If you ask people what is the most memorable part of DraQue, many people will say this *5.
It's the one with the strongest message of farewell, encounter and children. It's been 30 years since it was released. This is a game where there is still debate(war?) over the events of the game. (By the way, I'm a Bianca fan.)

As an aside, 5* was the last DQ that Chunsoft had worked on together for a long time, and perhaps the reason why "something has gone missing from DQ" since 6 is because Chunsoft is no longer involved.

i tried this after a friend who i didnt take for liking these types of games sung its praises, and man just from the first time period its writing is honestly....really really good. understands the internal state of elementary kids really well, of a time when any dumb argument could feel like a massive rift, when nothing gestures could be imbued with love that you couldnt really understand yourself at the time, the sensations of having a childhood crush and navigating the personalities of other children. it allows you to re-enter that space through how you interpret your dialogue choices and its so effective. theres a part where you go to a bbq and it actually overwhelmed me, reminding of an instance of where i wanted to feel safe with one of my parents out of some sense of sensory overload that i dont recall the cause of. could be something like that for you in this.

its fluff yeah but incredibly nostalgic and emotionally acute fluff. im not done with this, im waiting until its all out before i keep going, but its been impressive so far and im hoping it keeps up for the rest of it.

Psychonauts 2:

Developing videogames takes much more effort, time and resources than it ever did; keeping up with modern graphics, sound design, established trends and alike is getting harder and harder for a lot of smaller scale studios. This is why we have a lot of indies nowadays, breaking those traditions AAA games are setting each year with their ultra realistic graphics, trying to be their own thing. Another thing is that we see much less AA games nowadays because back then AA games were pretty
much alternative games to AAA titles, having less budgets and less people working on them but with similar aim and mostly with more creative freedom. Psychonauts 2 was one of those AA games that spent whole lot time in the oven because of the rapid growing industry and after countless doublefine updates, varying release dates , the Microsoft acquisition; I can safely say the wait was worth it for this AAA game.

As a fan of the first Psychonauts, I have to say I both had a lot of hopes and worries for this game, the potential for a game about exploring people's minds is massive and if we're talking about the presentation just wow... This game is beautiful, from the animations to the surreal visuals to the UI everything is delightful. The world Psychonauts 2 takes place in is believable and highly immersive with a lot of details like the various interactions you can participate in with your abilities and just talking with people in general. It's easy to get lost in it's world and do a bunch of side activities in the packed hubworld and suffice to say I loved exploring, platforming all over the place in it's quirky and sometimes surreal hubworld and various minds thanks to incredible presentation and great level design.

The biggest thing I and other people were looking forward to were easily the minds / levels of the game. The various and distinct themes, gameplay mechanics and visuals they can pull of with a more modern Psychonauts game was straight up hype and I'd have loved to say I adore it but I think I kinda feel mixed on it, well not entirely. Okay let me preface it like this: The original Psychonauts had clunky platforming mechanics and so this led the team to change the gameplay a lot with each mind, you had your fully action based mind Lungfishopolis, puzzle based mind Milkman's Conspiracy, exploration based mind Waterloo, platforming based mind Milla's Party and even bosses were like this. In Psychonauts 2 however since we have a much better feeling gameplay on our hands most minds are just a mix of puzzle/platforming/action and some exploration rather than being their own thing gameplay wise and so this led to mind's proggression feeling samey and made them less distinct,(I won't refer to minds with their name to avoid spoilers so it's safe to read the whole review) in one mind you need to get 4 coins so you play 4 level gauntlets, in one mind you need to get 3 seeds so you play 3 level gauntlets, in one mind you need to get 2 books so you play 2 level gauntlets and so on. Of course it isn't all like this for example the seeds one has more exploration, each one offers new mechanics and they have their own visuals and presentation so that's why I have to say I still like them a lot but the minds in the original felt more distinct both in a good and in a bad way, it felt like they played it safe here to avoid pacing issues and I am not the biggest fan of that but it's a thing I can get behind since these minds still offered a lot of narrative/mechanical things not many 3D platformers or games of this scale offer these days.

If there was one thing Psychonauts 2 surprised me with, it would be the game's story. It's about the Psychic Six and the origin of Psychonauts so we learn about how they've formed the Psychonauts, what they've dealt with and such, it's also about Raz and him getting new friends, the story is engaging with a really fun cast of characters from Raz's family to his new Intern friends to Psychic Six. The story provides a lot of twists and turns that I mostly didn't expect and adored for what they were. This game felt personal in many ways with a lot of emotinal beats while maintaining it's quirky nature, I have to say though I might prefer the writing in the original, it's still great here however. It also has themes of memory implanting, killing the past and identity disorder just saying ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°).

Although I wished levels felt more distinct gameplay wise Psychonauts 2 is still an amazing journey from creative level design, game mechanics to the incredible presentation and charm to the surprising and engaging narrative, I loved every bit of this journey and I don't think I'll forget this game anytime soon. I highly recommend checking out both Psychonauts games they're some of the most unique takes on 3D platformers that are inspiring and just very enjoyable in general.