Quando joguei o Persona 3 original o sentimento que tive com o jogo (ainda mais fazendo parte da grande parcela que veio de P5) foi deveras curioso, visto que em alguns momentos a atmosfera sufocante e exaustiva me emergia bastante no jogo, enquanto em outros, a sensação de conectividade com os personagens e a estrutura que dava profundidade aos temas específicos de cada SL pareciam não lograrem muito quanto deveriam. A questão é que sempre que eu pensava na minha bagagem com o jogo, eu lembrava dos bons momentos mas sempre aquela pulga atrás da orelha de que eu teria feito determinadas coisas de forma diferente.

Dito isso, Persona 3 Reload altera a composição dessa experiência e cria algo totalmente novo? Não. Porém, mesmo que ainda possa me ocorrer um pensamento momentâneo sobre coisas que eu gostaria de fazer diferente, ainda assim defenderei a opinião de que esse remake é a melhor maneira de experienciar Persona 3.

Não passa pela minha cabeça achar racional que alguém tenha a opinião de que o Reload não faz nada a P3, pois, além de tornar o jogo mais divertido e com um ciclo mais fluído (apesar de sacrificar outros elementos), o jogo acrescenta e muito ao cast principal.

Não é que os personagens sejam chatos ou supérfluos no original, mas aqui é tudo tão mais condensado e elaborado que acaba trazendo um sentimento de proximidade absurda até mesmo com aqueles que foram tratados de forma simplória até demais pros próprios temas originalmente.

A trilha sonora, subjetiva como pode ser, me agradou bastante. Algumas músicas tiveram acréscimo na lírica e as novas encaixaram absurdamente bem com o jogo. Respeito muito quem ainda prefere as originais sobre aquelas que fora remixadas, e eu pessoalmente não tenho preferência, ambas me servem bem.

Persona 3 Reload não reinventa a roda e não altera tanto quanto alguns poderiam querer, mas mesmo assim os acréscimos e a experiência no geral, pra mim, é superior. Para os saudosistas, o bom e velho P3F vai continuar lá para que seja revisitado e lembrado como o jogo geracional que ele é, pois é isso que importa no final.

Slaps the roof of the Persona Franchise

"Ah yeah, this can fit so much peak in it."

Because I played Portable not all that long ago, I won't speak in as much detail as I usually do about new titles. My P3P review can be found here, what I do have to add is below:

Persona 3 Reload rectified an incredible amount of issues I had with P3P, a game which I played last year as it hit PC for the first time, jumping my Persona 3 experience from a 2.5 star to a 4.5 star rating. What did the Persona Team do in this recreation of a fan favorite? Viewable character models!!! Though that is a tremendous boon to my enjoyment of this title, it was just the tip of the "wow this is pretty damn good" iceberg that is Reload. Improvements made to the OST, design, and combat all turned this experience from a simple rehashing of a game I found decent at best to my smash hit of 2024.

"Persona Vibes" have been a joke in my friendgroup for some time... that silly stupid smile you get from simply existing in the Persona world going to school at whatever institution MC-Kun attends with the whatever group of misalined teammates that you call your friends with some of the best soundtracking to grace the medium of videogames... but damnit if it isn't really a thing and doesn't hit as hard as it does. The jump from Portable to Reload for me was a massive reward in this regard, just being able to run around Tatsumi Port Island with a high-definition display and consistently present hip-hop music creates an amazing vibe you can only get from Atlus' marquee franchise. I felt a noticable lack of buy-in to the world and characters at hand in Portable when I was mousing over and clicking on still profiles, it means so much more being able to physically approach and interact with the richly variable (yet still not deep) cast in terms of creating immersion. While I still don't find myself as into the cast of P3, nor the location (since its so small in comparison to P4 and P5,) it's still Persona at its roots. Maybe if I'd played FES or the original release, my approach to P3R would be a little more tempered, however I can't stress enough how nice it was to actually experience the world. I didn't forsee this being as much of a difference maker in my enjoyment of P3 (because I still have my issues with the game) as it was, but it did rectify the absence of Persona DNA and feel that existed in Portable.

As I've touched on a couple of times now, Lotus Juice and company did a fantastic job modernizing the work they and Shoji Meguro did in Persona 3's original OST. The instrumentation and mixing sounds far superior than in the original P3 suite, with the modern renditions of songs like Changing Seasons and the Dorm Theme (oh my gosh, they really did fix the dorm theme from the horrendous HEY HEY HEY version) as examples. It's more crisp, goes along with the redone and colorful locale, and lends itself to a more seamless Persona-experience. What I had originally imagined would be just a simple re-use of the already pretty strong P3 OST ended up as my front runner for Soundtrack of the Year. Normally I wouldn't count remaster/remakes/ports in this category but the lifting job in Reload to take an already great work of music into the stratosphere is as commendable as you can get.

I applaud the improvements made to integrating your party more into seeming like actual members of your crew through linked episodes which feed directly into the combat boons that are Theurgy's. Having a sort of ultimate attack/limit break in Persona is much needed for some of the longer weakness-lacking boss encounters, which are a plenty in P3R. You fight a lot of rather tough and long winded enemies in this game and it's nice to have a way to blast through that a little quicker while still having to retain a sound strategy and mind.

The negatives that existed within my P3P review that still remain in P3R include: horrible social link optics in many arcana's (Maiko, Maya, Kenji to name a few) which unfortunately were not re-written/fixed, abysmally slow pacing in the early sections of the game, and tartarus being the worst in-game mandatory dungeon in gaming (that I've experienced.) While these negatives still remain, the good in P3R was pretty damn good and enough to offset any and almost all sour feelings I had with my experience in P3P.

While it's not flawless, Persona 3 Reload rectifies Persona 3's biggest issues and breathes elysian life into a game that had the ingredients for a fantastic dish. I'd recommend Persona 3 Reload to fans of Persona and JRPG's alike, it's one of the best experiences I've had in a GOOD WHILE in games and has left a Persona sized hole in my heart once again. I mean with no announcement for Persona 6 what do I even do? Are there otherr games out there?

Nas primeiras horas Wildlands parece interessante, mas você vai percebendo que as missões do jogo são as mesmas de sempre, nada muda, é sempre a mesma coisa do início ao fim.

As missões do jogo já começa bem zoadas, tendo que pegar dados para startar o objetivo principal.. e lógico, isso envolve também a repetição de sempre: invade base, mata inimigos e vai lá.. só que após pegar os dados.. a missão principal que vai começar é também a MESMA COISA que você fez antes, só que no final tem um objetivozinho diferente que não muda também nada a mais.

Sério, eu joguei 7 horas desse jogo e estou vomitando ainda mais jogar Ghost Recon Wildlands.

Em coop, a proposta pode ser mais interessante e divertida, porém no momento disso aqui os servers estão offline faz semanas.

Despite what backloggd may say I’ve actually played this game 4 times now, and it’s really been cemented as one of my favorites of all time. I adore everything about this game. Start to finish it’s a constant joy to play! Since i honestly don't know where to start here, I'm just gonna go everywhere. So prepare your eyes for me to fucking gush as much as i can about how much i love this game for a couple paragraphs!

I love how this game takes the first 5 or so hours of the original ff7 and makes it into a 30 hour game where i have never once felt bored while playing, I adore its story and characters, Cloud’s one of my favorite protags of all time here, Barrett's such a bro (and a great dad!), Tifa’s lovely, Take one wild guess on how i feel about Aerith (spoiler alert i adore her too), the Avalanche gang is so fun to speak with, every antagonist- except corneo- is either threatening and terrifying like Sephiroth and Hojo or really damn fun to see like Reno and Rude or even both like Rufus Shinra (more on him later). When the story does finally change up from the original, its a giant middle finger to Gamers™ that just complain that remakes “shouldn’t do anything different” from their originals and honestly I love that! I love that it's so explicit that Cloud & co. literally KILL the game’s representation of those complainers! But yeah i love this games story that is and isn’t taken from the original, love the characters so much it's got one of my favorite casts out there.

Graphics are beautiful, yeah, but also the settings themselves are amazing! These towns and areas actually feel so lived in, the way you just overhear conversations while walking by, the kids in the towns playing, the fact you can talk to so many people, and that isn't really scratching the surface for me it feels! Small point but again it's great.

On this playthrough specifically thoughts occurred to me when dancing with Andrea Rhodea, and yes while one of those thoughts was “Damn Andrea’s pretty hot” and, yeah, he is, the real thought is that this game is so genuine with how it puts scenes across. Especially in wall market it really is unashamed and holds absolutely nothing back, basking in the absurdity and comedy of Andrea and Cloud’s dance was one of my favorite moments of this playthrough and i had a giant stupid grin on my face the entire time

This game has some of my favorite combat out there and it only gets better each and every playthrough. Every time I play I get better and better with the games near limitless possibilities when it comes to how you approach some combat situations and it makes it even better when the game shuts half of them down. This is to say, I wanna talk about Rufus Shinra, who is my favorite boss in any game ever. This fight is so fucking sick, the fact its a 1-on-1 (I guess 2-on-1) between Cloud and Rufus, the amazing song, paired with the cocky, confident and AWESOME character himself makes for a great vibe from second 1. But my favorite part comes when you try to attack him and he counters you. Like, first playthrough when that happened I kinda just sat mouth agape cause no other fight directly counters like that except the final fight with Sephiroth. Every phase ups the ante in this fight, from it first just being him and his dog and then going to him shooting coins that turn into lasers somehow at you and then speeding across the helipad with his guns? It's so fucking awesome. He punishes you for every single move that isn’t carefully planned out or executed when his guard is down, especially when Darkstar is still on the field. Despite how much I've gushed about this fight in particular, I don't want to take away from the other boss fights as well. From the Scorpion Sentinel to Sephiroth, I had so much fun with the games combat and also had so many fantastic moments in this playthrough where I was able to just make everything align well and end a phase or beat a boss in one stagger, and exploiting an enemies weakness will never not be satisfying as hell to me. Intensely satisfying moments like those are what really make FF7R’s combat for me.

Just as a last thing before I cap this absolutely gushy little “”””review”””” off, I can’t go without talking about its soundtrack and how it uses it. Its arrangement of the original’s tracks in an orchestral form is glorious, and especially in bosses the music changing every phase really keeps the urgency high and keeps the tracks from getting at all grating. Hard for me to talk about music at all in depth though so just know it’s got one of my favorite OST’s out there!

Final Fantasy 7 Remake is a game I adore in its entirety despite it being my intro to Final Fantasy 7 and even Final Fantasy in general. I am so excited for Rebirth next year, and I’m just as excited to get into the rest of the world of FF7 now that I’ve resolved to finally complete the original and Crisis Core. Even then however, I feel like I have a special attachment to this game that no other FF is ever going to replicate outside of maybe rebirth and the last part of 7 remake. But who knows! I still have a lot to go and this series has surprised me with stuff I love so many times already!

I played God of War all these years later after it finally got a PC port, despite owning a PS4, because I really wanted to see why it had defeated Red Dead Redemption 2 at the Game Awards in 2018. After completing the game, I am left even more confused than I was before. The 2018 release of God of War is a complete mess of gameplay decisions that obstruct what could be a fun and important gaming experience.

What does God of War do well? At least a few things. Kratos, one of the most legendary figures in all of gaming, remains a fantastic character in his limited conversation yet imposed depth of character. He's machismo to the T yet again, a Spartan warrior with the fury and rage to be unmatched, yet is capable of showing compassion make intelligent decisions. He is a rigid man, yet one that acts only with purpose and never without reason. Christopher Judge does an absolutely phenomenal job bringing the character to modern gaming, and to that point, he looks great too. Better advancements in tech after the original trilogy have Kratos looking better (and older) than ever before.

The other thing God of War has going for it, and I'm not sure how much I can really give to the game here, is the way it couples Kratos' backstory and time in Greece's mythos with that of the Norse mythos. The story that follows the dysfunctional family of Thor, Odin, and Freya is one built very, very long ago, but I think the game overall does a great job in its inclusion of the Norse "pantheon" and their impressions in the story and the world of Midgard and the seperate realms. It almost brings out the kid in me, I remember checking out myth books ad nauseum at the library and reading about each culture and their gods and godesses. God of War does a great job at bringing them to life and giving me an idea of what they would act like, how their quirks and unique attributes interact with eachother.

Outside of a phenomenal PC Port and great graphical fidelity, my praise for God of War basically stops there. This game, after playing a plethora of other games within the character action and action RPG genres feels like stale bread. It does everything other games do, but far worse. The combat within this game is probably the biggest qualm I have with it, genuinely nothing about it feels rewarding to play. It feels like a great majority of enemies are complete bullet sponges and require the same technique of hammering the right bumper to kill and it takes FOREVER. The dark elf enemies are the greatest example of this, especially when you fight them in the late game gauntlet. It took reloads, cheese strats, Spartan Rage perfect inputs to get through them, and this is as a veteran of games similar on harder difficulties. Nothing about the hack and slash of God of War made me, the person controlling Kratos, feel like an actual God of War... more like the God of Button Mashing. Everytime I walked into an open room and saw the first grouping of enemies spawn, I groaned because I knew what it meant. There were many times you enter an open area and enemies just continue to spawn, seemingly infinitely. I had to pause and question if I needed to restart because the game seemed bugged with unending enemies. But no, they really just balance the game by chucking as many enemies as possible at you until you eventually get bored and quite or power through and survive through the mundane combat experience. Upgrading my moves felt pointless and I legitimately never felt like a skill I had learned was beneficial to me in combat. DMC has been out for a while... why can't they just copy that model? Skills in DMC feel good to learn and exciting to master, in God of War it just felt like an unecessary chore.

A second issue I raise with the game is the oddly tacked on RPG elements that only took away from the overall experience. God of War has no need to be a level up RPG where you need to upgrade/craft new gear through finding raw materials. Why is that included? Why is my progress and skill gated by the fact that I haven't grinded my teeth into the ground messing around with the game's horribly boring combat. I strongly dislike the collecathon trend that's hit many of Playstation's big budget games. Horizon, Ghost of Tsushima(a game that I really enjoyed,) Days Gone, God of War (and probably many more) all have this issue. I don't get why God of War needs to have a huge map of side quests and totems to uncover. Why does this game with its narrative focus ask the player to scour every corner of every room to find all of Miscellaneous Objective X? That made far more sense in the recent Kirby release than it did in this AAA game that has as powerful visuals as it does. I legitimately don't understand what the post game valkyrie hunting brings to the game and its narrative either. Coming into the game I didn't think I would love it, but the completely unecessary RPG time-adders, were probably the biggest detriment for me in my enjoyment of this game.

On top of the above issues I had with it, I took great issue with the MacGuffin nature of the story and downright annoying characters. I felt like the games overall narrative made sense, you are on a journey to spread the ashes of Kratos' betrothed and Atreus' mother, however all of the in between was the "your princess in another castle" dilemma to its nth degree. If you wanted to go from point a to point b, you had to find item c. If you wanted to finally get to point b with item c, you were taken away to another area to get out of before you could return to point b. After completing point d you had to find item e to get into room f. After room f you had to find NPC g to complete their reqeust so that the bird in room h could retrieve the item I from giant monster J. After Giant monster J was felled, perhaps NPC K had something that could lead me back to location L and I'd finally be able to continue on to the next part of the journey. I wish I was kidding when I went on that tangent but thats how the story feels to me. In a year where Red Dead Redemption 2 was released in the same year, God of War doesn't hold an inch of a candle to the narrative expertise it had. This game is a mess of story expose in which I routinely sighed everytime I tried to continue on the main path of the story to spread the ashes because I knew that SOME sort of random problem was about to fall in Kratos' lap. Trying to progress in God of War felt like needing to be slapped in the face before getting up, slapped in the face while making coffee, slapped in the face while brushing your teeth, then slapped in the face again while putting on your clothes. Like I mentioned before, there were some characters that I just couldn't stand. Atreus throughout the majority of the game was far more than a bratty kid, but randomly an edgy teen and back again to a normal companion. Companion characters in games are delicate because they can OFTEN be annoying and overbearing (looking at you FFXIII and RE6,) but God of War flipped a switch between decent and downright cringey. I don't know why this was done, most of the writing in the game was alright, but the conversations with Atreus were just annoying eventually and meaningless. There were a few other characters I was indifferent to like Freya and the dwarf smiths, I felt like they were copy and paste Hollywood Movie characters rather than something unique to God of War, and that felt like a disservice to a legendary franchise.

I can't recommend anyone to play God of War unless they are really that curious, it's a slog of an experience and narratively speaking there are many games out there that far outperform it. That being said, if you feel like you don't have enough stories about Norse mythos in your life, or are a fan of Kratos, this may be a good pick for you.

I'm still in a dream
Snake Eater

I just beat MGS3 recently and my mouth is still open in awe of the genius of Hideo Kojima in creating one of the most thick and convoluted narratives I have ever seen, but having the skill to weave and resolve said plot within a ~fifteen hour experience.

MGS3 is not perfect mechanically, but with a release year of 2004 that is easily excusable, however everything else included in the game is done to almost a sheer perfection. Metal Gear has become sort of a meme (MGSR pun intended) in how all over the place the plot gets and how interconnected it seems every single character is, but after getting my feet wet I see why the series is held in such high regard outside of the fact.

In Snake Eater you hear the legendary quips of: "You're pretty good," Snake's issue with tactical engravings, and learn about the "basics of CQC" which make you laugh, but the story is so much more interesting than these moments. You play as Naked Snake, who many will eventually know as Big Boss, on a sneaking mission deep into Soviet Russia in the height of the Cold War 1960's with one mission: to rescue a Soviet scientist to bring back to the States.

Everything goes awry very quickly and Snake's mission changes on a whim, soon the famous man with the headband and sneaking suit becomes the sole person responsible in prevention of nuclear destruction. Friends soon become foes, Snake becomes isolated and alone in the jungles of a foreign land. Constantly while you fight the pest ridden jungle and Soviet forces on your top secret mission (I will not devulge due to spoilers) you learn more and more about the uncertainty of the task you were given and those who come to your aid. Snake Eater beckons the player to ask many questions: Even though the future of the world rests upon Snake's shoulders, why is everything going the way it is? Why are certain characters acting as if they are playing both sides, is the sacrifice for your nation, pride, or for a loved one? By helping the United States, are you really performing the morally good action?

It's with the above levels of intricacy that MGS3 hits the nail on the head. There's so much at stake and so much unknown that the story has you constantly invested and impacted by the events that go on. One moment you are silencing guards inside a desolate forest, and a few moments later you are watching the Soviet Union at a terrifying new level debut heinous and world destroying technology.

Sneaking in MGS3 is far improved on the sneaking in MGS2, where camoflauge and added items to Snake's toolbelt make it extremely rewarding when you succesfully take out an enemy encampment and are able to hide from it. I still get chills on my spine from a moment in the game where you climb a mountain and have to take out troops on the way to the other side, ideally without being seen. Part of this is due to the wide arsenal in Snake's inventory: you have multiple pistols, a shotgun, several fully automatic options, a sniper rifle, and more that are all available for your Soviet removal needs.

Needless to say, but MGS3 has stellar voice acting from the entire cast, and especially everyone's favorite David Hayter.

All in all. MGS3 is a masterclass in storytelling that gives you a captivating experience with exciting gameplay in addition.

MGSV is the black sheep of the Metal Gear Series, but I still believe it's a must play due to the advancements in narrative, interesting characters, and unmatched freedom of gameplay.

Critics of the Phantom Pain cite that it is a unfinished game in which Kojima's dream of story was never fully realized, and is too light on the story (often calling it "Horrible".) However I could not disagree more. What you get out of MGSV from a story perspective is an incredible explanation of story that connects MGS: Peace Walker to Metal Gear 1 which leads into the best known Metal Gear Solid series. You come to a crossroads, allying with everyone's favorite "villain" Revolver Ocelot, the ever so mysterious Kazuhira Miller, the intruiging scientist Huey Emmerich (father to Hal aka Otacon,) and the beautiful sniper Quiet. This cast of characters exists as a dysfunctional family to Snake's Diamond Dogs PMC who operate as their own entity with no alleigance to country. Through time spent with these characters both on the field and in the mother base, you learn more and more about the identity and reasonings of your enemies and foes. Who is Mr X and what is Cypher doing in Afghanistan and in Africa? As you play through the story you discover the harrowing truth behind their actions and what the Diamond Dogs must do to stop it.

Gameplay is easily the highlight for most people in TPP, with an unparalleled degree of freedom in approach and in-fight decisions. You have an outrageously large arsenal to choose from before combat with everything from silenced tranquilzer pistols, to rocket arms, to inflatable dummies that made fighting and making your way to your targets ALWAYS fun and innovative. The buddies you are allowed to bringalong are also interesting, each providing a different service that make can vastly change the outcome of the fight or objective. Quiet can provide great overwatch and assistance if things get hairy, D-Dog can help sniff out objectives and enemies in the area, D-Walker is great if you want to go guns blazing, and D-Horse is great for early game traversal.

With a great cast of characters, impressive open world, and seemingly unending gameplay mechanics, MGSV is a great experience and a phenomenal next step in the MGS series.