better than cyber sleuth, mostly in the story and character department. i never gave a single fuck about any of the characters in cyber sleuth, they were awful, but i found this main cast to be quite likable this time around.

the game feels more straight to the point but it still has those moments of dumping a lot of boring dialogue on you, and since its basically an extension of cyber sleuth, it still suffers from some of the same issues (unbalanced difficulty, boring environments, etc).

domination battles were a nice change of pace, although theres not a lot of strategy involved and playing them on hard felt like a massive slog sometimes.

also Yu made me question my sexuality

Digimon Story: Cyber Sleuth es probablemente uno de mis videojuegos favoritos en general. y la verdad tras varias horas invertidas en Hacker's Memory puedo decir con seguridad que disfruté muchísimo mas de este ultimo.
No demerito para nada al original Cyber Sleuth, ambos juegos son igual de valiosos para mi y siempre voy a recomendar jugar ambos juegos en su orden de salida al mercado, de hecho a nivel mecánico ambos juegos me parecen igual de buenos (mas que nada porque ambos son prácticamente iguales en ese sentido) sin embargo varios agregados de Hacker's Memory como las batallas de dominio hicieron que la experiencia no se sintiera como un refrito donde la mayoría del contenido nuevo viene al final (Ej. Las segundas versiones de Pokemon)
La historia también me pareció mucho mejor enfocada en este juego, y eso que la del primer Cyber Sleuth no me parece nada mala, pero si había varios puntos donde sentí que la historia te sabía como continuar ya estando en puntos relativamente avanzados de la misma, y si bien Hacker's Memory también peca de lo mismo en cierto punto, el grado es muchísimo menor, así como su inicio también se me hizo mas enganchante.
No se que le depare a la división de juegos de Digimon en el futuro, pero la verdad, si suponemos que esto es fue un proyecto de bajo presupuesto, solo puedo esperar que ojala Digimon Survive sean igual de bueno.

A masterfully written game that was crafted in memorial of the singer for the classic butterfly dream song. Easily the best digimon game in the entire franchise, with an amazing soundtrack, additional Kowloon stages, more variety when it comes to sidestories and quests, as well as more character development and lore that was absent from the first game.

Far superior to the original cybersleuth, and in my opinion, a standalone that makes the previous game obsolete. The first installment of cybersleuth was erroneous and set up a premise that would not allow you to fail since your powers in cyberspace relied on being an anomaly (a glitch that could easily access anything and everything, making the tension very slim). I personally think you can always make up bullshit to get your characters into trouble, but you should never make up bullshit to get them out of trouble. Cybersleuth (the original) set up a world where the main character simply could not be defeated, which ruined any stakes and allowed us to only experience the plot because the main character became a glitch (gathering information otherwise inaccessible, meaning it would be impossible to reach the ending unless you became a glitch).

This time around, we are playing a regular every-day character with a lively and expressive personality. Instead of being the only source of power and acting alone, you join a team and work together with characters that eventually become your family.

The interesting thing is that every character in this circle cares deeply for one another, but each and every one of them is keeping secrets in hopes of protecting the other. This is where our protagonist (Keisuke) becomes a pivotal part to the story, bridging gaps between characters and allowing us insight into how some characters view each other and what their dynamics are. By Keisuke's help, each character is allowed to flourish and blossom, or crash and suffer- depending on how he acts (and both cases are true- giving the scenario more weight by showing that you can not always succeed even with the best of intentions).

I think what this game excelled in the most is communication. It allowed us to see when communication failed, was avoided, or misunderstood or kept secret, and how it impacted the plot and characters. There are numerous instances where a simple glance or quiet dialogue spoken in mere expressions can mean so much when you replay the game. The very first scene with Yuu and Keisuke in the cafe shows us a silent conversation that consists of nothing but nods and expressions. Upon first playthrough, it seemed just like any normal conversation. After having finished the game and replayed it, I now know what Yuu was feeling when he was trying to convey his feelings to Keisuke about how "he should be enough".

Having 100% completed cybersleuth, and knowing the ending, I can safely say I was aware what would happen, but was not prepared for just how the game tore my heart out and ruined me. Thinking about it now makes me feel all types of emotions.

The appeal of this game is not just in the battle system (although it's addicting and fun) nor in the areas, the music, or even the lore in the end- it's about a journey to complete a puzzle that no one knew was missing a piece. The group was one as a whole at the start of the game, united, but distant because of their traumas and hardships. Keisuke becomes the piece that no one knew was missing, allowing the puzzle to finally be completed.

I love this game. It's the only game I replayed immediately as I was done going through the end credits. My tears had not even dried before I was back at the start of the game, eager to go through the story yet again just to catch all the hints and foreshadowing added to the story.

If you want a meaningful game that will capture your heart and make you understand what it means to mend a friendship no one knew was broken and grow closer because of it, this game is 100% going to satisfy you.

And if you just care about a guy being obsessed with the protagonist so much he wants to kiss him on the mouth, don't worry, this game is also 100% for you.

Basically, if you breathe, this game is for you.

Everything positive that I said about the original game is either maintained or elevated in Hacker's Memory. This is, of course, due to the fact that Hacker's Memory is built directly on top of Cyber Sleuth's foundation, but it's a good foundation!

Hacker's Memory uses the world set up by Cyber Sleuth to tell a story that's much less concerned with the over-the-top earth-shattering events of the first game, and much more concerned with a strong cast of characters living in that world. The members of Hudie are simple, likeable, and all get their own satisfying character arc. These are side characters in the broader world of Cyber Sleuth, and they know they're side characters, and they interact almost exclusively with other side characters. I think the way the cast is developed despite the fact their actions are often futile is really interesting, and seems to comment on the nature of what it means to be a side game. All this is to say, Hacker's Memory's greatest asset is its narrative, and it's much better than Cyber Sleuth in that regard.

The only thing here that wasn't drastically improved is the combat system, and it's probably the thing that needed it the most. It really sucks to spend hours upon hours finely tuning your team of genetically engineered freak Digimon only to go into a battle and realize you're gonna spam the same move 99% of the time. Halfway through this game I started using autobattle for virtually everything that wasn't a boss. I know these games are made on a budget of $50 and a ball of twine, and it's impressive that they can make a game on this scale with that budget, but the combat system desperately needs an overhaul if they ever make another Story game.

Also bring Masafumi Takada back and let him compose more than like 5 songs for a 50 hour game. Seriously, it got to the point where I could predict the exact song they would play during every single scene, which was kind of a metagame in itself. Maybe that was intentional? Probably not.

Wormmon is best boy.

Hacker's memory is an overall improvement over base game Cybersleuth; keeps the things that made me like cybersleuth, improves on parts of it, but still has some of its issues.

The story I think is overall better, mostly held up by how much I actually liked the Hudie gang and the sense of being a real close knit team is the forefront of the story and I throughly enjoyed it. It lacks a lot of the real Oh Shit Lets Fucking Gooooo moments of CS but is better paced overall (still has the weirdness of doing tonal unfitting but necessary to progress the plot sidequest, but it never gets as bad as cybersleuth), and some plot threads feel a little underbaked, but it all works out in the end, and it's a lot of fun.

The gameplay systems of CS are mostly the same in HM, but the encounter feel a lot more fleshed out. Bosses in this game have a greater sense of identity and strategy to fighting them, and a lot less fights that are just higher stat 'mons. This is for better and worst; for better it's satisfying to fight a boss with creative rules, for worst you get things like Matadormon which made me wanna pull my hair at how annoying it was. It also introduced me to a brand new issue that I didnt discover when I played through CS cuz I played that game on normal; difficulty.
The game has two difficulties, Normal and hard. Normal is too easy imo, you can kinda breeze through most of it. Hard on the other hand is pretty tough, and will force you to respect the battle system more, but the game becomes really annoying. Bosses are giant brick houses of health, even when buffed attacks that aren't either 3x bonuses or a def/int penetrating attack (or poison if it works on the boss lol) feels like it does nothing. It puts a bit of a dampen on party building; 'mons that don't have the aforementioned penetration or just some really useful utility skills dont feel worth having, they'll do pathetic damage and you'll probably just use their turns to apply items rather than use them, it feels bad.
I personally say just go with normal, but you will learn to appreciate the system more if you go hard at the cost of needing to do more 2-3x platinum sukemon grinding and some really tedious boss fights. Pick your poison.

I also think the game comes into its own artistically in HM. While it's obviously limited being a vita game/vita port (i played this on PC complete edition but but I cant separate the pc port games on backloggd) they realyl went further in this game with more weird enviroments, fights with cool backdrops or camera angles, more creative inengine cutscenes with 'mons doing cool things, it looks great for what it is.

I highly recommend this and cybersleuth (they both come together anyways). I put an easy 90 hours into it, and if you're a bigger collect them all head you'll go nuts in this game. It's rough, but games with a lot of soul are often rough. It's also one of those games that seems like it's constnatly going on sale, and this game is well worth whatever sale bucks you get it on.
And above all, you'll get it and then play through a pokemon game and feel like you've been getting played for like 20+ years