.

The city suffers from the same thinness. Battle environments repeat frequently, the limited soundtrack begins looping into familiarity, and the kidnapping story rarely gives the human cast much dramatic weight. Even the later narrative developments have little chance of competing with the tactical decisions taking place every few minutes.

Mankibo has already solved the harder design problem. Its creature collecting changes deck construction, its deck construction changes positioning, and positioning changes how every enemy attack is read. The creatures now need a world capable of making them matter once the cards leave your hand.