Hacxz
90 Reviews liked by Hacxz
Katamari Damacy
2004
first stage: "haha cute i made a pile of erasers and legos :)"
final stage: "i spirit bombed ultraman with a ball made of all of detroit"
final stage: "i spirit bombed ultraman with a ball made of all of detroit"
Lost Judgment
2021
I don't know if I like the story better than the first Judgment, but I thought the story was pretty good and had one of the best villains in the series easily ranking up there to Judgment,Yakuza 7 and Yakuza 3's antagonist for me. the gameplay however is the best out of the entire series, as so much content was added and the amount of activities is more than any of the other games. with even new additions like skateboarding (which you can use to traverse the world faster as well),boxing and even bike racing, and the combat is the most refined it's ever been as each fighting style Yagami uses is extremely fun and each has it's own use. you'll be constantly switching fighting styles often, they also added a new fighting style called Snake that is similar to Tanimura's fighting style from Yakuza 4 but this fighting style is way more fun to use and the parrying mechanic is more refined. overall it's one of the best games Ryu Ga Gotoku studio has made and if you're a fan of the series it's easily worth your time
CHILDHOOD DREAM COME TRUE 10000/10
Final Fantasy X
2001
This review contains spoilers
Listen to my story... this may be our last chance.
Final Fantasy X is the peak of Square Enix's flagship franchise, why? It tells the perfect story that hits every beat and will leave you both sad and in awe.
The 45 hour journey begins with a braggadocious young adult playing spherical water polo and quickly transforms into something so special that I was glued to my monitor right away. Tidus, the star player of the Zanarkand Abes is taken away from his home and placed in the world of Spira with seemingly no purpose. Eventually he will meet a young girl by the name of Yuna and neither of their lives will be the same.
Musically, FFX is again a masterclass from Nobuo Uematsu. "To Zanarkand" is an all time favorite by most out of all Final Fantasy tracks, and "Yuna's Theme," "Besaid," "Spira Unplugged," "A Fleeting Dream," and "Fight with Seymour" are all timeless. FFX saw Uematsu go more ethereal and spiritual than he ever had before. Finally he had voice acting to go along with his songs, he could create background music that would still serve a purpose yet not become more memorable than the occurrences of the game at hand, it was a perfect job of making the game experience feel enhanced through the power of sound.
The setting of FFX is easily my favorite in the series; in FFVI you saw a typical fantasy world that was interspersed with machines, FFVII went into the future with Midgar yet remained fantasy, FFVIII went to space, and FFIX remained a medieval fantasy as a love letter to Final Fantasy of yore. FFX had the most striking departure from this and created a world reminiscent of the pacific island nations. The locales and cultures you visit are impressive and unique to gaming, you meet people who spend their whole life on the ocean and have a spiritual culture. Places like Besaid, Kilika and Luca are all varied and easy to remember, especially when you witness the destruction and sorrow that visits them.
The characters of FFX (outside of the story) are easily the best case the game has for its greatness. The great thing about a game based on a great journey/pilgrimage like FFX is that you have a great way to measure character growth. How was character Y at their journey beginning, and how are they now? No character in FFX be it hero or villain is the same at these two spots in the game. The most stark difference is in the heroic three of Tidus, Yuna, and Wakka. Tidus starts the journey out like I previously mentioned as a cocky athlete, son of one of the greatest in the sport to ever have existed, he’s jovial and has little to no filter and sees no wrong in his actions. Throughout the journey he begins to humanize and slow down in his extroverted nature. As he sees all the tragedy befalling Spira, Tidus realizes that being all happy go lucky can often be a detriment to the hopes and dreams of those around him. His caring for Yuna moves quickly from funny friend to concerned lover. People oft remember him for the infamous “HAHAHAHA” scene outside Luca, but should bring to mind the Macalania Wood endeavor crying scene first. How do you go from one of the best in your respective field to starting out anew in a foreign world, fighting against the most devastating force in the history of time immemorial? There is no correct answer, however Tidus does a pretty damn good job showcasing the way to do so. Another great character is Wakka, a fun loving Polynesian Blitzball player who loves to do no more than worship Yevon and play sports. At the start of FFX he is one of the first characters you meet (after Sir Auron,) and he comes off as your best bud who sees no wrong but as time goes on, his shell begins to come off. You soon learn about the tragedy that befell his brother at the hands of foreign weaponry, which explains Wakka’s simply put racism toward the other major ethnic group (the Al Bhed) in the game. He struggles with seeing Al Bhed as equals because of something he’d seen with his own eyes and cannot for the life of him admit that the religious organization he belongs to is responsible for some seriously seedy happenings. Throughout the game we see Wakka go from your funny uncle archetype to your mature best friend, everyone wants a friend like Wakka at the end of this journey. Yuna is the last of these three and oh man, if you want to nominate a “greatest video game heroine” she is without a shadow of a doubt number one. The daughter of the last summoner to defeat Sin (the games primary antagonist and world ending massive demon,) the pressure of greatness was put upon her at birth. From dusk till dawn she has trained and trained to become a summoner because of her bloodline, the expectations put on her are massive from the first time you meet her. Yet despite this insane work ethic and seemingly insurmountable pressure, Yuna is still just a normal girl at the end of the day. After conquering her first trial she attempts to bring luggage with her before Wakka reprimands her and says something along the lines of “this isn’t a vacation Yuna” thus forcing her to leave much of her good and trinkets behind. She often cracks silly jokes, laughs, and even oversleeps on her pilgrimage to become the high summoner to a point where you think she’s just “princess from video game who will eventually win because she has to” but you eventually get to her breaking point. There comes a time in FFX where she bares all to Tidus and admits how scared she is, breaking into tears because she knows the end of the journey of the summoner who defeats Sin ends with death. You get a mostly realistic viewpoint of how a girl plucked from her home to save the world would act in a scenario like this: panicked and afraid, yet cognizant of the great responsibility before her.
I’ve touched on it greatly already but the story of FFX (to me) leaves every other Final Fantasy story in the dust. Not only does it involve an impressive journey beginning in Zanarkand and ending in magnificent glory, but the story beats and multi-leveled themes along the way give it an extreme amount of depth. Conversations about racism, religion, depression, and anxiety all are involved and to a great extent. Characters often shift from good to bad, from reasonable to unreasonable, and the situations Tidus and crew are placed in are rarely ones that go in their favor. There are twists galore regarding the fate of each member of the crew guarding Yuna, as well as the villains they face off against. Though on paper or looking at a guide you can imagine how the game just goes from zone to zone, dungeon to dungeon, temple to temple, it’s often the places in between that give the story the most weight. The nights that the crew spends camping out or resting at a travel agency where Tidus or Yuna will sit outside and give a monologue about their journey and the pain and sadness that comes along with it.
FFX is my favorite SINGLE player game ever, and is a fantastic multi-faceted story about a young man and woman on a journey to save the world from an enemy more sinister and impactful than I’ve seen before.
Final Fantasy X is the peak of Square Enix's flagship franchise, why? It tells the perfect story that hits every beat and will leave you both sad and in awe.
The 45 hour journey begins with a braggadocious young adult playing spherical water polo and quickly transforms into something so special that I was glued to my monitor right away. Tidus, the star player of the Zanarkand Abes is taken away from his home and placed in the world of Spira with seemingly no purpose. Eventually he will meet a young girl by the name of Yuna and neither of their lives will be the same.
Musically, FFX is again a masterclass from Nobuo Uematsu. "To Zanarkand" is an all time favorite by most out of all Final Fantasy tracks, and "Yuna's Theme," "Besaid," "Spira Unplugged," "A Fleeting Dream," and "Fight with Seymour" are all timeless. FFX saw Uematsu go more ethereal and spiritual than he ever had before. Finally he had voice acting to go along with his songs, he could create background music that would still serve a purpose yet not become more memorable than the occurrences of the game at hand, it was a perfect job of making the game experience feel enhanced through the power of sound.
The setting of FFX is easily my favorite in the series; in FFVI you saw a typical fantasy world that was interspersed with machines, FFVII went into the future with Midgar yet remained fantasy, FFVIII went to space, and FFIX remained a medieval fantasy as a love letter to Final Fantasy of yore. FFX had the most striking departure from this and created a world reminiscent of the pacific island nations. The locales and cultures you visit are impressive and unique to gaming, you meet people who spend their whole life on the ocean and have a spiritual culture. Places like Besaid, Kilika and Luca are all varied and easy to remember, especially when you witness the destruction and sorrow that visits them.
The characters of FFX (outside of the story) are easily the best case the game has for its greatness. The great thing about a game based on a great journey/pilgrimage like FFX is that you have a great way to measure character growth. How was character Y at their journey beginning, and how are they now? No character in FFX be it hero or villain is the same at these two spots in the game. The most stark difference is in the heroic three of Tidus, Yuna, and Wakka. Tidus starts the journey out like I previously mentioned as a cocky athlete, son of one of the greatest in the sport to ever have existed, he’s jovial and has little to no filter and sees no wrong in his actions. Throughout the journey he begins to humanize and slow down in his extroverted nature. As he sees all the tragedy befalling Spira, Tidus realizes that being all happy go lucky can often be a detriment to the hopes and dreams of those around him. His caring for Yuna moves quickly from funny friend to concerned lover. People oft remember him for the infamous “HAHAHAHA” scene outside Luca, but should bring to mind the Macalania Wood endeavor crying scene first. How do you go from one of the best in your respective field to starting out anew in a foreign world, fighting against the most devastating force in the history of time immemorial? There is no correct answer, however Tidus does a pretty damn good job showcasing the way to do so. Another great character is Wakka, a fun loving Polynesian Blitzball player who loves to do no more than worship Yevon and play sports. At the start of FFX he is one of the first characters you meet (after Sir Auron,) and he comes off as your best bud who sees no wrong but as time goes on, his shell begins to come off. You soon learn about the tragedy that befell his brother at the hands of foreign weaponry, which explains Wakka’s simply put racism toward the other major ethnic group (the Al Bhed) in the game. He struggles with seeing Al Bhed as equals because of something he’d seen with his own eyes and cannot for the life of him admit that the religious organization he belongs to is responsible for some seriously seedy happenings. Throughout the game we see Wakka go from your funny uncle archetype to your mature best friend, everyone wants a friend like Wakka at the end of this journey. Yuna is the last of these three and oh man, if you want to nominate a “greatest video game heroine” she is without a shadow of a doubt number one. The daughter of the last summoner to defeat Sin (the games primary antagonist and world ending massive demon,) the pressure of greatness was put upon her at birth. From dusk till dawn she has trained and trained to become a summoner because of her bloodline, the expectations put on her are massive from the first time you meet her. Yet despite this insane work ethic and seemingly insurmountable pressure, Yuna is still just a normal girl at the end of the day. After conquering her first trial she attempts to bring luggage with her before Wakka reprimands her and says something along the lines of “this isn’t a vacation Yuna” thus forcing her to leave much of her good and trinkets behind. She often cracks silly jokes, laughs, and even oversleeps on her pilgrimage to become the high summoner to a point where you think she’s just “princess from video game who will eventually win because she has to” but you eventually get to her breaking point. There comes a time in FFX where she bares all to Tidus and admits how scared she is, breaking into tears because she knows the end of the journey of the summoner who defeats Sin ends with death. You get a mostly realistic viewpoint of how a girl plucked from her home to save the world would act in a scenario like this: panicked and afraid, yet cognizant of the great responsibility before her.
I’ve touched on it greatly already but the story of FFX (to me) leaves every other Final Fantasy story in the dust. Not only does it involve an impressive journey beginning in Zanarkand and ending in magnificent glory, but the story beats and multi-leveled themes along the way give it an extreme amount of depth. Conversations about racism, religion, depression, and anxiety all are involved and to a great extent. Characters often shift from good to bad, from reasonable to unreasonable, and the situations Tidus and crew are placed in are rarely ones that go in their favor. There are twists galore regarding the fate of each member of the crew guarding Yuna, as well as the villains they face off against. Though on paper or looking at a guide you can imagine how the game just goes from zone to zone, dungeon to dungeon, temple to temple, it’s often the places in between that give the story the most weight. The nights that the crew spends camping out or resting at a travel agency where Tidus or Yuna will sit outside and give a monologue about their journey and the pain and sadness that comes along with it.
FFX is my favorite SINGLE player game ever, and is a fantastic multi-faceted story about a young man and woman on a journey to save the world from an enemy more sinister and impactful than I’ve seen before.
Poppy Playtime
2021
Sad that chapter 1 is pretty much just a demo. I was getting really invested right at the end but i just got blue balled like that but i'm interested to see where this goes.
There does not exist an entity in the entirety of our conceivable universe that deserves happiness less than people who whine about JRPGs.
In every sense of the words, completely and absolutely, cope and seethe. And go back to Reddit while you're at it.
In every sense of the words, completely and absolutely, cope and seethe. And go back to Reddit while you're at it.
Super Metroid
1994
This game really is something special. It's no secret that SNES games have aged beautifully, both graphically and control-wise, but this game manages to be so ahead of its time that it's better than most games that have been released since its launch in 1994.
The presentation of this game manages to be a strength despite its age. Super Metroid environments are diverse and vibrant. It's hard to get bored when there's an entirely new background setting every hour or so. This game also controls beautifully. It has some movement quirks that will hopefully be fixed in dread, but besides that, its controls hold up extremely well, like 90% of the controls for games in the SNES catalog.
This game refuses to let you be bored. It introduces a new game mechanic/power up everywhere you go, which enables you to backtrack and explore optional areas. It blows my mind how perfectly this was incorporated. The last thing I'll touch on is the boss fights. They were consistently great. The last boss fight/final segment of the game is legit peak gaming and extremely ambitious. Couldn't believe I was playing a 28-year-old game at that final segment. Fingers crossed Dread is anywhere near as good as this near-masterpiece.
The presentation of this game manages to be a strength despite its age. Super Metroid environments are diverse and vibrant. It's hard to get bored when there's an entirely new background setting every hour or so. This game also controls beautifully. It has some movement quirks that will hopefully be fixed in dread, but besides that, its controls hold up extremely well, like 90% of the controls for games in the SNES catalog.
This game refuses to let you be bored. It introduces a new game mechanic/power up everywhere you go, which enables you to backtrack and explore optional areas. It blows my mind how perfectly this was incorporated. The last thing I'll touch on is the boss fights. They were consistently great. The last boss fight/final segment of the game is legit peak gaming and extremely ambitious. Couldn't believe I was playing a 28-year-old game at that final segment. Fingers crossed Dread is anywhere near as good as this near-masterpiece.
For whatever reason, despite going in knowing that this one isn’t the most praised Final Fantasy game, I knew that I had to beat it. This is by far the most interesting Final Fantasy game to me.
For cons, the story is confusing and strange at times and contains a combat system that I got the hang of like 18 hours in, which can prove problematic. And while it actually became kind of fun after a while, I can’t ignore how unwelcoming this can be for someone who just wants to experience the game.
But for the pros, this world was incredibly fascinating for me to explore. The art design's contemporary esthetic is just so appealing that I found myself getting sucked in by the atmosphere. The characters are a lot better than people give them credit for, with many of them being greatly enjoyable to spend time with. My favorite one obviously being Laguna, who deserves the world and more.
And the music is honestly so fantastic that I could never do it justice.
If the FF7 Remake ever comes to completion, this game would be a godsend if remade, with voice acting and a restructured story, it would be so good man.
For cons, the story is confusing and strange at times and contains a combat system that I got the hang of like 18 hours in, which can prove problematic. And while it actually became kind of fun after a while, I can’t ignore how unwelcoming this can be for someone who just wants to experience the game.
But for the pros, this world was incredibly fascinating for me to explore. The art design's contemporary esthetic is just so appealing that I found myself getting sucked in by the atmosphere. The characters are a lot better than people give them credit for, with many of them being greatly enjoyable to spend time with. My favorite one obviously being Laguna, who deserves the world and more.
And the music is honestly so fantastic that I could never do it justice.
If the FF7 Remake ever comes to completion, this game would be a godsend if remade, with voice acting and a restructured story, it would be so good man.
Persona 5 Royal
2019
Upon beating the original version of this game, I gave it a strong 9/10 because it slipped up in a few ways in my eyes. But upon beating this version, I can safely say that this version fixes almost every single issue that I originally had.
The music is the best in the series, the art style is fantastic, the menus are cooler than I’ll ever be, the story is engaging, and the characters are even better than I thought they were.
Mementos is better, the restrictions are toned down significantly, and I was able to achieve way more with my time than I ever did in the base version.
Truly unforgettable, undoubtedly a masterpiece.
The music is the best in the series, the art style is fantastic, the menus are cooler than I’ll ever be, the story is engaging, and the characters are even better than I thought they were.
Mementos is better, the restrictions are toned down significantly, and I was able to achieve way more with my time than I ever did in the base version.
Truly unforgettable, undoubtedly a masterpiece.
Persona 4 Golden
2012
After playing Persona 5 Royal and Persona 4 Golden back to back, I came to the conclusion that I prefer Persona 4 Golden. Why is this? Well I'll explain.
Story
This is my favourite story of all time, why is this? Character writing. Each character in this game is fully developed in their own way, most characters to me have relatable struggles of identity and finding themselves. This makes the game more personal to me since the characters are so grounded, easy to empathise with and easy to relate to. Even freaking Teddie has an incredible arc of realising that it doesn’t matter what you are or how you were born, it’s how you can change and creating meaning for yourself. Even the villain feels relatable in a sense since he's a lesson on what happens if you live without actually living, end up being alone, and blame the world and people around you for your problems.
The games’ theme of truth also is relatable, sometimes it's easier to live a peaceful lie rather than accept the truth of reality. In a sense, a world full of shadows would be peaceful, where no-one thinks for themselves, believing what they want to believe, living in ignorance to the world around them. Ignoring your problems, running away from yourself, thinking everything is fine when it's not. But facing the truth shows strength of character, in a way it's a precursor to the third semester in Persona 5 Royal, it's an interesting idea the game plays with.
The game also has a lot of levity, it's the funniest game out of modern Persona trilogy due to how well the group dynamics are written, the voice acting and the weird scenarios. The game has a lot of funny moments, the most in the series, but this is balanced out because this game can have very dark, twisted scenes sometimes like confronting the true culprit for the first time and seeing how his twisted mind sees things or December 3rd. I do admit the darker aspects aren't as common though, but they hit harder due to their scarcity and the highs the game has. I wouldn't go as far to say it's "darker than Persona 3" but the dark moments felt darker for me than Persona 3 or 5 if that makes sense.
Another thing I like about the story is how dense it feels. I’ll explain, with Persona 3, the main story is basically about the mystery of Tarturus, at least for the first half. This is fine, but it sometimes makes the story feel a little sparse. With Persona 5, it’s about the short term villain arcs and the mystery of mementos. Persona 5 feels quite dense too, Persona 4 has the mystery of the TV world, the murder mystery aspect and the short term character arcs in the story when you go to rescue them. There are a lot of initial “hooks” in the story which keep you engaged and wanting to see more, this to me shows structurally the story is great.
We cannot forget about the social links though, these are basically side stories to the main story. These social links allow you to further explore a party members inner struggles and helps you even overcome them. Like helping Kanji to be more honest about his hobbies and not caring what others think or helping Rise realise her “Idol self” was never fake and was always a part of her, or helping Yosuke face the reality of Sakis death. These party member social links are so well written, they are the best in the series, Persona 5 had some excellent party member social links but some were questionable like Ann’s social link (still was entertaining though). The non party member social links are also consistently good and the best in the series. Some are incredible dark, like helping Saikis brother coping with his sister’s death and the reaction of people around him to that or the Death social link which explores the guilt of Hisano when she wished for her husband to die due to him suffering from dementia and forgetting she even existed. Or Nanako and Dojimas social link which explores what “family” is and exploring how isolation hurts yourself and the people you care about. The social links are so good, there are two forgettable ones like Eri’s and Shu’s, however even these have some heartfelt moments at times and aren’t bad at all. So yeah, this has my favourite social links in the series.
Presentation
Lets start with the graphics. This is a PS2 game plain and simple, but, I think it’s aged incredibly well. Character models are clean and simple, the character designs are so iconic so that helps too. Environments look simplistic and slightly low resolution, especially in more rural areas of Inaba, but it has this charm to it.
The music… It’s literally Persona, of course the music is incredibly good. Amazing battle theme, amazing overworld music, amazing music all around. Maybe the opening isn’t my favourite but that’s about it. I love the J-Pop vibe the soundtrack has, it fits the game due to it prominently featuring media and Rise existing.
Gameplay
I love the gameplay a ton. The Persona formula is so excellent. The time management aspect is so fun for me since it’s actually quite strategic, loads of little decisions are always made like if I should see a certain social link today, or level up my social stats, among other decisions which can affect how efficient you are with your time.
What about dungeon gameplay? Since it’s divided into two halfs, the dungeon and social sim aspect, it provides a good balance. Is battling and dungeon exploration fun? Yes. Basically, dungeons consist of randomly generated paths you go through, it’s simple, kinda lazy, and nowhere near as engaging as handmade dungeons like Persona 5’s. But it gets the job done, floors don’t feel tedious to explore like Tarturus since there are less floors than Tarturus (but floors are bigger though), and you can fast travel to the stairs once you find the stairs which you cant in Tarturus. It would be nice to have handmade dungeons but this certainly isn’t bad.
What about the battling though? I love the battling in this game. The game feels very balanced with enemy encounters, each encounter is mostly fair, and can be beaten with any number of strategies. Going for all out attacks feels satisfying, I love the reliance on follow up attacks since you can make educated guesses on when they’ll usually appear and plan around that, abusing status ailments (especially dizzy) is sometimes necessary, it’s not always about all out attacks, sometimes it’s better to not go for an all out attack. The game on very hard mode is indeed very hard throughout the entire game, this difficulty makes battling fun since it makes me feel like each decision matters. If a game is too easy then it makes me feel like decisions don’t matter in the end. This is one problem I had with Persona 5 because in the second half it gets way too easy. So due to this, despite having less mechanics than Persona 5, Persona 4 feels more balanced so I actually prefer the gameplay of Persona 4 which is probably strange. I will say though, sometimes enemies can be bullshit, like one time I literally did an enemy encounter, and it used Megidola, wiping out my entire party before I could even act. This is rare though, on very hard mode you are underlevelled most of the time, but due to how good the combat is, most enemy encounters are still beatable if you play carefully.
However, I actually haven’t spoken about bosses yet. On hard mode and below, bosses feel mostly fair and balanced, besides one stupid ass baby boss you must deal with. But on very hard mode, grinding is basically required, especially Ameno Sagiri which had me grinding for hours. So for bosses, I’d recommend turning the difficulty down since no matter how much strategy you use, if it can wipe out your entire party in one strike, it doesn’t matter in the end. Bosses aren’t fun to fight anyways, and feel mostly very bullet spongey and rely on basic strategies like “Guard when it uses a super move”. Bosses are definitely a weaker aspect of the game, although they aren’t bad. Persona 5 Royal has better boss fights yet the enemy encounters are too easy, these take up most of the game so I’d rather have engaging enemy encounters over engaging boss fights personally.
Final thoughts
Overall, I have to say, I think this game is my favourite game ever made. I was able to do two playthroughs back to back to collect all the achievements, and never ONCE felt burnout, I was able to do the same somewhat with Persona 5, but due to how easy that game is and some weaker arcs like Okumura’s arc, I think it’s clear to me Persona 4 Golden is slightly better than Persona 5 Royal but not by much. Thank you for reading my rambling if you made it this far bruh lmao
Story
This is my favourite story of all time, why is this? Character writing. Each character in this game is fully developed in their own way, most characters to me have relatable struggles of identity and finding themselves. This makes the game more personal to me since the characters are so grounded, easy to empathise with and easy to relate to. Even freaking Teddie has an incredible arc of realising that it doesn’t matter what you are or how you were born, it’s how you can change and creating meaning for yourself. Even the villain feels relatable in a sense since he's a lesson on what happens if you live without actually living, end up being alone, and blame the world and people around you for your problems.
The games’ theme of truth also is relatable, sometimes it's easier to live a peaceful lie rather than accept the truth of reality. In a sense, a world full of shadows would be peaceful, where no-one thinks for themselves, believing what they want to believe, living in ignorance to the world around them. Ignoring your problems, running away from yourself, thinking everything is fine when it's not. But facing the truth shows strength of character, in a way it's a precursor to the third semester in Persona 5 Royal, it's an interesting idea the game plays with.
The game also has a lot of levity, it's the funniest game out of modern Persona trilogy due to how well the group dynamics are written, the voice acting and the weird scenarios. The game has a lot of funny moments, the most in the series, but this is balanced out because this game can have very dark, twisted scenes sometimes like confronting the true culprit for the first time and seeing how his twisted mind sees things or December 3rd. I do admit the darker aspects aren't as common though, but they hit harder due to their scarcity and the highs the game has. I wouldn't go as far to say it's "darker than Persona 3" but the dark moments felt darker for me than Persona 3 or 5 if that makes sense.
Another thing I like about the story is how dense it feels. I’ll explain, with Persona 3, the main story is basically about the mystery of Tarturus, at least for the first half. This is fine, but it sometimes makes the story feel a little sparse. With Persona 5, it’s about the short term villain arcs and the mystery of mementos. Persona 5 feels quite dense too, Persona 4 has the mystery of the TV world, the murder mystery aspect and the short term character arcs in the story when you go to rescue them. There are a lot of initial “hooks” in the story which keep you engaged and wanting to see more, this to me shows structurally the story is great.
We cannot forget about the social links though, these are basically side stories to the main story. These social links allow you to further explore a party members inner struggles and helps you even overcome them. Like helping Kanji to be more honest about his hobbies and not caring what others think or helping Rise realise her “Idol self” was never fake and was always a part of her, or helping Yosuke face the reality of Sakis death. These party member social links are so well written, they are the best in the series, Persona 5 had some excellent party member social links but some were questionable like Ann’s social link (still was entertaining though). The non party member social links are also consistently good and the best in the series. Some are incredible dark, like helping Saikis brother coping with his sister’s death and the reaction of people around him to that or the Death social link which explores the guilt of Hisano when she wished for her husband to die due to him suffering from dementia and forgetting she even existed. Or Nanako and Dojimas social link which explores what “family” is and exploring how isolation hurts yourself and the people you care about. The social links are so good, there are two forgettable ones like Eri’s and Shu’s, however even these have some heartfelt moments at times and aren’t bad at all. So yeah, this has my favourite social links in the series.
Presentation
Lets start with the graphics. This is a PS2 game plain and simple, but, I think it’s aged incredibly well. Character models are clean and simple, the character designs are so iconic so that helps too. Environments look simplistic and slightly low resolution, especially in more rural areas of Inaba, but it has this charm to it.
The music… It’s literally Persona, of course the music is incredibly good. Amazing battle theme, amazing overworld music, amazing music all around. Maybe the opening isn’t my favourite but that’s about it. I love the J-Pop vibe the soundtrack has, it fits the game due to it prominently featuring media and Rise existing.
Gameplay
I love the gameplay a ton. The Persona formula is so excellent. The time management aspect is so fun for me since it’s actually quite strategic, loads of little decisions are always made like if I should see a certain social link today, or level up my social stats, among other decisions which can affect how efficient you are with your time.
What about dungeon gameplay? Since it’s divided into two halfs, the dungeon and social sim aspect, it provides a good balance. Is battling and dungeon exploration fun? Yes. Basically, dungeons consist of randomly generated paths you go through, it’s simple, kinda lazy, and nowhere near as engaging as handmade dungeons like Persona 5’s. But it gets the job done, floors don’t feel tedious to explore like Tarturus since there are less floors than Tarturus (but floors are bigger though), and you can fast travel to the stairs once you find the stairs which you cant in Tarturus. It would be nice to have handmade dungeons but this certainly isn’t bad.
What about the battling though? I love the battling in this game. The game feels very balanced with enemy encounters, each encounter is mostly fair, and can be beaten with any number of strategies. Going for all out attacks feels satisfying, I love the reliance on follow up attacks since you can make educated guesses on when they’ll usually appear and plan around that, abusing status ailments (especially dizzy) is sometimes necessary, it’s not always about all out attacks, sometimes it’s better to not go for an all out attack. The game on very hard mode is indeed very hard throughout the entire game, this difficulty makes battling fun since it makes me feel like each decision matters. If a game is too easy then it makes me feel like decisions don’t matter in the end. This is one problem I had with Persona 5 because in the second half it gets way too easy. So due to this, despite having less mechanics than Persona 5, Persona 4 feels more balanced so I actually prefer the gameplay of Persona 4 which is probably strange. I will say though, sometimes enemies can be bullshit, like one time I literally did an enemy encounter, and it used Megidola, wiping out my entire party before I could even act. This is rare though, on very hard mode you are underlevelled most of the time, but due to how good the combat is, most enemy encounters are still beatable if you play carefully.
However, I actually haven’t spoken about bosses yet. On hard mode and below, bosses feel mostly fair and balanced, besides one stupid ass baby boss you must deal with. But on very hard mode, grinding is basically required, especially Ameno Sagiri which had me grinding for hours. So for bosses, I’d recommend turning the difficulty down since no matter how much strategy you use, if it can wipe out your entire party in one strike, it doesn’t matter in the end. Bosses aren’t fun to fight anyways, and feel mostly very bullet spongey and rely on basic strategies like “Guard when it uses a super move”. Bosses are definitely a weaker aspect of the game, although they aren’t bad. Persona 5 Royal has better boss fights yet the enemy encounters are too easy, these take up most of the game so I’d rather have engaging enemy encounters over engaging boss fights personally.
Final thoughts
Overall, I have to say, I think this game is my favourite game ever made. I was able to do two playthroughs back to back to collect all the achievements, and never ONCE felt burnout, I was able to do the same somewhat with Persona 5, but due to how easy that game is and some weaker arcs like Okumura’s arc, I think it’s clear to me Persona 4 Golden is slightly better than Persona 5 Royal but not by much. Thank you for reading my rambling if you made it this far bruh lmao
I don't normally rate sports games this high but Mario Golf Super Rush sticks out as an outlier in the genre. As someone who plays Golf irl multiple times a week and has played multiple PGA video games, I can definitely say Mario Golf is surprisingly one of the better simulation golf experiences that exist. Speed golf and Battle mode bring variety to those who don't want to stick to the traditional turn-based game of golf and they are both really well-done modes. Speed golf with irls is some of the most fun I've had in any online Nintendo game. The courses are also extremely well polished and the character selection is fantastic, with each character having their own unique "move set" for speed golf. Extremely happy Nintendo delivered with this game.
PS: If you don't like golf and still bought this game just to inevitably dislike it and complain you're a loser
PPS: If you like Mario Golf 3DS but don't like this game you are bias and a liar because this game is objectively better in every way
PS: If you don't like golf and still bought this game just to inevitably dislike it and complain you're a loser
PPS: If you like Mario Golf 3DS but don't like this game you are bias and a liar because this game is objectively better in every way
Persona 5
2016
Rad as hell. I've heard that the enhanced version is better than this one, but I wanted to see if this version held up on its own. Since this is the game that got Joker in Smash, launched the series into the sudo-mainstream and got its own GOT nomination.
But yeah, really, really good. Some lackluster elements, and some twists are fairly obvious upon analysis, but it was so stylish and cool that it makes you overlook those things.
Also Makoto is best girl...
But yeah, really, really good. Some lackluster elements, and some twists are fairly obvious upon analysis, but it was so stylish and cool that it makes you overlook those things.
Also Makoto is best girl...
Persona 5 Royal
2019
This review contains spoilers
What isn't there to say about this game that already hasn't been said? It's a masterpiece, an almost flawless piece of fiction.
Story
The story is pretty spectacular from start to finish, it starts off with one of the best arcs in the game with Kamoshida. The starting characters of Ryujji, Ann and Morgona get you immediately invested in the story. These characters feel real in their motivations and goals, and feel very distinct and unique in their personalities. The same is true for the rest of the cast, each character is really well written. Some characters dont shine as well in the main story like Haru due to lack of screentime and importance in the story besides one arc, but this is where the social links come in to flesh out the characters. So either way, each cast member gets the attention they deserve.
The villains are pretty good, most aren't the deepest characters in the world but they get the job done. I was a little dissapointed by Shido though, he felt a tad forgettable, however this is only a minor flaw. The third semester villain trumps all of the villains for me due to his complex motivations and ideology, it's great because he's not a bad person, he just has a different perspective to the thieves. This makes him very sympathetic in the game, definitely one of my favourite villains in fiction.
There is only a couple of sore spots in the story for me, like the dreaded Morgona arc where he leaves because he thinks he is useless. This felt very contrived to me and forced since it's extremely clear from start to finish he isn't useless, and his reasoning for feeling useless is frankly idiotic, and Morgona gets overly angry in a short time span too, it went from 0 to 100 way too quickly. Ryujjis treatment of him didn't help for me either. The only other sore spots in the story is Shido as the big bad and some very minor scenes that feel very off to me, like the scene where they leave Shidos palace and everyone thinks Ryuji is dead, and they play it off as a weird gag right after. These weird tone shifts are rare though and thats the only occasion where it's really a problem.
Presentation
The music... 10/10. You don't need a review on the music. It's spectacular, one of the best soundtracks in gaming. The graphics? Despite being based off a PS3 game, it's still a looker. The art style is clean, quite a lot of detail but still very "anime". The animated cutscenes can sometimes look a little "cheap"? However the in game cutscenes look amazing, like when Ann almost kills Kamoshida. Shit is excellent looking.
Gameplay
Like the previous two Persona games, the gameplay is split into dungeon crawling and daily life gameplay. Daily life gameplay involves you spending time with your friends by levelling up their social link rank, this is the most important thing. All the other social gameplay revolves around this, like social stats like "Knowledge" or "Guts". That's important since social links can have barriers to entry if lets say your "Guts" wasn't high enough. You can level up social stats by doing various activities of your choosing So the daily life gameplay involves managing your time so you can max out as many social links as possible. There is a lot of strategy in spending your time, if you are good enough (and abuse Chihaya's ability enough) you can max out everyone. The social gameplay is really well done too since doing these links effect dungeon gameplay, like making you gain more EXP when fusing Personas of the same arcana, or confidant abilities that give you more options. However, I wish these abilities were optional in some cases when you get them, I will explain why later.
Dungeon gameplay is the other half. This involves exploring palaces and Mementos with shadows dotted around the place. Palaces are awesome, unlike previous Persona games, they are properly designed areas with puzzles, exploration and layouts. All of the palaces are well designed layout wise and puzzle wise mostly, there are some annoying puzzles like the air lock puzzles but these are inoffensive. There are also will seeds which are collectables that when you gather three of them, you get a very useful accessory. Adds a bigger reason to explore palaces more so I appreciate that. They also restore your SP, I don't like this because it makes SP management a bit too easy, luckily, I collect will seeds on the day of infiltration so it's not an issue for me. Mementos is like the previous games with randomly geneated floor layouts, this was terrible in vanilla Persona 5, but thanks to the stamps collecting and new music it's way better. Battling is amazing turn based combat. Striking weaknesses is very important just like the other Persona games for a "One more", but you also have technicals and baton pass which add another layer to gameplay. However, recently I've been feeling mixed on baton passing. For boss fights, I love baton passes because they allow for a lot of strategy within the boss fights, and bosses are hard and challenging, they feel well designed around baton pass. However, for enemy encounters, I don't think I like them. Because to me, it feels a bit too easy to knock down all the enemies with baton passing, it's a bit too versatile and makes enemy encounters feel too linear? With baton passing, you can make it so enemies barely get the chance to act, especially if you ambush them. I would call this is a criticism, but I can do something called "Just dont use baton pass lol", so really, it's nice it's an option for people who do like it. So yeah, the battle system is amazing, the best turn based combat ever. However, there is one fatal flaw with this game, perhaps the biggest in this game that holds back the battling for me.
The biggest flaw of this game
Whats this big flaw? Well, you may have noticed that I have restricted myself in a lot of ways in this playthrough in an attempt to make it harder. Like not collecting will seeds, not using baton pass, and I even don't use SP items too. I don't see these as flaws since I can easily just not use them and players who want to use them can do so. However, remember the confidant abilities? Well I want to max them all out because it gives purpose to the social gameplay, most confidant abilities are well balanced. However, there is one I do not like. Mishima's. When levelled up, Mishima gives the ability to increase XP you earn by a lot. Why is this an issue though? Less grinding right? Well true, but what if you like the battle system though? Mishima's social link maxed out makes it so only a couple of battles can make enemies a joke around you. Thus this makes battling repetitive and linear since enemies are no longer a threat, you don't have to be strategic as much, this with Ryujjis insta kill ability makes it so you can automatically get XP without even battling. For some people, they love this, it makes it so they do less battling and want to finish the palace quicker and get to the story. But for me, who wants to battle more, for me who wants to manage SP management and resources more often, Mishima removes that. This is why I feel confidant abilities should be toggleable. Despite this, I still really love the gameplay, in future playthroughs I will avoid doing Mishima's social link since before I didn't know he could negatively impact the playthrough this much.
Royal additions
Since this is basically a definitive edition over the original Persona 5, would I say the new additions are worth it? Yes. 1000%. There are so many good additions, it changes palace layouts, adds will seeds, adds technicals and changes up boss fights in the gameplay department. I love these additions, it makes the gameplay so much better over vanilla, it's like an improved remix. Story wise this has added a lot too. Kasumi is an excellent addition to the game, her struggle for identity and moving on from the past really hits hard. Her social link is one of the best in the game. The villain as I said is amazing for so many reasons. And then there is Akechi... To be frank, he SUCKED in vanilla. Here, they really fleshed him out as a person both in the base game with his brand new social link and his use in the third semester. Akechi is incredible in this game, certainly one of the best characters in this game.
Conclusion
Despite the difficulty complaint and some minor complaints, this is indeed perhaps my favourite game of all time. After this, I am planning to replay Persona 4 Golden too, this is to decide which game takes hold as my top 1 game. This has already shot past Danganronpa V3 and retook it's place as my top 1, now it's up to P4G on whether it can surpass this game or not. Overall, Atlus, you have created one of the best pieces of fiction in existence, I applaud you.
10/10
Story
The story is pretty spectacular from start to finish, it starts off with one of the best arcs in the game with Kamoshida. The starting characters of Ryujji, Ann and Morgona get you immediately invested in the story. These characters feel real in their motivations and goals, and feel very distinct and unique in their personalities. The same is true for the rest of the cast, each character is really well written. Some characters dont shine as well in the main story like Haru due to lack of screentime and importance in the story besides one arc, but this is where the social links come in to flesh out the characters. So either way, each cast member gets the attention they deserve.
The villains are pretty good, most aren't the deepest characters in the world but they get the job done. I was a little dissapointed by Shido though, he felt a tad forgettable, however this is only a minor flaw. The third semester villain trumps all of the villains for me due to his complex motivations and ideology, it's great because he's not a bad person, he just has a different perspective to the thieves. This makes him very sympathetic in the game, definitely one of my favourite villains in fiction.
There is only a couple of sore spots in the story for me, like the dreaded Morgona arc where he leaves because he thinks he is useless. This felt very contrived to me and forced since it's extremely clear from start to finish he isn't useless, and his reasoning for feeling useless is frankly idiotic, and Morgona gets overly angry in a short time span too, it went from 0 to 100 way too quickly. Ryujjis treatment of him didn't help for me either. The only other sore spots in the story is Shido as the big bad and some very minor scenes that feel very off to me, like the scene where they leave Shidos palace and everyone thinks Ryuji is dead, and they play it off as a weird gag right after. These weird tone shifts are rare though and thats the only occasion where it's really a problem.
Presentation
The music... 10/10. You don't need a review on the music. It's spectacular, one of the best soundtracks in gaming. The graphics? Despite being based off a PS3 game, it's still a looker. The art style is clean, quite a lot of detail but still very "anime". The animated cutscenes can sometimes look a little "cheap"? However the in game cutscenes look amazing, like when Ann almost kills Kamoshida. Shit is excellent looking.
Gameplay
Like the previous two Persona games, the gameplay is split into dungeon crawling and daily life gameplay. Daily life gameplay involves you spending time with your friends by levelling up their social link rank, this is the most important thing. All the other social gameplay revolves around this, like social stats like "Knowledge" or "Guts". That's important since social links can have barriers to entry if lets say your "Guts" wasn't high enough. You can level up social stats by doing various activities of your choosing So the daily life gameplay involves managing your time so you can max out as many social links as possible. There is a lot of strategy in spending your time, if you are good enough (and abuse Chihaya's ability enough) you can max out everyone. The social gameplay is really well done too since doing these links effect dungeon gameplay, like making you gain more EXP when fusing Personas of the same arcana, or confidant abilities that give you more options. However, I wish these abilities were optional in some cases when you get them, I will explain why later.
Dungeon gameplay is the other half. This involves exploring palaces and Mementos with shadows dotted around the place. Palaces are awesome, unlike previous Persona games, they are properly designed areas with puzzles, exploration and layouts. All of the palaces are well designed layout wise and puzzle wise mostly, there are some annoying puzzles like the air lock puzzles but these are inoffensive. There are also will seeds which are collectables that when you gather three of them, you get a very useful accessory. Adds a bigger reason to explore palaces more so I appreciate that. They also restore your SP, I don't like this because it makes SP management a bit too easy, luckily, I collect will seeds on the day of infiltration so it's not an issue for me. Mementos is like the previous games with randomly geneated floor layouts, this was terrible in vanilla Persona 5, but thanks to the stamps collecting and new music it's way better. Battling is amazing turn based combat. Striking weaknesses is very important just like the other Persona games for a "One more", but you also have technicals and baton pass which add another layer to gameplay. However, recently I've been feeling mixed on baton passing. For boss fights, I love baton passes because they allow for a lot of strategy within the boss fights, and bosses are hard and challenging, they feel well designed around baton pass. However, for enemy encounters, I don't think I like them. Because to me, it feels a bit too easy to knock down all the enemies with baton passing, it's a bit too versatile and makes enemy encounters feel too linear? With baton passing, you can make it so enemies barely get the chance to act, especially if you ambush them. I would call this is a criticism, but I can do something called "Just dont use baton pass lol", so really, it's nice it's an option for people who do like it. So yeah, the battle system is amazing, the best turn based combat ever. However, there is one fatal flaw with this game, perhaps the biggest in this game that holds back the battling for me.
The biggest flaw of this game
Whats this big flaw? Well, you may have noticed that I have restricted myself in a lot of ways in this playthrough in an attempt to make it harder. Like not collecting will seeds, not using baton pass, and I even don't use SP items too. I don't see these as flaws since I can easily just not use them and players who want to use them can do so. However, remember the confidant abilities? Well I want to max them all out because it gives purpose to the social gameplay, most confidant abilities are well balanced. However, there is one I do not like. Mishima's. When levelled up, Mishima gives the ability to increase XP you earn by a lot. Why is this an issue though? Less grinding right? Well true, but what if you like the battle system though? Mishima's social link maxed out makes it so only a couple of battles can make enemies a joke around you. Thus this makes battling repetitive and linear since enemies are no longer a threat, you don't have to be strategic as much, this with Ryujjis insta kill ability makes it so you can automatically get XP without even battling. For some people, they love this, it makes it so they do less battling and want to finish the palace quicker and get to the story. But for me, who wants to battle more, for me who wants to manage SP management and resources more often, Mishima removes that. This is why I feel confidant abilities should be toggleable. Despite this, I still really love the gameplay, in future playthroughs I will avoid doing Mishima's social link since before I didn't know he could negatively impact the playthrough this much.
Royal additions
Since this is basically a definitive edition over the original Persona 5, would I say the new additions are worth it? Yes. 1000%. There are so many good additions, it changes palace layouts, adds will seeds, adds technicals and changes up boss fights in the gameplay department. I love these additions, it makes the gameplay so much better over vanilla, it's like an improved remix. Story wise this has added a lot too. Kasumi is an excellent addition to the game, her struggle for identity and moving on from the past really hits hard. Her social link is one of the best in the game. The villain as I said is amazing for so many reasons. And then there is Akechi... To be frank, he SUCKED in vanilla. Here, they really fleshed him out as a person both in the base game with his brand new social link and his use in the third semester. Akechi is incredible in this game, certainly one of the best characters in this game.
Conclusion
Despite the difficulty complaint and some minor complaints, this is indeed perhaps my favourite game of all time. After this, I am planning to replay Persona 4 Golden too, this is to decide which game takes hold as my top 1 game. This has already shot past Danganronpa V3 and retook it's place as my top 1, now it's up to P4G on whether it can surpass this game or not. Overall, Atlus, you have created one of the best pieces of fiction in existence, I applaud you.
10/10
Titanfall 2
2016
Short and sweet experience. This game has fantastic gunplay, movement, and platforming. The level design is top notch. The story overall is decent. It had a really great ending but I won’t go into spoilers. 7.5/10
Fortnite
2017
.