Despite its richly detailed environment, great soundtrack, and super fun gameplay, the game's story and characters still left me a little underwhelmed. It's still pretty good, but compared to other aspects of the game which are absolutely fantastic, its issues are pretty glaring. At its core the story is just another friend-become-foe tale with frustrating characters that never seemed to learn their mistakes, leading to predictable outcomes. Along with this the story missions become repetitive because there's only so many variations of gunfights imaginable before it becomes tired really quickly. The gameplay remains entertaining despite its repetitiveness however so it didn't bother me too much. There's also a chapter in the main story that felt a bit jarring compared to the rest but at the same time features one of my favourite gameplay sections so it's not really an issue. Despite all of this, the story near the end did add a surprising level of depth to the main character which ended with an emotional climax. And even though the epilogue felt a bit out of place (and its presence felt like it was just for pure fanservice), I was so invested in the story and characters that I was still engaged throughout, not to mention it has a satisfying conclusion.