It's almost insane how hard they nailed almost every aspect of this game. Kirby Super Star Ultra introduced the backbone of every modern Kirby game, you know how these games go. You have your silly little extra minigames, a boss rush, and of course a main story mode (or multiple story modes in this games case) and a mode where you speedrun through all the main level themes as a guy who is most likely not Kirby.

The way Super Star differs from the modern Kirby game is the fact that instead of just having one main story mode there's around 4 different campaigns for you to enjoy. We have a remake Kirby's Dreamland, Great Cave Offensive which is Kirby's first stab at a metroidvania, Milky Way Wishes which has you unlocking all your copy abilities by finding them in levels for you to be able to pick any copy ability at anytime, you can also pick any stage you want to play first in Milky Way which adds some spice to a replay, and of course there's Dynoblade. Just a somewhat normal kirby romp where he beats the shit out of a giant bird mom at the end. Oh I also forgot about Revenge of Metaknight which is much more storybased than the other gamemodes. And to top it all off after you finish up the main gamemodes Ultra adds 2 more extra game modes to end each playthrough with a bang.

I feel like gushing about how cool Revenge of the King and Revenge of Metaknight is. Kirby storytelling here is at its peak in my opinion. There’s no reading boss descriptions (which is cool I admit) or Miiverse posts to piece together what’s happening here, here the characters narrate over your gameplay and react to what you’re actually doing in game. You get to see the Halberd’s crew freak out over the fact Kirby (who is just a little man mind you) is dismantling and attacking the ship at it’s seams, or see King Dedede get more and more desperate as Kirby invades his castle. It’s a nice way to keep the player engaged in what’s going on with the plot while also keeping the pacing of the gameplay going. Also the duels with Dedede and Meta Knight at the end of both of their respective campaigns is peak Kirby.

Onto Great Cave Offensive, basically Kirby falls into a treasure filled mine and it’s up to you to escape, and hopefully snag every goody you see along the way. It’s just a fun little collectaton/metroidvania type thing filled with numerous fun references to other Nintendo franchises which I don’t see how anyone can say no to, I mean hey Kirby somehow picks up Falchion and Mr.Saturn, that’s pretty cool! Not much to say about it really, it’s just cool seeing money go up and getting shiny collectibles.

Finally I gotta talk about Milky Way Wishes. Marx is an absolutely little silly little guy, and easily one of the best Kirby antagonists and personally is the true start of Kirby fighting lovecraftian demons. Tackling levels out of order is a blast, especially since it also affects the order of copy abilities you can obtain, and therefore how you tackle enemies and bosses. Copy abilities in this game are sick, for Kirby’s first shot at giving every copy a unique moveset they completely knocked every copy ability out of the park. All of them are a blast to use. They should bring back the gimmick of unlocking copy abilities by finding them and then being able to pick whichever one you need at a given moment, but I’m not exactly left disappointed with how Milky Way execute the concept as this mode is still a complete blast even to this day.

I think that wraps up my thoughts on this game. I’ve 100%’d twice and it’s definitely a standout Kirby title next to Planet Robobot and the like. As always the bosses are bangers and the music even more so. Play this game sometime you won’t regret it!

I love Persona 3, It's a game very near and dear to me. And I'm glad Reload delivers.

All the new voice actors kill their roles, the new scenes provide are incredibly charm and add depth to the male cast of S.E.E.S, Tartarus has been improved tenfold. Persona 3 has never been better. This game always had a beautiful story about finding the meaning of life, and all of reload's additions and graphical enhancements complement them greatly. It's really easy to forget that life is worth living at times. And I'm glad that this game was here for me. I think it couldn't have come out at a better time. I really needed to replay Persona 3 again and I'm glad this game allowed me to do so in such a fresh and spectacular fashion. I don't know the meaning of life, I don't know why I wake up in the morning. But this game reminded me that it'll be okay. One day I will find the answer to life's greatest question, and when that day comes I'll be able to look back on everything I've accomplished and be proud of myself.

I just finished my ironman of this game, it was the first ironman I've ever attempted and I can confidently say that you should at least try ironmanning a game in this series at least once. I didn't reset my entire game if I got a game over however and if you just want to casually play around with permadeath I recommend you do the same. Permadeath is actually a really fun mechanic and can really bring some overlooked units into a new light. For example I used Kane in my playthrough because aside from Finn all my other cavs had died and he was the next best thing and he ended up being one of my favorite units to use. I can say the same about Homer who got 2 lucky move level ups on the map he joined in and with use of paragon I was quickly able to turn him into a power house. Permadeath is a really interesting mechanic, and it'd be a shame to not at least do one playthrough of any fe game enforcing it. Kaga was right, you shouldn't worry about the perfect ending where everyone lives or the super optimal plays everytime you play this game. Create your own story of how Leif clawed his way back and retook Leonster while preceding to take down a faction of the Loptr church. You'll probably make an unforgettable playthrough and discover some favorite units you would usually overlook.

I want to rewrite this review because I personally think I can do better.

Part 1 The Gameplay:
Metroid Fusion is a lot more linear and hands on than its predecessors, which personally I find does this game more harm than good. I want to make it clear that this isn't a bad game by any means, the movement is solid, the level design is quite serviceable and it has all the classic metroidvania upgrades we all know and love. In a way the linearity isn't even a horrible thing, if you're new to Metroidvanias I think Zero Mission or Fusion is a great place to start. Can't really get lost when the game goes "HEY! YOU'RE SUPPOSE TO GO HERE!" while locking you to 1 area at a time. But I think that's exactly my problem with Metroid Fusion. The sense of discovery is incredibly hampered when the game quite literally tells you where to go the moment you enter a new area, and the way you can only explore 1 area at a time really limits that feeling of wonder and suspense when you accidentally discover a brand new area to explore and sink your teeth into. In Fusion you know exactly when and where you're suppose to be in order to progress in this game. You always know when you're about to unlock a new area on the map. It takes a lot of the fun of this genre out of it for me. While each area does have a few secrets to discover it just doesn't hit the same as it would in a Metroidvania that's a lot more hands off.

Part 2 The story:
There is a lot of dialogue in this game, which is mostly why I would rather recommend Zero Mission to a new player. To be clear I don't think having dialogue or exposition in a Metroidvania is a bad thing, Sotn and a bunch of other Castlevania games do have cutscenes from time to time but those games know when to just let the player wander around and stumble upon the plot more organically. Metroid's storytelling is at its best when it shows and doesn't tell. Super's sombre environment tells what it needs without ever uttering a word outside of a brief opening. I wish Fusion would have done the same. Instead Samus is accompanied by a computer she names Adam that just won't shut up. I think this hurts the games atmosphere quite a bit. The opening of Fusion sets the stage well enough that the player should be able to piece together the dangers of the x-virus and of the wrecked and abandoned space centre/lab where the game takes place. The x-virus takes control of Samus' old power suit and the feeling of loneliness and despair as you're hunted down by essentially yourself this game could have had would have been incredible. And at times it does nail that feeling perfectly but it's offset by Adam the computer. Samus isn't really alone, for 90% of the game she's accompanied by a computer that will throw exposition at her and tell her where her objective lies. At the end from what I remember the computer finally gets shut down but the dies been cast. At that stage of the game Adam has already done enough damage to this game's sense of exploration and atmosphere for the brief moments where he goes offline to really feel impactful. At least for me.

Putting into words how much I love this dumbass game is something I find some difficulty doing. I first played this game when I was 13. The extreme grandeur of everything in this game was astonishing to me. The maps were huge, brigands were razing down villages halfway across the map, the angelical soundtrack that accompanied it all, the ability to deploy every unit you recruit all at once, the fact you can't trade normally between units, and the fact they all have their own amount of income, the unique skills they come with, makes every character feel like they bring something to the table, like they're worth using in someway no matter how minor. Not to mention the story takes place between 2 generations of people. Planning what units to ship and what items to pass down during generation 1 so I can have some overpowered units during generation 2 is always fun. Not to mention the amount of secret items you can discover. Everyone should give this game a shot, maybe the giant maps aren't for you, and maybe the way gold and item trading works isn't your cup of tea but the way this game is able to paint out the continent of Jugdral through it's gameplay and story is something you shouldn't pass up. At least give it a shot, it'll be worth a try.

Shin Megami Tensei IV has been on my digital shelf for a VERY long time now. I bought this game during the pandemic and played it for a few hours but got carried away with other things and had to drop the game. I enjoyed what I played but it wasn't spectacular. What do I think about it now? It's a hard 6/10. Maybe a 7 if we're being generous but this is such a big step down from Nocturne.

The base mechanics of SMT 4 are solid considering they're based on Nocturne's. Where the game goes wrong is the smirk status. I'm not a huge fan of it, basically you get increased evasion and attack if you land a critical/exploit an enemy weakness/void an enemy attack. The problem is that getting a smirk is totally random. The only consistent time I've seen a smirk proc is when a crit lands which in it of itself is a random chance already. You can't exactly plan around whether or not you or a boss will get a smirk so it just adds another random rng chance for you to instantaneously lose a boss fight if you get unlucky with getting crit. Literally the only time a boss will hand your ass to you to this game is if you get majorly fucked by rng (or let Walter's stupid agi spamming ass cook ever again), You can't even really play around with it defensively because you lose smirk and therefore the evasion boost if you get another turn which is likely considering the only way to proc smirk are ways that give you more press turns.

Talking about bosses, in this game I can't say they were particularly impressive. The first 2 main bosses are borderline unfair at times, Minotaur especially is just a coin flip depending on which partner you have with you. Medusa can also be tough but she's a little more fair than Minotaur was. But after that? I can barely remember any of the bosses in this game they're all so uninteresting and get absolutely steamrolled by the average dex/gun build. While I can't lie and say there isn't fun to be had in clicking stun needles or myriad arrows and seeing big numbers fly on screen, it is a little disappointing for a series that's known to be difficult. I never had to stop and craft a specific team to counter and pile drive a boss to dust like other megaten games, in Smt 4 I just clicked charge and a multihit move and saw the bosses go down with ease.

I want to talk about alignment real quick, not a huge fan of how this game tackles it really. What alignment you get is based on dialogue options you pick throughout the majority of the game and you probably aren't going to get neutral route unless you keep track of your options which I think is a little lame. Also on the neutral route the game forces you to do around 18 supposedly optional sidequests without telling you what those 18 quests even are, it totally kills the pacing of the game for 0 reason. Only around 5 quests they hold you at gunpoint to do are actually unique and interesting.

All in all, I just think SMT 4 just lacks that impact as the other Megaten games I've played have. The most standout moment is entering Tokyo for the first time and hearing the beautiful yet melancholy overworld theme for the first time. https://youtu.be/qDsDYCI3fyc?feature=shared Outside of that banger I can't say a lot of this game is very memorable at all, but that's just me. The story itself is actually pretty decent, The game hard pushes neutral route but I think that's the point. You need a balance between law or chaos. The game has a moment where it shows you what the law and chaos route endings would look like for the citizens of Tokyo which is actually pretty cool so add that along with entering Tokyo for the first time to the list of memorable moments of this game. The pacing would've been better if neutral route didn't ruin the pacing with 18 random sidequests but the ending was decent enough outside of a somewhat disappointing final boss. Also while I may not have enjoyed all the random pngs that make up this game's enemies, all the designs are usually really great and take inspiration from the demon's roots in it's mythology it's neat! Also I hope the guy who redesigned demons like Omoikane still works at atlus cause his demon designs are literally so cool and awesome to look at.