Ayakashi Ghost Guild (Android/iOS) – In-depth Review

Disclaimer: This is detailed, and quite a long read. I apologize if this much info just isn't up your alley. For my next review, things will be a little more condensed. If you do enjoy this article though, thanks a bunch!

Due to recent events, certain bits of information have been added to this article and it now serves an archive of the game under Zynga's administration. At the time of editing, there are projects related to Ayakashi that have not been completed, and will only be talked about here if and when they come to light.

Edit 4/29/15: Zynga announced the game's closure on March 20th, 2015 via a Facebook post on the game's page, with the ETA of said event occurring one month later, on April 30th. The announcement was sudden but speculated by many members of the community following an entire month of no announcements, daily gifts, or events whatsoever. The Facebook page also held no answers, with two posts prior to the announcement advertising two other unrelated Zynga games. This method of breaking the news caused backlash by every member of the community who posted on the thread, as even to the day of closure there were still no in-game notices about it. 

(Pic provided by Zynga's App Page on Google Play, when it was still listed.)

Greetings and salutations everyone. After reading a plethora of “reviews” for Zynga's immensely popular Ayakashi Ghost Guild app, I thought it was about time that a real review hit the scene. You know, not something in 200 characters or less, but an actual review. Being as how I truly enjoy this game and have played it long enough to be quite far, I think I've gotten just about everything figured out-- to an extent. There are people way more hardcore than I am, and their talents can be admired over in the Ayakashi Wiki. However, for those of you who are interested in the game but aren't sure how it works or what lies beyond the fine print, this article is for you.

What is Ayakashi? It's a mobile collectible card game where your primary objective is to recruit, fuse, and power up your cards. You take the role of a Ghost Agent working for the Ghost Guild, whose goal is to investigate and cleanse any unwanted spiritual activity. You're joined by a mirror-dwelling spirit named Mira, and she helps you throughout the story and acts as a guide of sorts. She gets you started and helps you to summon your very first daemon to protect you.

Like many Asian-influenced games, the cards are referred to as “daemons”, and there are 3 types of them-- Phantom, Anima, and Divina. Phantoms are just what you'd expect, ghosts who embody hate or other strong negative emotions. Anima daemons represent physical objects or weapons, and Divina include gods, deities, and legendary spirits. Phantom is strong against Anima, Anima is strong against Divina, and Divina is strong against Phantom. This rock paper scissors setup adds another layer of depth and variety to the system, but it isn't terribly deep.

So how's the gameplay? Well there are many aspects of Ayakashi that I will explain briefly.

(Pic provided by the Wiki)

Story Mode – The Story Mode is where the “meat” of Ayakashi lies. At first you might be a little confused, but there's nothing to it. Tapping the “story” icon listed in the navigation menu will take you to a chapter select, where you can choose which chapter you'd like to play. If you've just started, you'll only be able to play and progress through Chapter 1, but that's to be expected. Each chapter is further broken up into subsections, which usually have a dialogue between them. What you'll be doing in each section is repeatedly tapping the “investigate” button until you complete the section. Every time you tap, you'll get some money and sometimes a daemon, just like that! Be careful though, as your health depletes a fixed amount each time you do this, and once your health is low enough you won't be able to investigate for awhile.

Health replenishes once per minute, so at earlier levels it takes a very short amount of time.

Every once in awhile, a powerful foe may appear and this is where the battle system comes in. It's all automated, using simple math to determine the winner. If you're overall attack (after daemons' special abilities fire off) is higher than your opponent's defense, you win! If not, you lose. For story bosses, after defeating them you'll get a chance to negotiate. You can buy cabal chains from the in-game shop to make sure the negotiation is a success, as trying to without them usually doesn't work. Fear not if they refuse, however, as you'll still find them wandering around in that chapter later on if you need to come back at another time.

While investigating, you may also find “Sealstones”. Sealstones are like puzzle pieces and when you collect 6 of them, you'll acquire a daemon that can't be found elsewhere! Very useful for the earlier levels. Investigating is also the only way to earn experience points.

Ability Points and Spirit Cost – After completing a section of the story or leveling up, you earn Ability Points. These points work just like stat points, and you allocate them to either increasing your max HP, Attack Spirit or Defense Spirit. How you distribute your points is entirely up to you and your preferred play style. While the HP is self explanatory, Attack and Defense Spirit need a bit of explanation. As a Ghost Agent, you control 2 parties of daemons-- your attack party and defense party, consisting of 5 members each. You also assign a daemon to be the leader, who is present in both parties.

Your attack party is what you use when you're on the offensive, and you'll want to use daemons who have special abilities focused on boosting attack and lowering the enemy's defense. Your defense party is only present in PVP, as in-game story or event battles always have you take the offensive. Whenever someone challenges you to a battle, if they initiated, it will always be their attack team versus your defense team. For your defense team, you'll definitely want daemons with defensive skills as well as those that lower the enemy's attack.

Each daemon has a general “spirit cost” which is how many points they consume when in either of your parties. Let me map out a quick example.

I have 50 total attack and defense spirit at my current level.

The 4 daemons in my attack party come to a total cost of 45.

The 4 daemons in my defense party come to a total cost of 40.

I have an Anima daemon, “Barbetta”, who has a spirit cost of 6.

As I have 5 points remaining in my attack team, she will only fit in my defense team.

Did you get all that? This may seem intimidating, but once you play you'll get the hang of it. There's just a majority of simple math in this game, but all it takes is a short amount of time to understand it fully.

(Pic provided by the Wiki.)

Fusion – During your adventures you'll obtain many, many daemons, but not all of them are useful! Take the Magatamas and duplicate daemons you find and fuse them into your stronger ones that you wish to keep. Fusing not only increases the selected daemon's attack and defense, but their skill levels as well! For many daemons obtainable in events, there are specially-marked Magatamas that exist solely to level up that daemon's skill to a higher level than normal. This is absolutely beneficial and it's wise to seek out a daemon's Magatamas whenever they're available.

PVP—Other than during specific events, there are times in which you must do battle with other Ghost Agents. As mentioned before, Sealstones are obtainable via story mode, but chances are you won't be finding all 6 on your own. Sometimes, you'll need to snag one that you're missing from another player who has it. All that is required of you is to enter the “Stone” section of the menu, tap your desired missing piece, and then search for an opponent. Don't get cocky and try to fight someone who is a much lower level than you, otherwise you'll be fined and receive Mira's utter disappointment. You can also battle opponents to obtain money or event Sealstones.

Crew mates-- No one should be alone! Friendly competition (and trolling) between Agents is common, but it's important to stick together. While exploring the Story, you might come across another Agent. You can send this person a crewmate request, and there are many benefits to doing so. If they accept, you can poke them daily for a free summon point (explained in the “free summon” section below), call upon them to help you during some battles, and send them short messages. Guilds also exist, and level up when a member donates 20,000 silver. The more your guild levels up, the more members it can hold and the more benefits you can receive. There are also events called “Guild Conquest (GCQ for short) where a Guild must band together to defeat a powerful foe, and everyone who participates gets something nice.

(Pic provided by the Wiki.)

In-game Shop – In the mystical land of Ayakashi, there exists a Shopkeep named Dora. Every day when you log in, you will receive silver apples. You will get 1 during weekdays and 2 on Saturday and Sunday. Certain 3 and 4-star rarity daemons can also be traded for silver apples. Dora can exchange your apples for limited-time Daemons, cabal chains, or a permanent increase to the amount of daemons you can own at one time. Many other useful items can be bought with gold, which is of course the currency conversion of actual cash. However, you do get a free daily gift just for logging in which consists of said items, so if you're not interested in spending money you can always wait and acquire items that way.

Daemon Rarity and Events – Rarity is a pretty common asset in just about every card game, and it's no different here. Rarity ranges from 1 star to 5 stars; with 1 being common, 2 being uncommon, and so on. Rarity also coincides with strength, as 5-star daemons are the strongest in both attack, defense, and abilities.

Events are the easiest way to obtain one-of-a-kind daemons and are also the easiest way to obtain 5-stars, albeit being more difficult for lower-level players at first. Events are happening in Ayakashi almost constantly, so there's always something to do, and always new daemons to collect!

Free Summon – Other than through events or exploring in Story Mode, the Summon page is another method to obtain daemons. Each day you're allowed one free summon, and you get another at lunchtime. You can earn “summon points” via poking your crewmates, beating an event ghost in story mode, or sometimes as a guild donation reward. When you collect 10 summon points, you're allowed to make another free summon. There's a feature called “summon 6-pack”, which you can use to get 6 daemons at once after racking up 60 summon points or more. It's very useful! After completing a chapter of Story Mode 100%, you'll get a Special Summon Ticket. This ticket is used to summon stronger daemons than in free summon, as the ones there are usually just good for fusing.

(Pic provided by the Wiki.)

NOT Pay-to-Win, just Pay-to-Speed-up-- Whew, that was a mouthful, and I apologize. There's a lot to Ayakashi that makes it more than your standard phone app time-waster. It can be kinda fun to go hardcore and make strategies from time to time. Being a free player doesn't hinder you as much as you might think, as I've been able to reach many goals and collect several daemons without spending a dime. The only way you may feel outclassed by paying players is for rankings during events. No matter how you look at it, to be at the top of the rankings and receive the “best” prizes, you'll need to use several items to avoid wait times. Now, whether you've spent money on those items or if they're just what you've been hoarding for several months is irrelevant. Either way, you'll have to put in some kind of time and effort. While this may be dampening to some, personally I feel that as long as I keep leveling up, hanging on to my items, and making my daemons stronger, I can do anything that I set my mind to. If there's something that I really really want, I will use my item stash and do my best to get it.

Unless you're after the absolute best and fanciest daemons in the game, you'll find that there's more than enough in Ayakashi to keep you coming back and having fun. Of course, it's all about perspective in that regard.

Then again, the point of Ayakashi is that it's a game, and you can play however you want to. Keep the daemons you like even if they aren't considered “good”, participate in events that you're interested in, and take your time exploring the story. Truly, it's your own experience that matters the most and no one can tell you otherwise.


Limit Break- At the end of 2014 a new feature was announced called "Limit Break" where you could permanently increase your daemons' level and stats by fusing copies of said daemon together OR by using special mixer daemons called "Da Liu Ren". These Da Liu Ren came in 5 variations, just like normal daemons (1 star - 5 star). If you didn't have a copy, the Da Liu Ren that you used had to be the same star rarity or higher to give you the level increase, otherwise, it would only work like normal fusion fodder. This was the last major element added to the game before its closure.