After a long time waiting, Disgaea 5 is finally available on PC. Along with Disgaea 1 and 2, this is the 3rd game from Disgaea series that got ported to PC. But the problem is, the most recent Disgaea on PC is Disgaea 2 - so if you don't follow the series on other platforms, you WILL getting confused. Story wise, gameplay wise, there are so many new things on this latest installment. If we have to make a comparison, it's like reading a book to page 100, and then skip right through the end.
So, what can you do to not getting overwhelmed by the sheer amount of new contents? Well, here are some tips for you.
Prioritizes on the storyline
In Disgaea 5, there are so many side activities that you can do. From Item World dungeons, to Netherworld Investigation, or playing Chara World board game, and so many more things. All these side activities are fun and worth doing, but they are not the main priority. For a game as huge as Disgaea 5, it can be so easy to get overwhelmed and lose your way in the process. Believe me, I've spent like 70 hours of doing side activities, without touching the story AT ALL.
Of course, you can play the game any way you like, doing any things you want. But my advice is, you should prioritize the story mission above all else. For a huge game like this, the main story serve like a big tutorial, and will help you get more familiar with the game mechanics and systems. You will also unlock more characters, abilities, and even more side activities with the story missions.
Tweak the settings any way you like
Disgaea 5 features a special "settings" menu, which is the "Cheat Shop". In this menu, you can pretty much do any things you want with the game. You can increase the amount of exp you earn (at the cost of decreasing the gold gains), change the difficulty, or even out right detonate all your characters (seriously don't do that).
Since the game provides you with so much freedom, just tweak the game as you see fit. Feels the game is getting too easy? Turn the difficulty up to eleven. Need more gold? Raise the gold rate to the max. Before doing anything, remembers to go to the Cheat Shop and make adjustment based on your goal. Also, don't forget the main settings, where you can change graphics and voice options, and the speed of combat, text and cursor.
Don't forget to check Quest Shop and Dark Assembly on a regular basis
With so many things to do in Disgaea 5, of course it's easy to get confused and forget what to do at times. But if I have to make an advice, then try not to forget checking the Dark Assembly and Quest Shop. They are located at the hub, and will provide you with essential resources to the game. While the Dark Assembly provide you combat bonuses and upgrading resources, the Quest Shop is essential to unlock new classes. There are also some quest that will reward rare scrolls, which can add new skills for the characters.
The problem is, there are absolutely no notifications of when those good things are available, so you have to check it yourself, regularly.
Disgaea 5's battle system is deeper than what you might think
You might think of Disgaea 5 as a typical JRPG, with grid-based, turn-based combat system. You control your team, move them around on the battlefield, attack the enemies. Which is right, but that's not all the things Disgaea 5 offers. Here are some combat maneuvers that you can implemented in your game plan:
Capturing: Available after unlocking Capture Squad in the Netherworld. With this, you can capture enemies instead of killing them. After capturing, you can interrogate them to gain items, or use them as your units.
Towering: You can stacking your character to form a tower. This maneuver will distribute exp evenly among all units, which will help with leveling. Also, when stacking units to form a tower, you will unlock special "tower attacks".
Throwing: One of the techniques for tower stacking, since you can throw your units to the same square to make a tower. Along with that, you can also throw your allies to reach higher platform in the battleground, too. This technique is applicable to enemies, too, and if you throw an enemy to another enemy, they will combine to make a stronger opponents, which worth even more experience.
There are some classes more powerful than others
As with many games with class-based system, there will be some classes that can make your game becomes a breeze. So if you are a casual player, just want to enjoy the game and cheese though all the hard stuff, then it's a good idea to invest your time to these units:
Armor Knight: Super tanker, can protect 3 alies no matter how far they are.
Wrestler: They can throw allies all over the map, which is essential for towering strats.
Thief: An unit that can steal items from enemies, so you can easily get better items at the early game.
Maid: A balance unit, which will provide unique buffs to allies.
Professor: A strong support unit, which provide better buffs than maids, but have weaker stats overall.
Build a balance party
Since Disgaea 5 is a game with loads and loads of characters, it give you a lot of choices for units loadout. But that doesn't mean you should use all the units - just focus on those who fits with your playstyle, or strategies. Don't try to equip everyone with the best gears, just focus on around 10 characters, since you can only bring along 10 units to battles.
Also, the main characters are really good, and you should focus on them, too. Aims to have balance party, which have both range and melee attacks, physical and magic, buffs, and healing.
Don't try min-maxing at the early game
You can, and free to make mistakes at building your characters in Disgaea 5. If you are not happy with your character build, just reincarnate them and build again from scratch. At the early games, wrong builds doesn't matter much, so don't sweat over it. When the build are matter (at the late game), you'll have access to some of the best grinding spot in the game, so rebuilt a character is not a big problem anymore. Have fun with try out different builds, and don't worry about the consequences.