The series is typical of action role-playing games, in which players attack enemies in real time. The game's action pauses whenever the menu is opened to select magic to cast, items to use, or skills to perform. The player directly controls Kite and the other characters are controlled by artificial intelligence. The player may either provide the computer-controlled characters with guidelines ("attack", "first aid", "magic", etc.) or issue direct commands. Most hostile creatures are contained within magic portals and combat will not begin until the player character approaches the portal and releases the monsters inside. Kite possesses a unique ability called "Data Drain" which allows him to transform these enemies into rare items. Many boss monsters are known as "Data Bugs"—enemies with corrupted data which gives them infinite health. Data Drain is used to repair the damaged monsters' data and render them vulnerable but its use increases Kite's level of infection, randomly causing harmful side effects. The infection can be cured by defeating enemies without Data Drain.