It cannot be a coincidence that 1997 is a pivotal year in the world of Jack Move. In the game, it's the year everything went dark in this turn-based Japanese-style RPG, with a solar storm biffing the world's electronics. It threw the world into chaos, giving rise to the megacorps that now control the dystopian cyberpunk society where our heroine Noa is trying to make a living. In the real world, of course, 1997 was the year Final Fantasy VII came out, the seminal JRPG that Jack Move owes a great deal to (right down to its menu plink plink sound). Developers So Romantic have said outright that it's been one of the main inspirations for Jack Move, and its shady corporate powers and grungy urban landscape certainly feel of a piece with ShinRa's grip on the city of Midgar.
But the bigwigs at MonoMind aren't out to poison the world and suck the life from it in Jack Move. Instead, they're more concerned with using their newfound technological powers to find eternal life – a classic 'upload your mind to the metaverse' kind of tale you'll probably recognise if you've read any of the cyberpunk 101 novels such as William Gibson's Neuromancer or Permutation City by Greg Egan. Jack Move's story doesn't tread any new ground in this respect, but Noa and her hacker pal Ryder are a fiery spirited pair that make this six-hour tale of espionage and rebellion against its cartoonish villain well worth dipping into. Yes, you read that correctly. A JRPG you can polish off in a single day of play. Bliss.