Whenever you get into a fight with a Yokai, the ones you have in your immediate party (up to a maximum of 6) will be shown on the bottom screen on a wheel. Three will be designated to your front row (top three), while the others are put into the back row and can be switched Before the battle officially begins, you can choose the three participating Yokai by rotating the wheel and then pressing the “Fight” button in the middle of the wheel. Now, instead of inputting commands, like many traditional games, the Yokai will automatically fight on their own, choosing one of four different commands. They can use a regular Attack , perform a Technique (usually elemental), Defend or Inspirit (similar to a buff or debuff).

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The radar in the upper right will indicate when a Yokai is near (left). You have no control over what a Yokai does during battle (right).

The only command that players can give to the Yokai is the Soultimate command, which is akin to an ultimate attack. In order to use this attack, you’ll need to have a full Soul Meter, which is the tear-shaped object near the Yokai’s portrait in battle. Outside of talking to Eyepo, the game’s equivalent to a save point of sorts and which restores all of a Yokai’s HP and Soul Meter, the other way to do it is by attacking Yokais in battle. However, if you see a purple aura coming off of the enemy Yokai, then they have been Inspirited (debuffed) and if your Yokai attack them while they are, they will receive a big boost to their Soul Meter.

It should be noted that you need to perform a minigame once you choose the Soultimate option, which will be displayed on the bottom screen of your 3DS. This comes in a few forms, such as spinning something with your stylus, tapping bubbles that move, or tracing specific patterns. Once you complete the minigame, the Soultimate maneuver will be performed in the actual battle and the Soul Meter will be emptied, requiring you to do the above in order to fill it again before another can be performed by that same Yokai.

Since the Yokai will automatically perform actions, they will attack whoever they feel like, but there’s something you can do about that. The option in the upper right of the screen is called Target , which lets you place a pin on a specific enemy, forcing your characters to focus on that particular enemy until they are defeated. The Item command should be pretty easy to know about and doesn’t really need to be talked about, although there is a brief cooldown in between uses.

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Soultimates (left) are very strong attacks that can change the flow of battles. Pin an enemy Yokai (right) to make your own concentrate their attacks.

The last command, Purify , comes into use whenever your own Yokai become Inspirited by the enemy. By switching that particular Yokai into the back row, you can select Purify and do another minigame, although these are different, to an extent. You have the same spinning of the wheel, but there are also bubbles to pop, tapping the screen to break a crystal and even rubbing the affected area to get rid of the smoke. Do this and you’ll get rid of the nasty effect and also earn extra EXP at the end of the battle.