Me and my brother played a demo of this game with friends. Despite being young at the time, we were not scarred at all and eventually got the full game.
We played many nights as each cast member (Using the All Vs All rule). The combat is pretty unique and I believe is still unique now (each creature has three attacks on cool down and fight in a 3D arena). It's also fascinating reading up their lore and learn their matchups (e.g Brontu, a big rhino like creature that charges through things will have a bad time against flying foes like the Killcycle and Wasp).
The strategy mode is also good which is basically like Fire Emblem but our home was the aforementioned mayhem mode. Even after all these years, we still think about this game and the cast while pounder about the sequel. It seems to remain an obscure game unless it will make an appearance in Astro Bot but a modern re-release could give it a new fresh of air.
Oh yeah, the Japanese version is wild from what I've heard but that's a story for another time.