It’s been a while since I played a Yo-Kai Watch game but with my longing for a new entry and all the signs of the series making a comeback I thought I would replay the original. This series will forever be special to me so this review may be slightly biased but I can acknowledge Yo-Kai Watch left a lot to be desired in the initial game. First of all I did play this on the 3ds version because for one the remaster isn’t in English but more importantly I feel the 3ds is where the battle system shines the most but as a consequence I will be having very few compliments about the graphics. I want to start by talking about the story. Yo-Kai Watch story has never been a strong point but to make up for this it has never taken its plot seriously, however compared to future entries and other games this games story just felt super empty. It’s not too long and isn’t the worst thing ever but as an introduction to some characters it’s not very good especially when some backstory and plot points are redone in the sequels and are just straight up so much better there. This plot leaves a lot of things unexplained and honestly not too impressed with it especially since none of the characters really felt as alive as they do in future games. Moving on I want to talk about something I think Yo-Kai Watch is almost unrivaled in and that’s exploration and side content. It feels almost impossible to talk about the story by itself with how much is usually in these side missions and extra areas. The problem is the first installation in the series feels like a beta for this idea. While there is lots of rewards for exploring and some side missions that affect huge parts of the game it’s just isn’t as vast as future entries. There are quite a lot of quests for a monster collecting rpg don’t get me wrong but not enough to feel like I’m not delaying progression. I think the main factor holding the side quests in the game back is the fact that the characters are so dry. It’s hard to feel like Mr. Barton is more than a npc with a name in this game compared to future games. While the exploration in this game is definitely worthy of yo-Kai watch quality, it isn’t the same without the train system or disconnected locations. The battle system though is still very much fun. A system where you don’t need to worry about directly controlling your yo Kai but instead about trying to manage all parts of the fight so your team can do what they do best. While it’s super bear bones in this installment it’s still got the most important parts. I will say the befriending system is a little unfair in this version with little ways to increase befriending odds but it wasn’t too bad. Very few broken items in this game with most of them being locked behind end game shop purchases or passwords. The difficulty of the game isn’t too bad with how easy it is to get shogunyan and how available talismans are (a little harder than I remembered though). The only problem I think the battle system really has is all the creative battles are locked in post game. I love this battle system and am sad yo Kai watch 4 doesn’t have it. It’s very unique and no game I have played has made something similar to it. I think this is a solid game and was a base for future entries in the game. It suffers from being over shadowed by yo Kai watch 2 in every way but has the first piece to the story of the series so feels like it needs to be played first. This game gets a 7/10 for me because yo Kai watch 2 exists but in the genre of monster collecting RPGs I would say 7.5-8/10 but still just play yo Kai watch 2 or 3. Fun to have completed it again and please give yo Kai watch a chance, it didn’t deserve this fate.

So I’m doing a thing where I beat a game a month and this month was Mario RPG Remake and I thought I would do wrote up on each one since why not but since I know some people want to play that game still I’ll mark the rest in spoiler
I did not play the original Mario rpg and honestly it’s been a very long time since I played a Mario rpg (since dream team on 3ds in elementary school) but this definitely reminded me how much I love the franchise. It’s essentially a quirkier and more accessible version of the early final fantasy games and are very fun and full of life something many modern games are missing. It doesn’t try to take itself seriously and as such can make fun jokes about itself. The plot isn’t anything to write home about but I did enjoy the characters including a lot of the new ones. This was a very faithful remake I started to notice as lots of the things appeared to be taken directly from the old game and as such some things were definitely outdated and in talking about the battle system. Now I didn’t really hate or like the battle system but I will says o have never seen such a polarizing battle system like this before. It can go from being the bane of your existence to making you untouchable in a matter of seconds. I can start to see where ideas from future Mario rpgs come from like the badge system and timing your button presses but in this game, quick time events r everything. These r literally the difference between you taking a critical hit versus taking no damage and from doing minimal damage to always citing. Now this is an easier game so the button presses aren’t too extreme except if u don’t know the timing and if u don’t then u will be fumbling your damage output and taking heavy crits all over the place (luckily healing is more than abundant in this game though). It’s very polarizing and makes you constantly have to be involved with turn based combat but hey it’s definitely different and not entirely bad. Also I would like to mention about half way through the game I got an item that literally allowed me to restart fights and was infinite use so difficulty curve is very wild. I enjoyed how it was short but fun and full of hidden secrets my favorite part of games. Another thing about the battle system I didn’t like was shared magic points which I only felt good using on boosts and heals making magical attacks feel kind of wasteful since this points could be used to make my offense and defense better. Overall neat little game, nice change of pace. I give it 8.5/10 overall and honestly just a 9/10 rpg