I'm not sure which one to log but since I played both, I'll at least use this one.
this is a genuinely compelled set of games with a lot of layers and themes that makes a strong and cohesive narrative with a lot of really fun and dark moments. I'm kicking myself for not playing these sooner but I'm still glad I gave them a chance.
I'm always impressed with what indie devs come up with and this one is honestly no exception. Absolutely brilliant in terms of music, gameplay and character development for pretty much everyone regarding your party members, the main character and some of the enemies you come across on your journey through the apocalypse.
I do think to some extent "The Joyful" is weaker but I do love Buddy as a character even if her story doesn't hold up as well as "The Painful", but I still felt myself enjoying and engaging with it, especially towards the end with the true ending.
The use of music and the different kinds of music that is used in both games has a lot of eerie tunes that build atmosphere but also some genuine bangers. I don't think there's much I can say at this moment but I think this is now a favorite of mine that'll probably be hard to top.
this is a genuinely compelled set of games with a lot of layers and themes that makes a strong and cohesive narrative with a lot of really fun and dark moments. I'm kicking myself for not playing these sooner but I'm still glad I gave them a chance.
I'm always impressed with what indie devs come up with and this one is honestly no exception. Absolutely brilliant in terms of music, gameplay and character development for pretty much everyone regarding your party members, the main character and some of the enemies you come across on your journey through the apocalypse.
I do think to some extent "The Joyful" is weaker but I do love Buddy as a character even if her story doesn't hold up as well as "The Painful", but I still felt myself enjoying and engaging with it, especially towards the end with the true ending.
The use of music and the different kinds of music that is used in both games has a lot of eerie tunes that build atmosphere but also some genuine bangers. I don't think there's much I can say at this moment but I think this is now a favorite of mine that'll probably be hard to top.
This game sucks
This game is so sad and bleak, but so so funny. This is a game that understands that rpg battles can be difficult for reasons outside of the enemies having high health and attack.
literally peak fiction
I ran through this definitive edition in about a third of the time compared to my first playthrough, which has readily prepared me for my third (and maybe final) pain mode playthrough. The new additional content is mostly just there to add more to the characters and world, which I appreciated. The quality of life improvements is also very welcome, with the amazing psychedelic backgrounds of battles paired with the fine-tuning of the visuals in general. The original and this version aren't honestly too different, so id recommends playing both of them as they're both masterpieces in every way.
Lame censorship, it gets worse on soystation consoles by removing any reference to alcohol and cigarettes from an M rated game. Better get the original if you can
That's it? That's the definitive edition?
THAT WAS JUST A BUNCH OF CHEAP CAMPFIRE SCENES!
AUSTIN BETRAYED US!!!!
THAT WAS JUST A BUNCH OF CHEAP CAMPFIRE SCENES!
AUSTIN BETRAYED US!!!!
Maybe it's because I"m coming off of Omori, a really narratively complex and starkly interesting game, but this feels a lot less genuine. At times it can feel like "torture porn." My reasoning behind this is that a lot of plot points are just left in the air, never to be addressed. There's a lot of plot holes like Yado's plan or the flash that are just used as vague setpieces or fake motivation. It feels like there's a lot of context just ripped out of this game and constant toying with all these sadistic and horrifying things but never really following through on them. It tells a decent story but it doesn't really say or do anything very profound.
Overall, these are excellent remasters of the LISA games. The core gameplay is still there with solid improvements and some quality of life. Both games have additional super bosses and added lore bits, which are super great for anyone revisiting the series.
Still just as good as back when I first played in 2016, and I was very happy to return to it all.
Still just as good as back when I first played in 2016, and I was very happy to return to it all.
as the buddy to a brad, joyful's ending made me cry in a way i haven't cried for a video game before. the game is definitely worth the hype. that said, i wish the new definitive edition stuff could've been unlocked through painless mode, as i 100% the og game and sometimes the rpg mechanics--while fun--can take a while. but maybe that's a me problem.
This review will speak about both The Painful and The Joyful games, and what the Definitive Edition has added to them
The LISA duology has always been one of the top games when speaking about indie RPG Maker games (not counting The First, since it's a Yume Nikki kind of game), and being its release date one year prior to Undertale's, the other juggernaut of the genre, and being both inspired heavily by the MOTHER series, it's important to point out how different LISA plays when compared to anything else.
The LISA Duology takes on a lot of dark subjects, such as abuse, emotional manipulation, drug addictions or abusive environments, but it does those things in a subtle way, instead of straight telling a story, the game focus instead on the journey of their protagonists, who, initially, we know little about them, and exploring bit by bit their traumas, their inner thoughts and their fears.
The humour of this game in my eyes is excellent, the game knows how to mix a serious, dark setting with dark jokes and gags that don't feel out of place, and a lot of the time reinforce the narrative the game wants to go for.
In terms of the protagonists, in The Painful we'll play as Brad Armstrong, and in The Joyful, as Buddy, his adoptive daughter. Brad, is in my opinion, a magnific main character, he's obviously flawed, and he's far from being a good person, but that doesn't stop him from being sympathetic, and in the end, he feels like a person trying to do the best he can to improve as a person, and you can empathize with him.
In the other hand, I didn't feel the same with Buddy, I think her goals are just stupid, and I feel like her character arc in Joyful is just there to give an extra game with more context in what happened in Olathe.
Now, about the extra content of the definitive edition, it is very few, and it's not worth a replay if you played it recently, there's a new superboss on each game, and they're both found by doing a lot of cryptic stuff (and I really mean it, nothing in the whole game points it out, and it's basically impossible to find them without a guide), they're there mainly to give some extra context that the original game didn't have, and in the case of Joyful, it gives a better ending than the previous ones (which weren't bad per se, but there's an extra conversation that feels really gratifying after playing both games).
There's also campfire conversations, which gives some extra dialogue to almost all the recruitable party members, and helps to give some extra information about them, which is always welcome.
In the end, the Definitive Version has been to me more about a reason to replay LISA, since it's basically the masterpiece that has always been, with a cherry on the top.
The LISA duology has always been one of the top games when speaking about indie RPG Maker games (not counting The First, since it's a Yume Nikki kind of game), and being its release date one year prior to Undertale's, the other juggernaut of the genre, and being both inspired heavily by the MOTHER series, it's important to point out how different LISA plays when compared to anything else.
The LISA Duology takes on a lot of dark subjects, such as abuse, emotional manipulation, drug addictions or abusive environments, but it does those things in a subtle way, instead of straight telling a story, the game focus instead on the journey of their protagonists, who, initially, we know little about them, and exploring bit by bit their traumas, their inner thoughts and their fears.
The humour of this game in my eyes is excellent, the game knows how to mix a serious, dark setting with dark jokes and gags that don't feel out of place, and a lot of the time reinforce the narrative the game wants to go for.
In terms of the protagonists, in The Painful we'll play as Brad Armstrong, and in The Joyful, as Buddy, his adoptive daughter. Brad, is in my opinion, a magnific main character, he's obviously flawed, and he's far from being a good person, but that doesn't stop him from being sympathetic, and in the end, he feels like a person trying to do the best he can to improve as a person, and you can empathize with him.
In the other hand, I didn't feel the same with Buddy, I think her goals are just stupid, and I feel like her character arc in Joyful is just there to give an extra game with more context in what happened in Olathe.
Now, about the extra content of the definitive edition, it is very few, and it's not worth a replay if you played it recently, there's a new superboss on each game, and they're both found by doing a lot of cryptic stuff (and I really mean it, nothing in the whole game points it out, and it's basically impossible to find them without a guide), they're there mainly to give some extra context that the original game didn't have, and in the case of Joyful, it gives a better ending than the previous ones (which weren't bad per se, but there's an extra conversation that feels really gratifying after playing both games).
There's also campfire conversations, which gives some extra dialogue to almost all the recruitable party members, and helps to give some extra information about them, which is always welcome.
In the end, the Definitive Version has been to me more about a reason to replay LISA, since it's basically the masterpiece that has always been, with a cherry on the top.
they weren't lying
that lisa really be painful
that lisa really be painful
From what I've seen it doesn't have much substantial in terms of content additions, but it's nice seeing it get ported and work better on modern platforms with some QoL changes.
they changed Work Harder ðŸ˜