The sequel to the critically-acclaimed action RPG Kingdom Hearts is one of the greatest sequels ever. It improves upon it's predecessor in almost every way possible - from the vastly superior combat to the thrilling story, Kingdom Hearts II succeeds by every possible metric. It isn't without it's own problems, mainly a few issues here-and-there, some of the world's feeling a bit more empty compared to the first game, or the lack of context for some important story beats (the game expects that you've played through a niche Gameboy Advance game in order to understand parts of the story. This problem is slightly remedied in later HD collections of the games.) But these nitpicks aside, the game is phenomenal. The Final Mix version of it is even better, adding more post-game content and additional quality-of-life improvements. Seeing as these days, most people are going to experience the Final Mix versions of these games in the HD ReMix collections, this point may be moot, but I'd definitely recommend playing the Final Mix version of both this game and the original Kingdom Hearts.

This unassuming Action RPG stole my heart back in 2010. It's rich characters, melancholic tone, and breathtaking music make for an experience that few games can achieve. It contains one of the greatest stories ever told in a video game (I'm a sucker for the whole Do Androids Dream? trope, even if it isn't literally androids in this case.) The concept of beating the same game over and over again to experience the full story is one that this game introduced me to, and now I love it. Any game that can pull off something like that should be commended. The gameplay is a little rough around the edges in that it's pretty basic. There are a lot of optional side-quests that are also very fetch-questy. But no minor complaint can dampen this tremendous game.

Imported from my Backloggery:

Despite a relatively dry beginning and slow start, I found myself absolutely transfixed by the end of NieR. The combat left a lot to be desired, in addition to being repetitive, I found that I was having a better time if I was overpowered for each encounter. The story is basic, but it becomes quite a unique narrative 10 hours in. I found myself highly invested in the narrative, even if it did come across as sadistic to the point of comedy at times. NieR is highly flawed but very special.

This expansion means a lot to me. Its the best of the best that cyberpunk has to offer, what the dlcs for fromsoft games meant for the original. A full blown understanding of the game, but one that has bigger visions planned, ones that were also achieved. While this expansion is not needed for the main game, it benefits immensely from it along with all its improvements to story, environment, set-pieces, characters and gun play. I can only hope cyberpunk 2 has the same goals this expansion pack managed to achieve

phantom liberty takes everything that makes the base game great and enhances it, telling a political spy thriller centered around 2 key characters who are both complex and written with incredible moral ambiguity and nuance. taking place in a dictatorship on the edge of night city, the map is relatively small in size but uses the setting of slums and destroyed streets to play with verticality and have a massive amount of new content. and obviously, being a cdpr dlc, the side quests are a masterclass. lots of these side quests are better than the main missions in most triple A games.

obviously the main point of comparison for most people will be the witcher 3’s blood & wine, and while this doesnt surpass it in scope, scale or the fantastical setting, phantom liberty does tell a more complex and emotionally resonant story that frequently hits higher highs than anything from it. it hasn’t surpassed blood & wine as the highest standard for all video game expansions, but this is as close as anything will come for a LONG time.

if you enjoy phenomenal writing and world presentation with some of the best fps gameplay in history, you CANNOT skip out on this.

i wouldve given this a 5 stars before i reached phantom liberty, that expansion was just so good it made the base game feel less impactful. but still absolutely incredible from a gameplay standpoint, the writing is phenomenal and the world is by far the best part of it. theres something about this twisted and deranged city where everybody has become so obsessed with altering their bodies that theyre losing who they really are. just really incredible stuff, a big step above 99% of games out there. and the best side quests in gaming

Takes everything from the base game and improves upon it. The story has a great hook and is consistently engaging. Love the new characters they introduced in this game. One huge improvement is the 9 new gigs with this dlc. Each one has its own set of characters and actually puts you in situations where you have to thoroughly think about the decisions you are making. They end up being considerably more memorable than any of the gigs in the base game and were a highlight of this dlc. It would be incredible if the cyberpunk sequel kept the same quality of writing present in these and still had as many as were in the base game. The side missions were mostly great as well. I only played through one of the endings but I really enjoyed how it played out narratively and in gameplay. It seems like the final act of this story can go in two completely different directions so it would be interesting to return to this and see the other set of final missions. This dlc offers a new ending to the base game as well and I personally found it to be my favorite ending available. Overall I feel like this is truly what CD Projekt Red wanted Cyberpunk to feel like and I hope Project Orion is able to take this and apply it to a full game.

I discovered how much this game means to me after learning about some of the changes made with Persona 3 Reload and becoming very nervous about how the final product is going to turn out. At the time of writing this Persona 3 Reload is a little more than a month away, and I have to be honest and say I'm more worried than I am excited.

To me, so many elements of Persona 3 are near perfect, so I don't want to see them changed at all. Like everyone else I think the battle system and dungeon crawling aren't flawless, but I appreciate this game for what it DOES do extremely well rather than hold what it doesn't do perfectly against it. So while I'm open to seeing battle system improvements in Persona 3 Reload, I just don't want the remake to subtract the other elements that made this game so special.

The atmosphere, the music, the characters, the story, the art, and the themes all work together so well to create something that is more than the sum of its parts. The simple and haunting way the cutscenes are animated... The leitmotifs that can be found everywhere in the soundtrack... Shigenori Soejima's iconic artwork... I don't want them to change any of it. Maybe Persona 3 didn't need a remake after all. Just an enhanced port with party control would have been fine. But I can't make a judgement about this remake yet. We'll see.

However, even though I haven't played Reload yet, I've already heard a bit of the music in Reload and I don't like what they've done with some of the remixes. Mass Destruction is the main battle theme, which is obviously very important, and they really didn't do a good job with the remix. Hearing that remix just made me realize how special the original soundtrack is and how nothing about it needs to be changed. Just give me the original soundtrack. When they set out to remake a soundtrack of this caliber they had nowhere to go but down.

Also, the animated cutscenes in Persona 3 are incredible to the point that I prefer them over the Persona 3 Movie's cutscenes. Something about the simplicity is very chilling. Reload replaces the original's cutscenes with a mix of animated and in-game cutscenes, but I really can't see in-game cutscenes being an upgrade when the originals were already so good.

The story in Persona 3 is more focused on characters than events for the beginning chapters. This may bore some people who are expecting major events frequently like in a number of the other Persona games, but the character drama is much, much stronger here than in Persona 4 or 5. I really like Persona 2's story but I think there's no beating Persona 3's story and characters. The game's messaging and themes are too strong.

It's easy to be cynical about a Persona game like Persona 3, but can you think of that many other games that impacted people's lives with such potent messaging and themes? I have seen lot of people saying something along the lines of "Persona 3 saved my life". It's easy to understand why people say this - the game's messaging is all about living your life to the fullest and seeing it through to the end. Although there are people who prefer SMT because they think Persona is cheesy or cringeworthy, I can't help but see something like Shin Megami Tensei V as extremely shallow and meaningless in comparison. I rarely ever hear of someone impacted by Shin Megami Tensei V's messaging. Usually fans of SMT V only say that they like the design of the protagonist and say Nuwa is hot. Despite my criticism here, I like the SMT franchise so I wish Shin Megami Tensei V was a game that was capable of deeply impacting people's lives the way that Persona 3 has.

While I acknowledge that Persona 5 is the future of the franchise gameplay-wise, Persona 3 has a sort of legendary status for me. All of the games elements culminated in an absolutely unforgettable experience, which is why I'm nervous about these elements being changed. But no matter how the remake affects future generations' perceptions of Persona 3, I'll always know that the original was an incredible game. It remains to be seen whether or not I can recommend Reload to newcomers, but any changes they make - even for the better - will just make me more attached to the original game.