I'm not gonna lie, I both really want to like and hate this game due to it's design. The idea for a roguelike with item synergies that deals directly with damage numbers on a 2D plane with a fitting progression curve sounds great. Gathering only 2 items for most synergies and becoming broken quickly, the flashy lights and sound effects ripped from an arcade machine at Vegas, and the overreliance on luck for synergy makes this game a slog and a pain. Every time I think "that's it, this game has gone too far and I've made a decision on it", I then begrudgingly play another 40+ minute game. 2 stars for a failed vision, because all of these qualities fundamentally work to serve the base idea for the gameplay, which unfortunately boils down to walk in a circle for 30 minutes and wait during animations.

Shu Takumi really has a thing for detective games involving talking to deceased people featuring a wacky team of legal workers and criminals centered around a grand conspiracy reaching back generations that you aren't told about until the very end, huh. I guess after replaying Ace Attorney 4 and the Great Ace Attorney, plus thinking about Professor Layton vs Phoenix Wright, I didn't really end up that invested in this story cause Shu Takumi really likes making this one type of story again and again.

But, gotta say, pretty good story this time around. The narrative never forgets the central mystery (despite how hard it tries to), the events of the game are engaging and present the MANY plot twists in a fun way, the conspiracy is easy to follow and explains every element of the strange game in it's own weird way, and even the themes manage to remain ever present without showing themselves too early. Then even the gameplay hits a nice sweet spot for mystery/puzzle games, where you want the player to experiment and try solutions within the rules without gaining access to information they shouldn't have yet, plus creating interesting consequences of these rules that will be brought up later to create new puzzles.

Shu Takumi's (well I have to assume it was him given he's the only credit that could possibly be in charge of this) story is classically wacky and weird in his usual style, and unfortunately this time it leads to much more of his usual unnecessary explanations or annoying conveniences. It was very satisfying to remember or realise something about the plot of this game directly before getting more details on that point, however it slowly turned pedantic as the game made sure you fully understood what the next plot element or explanation was in greater belittling detail the further you play (figuring out who the justice minister was ahead of time and what directly happens after that felt cool, until the game told you unnecessarily). And I understand this is me going into great detail about a nitpick, however this is how it feels whenever the game explains every scenario, nitpicks or not. That's before even addressing the time travel problems that always show up, conveniences of chance, and the overabundance of dialogue reiterating what is going on.

The music consists of very rock-spun ds detective sounding pieces all in a similar style to Ace Attorney, the sound effects are literally an alternate world's version of Ace Attorney sounds, but the visuals take a fun classic limited 3D turn into something from New Super Mario Bros that's always fun to look at. Animations are fluid (on this version) and expressive, popping straight out of the 2D-3D blend of backgrounds that look straight out of nothing, I can't think of a comparison it's just that uniquely stylized.

I don't know though, despite all my ramblings of 'idk pretty good, reaches just above a passing grade', this game reminds me how weird and wacky games can be. Why does this game exist? Fun, first and foremost. Every minor or major problem I had with this game was overriden by the things it does well that other games don't usually worry about that much. There's always something happening in the mystery so it's constantly recontextualising your understanding of what's happening, when most other mystery games I've played all work off a basic unchanging understanding of what's going on. New information is always being added (during investigation) whether it's useful or not, where other games give you information to confirm other pieces of information you already have. This game works off your pattern recognition to see connections through coincidence, adding on top of how other games work with your pattern recognition to follow more complex lines of reasoning than what had proceeded and to use the mechanics available to you in more complex scenarios. It's fresh (despite being over a decade old) and stretches some brain muscles that have been lying atrophied outside the 'safe' zone for mystery game design. And this isn't a dig at other mystery/puzzle games, just something nice to have and made this experience uniquely exciting to experience, covering over the problems this different style creates.

I don't know how to end reviews. Um... game good :)... uhh :|... Writing spoiler-free reviews of mystery games is limiting, but it's very much worth it to keep you following the logic in finding the conclusion along with the game. And damn, this one fun journey.

Really makes you feel like, wait what? Why did you barge into my house, can I help you? Did the lamp just move? Ghost Trick? What are you talking about, get out of my house. I'm going to call the police under my comical anvil hanging from a thread. Wait when did that pair of scissors get there?

For HeartMachine's second ever game, it hits that nice sweet spot of blaring ambition and drive to create something special and impactful, and ever just barely mitigated lack of experience from early and/or unrestrained game devs that mostly remains out of the way enough to appreciate what their vision can create. Realistically my review can be summated by this (unnecessarily long) sentence, however ignoring the specifics of why this game slaps is doing an injustice to both the ingenuity of the developers and your, the reader's, understanding of the game from an outside perspective.

So, just to keep my praise contained, I will follow the game's example and start with the negatives. Learning to control your character in this game is a requirement to experiencing the killer back 2/3rds of the game, and is both improperly communicated and surprisingly complex to master. This is at it's core a platformer, a very strange movement focused version of a platformer, but the focus is still on overcoming challenges relating to traversing platforms and so you need somewhat of an ability to perform that task, plus mastering the movement always unlocks more enjoyment in performing that task (also I've heard this is very similar to Jet Set Radio, but I haven't played that yet so idk). The worst moments of the game are when it forces the camera into a scripted sequence, or the game removes all of your abilities beyond walking for story segments. These scripted experiential moments would be great if either the game developed it's story beyond what it already is, or this was not a movement focused game where an inability to move shunts your enjoyment. Next I've got a pet peeve with hidden collectibles requiring exploration in games designed to blitz past segments of the world, however the game is designed to feel like you are exploring the Ultravoid despite the very linear platforming level design so whatever.

Very few things feel better than running around the Ultravoid at full speeds, chaining dashes following jumps and grapples, pathing along the plasma laid out between and through the environment. The major limitation on your character at any given moment is your inability to easily turn, however it's rarely an issue given proper pathfinding and proper uses of mechanics. The game's first and foremost goal is to make you feel like a voidrunner (hey it's the thing on the last line) as it assumes you must do, and I almost always felt like a dexterous warrior too fast to be hit and too fast to ever stop. The game makes this assumption as it does not ever enforce a time limit on your experience, and so it expects your interactivity to feel fast to reinforce your character's mad dash to save their planet against inevitability.

But on that note, the level design is surpringly well integrated into the absolute dexterity of your capabilities in surprisingly subtle ways. Paths are always wide enough to allow variance in progression, but narrow enough so you gotta bonk your head a few times. Environmental mechanics such as railgrinding or grappling were a bit finicky but served to throw mix-ups into the monotony of running around constantly, and worked particularly well to introduce more linear segments following open exploration. The open segments felt simultaneously expansive for mechanical freedom and limiting in mechanical intrigue, I like myself some boundless clouds but not all the time. The shadow of the colossus style bosses mixed up the progression platform puzzles into further time-trial-esque tests of ability. The highlight for me is world/chapter/location 5, as the large flat plateau introduces a simple radiation hazard testing your dexterity in traversal between points of safety as a timer slowly ticks towards instant death. Which the death is just the right balance of punishing and a non-issue, the only change brought by death is requiring to hit a box and moving back to an earlier checkpoint in your path.

Speaking of, the path looks weirdly delightful in an simplistic off-cartoon sort of way you only really get out of generative rendering. This game somehow has a very similar combined style to both Risk of Rain 2 (if it was cohesive and realised (for lack of my own vocabulary)) and Hyper Light Drifter. Switching between the flat and typically rounded open vistas or twisting levels into moments of high-contrast 2D animation elevates the visual identity of this game from Hyper Light Drifter, whilst becoming something uniquely characterised of it's own. My only complaint was that the game was so visual pleasing, the markers or points of interest were difficult to differentiate amongst the painting.

The music does not follow in the art style however, as it prefers to directly iterate on Hyper Light Drifter's soundtrack. I personally prefer this soundtrack, however I'm comparing Windows 10 to Windows 11 here, it's basically more of the same with minor tweaks (which is downplaying the effort spent on it's creation, however this is the result I experienced). Also, mainly cause I don't know where else to mention this, the voice acting is surprisingly good and well edited into the voice logs scattered about the Ultravoid.

And finally, for the first time in HeartMachine's history, this game has a narrative. At first I felt as if the studio's strength in telling stories lay in not telling them directly, as the narrative in the first 2 chapters wasn't very interesting, however those parts they weren't saying yet were told later and damn they can execute. Unfortunately though, the main character remains as boring to listen to as possible the entire way through, however that boredom is skewed by the story presented. HeartMachine understands the unique method of storytelling you can perform through interactivity, and so I must apologise for underestimating the intentionally obvious optional lore collectibles as they are as integral to the story as the actual events of the narrative. There was not a single time where my actions did not contribute towards the story being told, as the themes relating to the indifference of existence, possible meanings of consciousness in existence, and grief in these larger contexts pervey every fiber of this game's creation (yes, I'd argue even just being afk at a checkpoint counts in this context). I don't know if you can tell this story in a different medium, or even under a different storyteller, and so I struggle to say if anyone else may have the same experience I did.

This is an amazing second go around for HeartMachine, though it took me a fair chunk of the run time to realise exactly what I was in for. This felt like a lesser version of walking into Everything Everywhere All At Once for the first time and expecting a fun time with an alright narrative, then being very sorely mistaken. The start of the game will probably turn people away, and despite my praise I have to recommend that you let it turn you away, I don't think this game will work with everyone. Some iteration on the mechanics, pacing, soundtrack, moments of gameplay, and dialogue would definitely improve this game from it's creators' lack of experience, however these negative elements never ruined or even showed up often in my experience. I love movement games so my opinion is skewed for this particular matter, but this may be one of my top 5 games of the decade.

Really makes you feel like the endless matter compounding ash into clouds under the weight of a star's berth

Below is a much too long, analytical, and spoiler-free review (does spoil stuff to do with Phoenix in game 4 though). If you just want the TLDR, only read the last two paragraphs and know you’ve probably made the correct choice. Don’t question the ramblings of a mad man driven to passionately write on experience with an individual art piece, but feel free to question my sanity

I was planning on reviewing Dual Destinies in the same format as I had for the other Phoenix Wright games: giving short paragraphs on gameplay experience, overall story, and an individual rating with quick comments for each case. I really loved this game when I had previously played it, way back when I was young and dumb enough to replay visual novels out of boredom, and expected to love this game in a similar way but with added perspective following gained experience analysing games that was learnt through (a LOT of) trial and error. After playing through the first two cases my expectations were disappointed, with the game itself being capable of only a surface level analysis due to the 'talk down' entry-level approach this game took, seemingly assuming new players of the series would be the majority audience (to be fair, this was the first Phoenix Wright game I ever played). I was beginning to realise exactly how I had changed over time, evolved in my capability to understand narrative and textually engage with art, to a point where it seemed I wasn’t having fun with the game anymore. My perceived truth of this game’s brilliance was tested (working backwards from an expected outcome with my experience wasn’t matching what I was actually experiencing while playing (pay attention, this pattern will return later)), the ideological themes weren’t being enacted as I’d expected, and the completeness and correctness of the overall storytelling wasn’t present (especially in the context of the Apollo Justice Trilogy, which is the version of the game I played). I looked forward to case 3 (Turnabout Academy) as I remembered it being exceptional for it’s message about a general correct moral philosophy to act with integrity and a more mature ideologically-charged plot by sinister actors, with the gimmick of a murder following a fake-murder trial’s script. At first the third case seemed to follow the same surface-level uninteresting steps as the first two cases in this game, being okay with mostly copying Apollo Justice’s case 3 (Turnabout Serenade), but by the end I found my perspective shifted back into understanding the surprisingly subtle genius permeating the entire game, and recontextualising my perception of this game and how it fits into where it does in the overall series’ story.

First, I want to touch on how the Phoenix Wright games are presented in the visual novel format, and how this presentation allows for certain methods of presenting information to the player, for either the purposes of storytelling or solving the case. The Ace Attorney games all follow a formulas to varying degrees which I tend to think of hierarchically;
- The overall case formatting (investigation -> trial -> repeat) involving gathering and presenting information in a scripted search for truth,
- Duelling perspective trials starting with the prosecution’s argument cornering the defence as they slowly unravel threads of logic into concrete proof through reason and evidence,
- The witness testimony leading into cross-examinations presenting (typically) inconsistent information which you will examine to gain a new common understanding,
as some broader to specific common examples. There are also more ‘gimmick’ context-specific formulas such as Phoenix’s psyche-locks, Apollo’s bracelet, and Athena’s psychotherapy, and these create expected seamless and streamlined modes of communicating information to the player. The means of enacting these formulas is by;
- Presenting text dialogue through boxes at the bottom of the screen
- Descriptions and images of objects and reports collected as evidence which is accessible at any time
- And invariable scripted animations.
Pacing will obviously become a problem with the methods the game uses to tell it’s stories, as it usually is in any interactive medium where a person can simply stop at any time, however this formula is surprisingly easy for the developers to pace so that the player usually follows an expected understanding of the case and story. The only way to get information is by ‘moving’ through the story, scenes, and interactions presented, therefore you mustn’t have more information than what is currently accessible to you, while scripted sequences are naturally intended to be paced as presented. As one revelation shocks you, your mind racing to understand the consequences as the dialogue box simply sits there waiting, the game is very smart to follow that up with another revelation or surprise which won’t give you time to think or react in scripted segments. The engagement you experience with the game changes throughout play between these two modes and simultaneously allows you to pace yourself to understand thematic context of what is being presented while still being able to rush you with information you may need to miss or digest in unison, irrespective of which method it uses to do so and at which hierarchical degree the game performs it at. This lets you really feel the messages and flow of the game to follow the logical puzzles presented literally and narratively, which the game very expertly switches up in the few times it breaks it’s own formula (in meaningful ways unique to these methods, that are mostly all spoilers). What’s really interesting is the two new additions to the base formula introduced in this game actively ruin the pacing and tonality of the established storytelling methods. The anime cutscenes, despite the fact it is a switch up on the formula, removes this unique contextual method of storytelling for a more generic cinematic approach adhering to scripted convention in ways which clash with the game’s methods. The revisualisations additionally ‘talk down’ to the player, removing the player’s ability to figure out an element of the mystery on their own, while simultaneously reducing the massive (commonly two answer) multiple choice of presenting evidence during trial to unengaging simple repeating 2-3 choices.

I hold the understanding that humans don’t actually follow logic through rationalization (actually thinking through the logic in their mind), and that instead we simulate logic through experienced and connected emotional reactions to patterns or simplified memorised conjugate reactions to prompts. This understanding may explain why some people have trouble with certain subjects in education, make common logical errors, fall for logical fallacies, and can be persuaded under a logical pretence through appeals to emotion. This game’s emo inmate prosecutor, Simon Blackquill, perfectly illustrates this last idea in his ‘psychological manipulations’ (commonly they're just logical fallacies or elevating authority over the judge) as he twists logical argument into emotional manipulations of the legal professionals and witnesses to simply accept his perspective. The signature method for argument used by Blackquill is control through manipulation, as he does not care for changing his argument based on new information but instead enforces a perceived ‘final truth’ in the form of a logical trap to convince you there is no alternative interpretation of the facts (despite this being a Phoenix Wright game where you must overturn the prosecution’s argument). Blackquill works backwards from perceived ‘absolute final truth’ to build his case (an end he uses to justify the means of getting there), and this often leads to his incorrect expectation of a ‘final truth’ being disproven by the defence during court (almost like my expectations of this game…). This is in direct contrast to the prosecuting philosophy of dispelling all doubt about the defendant’s guilt (against the opposing defence’s belief in their client’s innocence) to find the unbiased truth of the case, a philosophy which is held by a majority of the other prosecutors in these games. This clear disregard for a proper method of reasoning, and further disregard for the purpose of argument in court, represents the public’s opinion of the corrupt lawyer working under the dark age of the law in this world, with the strong example of misusing psychological practises by manipulating the human legal professionals enacting logical argument. Add in blatant assault through his hawk Taka scratching at people’s faces, intentionally missing attacks with concealed weaponry to shut people up, and breaking his shackles to remind everyone who’s in control of the situation, the courtroom becomes a power struggle held by the prosecution for whoever controls the court’s opinion. In contrast, the third protagonist of Dual Destinies, Athena Cykes, is a straight out of law school graduate who only follows proper methods and means of argument, despite her diverse over-the-top emotional states and alternative method of cross-examination through Widget’s Mood Matrix. Athena’s view on psychology in the courtroom is for it to be used alongside witness testimony to help guide the court towards a correct understanding of the facts of the case, as exemplified through her ‘therapy sessions’ constructing a mood matrix to accompany testimony, and to help people under immense turmoil recover to be able to aid in the pursuit of truth. Since the understanding is that humans experience logic through emotion, Athena represents an attempt to better understand these emotions to help enact logic or pursue truth in witness’ perceptions/perspectives. Athena believes the act of lawyering to be a collaborative process of discovering truth from the beginning of the story, however only truly understands the correct methods and means to contribute to this process throughout the events of the game, which is why she is able to escape Blackquill’s traps so easily and pursue truth despite lacking the ‘power’ in Blackquill’s court, but can't handle fears of inability and failure.

Speaking of, Phoenix Wright following his own trilogy has reached a point of mastery in the legal world and found his way into owning a small law firm (despite his best efforts) with two rookie lawyers who both now are learning their way in pursuing truth through the legal system. Despite how Phoenix had a mentor in Mia Fey in help him learn the basics of lawyering, he does not do the same for his apprentices in this game. In the 4th game, Phoenix is actively using Apollo as a bright-eyed defence lawyer recently out of a job and with a special perception power to further Phoenix’s own half-virtuous retribution, and thus the advice he gives is very lacking in substance and specific to the events of the game, especially with his new pessimism thrown in to his conversations. Now having recently reacquired his attorney’s badge, believing once again in the righteousness of the justice system and determined to put an end to the dark age of the law he himself helped permeate, it would make sense that he’d want to teach his associate attorneys his way of defending clients, eventually growing to figure out that Apollo and Athena would need to figure out their own way of seeking truth throughout the game. This is touched on in the special case (Turnabout Reclaimed), with Phoenix acting somewhat like a lax commandeering boss offloading all the unwanted and ‘un-fun’ work onto Apollo now that Phoenix can fight his own court cases, and exactly 8 lines out of some thousands where he remembers why he gives the advice he does. However the main game never does this, the most we textually get is Phoenix offscreen before the events of the game telling Athena that ‘the worst of times is when lawyers have to force their biggest smiles’. It seems like this theme of mentorship and evolving practice was a larger theme in the game that just got cut for some reason, as: certain pieces of dialogue feel unended between Phoenix and his workers, circumstances created in the story aren’t naturally leading into reflection on how the characters got there, they lean heavily into how the court system itself will escape the dark age of the law but not the practices the main characters take to achieve this, the characters being able to trust each other despite ignoring the distrust Phoenix created in game 4, and Apollo’s entire arc is centred around his extreme alternative method for finding the truth. Phoenix Wright always prioritises trusting his client no matter the situation, and Apollo Justice learns throughout the game how to follow that practice while accepting reasonable doubt in that trust into his work (which would be much more interesting if Apollo held a bit of a grudge against Phoenix for using him in the events of the 4th game, but he never actually correctly mentors Apollo so that grudge, if it existed, would never disappear). The perspective on the legal system held by the series until Dual Destinies (to have two opposing perspectives reason their understanding until there can be no more argument and an objective truth is found), where you need to be able to trust your clients to act as a successful defence attorney with integrity until that trust is broken, however Apollo accepts the prosecutor’s perspective of questioning every detail of the case to be able to guarantee the truth is found and presents this as a correct alternative method to be an amazing defence lawyer. Finally, the main character of the second trilogy (technically not, but his name’s on the trilogy) learns his unique method for being a defence attorney and is ready to find his own way, however his path to get there is tainted with the corruption standard in the legal system.

Now to get to the real meat of this game over these next two paragraphs, and what it represents for both the Apollo Justice Trilogy and fans discussing it online. The ‘dark age of the law’ being properly introduced, as the Wright Anything Agency begins to build itself back into a law firm, cleanly follows on from the callous disregard for lawful practices from the 4th game. The corruption more blatantly on display following a real conviction of a culprit in a practice trial for a new court system, all organised by Phoenix by the way, transitions a little more into the background and we get a peek at the roots of the more general corrupting practices that take place. Major overarching themes for the trilogy (established in Apollo Justice) become less subtextual and further abstracted into addressable ideas that the story can analyse and be combated or accepted, which are reiterated and evolved in Spirit of Justice. A returning convict prosecutor who represents the distrust the public has with the legal system (largely due to how they were convicted) is deemed as one of the two origins of this corruption, alongside Phoenix himself who basically all but admits his crime of forging evidence (as well as illegal surveillance) during the 4th case of the 4th game. These two polar opposite lawyers each made one mistake which ended up defining their legal system for 7 long years, and the standard practice became to win no matter what. The 3rd case (Turnabout Academy) revolves around one philosophy that perpetrates these acts, being that "the end justifies the means" where doing stuff like forging evidence is fine as long as you don't get caught (aka use any means possible to achieve the ideal end result). Each of Blackquill’s psychological traps introduced in the previous case follow this philosophy, as he doesn't care about searching for the truth but instead justifies his idea of the truth through fitting facts to his perception: an end he uses to justify the means of getting there. However, just as the presented righteous philosophy states "the means justifies the end", each time you escape one of Blackquill’s traps you do so because you took the correct exhaustive path to get there, often finding the facts contradict Blackquill's ‘truth’. For the second time ever in the series, the game takes a hard stance against this ideology and reasons the purposes of acting honourably with integrity in pursuing justice (the other time was the final case of Justice for All, ironically enough). However, the ‘dark age of the law’ is a powerful and difficult standard to remove for those who follow it, as it’s easy to abuse for deceit or personal gain, and the game takes the time to fully dismantle it in an ideological war for the future of the legal system. It reframes every aspect of the game you played, and approaching the game with this mindset leads to finding the purpose in those seemingly Phoenix Wright classic stock-standard first 2 cases of the game. Seeing the darkened moralistic debate silently occur across the wacky goofy Phoenix Wright hijinks is brilliant, but it’s also too bad it’s undercut by retreading and undoing the previous game’s steps.

To be fair, Apollo Justice wasn’t as silly goofy with classic hijinks, largely due to it’s attempts to create a distinct new Ace Attorney story in a darker context. It acts as a sort of generational sequel, continuing on from the original trilogy and the investigations games featuring an original series of characters and how they deal with similar experiences to the previous games, and this game really does not want to do any of that. The new Phoenix Wright team following Shu Takumi’s absence, while he worked on PWvsPL and TGAA:A, seem to be silently screaming through their actions that they really didn’t wanna deal with breaking narrative formula and really wanted to add another Phoenix Wright story. Phoenix Wright gets his badge back and wrenches control of the trilogy away from Apollo so he can repeat lessons learnt in his own trilogy, Apollo gets hard sidelined into 3rd character in the story after Athena, and Apollo’s own journey is completed in the length of one case (despite being talked about for most of the game). Sure, usually the Phoenix Wright formula involves some first case setup, into nothing happening for 2 cases, ending with one big old explosive ending to justify changes in perspective or identities, however you don’t have to treat a formulaic pattern in design as hard-set rules. Apollo Justice’s own game had a very subtle but clear direction where that formula was changing, with one large interconnected story sectioned into multiple cases across the game, but this game seems against this idea being implemented as the main plot as instead it's relegated to the C-plot involving Athena's trauma (which is ironic, given they go back to the massive overarching plot again in Spirit of Justice). Sure, you could argue ‘the dark age of the law’ is consistently foreshadowed in the previous cases, however this is again done the same as in Apollo Justice with Phoenix’s ‘forged evidence’ mystery. I’m not arguing for radical change, I’m simply offput by this game’s safety net of following formulaic storytelling when the story being told is really compelling, and could be even more so in moments when the pacing switches up. It feels like this game is content to simply do the motions in terms of especially the case structure, probably because it’s familiar and comforting. Speaking of, I honestly don’t even want the exact same Phoenix Wright to immediately come back in this game, I’d prefer if he had to earn his way into a changed perspective on the law that he could show in solving the final case. Nostalgia for the way things were should drive you to iterate on previous works, not copy-paste Phoenix from game 3 into game 5 with no changes (especially when Phoenix from game 4 contradicts that character (for good reasons explained in game 4)). This return to form never ruined my engagement with the game in any meaningful way, just added unnecessary friction into the experience I assume they intended to present.

So speaking of returning to form, I’m gonna list out all the cases and any notable comments like I usually do for these games’ reviews. I also found that there were unique themes that existed only for individual cases that additionally contribute towards the overarching ‘dark age of the law’ throughout the entire game, and so I have added each of these themes after the case name to help highlight exactly what I found.
- Case 1, Turnabout Countdown (Gluttony): Destructive over-indulgence with intent of continuing addicting behaviour. This case is way too eager to over-explain or hand-hold you through everything, and weirdly is the most anime influenced case in the game. Low tier 1st case that I’d put around the same quality as game 2’s 1st case
- Case 2, The Monstrous Turnabout (Greed): Overpowering desire to obtain unnecessary amounts of wealth or power. Pretty solid forgettable mid-game case that just kinda ends up being a lot of setup with little to no execution. Pretty good though, presenting a classic Phoenix Wright mystery while defining what this game’s gonna be like in subtle ways
- Case 3, Turnabout Academy (Pride): Ego defeating rationality to control action, defined by a dictatorial belief that you are right. While retreading similar steps to game 4’s case 3 (Turnabout Serenade), this game manages to quickly walk that path before continuing on it’s own new path through a much more interesting territory. The focus isn’t on the mystery presented but instead on the ideological conflict at play at Themis Legal, and it’s so engaging to follow along and participate in that debate. Definitely my favourite case of this game, 2nd favourite of the whole series after game 2 case 4
- Case 4, The Cosmic Turnabout (Sloth): A deliberate lack of action, especially when that laziness perpetrates deterioration. Honestly, it’s a strange case in a good way. The case is defined by what it sets up for what comes after it (I usually think of this case and case 5 as being one really big case), but still presents it’s own mystery in a largely complete and satisfying way. It really encompasses Takumi’s legacy of always adding more information
- Case 5, Turnabout for Tomorrow (Wrath): Complete and all-encompassing rage often targeted at someone or something that the perpetrator deems to have wronged them. Pretty solid callbacks and continuations of previous games, absolutely amazing completion of current game's unique stories and themes. We really get the full experience and justification for Athena’s unique ability pretty late in the game, but I love me some evolving gameplay. This case is an amazing conclusion, justifying all of the game in one giant war to end the dark age of the law and seek peace with opposing (and synergising) dual destinies
- Case 6, Turnabout Reclaimed (Envy): A sinister want to obtain qualities of life that others have, usually jealously resenting the life others enjoy. Despite the fact this is basically case 2.5, it does a better job of creating a complete story and interesting mystery with the same moral lesson as case 2. You really get the ‘normal case’ in Dual Destinies’ style with clean keyframed animations that can’t be done easily in 2D, and a further understanding for Blackquill’s disregarding expectation for corruption in the legal system. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not a great case, that first day drags and the mystery seems much more focused on the aquarium than the actual murder.

There is so much this game achieves to be in spite of it’s strict adherence to patterns and ideas set forth by the games that came before it. Most fans tend to find this game lacklustre and inherently contradictory as a Phoenix Wright game, which I do agree that it fails to logically follow from game 4, however I argue these concessions were made to be able to present such a (weirdly shonen) inspection of lawful practices. I usually write reviews in one sitting directly after finishing the game, as I find experiences with games and games themselves to be things of passion (despite how sterile they can be in certain contexts), however this review took me a solid 2-3 weeks of drafting and editing due to how enthralling and cerebral it’s story is presented; I wanted to match the experience I had playing the game despite the review’s outcome being less of a narrative journey. Also it’s a visual novel, I think there’s a higher chance I can get away with writing an essay as a review for that genre. There were even things I left out due to length and lack of my own knowledge, like:
- The graphical challenge presenting expected mechanics while jumping to 3D
- Why certain mechanics may have been cut for time (like fingerprinting)
- Apollo receiving yet another backstory (I might get into that for my review on Spirit of Justice)
- Too many characters leading to Trucy being hard sidelined
- How they use discrete animations to represent the continuous spectrum of characters’ emotions, especially in the context of Athena’s power
- Using classic Phoenix Wright comedy in the more mature themes (and even how Justice for All’s last case didn't do that)
- Why do the Phoenix Wright writers love making time intervals of 7 years for corruption to propagate
- The DLC being so disconnected from the main game, and reasons the DLC may even exist in the first place
- Phoenix’s new relationships at the Wright Anything Agency and old relationships with the Fey family
This is an amazing game that I found you need a certain mindset to perceive it as such, especially during the first 2 cases. In terms of a recommendation, I’d say it defines the place it takes in the Apollo Justice trilogy and shouldn’t be skipped if you haven't played it before, however it’s definitely worth an individual playthrough even as your first Phoenix Wright game (might even be more enjoyable that way given the super straight-forward first 2 cases). I understand that most people who already don’t like the game won’t be reading this sentence. If nothing else I hope that I successfully argued how fervently Blackquill-pilled I am.

Really makes you feel like reincarnate correctness, the conjoined fates of solar magistrate and wisdom amped

Where do I begin with another game so big it tanks the company?

The story is simultaneously horrible and themetically engaging (Sanzu's story should have been the main story), the music's the most generic western pseudo-japanese inspired bullshit, the visuals are both incredibly crisp and boring, the levels and missions are repetitive and approachable from so many different aspects, the character writing feels like they took the head of a Sharknado writer and put it on the body of a Daredevil tv show writer, and the game mechanics and experience are just something else.

This game creates the unique blend of movement stealth game with rpg mechanics, where the movement is so smooth and fluid with so much time spent making the gameplay smooth and never mistake your intentions with your inputs (there's an auto-target reticle in the game for teleporting to ledges and it never misses your intended target, which is wizardry). The abilities allow you to approach any mission in so many different ways with additional objectives such as pacifism or murder, and no detection or fully alerted vastly changing how the game plays. The stealth is designed such that you can always take any hostile out at any time in any way no matter what the situation, and yet presents a unique puzzle each time you come across anyone. And yet, for all this praise of managing the impossible task to create one game that manages these goals with a 20+ hour completion time, the experience comes off as incomplete, buggy as hell, and just drags over it's run time.

Yet another game to add to the list of games with such lofty goals it literally crushes the studio under their expectations of it's experience, reinforced by the gamer's consensus of more = better for experience. Overall, wait for the next game that manages to execute this vision better, it's too late for this studio anyway.

Really makes you feel like Aragami 2

Now that I've finally unlocked every item, unlocked every character, unlocked most of each survivor's skills and skins, completed a prismatic trial, played multiplayer, and beaten eclipse 8 (all in only a tiny 339.4 hours) I feel finally able to somewhat confidently talk about this game. This is a (almost) perfect roguelike with a subpar entry experience.

Have you ever done work, like put yourself in a position to get through an activity with required effort? Well... that's what starting to play this game is like. To be able to actually engage with the complete game there's a series of 10+ 'warm-up sets' you need to do before you finally get access to a satisfying substantial amount of the experience. You're locked to 1 character, their base 4 abilities (which are mostly bad), and 95 accessible items (technically 61 if you just count regular stage loot). To unlock the 13 other survivors, get to the 148 total items, and start using alternate survivor skills you need to grind, sometimes hard focus, challenges and fork over the $22 AUD for the DLC. That wouldn't be too difficult or troublesome if the challenges never got as complex/tiring as beat a prismatic trial (daily challenge) without taking damage, deal 1000000 damage in a single shot, perform the worst object manipulation you've ever done on a specific stage (unless you have a friend and get to unlock the aqueduct gate the easy way), charge a teleporter without being hit, or chase 20 of a specific enemy off a map that has edges (which requires looping for that enemy to be able to spawn on one specific map where this is possible). This sense of external progression to individual runs, while somewhat motivating, is never more justified than just going into config files or downloading a mod to instantly unlock everything. Trust me, I didn't and I regret it.

But once you've slogged through the mud and successfully charted a course to unlock each item and most survivors (or enabled a funny mod), you've done it. Now you get the brilliant reward of playing an amazing game over and over again. Before I get to the quality of playing the game, I wanna quickly highlight the meta-progression that actually doesn't like pain. The treasure hunt in unlocking artifacts is equally as optional and goofy as the rule-changes it grants. Alternate survivor skins are a nice signifier of your own progress in learning the game. The many alternate endings are simultaneously satisfying conclusions to runs in their own way and give unique reasons to undertake each challenge. The meta-currency of lunar coins creates a butterfly effect from your past stupidity impacting your current ability to beat a run (despite most lunars being kinda free run-winners).

Risk of Rain 2 has 3 core aspects of it's gameplay I wanna talk about that make each run fun and engaging to play. Most roguelikes require these 3 in some capacity, however in this game they are utilised in additive contexts to make this game shine like any reflection in a modern remake.
1) Every item you gain in a run can be useful in a build. It may not be useful in your current build, but most decisions on refining your build aren't easy to autopilot
2) There are plenty of well-defined builds in the game, but it has gratifying balance of build overlap. This allows just the right amount of resistance to switch build types mid-run, while still not making it unlikely to combine build types and create a franken-build. This forces you to roll with the punches while still letting you bedazzle your knuckles
3) The game has enough variance to give you runs that are very different to each other and allow for enough 'ha cool' moments even on multiple replays. A recent example is the Eclipse 8 streamer Race who's been forced into playing with a game-changing DLC item in every run, even as a viewer those runs are fresh
All 3 of these aspects aren't without context, they exist in an ability-focused fps roguelike with an ascension/prestige/heat/eclipse mode and extensive modding community. It's passively difficult to get bored of this game when each element of the game feeds into another, multiplying the total enjoyment possible by the amount of connections made in design.

Usually it's difficult to recommend a game to the aether of review site users given the vast difference in taste and overwhelming amount of noteworthy games. Not this time, this time I get to say the nonspecific you will probably like this game despite it's overwhelming introduction. I've got at least 100 other things to bring up about the game, even some negative, but I won't hog too much more of your screen (If Gearbox messes this game up I'm gonna be so mad).

(Update: Gearbox doesn't even give me 24 hours after posting my review before they release their first update silently breaking the meta-progression with vields, made one of the artifacts an ARG instead of a treasure hunt (and the image is of a model in the game that doesn't actually have the code in the public release), silently changed the scanner, broke Loader's audio, leaked DLC files, and increased load times by an excessive amount for how little was supposed to be added. Like did somebody accidentally merge a test version into the release? Already, modern Gearbox shows it's innate desire to pump meaningless content into genuinely impactful works of art, and degrade the piece through their fundamentally greedy practices (like why would you even put effort into a free update? FOR THE SAKE OF CREATING GOOD ART YOU SHARE-WORSHIPPING SLUG MARKETERS). I am partly overreacting as the overall game has kept it's meaning with some minor positive and negative additions, however I also confidently claim to understand the intent behind Gearbox's actions in the past 5-6 years, and trust me when I say it's very unlikely that they want to fundamentally contribute positively to the artform. Wonderlands review coming soon containing more examples of Gearbox's unsavoury existence)

Really makes you feel like exposing yourself to nature's retribution from an entire planet terrarium

Utilises fun little gimmicks in mostly interesting and unique ways, and combines this larger meta gimmick in the funny little platforming guy game. What else do you need? Excellent bite sized chunks, a little lack in mechanical variety at times but still engaging, accessibility options so wide there's 12 playable characters and 24 (technically 22) different modifiers in the form of badges to help you play the way you want. This is not pinnacle mario but definitely a highlight in it's history. Now that I've (hopefully) communicated why I rated this game as well as I have, this context will help to understand my main reason for writing this review.

This game sets out to become exact what you expect it to be, with the 'randomness' of the wonder effect even staying within your expectations, and exists merely to maximise fun in lieu of overall favourable design or quality of life design elements. So that begs the question, why review it? The game spits in your face upon any attempts to diagnose the cavities left by design choices in the game. Why spin jump? Cause the r button didn't have much to do. Why does wall sliding have a delay? Because levels utilising the mechanic wouldn't be paced as well otherwise. Why the special badges? Because it may be fun to you to use them in normal levels, but they exist more to throw another gimmick level at you. Why another super secret really hard post-game level? Because it's expected at this point, and fairly easy to make this time around. This game attempts to be incapable of proper analysis, as it seems to imply that would be missing the point of the game. And don't get me wrong, this isn't me being angry at it being 'too easy and thus not engaging' or 'trying to find complexity in the funny jump for kids', as I find the 2D kirby games are easier (most of the time) and more engaging than this game. Clearly I should 'get over myself' and just enjoy the funny boing yahoo game...

And yet, we typically associate a good experience in playing a game with quality gameplay and intentional fun-first design, which this game features very little of in the platforming parts. The quality of controls is just passable enough to not be noticed unless it becomes an issue in the secret levels (or before if you pay attention), the level design is also just passable enough to get you interacting with the controller so that when a wonder flower pops on screen you're not apathetic enough yet to walk right by it. The focus of the game seems less on experiencing a platforming adventure and more on minigames featuring rule changes.

I felt disinterested in the actual jumping around I was doing by about world 4, and realised that I had stopped seeing the game as a platformer and more as a puzzle game, and I could only get back into the platforming mindset by attempting to count the clock externally to force some semblence of pressure on my interactions through the controller. It felt like the platforming came second in the level design to presenting a mechanics-based lock and key puzzle to progress, especially with the purple coins. Celeste is a perfect contrast (as always) of good platforming design, as the puzzle elements in the level design serve to help you with a blueprint for what actions to take in getting to your goal, the puzzle is secondary to jumping good.

All of this is in it's worst form for me with the search parties, now your ability to move a character around a screen is merely to search the screen for hidden or blocked off tokens. I especially did not like pipe park, however given the overwhelming about of trick/improperly communicated puzzle levels in the Mario Makers, I may be the exception. The mechanical intrigue, the 'action' part of the game, is (usually) hard sidelined in search parties, and less so in the game as a whole.

The overall quality of the game feels underwhelming/incomplete through many more elements than just the level design, however I find this to be a prime example for my personal gripes with the game. Every other design element seems to be lacking something, from more 'expected' or conformatory music to wonder flowers rarely adding more than just the gimmick to the experience. A lot of time and effort has to have gone into making this game, especially with wonder mechanics, however when a plan is not well thought out the follow through becomes somewhat lacking despite it's quality in execution. Also just to reiterate, good game, I had a good time, I also felt frustrated in my fun.

Really makes you wonder why are the mario bros super

I have not felt this level of hate towards a game since my days attempting to play Smash Bros competitively. Some people say some games age like a fine wine, some people say some games show levels of jank over time, I say Jet Set Radio was never intended to be played by someone who wants to interact with the game. This is like baby sensory videos for the 29th of June 2000, things are happening and you can kinda tell what but most of it is to distract from one simple failure, this game isn't playable.

By playable, I mean none of this is controllable. Your inputs do things, however it always feels like it's never what you intended. The game never lets you be in control of your character, in a movement game, in a platforming game, in a time-trial game. It's like everything Jet Set Radio teaches you about your controls is ever so slightly wrong, to where you believe it's your fault you messed up but there's no inherit logical answer as to why. Sure the age shows, and it only worsens existing problems in the game. Very little air control but massive jump directional changes but also basically no friction but also momentum is built in seconds. No HUD either, in a game about exploring the map when the controls are this actively hostile (with limited time, no less). The level design is also just painful enough to where you need good movement in order to tag some spots, but your character controls with what feels like 5 whole seconds of lag. There's always another 'but' to be added whenever you try to find something positive to say about the game. Wallrunning, but less than 1 second and destroys momentum. Momentum chaining, but freezing in place for larger graffiti. Chase sequences, but you can't truly control your character. I can go on.

What especially irks me is that Jet Set Radio gets you into a particularly vulnerable state and consistently punishes you for random things. It's takes a particular type of poor design to effect someone like that. I used to be a very angwy gamer when I was younger, whenever something didn't go my way I would yell and cry and have the urge to break something. I consider myself to be past that point of rage, only feeling at worst frustrated at an experience, however this game brought all of that flooding back. It feels like you're the one messing up your jump, and to be honest I probably am, but it also gives no explanation as to why. As an example, the game does not teach you the trick jumps but expects you to be able to do them (and not do them) consistently. But whenever you jump an unknown factor seems to influence whether you perform a trick jump when you're trying not to, and send you flying way past the location you were actually trying to jump to. While a lack of control like that is aggravating, infuriating even, Solar Ash implements something similar without it ever being frustrating. Sure, in Solar Ash sometimes you don't turn on the ground as fast as you'd like, however the game is actually designed around that and never takes agency of control away from the player. In Solar Ash it's just an added rule on your mechanics that syngerises with how the game is designed, in Jet Set Radio it's the mechanics themselves that seem to clash with the game's overall design.

This game is lucky I played Little Kitty Big City before it, because if I had not played a therapeutic jank game before this I wouldn't have given it the time of day. Hell I even gave it a second shot after I had made a decision on the game to double check it wasn't just my inexperience with the game, it wasn't. I wanna avoid just listing bad qualities about the game and not going into detail about why they don't work or why it's like that, but there's so much bad, so many confusing decisions, and so little explanation. I'm sure at the time it was groundbreaking and revolutionary, however on it's own right now it's actively hostile and an extremely poor proof of concept. Soundtrack's a banger and the heavy pre hi-fi rush visuals look good no matter what, everyone knows this, unfortunate it's tied to what I'd call an undesigned game.

Really makes you feel like you gotta Jet Set Get-out-of-here before it's too late

I love deckbuilding roguelikes. I'm the guy with the deckbuilding roguelike shaped neck. I'm the dog with a napkin wrapped around their neck ordering more deckbuilding roguelikes. I'm the angry birds rolling two deckbuilding roguelikes on my dice. I'm Lebron screaming when asked about deckbuilding roguelikes. And I finally figured why I don't like this game.

It took me unlocking the grappler deck to realise this game tries to be two types of games at once, but performs neither at equal quality to others of it's genre. If you're looking for 2D roguelike grid-based and turn-based strategy combat just play Into the Breach. If you're looking for a deckbuilding roguelike with unfocused deck archetypes and occasional non-combat encounters just play Slay the Spire. This game doesn't just try to have both cakes, but then it tries to eat them both at the same time and ends up passed out on the floor still holding both forks.

I appreciate the attempt, really. Movement cards being so valuable adds an interesting twist to the game, the gun mechanic is very interesting despite it's dlc paywall, the vibe and setting is surpringly well done, and the animations and camera movements are locked down to a science. However a list of redeemable qualities simply obfuscate the underlying problem, this game contains the problems in design of both games it emulates and thus suffers in quality of the good elements from both games. I'm sure there's a way you could make it work that doesn't leave your game as just... 'eh', but you won't find that construction in this game

What even is this game? It's the most easy to understand and confusing combination of mechanics you'll play, that comes out as an intriguing mystery plot designed around replayable levels that actually creates a good argument for rng as level design. The only way I can accurately review the game is by explaining what the game is while adding my opinion, so...

The game is divided into levels all starting with deckbuilding the 'world', choosing encounter/item/companion cards to be added to the existing ones for the level that have costs and rewards (sometimes being item cards) to change your inventory throughout the level, and are randomly placed once the dealer shuffles the cards into their pregenerated arrangement. The cards are all interesting ideas for encounters and while most of them are good, even the ones that fall behind contribute to an enjoyable journey. The levels also feature a completion reward of additional cards added to your collection to be used for later levels, and potentially a bonus reward for doing a secondary objective which get you the really good and/or interesting cards. The level designs and rewards scale satisfyingly to match your growing collection and mastery over the game's mechanics. Additionally, you can also complete side objectives for your companion (in a set of cards given with the companion) slowly over many levels to better understand your chosen friend and upgrade their abilities, both of which are just net positive experiences.

Using items cards you've got (weapons, armour, and potions) you then go into combat with those items and any effect they have. The combat is a simple beat-em-up thatpriorities different approaches for each enemy, while the other enemies often just hang back and let you wail on their friend. It's effective, if a little simple and lacking complexity, but realistically is only interesting to become an optimisation problem after playing enough. There are also trap rooms you may rarely encounter, but those are so basic they're not worth adding to this review in full.

The real mechanical interest comes from the non-combat encounters, where the dealer adds a remark or warning for each of these to go with the relatively simple narrative choices you make. These are the most interesting, as the storytelling is ironically the best part of a game that handed it's ability to attempt a cohesive story to the rng gods, and present actual interesting narrative beats, whether through your personal additions or those guaranteed by the mission. You choose cards at first for the mechanical benefits, but begin to choose cards later on for the opportunity to generate a new interesting interactive story. The cards almost function like encounters in a hero's journey, but that may also be my lack of satisfactory story competency showing. Despite these non-combat encounter cards being better than the combat encounter cards (on average) they also facilitate combat cards to be included with your additions, simply to further the complex conditional narrative you create, and after a short while you stop rushing to end each level and instead search for more boons to acquire through narrative evolution. These encounter cards fuel most of your drive to play the game, even if most of them fall on the same 4 gimmick minigames to represent changes of fate, though are more of the immediate interest variety rather than the long-form kind.

The long form intruge in the game comes in the form of the situation the main character (arguably the player) finds themself in, seated across from a strange mage who calls themselves 'The Dealer' in a seemingly endless trek in his traveling wagon uncovering a story The Dealer seems to be making up as you travel, a card game within a video game. The main long-form drive of the game comes from understanding why this is the premise the game decides to use, and how the story that the dealer tells you progress with your additions to his deck. Without spoiling too much, the way the story evolves from a simple hero's journey into it's own new narrative puts most other mysteries to shame.

I have not played Hand of Fate 1, and my opinion on this game may not translate to those with history in this franchise, though I do strongly believe that this is one of the most unique and consistently good narrative experiences you can only get through interactive games (especially for the medium of video games). Overall my feelings on this game are strange, because despite by praise for the game created it cannot be stressed enough that this is my opinion, and I easily imagine someone being frustrated with the experience and confused by the puzzle pieces of mechanics fitting together, thought this is a compelling instance of a puzzles not needing to be made of 4 sided pieces.

Really makes you feel like you have 2 Hands of Fate

This is such a well made puzzle shooter designed for people who really care or are invested in the game series, and yet is also the least satisfying Splatoon content to be released yet. The devs really put a lot of time into adapting the Splatoon gameplay and expectations into a cohesive fulfilling adventure and then forgot to do the same with most other elements of this dlc.

Lemme start strong and say the rougelike genre mechanics added in this dlc are great with little to no complaints on the execution of the gimmick. Despite how obvious the influences that shaped the design are, it creates a unique spire to 'slay' and differently engaging 'rain' of enemies to risk. Palettes are templates for the many branching possible builds you could create, with some weighting in colour tones for safer and more useful choices for your template. Each colour tone synergises well with itself but are useless without other tones being added, such as only going power tone will up your overall damage but that won't matter when you can only hit one target in a swarm of enemies. Once again, EPD division 5 proves they can make literally anything fun, even adding proper replayability to singleplayer Splatoon.

Now we get to the weakest element to balance out all the praise from the last paragraph. This story doesn't exist, I can use 4 bullet points to complete explain the story of the dlc and what little it does kinda flops. It starts strong, with an interesting premise and plenty of intrique, but unlike octo expansion the mystery is unsatisfying and the plot doesn't grip you up until the end. Octo expansion's final climb was a constant build of anticipation and mastery over all elements of the dlc, side order's constant climb is fun and somewhat meaningless. Don't get me wrong, I understand I'm comparing a (mostly) linear adventure narrative to a repetitive adventure narrative, but when the end tries to hit the same heights it fails to cross the bar simply because it's a different premise this time around.

Furthermore, the storytelling around the main plot was lackluster too. What is Dedf1sh doing here, I got a half-complete answer but nothing conclusive. Why is the background for the story a world tour with Off The Hook, that should have had more reason or influence over the main plot. Why hasn't Pearl proposed to Marina, they clearly like each other to the point they never wanna be apart so why not include that in the plot? Hell you could even explain Dedf1sh's inclusion as a spanner in Pearl's marriage plan and then they have a reason to be in the plot. This game attempts to give fan service (Marina's desktop background, lietmotifs all over the place, story following octo expansion) but fails to follow through on anything anyone actually wants, besides more Off the Hook and 8.

The artstyle and music are classic Splatoon level of quality, however it feels empty this time around. I understand these teams were fighting an uphill battle with a mostly colourless and ordered world, however despite one song (which isn't even used super well) at the end everything else is kinda forgettable. It's really well made and thematically appropriate, but still mostly forgettable nonetheless. Despite how (intentionally) bland everything is the level loading effect is pristine, the art direction continues to push Splatoon's quality even higher, music and sound effects served to further cement this world in it's reality, and the world/level design comes off as a beautiful stark emptiness.

Now, as literally anyone who's glanced at the dlc page knows, Splatoon has been marketing nostalgia for a 9 year old series like it's the last thing they got. The nintendo production company in charge of this series needs to chill out on the nostalgia because the most interesting, engaging, and rewarding elements of Splatoon 3 are all newer aspects or refinements of what makes a Splatoon game. This is the pinnacle of this fact, as every return to a status quo (literally and textually) remains uninteresting and unsatisfying when compared to improvements and additions on what was. Just because it's such an obvious thing to do, why keep hinting at Pearl and Marina being in love when you can just do it? Why keep the same instead of moving forward with these characters, changing their relationship over time and introducing uncertainty into their futures (LIKE THE GAME'S MAIN THEME LIKE COME ON JUST DO YOUR OWN THEME IN THE STORY WRITERS). Furthermore, to no-one who noticed this trend's surprise, the main reward for beating the dlc is more hollow nostalgia. Don't get me wrong again, I'm not against returning to or continuing from older ideas and times, but you gotta do something of substance with the return otherwise you get this empty hollow version of nostalgia which only exists to bait those feel good memories out. I want meaningful continuations of nostalgia, not more of this 'hey, remember this? here's this exactly as we left it with no changes'.

So, despite my rant, game good. Justifies it's existence despite it's failure to follow through, and creates an engaging repeat adventure in this strange cephalopod shooting game. Nintendo continues to push out quality and enforce interesting change in their IPs, and yet the ways in which this game doesn't change continue to annoy and bug me. More Splatoon please, but also less corporate Splatoon please.

Really makes you feel like you'll take a side order of the number 3 to go from splatoon