ColdCoffee
23 reviews liked by ColdCoffee
Honestly, this doesn`t change much things from the first game - it is still a buggy and blend mess.The levels are way less interesting than the first game, it gets kinda repetitve (these guys love them QTE, holy moly) and the story is really boring. The only things they improve from the first game is that the combat is much more refined and interesting and the boss patterns have something to it, but that doesn`t save this game at all for me.
Astro's Playroom
2020
A fun and short experience that brings all the nostalgia from past Sony consoles, while also introducing all the amazing features of the Dual Sense controller. Loved all the references to Playstations best hits and exclusives. A must play if you grew up playing on Playstation.
Just as the other DS entry, this game also fails to deliver a pleasant experience at the end. The comparisons to Spirit Tracks are inevitable; in my opinion, the music isn`t as enjoying in this one, the stylus controls are also present, which means that you not gonna have a good time controlling Link around the map, but thank god there`s not many microphone mechanic stuff - they are few of those, and the ones that shows up are fun and not near of a hassle, like those where you shout at the mic to stun enemies at one of the dungeons and when you have to ask for a discount for the cannons in the shipwright.
Storywise, this game makes more sense than Spirit Tracks, following after the end of Wind Waker, where Link and Petra must rebuild Hyrule after the flood; and let`s be honest, the whole story concept of Spirit Tracks, with the tracks around Hyrule and spirit trains and that whole stuff is kinda dumb and doesn`t make much sense. The low point for me is the Ocean King Temple, which has every piece of design universally hated by players: time limit, invisible enemies, and the fact that you have to do it like 4 or 5 times throughout the game, while repeting the stuff you have already done before, cause this dungeon is not sectioned off like the Spirit Tower in Spirit Tracks.
At the end, this is just one of those Nintendo games that feeds off gimmicks: stylus gimmicks, microphone gimmicks and other ones that just doesnt click well - the vibrant art style and cool sea exploration just gets buried underneath boring controlling and gameplay mechanics that looks cool on paper, but doesn`t work very well.
Storywise, this game makes more sense than Spirit Tracks, following after the end of Wind Waker, where Link and Petra must rebuild Hyrule after the flood; and let`s be honest, the whole story concept of Spirit Tracks, with the tracks around Hyrule and spirit trains and that whole stuff is kinda dumb and doesn`t make much sense. The low point for me is the Ocean King Temple, which has every piece of design universally hated by players: time limit, invisible enemies, and the fact that you have to do it like 4 or 5 times throughout the game, while repeting the stuff you have already done before, cause this dungeon is not sectioned off like the Spirit Tower in Spirit Tracks.
At the end, this is just one of those Nintendo games that feeds off gimmicks: stylus gimmicks, microphone gimmicks and other ones that just doesnt click well - the vibrant art style and cool sea exploration just gets buried underneath boring controlling and gameplay mechanics that looks cool on paper, but doesn`t work very well.
A small and nice teaser for Dawntrail, showcasing mostly the female Hrothgar who is apparently pivotal to the new expansion story and one of the new jobs, the Pictomancer. The story itself is nothing to write home about, but it just gives you that itch to play the new content. Tural, here we come!
God, I didn`t have fun with this one at all. I really wanted to like this one, but this left a really sour taste at the end. The combat is pretty bland and doesn`t really get off the ground at any point, the game has a lot of bugs ( I lost count on how many times I got stuck on virtually nothing and had to reset), the bosses designs are some of the worst I`ve ever seen in a videogame - seriously, whoever designed that fucking Destroyer boss battle shouldn`t be near a videogame ever again, cause that was probably the worst boss design I`ve ever seen in my many years of gaming. The story is cool, the game really lets you feel like a powerful guy and some of the map designs and planets are great, but that doesn`t make this much enjoyable at the end.
Following my trend on playing FF7 related stuff after I finished Rebirth, I fired this one up for the first time, one I`ve been longing to play for a while now. It follows, after the success of the original FF7, the idea of expanding the lore and the universe of the game, now with a rather unique, but ultimately fun idea - a shooter game.
This game has a pretty noticeable Devil May Cry-esque to it, and Vincent Valentine, the mysterious vampire like hero from the main game, it`s a perfect pick for this kind of game. It has the visuals and the feels from Advent Children, but the tone is a little more grim and eerie, especially on the scenarios and the whole feel of the stages throughout the game.
Story-wise, the game follows the events at the end of the original FF7 and introduces a new group know as DeepGround, a secret military organization from Shinra that features genetically enhanced soldiers. Vincent learns that their ultimate goal is to call forth Omega and basically turn the planet into a crumbly rock - the story goes fine until almost till the end, when it becomes too much convaluted and unnecessary complex; it`s like they tried to do too much at the same time, and it doesn`t work that well. And also, I wished the original cast, Cloud and the crew, were a bit more important and present along the game, but I can see why they did it like this.
Talking about gameplay, this game functions as a third person shooter with a variety of weapons and materias at your disposal, but Vincent can still use his melee attacks. Although I wanted a few more weapons to be avaliable, I had a lot of fun playing with the guns you can pick from and meddle with the different combinations you can make with them. Even tho it can get a little repetitive sometimes, the levels are short so you don`t really feel bored.
I wonder if they ever gonna poke around this one, after remastering Crisis Core, and introduce it to the new FF7 universe - some of the characters introduced in this game are already present in some parts, especially in episode INTERmission. Honestly, I had a blast playing this, but this has to do with me being a huge fan of the original game, so if you`re not into the lore and all of the story, you probably not gonna like this one.
This game has a pretty noticeable Devil May Cry-esque to it, and Vincent Valentine, the mysterious vampire like hero from the main game, it`s a perfect pick for this kind of game. It has the visuals and the feels from Advent Children, but the tone is a little more grim and eerie, especially on the scenarios and the whole feel of the stages throughout the game.
Story-wise, the game follows the events at the end of the original FF7 and introduces a new group know as DeepGround, a secret military organization from Shinra that features genetically enhanced soldiers. Vincent learns that their ultimate goal is to call forth Omega and basically turn the planet into a crumbly rock - the story goes fine until almost till the end, when it becomes too much convaluted and unnecessary complex; it`s like they tried to do too much at the same time, and it doesn`t work that well. And also, I wished the original cast, Cloud and the crew, were a bit more important and present along the game, but I can see why they did it like this.
Talking about gameplay, this game functions as a third person shooter with a variety of weapons and materias at your disposal, but Vincent can still use his melee attacks. Although I wanted a few more weapons to be avaliable, I had a lot of fun playing with the guns you can pick from and meddle with the different combinations you can make with them. Even tho it can get a little repetitive sometimes, the levels are short so you don`t really feel bored.
I wonder if they ever gonna poke around this one, after remastering Crisis Core, and introduce it to the new FF7 universe - some of the characters introduced in this game are already present in some parts, especially in episode INTERmission. Honestly, I had a blast playing this, but this has to do with me being a huge fan of the original game, so if you`re not into the lore and all of the story, you probably not gonna like this one.
I had an urge to play more FF7 related stuff after finishing Rebirth and i picked this one up and wonder how much different it was from the original PSP game which I played way back and boy, this one is this a blast. The game already looked so good for a portable game from the 00`s, but they made it look and play even better now.
Honestly, this remaster changes very little from the story; the bulk is still there, but the voice cast has been updated to feature the same actors from the Remake sequence (and they hit the jackpot with the casting selection, dear God) and the game now is fully voiced, so it`s even better to play.
It`s in the combat that you`re gonna feel that they made a lot of changes, if you played the original version. In this remaster, the combat feels way more smoother and it is much more refined - the DMW limit`s animation doesn`t interrupt the gameplay anymore and it seems like you`re playing a whole different game now.
The graphics look and sound much better, although i ran into some tearing and slow loading textures - granted I played arguably the "worst" version, which is the Switch one, so if i had to guess, these issues won`t bother at all if you play this on PS5 or PC.
If you just got introduced to the FF7 lore and universe through the Remake and Rebirth games, this one is a must play if you liked the characters. You see so much backstory from most of the cast - Cloud, Tifa, Aerith, the Turks and especially the main protagonist, Zack Fair, which is just delightful to accompany. You still have to deal with some repetitive gameplay and awkward transitions, as this is still an old game from a portable console, but at it`s core (yeah, I just did that), this is still an amazing experience.
Honestly, this remaster changes very little from the story; the bulk is still there, but the voice cast has been updated to feature the same actors from the Remake sequence (and they hit the jackpot with the casting selection, dear God) and the game now is fully voiced, so it`s even better to play.
It`s in the combat that you`re gonna feel that they made a lot of changes, if you played the original version. In this remaster, the combat feels way more smoother and it is much more refined - the DMW limit`s animation doesn`t interrupt the gameplay anymore and it seems like you`re playing a whole different game now.
The graphics look and sound much better, although i ran into some tearing and slow loading textures - granted I played arguably the "worst" version, which is the Switch one, so if i had to guess, these issues won`t bother at all if you play this on PS5 or PC.
If you just got introduced to the FF7 lore and universe through the Remake and Rebirth games, this one is a must play if you liked the characters. You see so much backstory from most of the cast - Cloud, Tifa, Aerith, the Turks and especially the main protagonist, Zack Fair, which is just delightful to accompany. You still have to deal with some repetitive gameplay and awkward transitions, as this is still an old game from a portable console, but at it`s core (yeah, I just did that), this is still an amazing experience.
Lethal League Blaze
2018
Really fun and actually unique fighting style game. It`s kinda difficult to master and really get good at this, but having a go at this one with friends is something you won`t regret.
An old school puzzle adventure that is a blast to play, especially if you play the co-op mode with a friend. The puzzles are engaging and well crafted, the combat`s fun and there`s a lot of weapon variety for you to spice it up the gameplay. A quick and fun experience, especially if you play alongside friends.
The most amazing Final Fantasy single player experience of this century, without question. It`s crazy to think how they take like 15-20 hours of the original game and expand in such a way that it becomes a game of it`s own; you have content, between main quests, side content, minigames, up to 80-100 hours of gameplay, depending on how much you wish to invest time on those secondary stuff.
Story-wise, you need to treat this as a whole different thing, even more so than the first part. You get a lot of memorable scenes and dialogues from the original back again, but there`s an "avalanche" (pun intended) of new scenes, new characters, new motivations to keep the story rolling and even apparations of characters that weren`t on the original game. The whole "alternate timelines" thing from the first part still plays a big role on the development of the story on this one, and it brings a lot of new stuff to the game, although it can be way more confusing to understand all the events and how they take place, even with the core events of the original game still intact.
Gameplay wise, it`s just as good to play as the Remake. The combat is still the same, and the new characters have interesting and refreshing gameplay mechanics, especially Yuffie and Cait. I just resent the fact that they removed the way upgrading weapons functioned in the first game; the way it works in this game is just not as interesting. Even so, that`s not really a big of an issue, cause with all the new stuff they added, especially the synergy abilities and the relationship mechanic, the weapon upgrades functions well. This game has a lot of stuff to do, and I do mean a lot: the amount of minigames they added is astounding, even to a point that maybe they tried to do too much, and it`s just becomes tiresome, especially if you`re a completionist kind of gamer that tries to do everything - believe me, you`ll be spending a lot of time doing it all.
The way the world and the game is built reminds me a little of Final Fantasy X; the game at it`s core is still linear - you go from area to area as you move on throughout the story. But the way this game introduces the free roaming and open world spaces from the original is very clever; as you move, you get little "pockets" of open world, areas where you can get sidequests, chocobo hunting, minibosses and much more. And actually that`s very clever, cause if this game used open world just as the original, with all the new things they added, it could had been very overwhelming, so this way works just fine - even though not all the areas where that fun to explore.
Graphic and music, it`s just phenomenal. The characters models are just gorgeous and just a sight to behold and the music is just up to Final Fantasy standards - I just can`t get enough of all these Aerith`s theme renditions, makes me cry everytime. The only thing bad about how the game looks it`s the fact that this one still has those blurry and not rendered well background objects that Remake had, and the textures are not just what we expected at this point, but it`s doesnt come to be such a nuisance.
As i said at the beginning, this is it; this is the Final Fantasy experience we all wanted, this is the franchise at it`s best. When we all dreamed of a remake of Final Fantasy VII, we didn`t expected we would get this; honestly, this is so much better than we could have imagined.
Story-wise, you need to treat this as a whole different thing, even more so than the first part. You get a lot of memorable scenes and dialogues from the original back again, but there`s an "avalanche" (pun intended) of new scenes, new characters, new motivations to keep the story rolling and even apparations of characters that weren`t on the original game. The whole "alternate timelines" thing from the first part still plays a big role on the development of the story on this one, and it brings a lot of new stuff to the game, although it can be way more confusing to understand all the events and how they take place, even with the core events of the original game still intact.
Gameplay wise, it`s just as good to play as the Remake. The combat is still the same, and the new characters have interesting and refreshing gameplay mechanics, especially Yuffie and Cait. I just resent the fact that they removed the way upgrading weapons functioned in the first game; the way it works in this game is just not as interesting. Even so, that`s not really a big of an issue, cause with all the new stuff they added, especially the synergy abilities and the relationship mechanic, the weapon upgrades functions well. This game has a lot of stuff to do, and I do mean a lot: the amount of minigames they added is astounding, even to a point that maybe they tried to do too much, and it`s just becomes tiresome, especially if you`re a completionist kind of gamer that tries to do everything - believe me, you`ll be spending a lot of time doing it all.
The way the world and the game is built reminds me a little of Final Fantasy X; the game at it`s core is still linear - you go from area to area as you move on throughout the story. But the way this game introduces the free roaming and open world spaces from the original is very clever; as you move, you get little "pockets" of open world, areas where you can get sidequests, chocobo hunting, minibosses and much more. And actually that`s very clever, cause if this game used open world just as the original, with all the new things they added, it could had been very overwhelming, so this way works just fine - even though not all the areas where that fun to explore.
Graphic and music, it`s just phenomenal. The characters models are just gorgeous and just a sight to behold and the music is just up to Final Fantasy standards - I just can`t get enough of all these Aerith`s theme renditions, makes me cry everytime. The only thing bad about how the game looks it`s the fact that this one still has those blurry and not rendered well background objects that Remake had, and the textures are not just what we expected at this point, but it`s doesnt come to be such a nuisance.
As i said at the beginning, this is it; this is the Final Fantasy experience we all wanted, this is the franchise at it`s best. When we all dreamed of a remake of Final Fantasy VII, we didn`t expected we would get this; honestly, this is so much better than we could have imagined.
