Back when I was a kid my older brother got this game after seeing me struggle so much trying to play BoF IV. He didn't really like it that much, we were big JRPG heads and anything that didn't look or play like Final Fantasy was discarded as a waste of time. I thought it looked pretty cool tho so it always hovered somewhere in the back of my mind.
Over the years i've only heard this game mentioned as the "bad one", "the one that's plays badly", etc etc.
After my BoF IV replay I was willing to give it a shot cause I was always fascinated by the concept of "you're stuck underground and your journey is to make it to the outside world." Turns out I shouldn't ever trust other people's opinion on video games because it was one of the most enjoyable game I've played in the recent years. The combat system is phenomenal, and the constant anxiety of trying to outrun the constantly ticking time limit is something I've never seen in a game before, nor since.
I'm a big sucker for metanarratives, and I get what they were shooting for here. Stumbling through these longs dungeons that have no checkpoints, that constant doomsday clock ticking over your head, the lack of safe area where you can just relax and heal up. You get none of that, you have to spend every little ressources trying to move forward and get no chance to catch your breath. Why would you anyway? The air is disgustingly polluted so there is no reason to stop until the end of your journey.
But by far the best part about this game is those extremely hard and unfair boss fights at the end of each dungeons. I was annoyed at first, but then Bosch said "Protect your friends or save yourself, you can't do both !" and suddenly I understood. They are meant to be unfair because the game gives you a choice every single time: will you start over from a previous save so you can be stronger and more efficient (saving your friends by hurting yourself), or will your be selfish and summon the Dragon to make the boss easy? (Saving yourself by hurting Nina). After struggling for so long I decided Nina shouldn't be the one to suffer for my dumb mistakes, and I replayed the entire game without using the Dragon form until the very end, and I'm so glad I did.
I want to save Nina. TO THE SKY!
Over the years i've only heard this game mentioned as the "bad one", "the one that's plays badly", etc etc.
After my BoF IV replay I was willing to give it a shot cause I was always fascinated by the concept of "you're stuck underground and your journey is to make it to the outside world." Turns out I shouldn't ever trust other people's opinion on video games because it was one of the most enjoyable game I've played in the recent years. The combat system is phenomenal, and the constant anxiety of trying to outrun the constantly ticking time limit is something I've never seen in a game before, nor since.
I'm a big sucker for metanarratives, and I get what they were shooting for here. Stumbling through these longs dungeons that have no checkpoints, that constant doomsday clock ticking over your head, the lack of safe area where you can just relax and heal up. You get none of that, you have to spend every little ressources trying to move forward and get no chance to catch your breath. Why would you anyway? The air is disgustingly polluted so there is no reason to stop until the end of your journey.
But by far the best part about this game is those extremely hard and unfair boss fights at the end of each dungeons. I was annoyed at first, but then Bosch said "Protect your friends or save yourself, you can't do both !" and suddenly I understood. They are meant to be unfair because the game gives you a choice every single time: will you start over from a previous save so you can be stronger and more efficient (saving your friends by hurting yourself), or will your be selfish and summon the Dragon to make the boss easy? (Saving yourself by hurting Nina). After struggling for so long I decided Nina shouldn't be the one to suffer for my dumb mistakes, and I replayed the entire game without using the Dragon form until the very end, and I'm so glad I did.
I want to save Nina. TO THE SKY!