It’s no secret to anyone who knows me that story is what I value most in a game, and ever since I started getting into JRPGs, Xenogears has been one of the ones that caught my attention the most. This interest only intensified after one of my friends finished it. I always heard that it was a game with an excellent narrative but severely hindered by development issues, mostly related to budget and time, and… yeah, it was true. Everything related to Xenogears’ gameplay seems poorly planned in some way, starting with the human combat, which initially seems interesting, working quite differently from the rest of the genre. Here, instead of defined turns for each participant with one action possible per turn, we have a combo system. Each character has a certain amount of Attack Points (AP) per turn, starting at 3 and ending at 7 as the characters level up, and three types of attacks: weak, medium, and strong, each requiring 1, 2, and 3 AP respectively. It’s possible to keep attacking as long as there’s AP left, and different attack combinations unlock special end-of-turn moves called Deathblows, which act as specials and deal significantly more damage. Thus, you are encouraged to always vary the combos you perform to discover new Deathblows, and of course, the combinations only increase and become more complex as more AP is gained. But quickly, the novelty of this system wears off, and all that remains is repetitive, often unfair, and very, very, VERY slow combat. Slow to the point that playing with the emulator's turbo activated feels like the normal speed the combat should happen at. Learning Deathblows requires the combinations to be repeated numerous times, resulting in the player spamming the same sequences dozens of times in a row, which obviously becomes boring quickly. As usual for games of the genre, we also have magic or skills, but all except for the healing ones are extremely useless. I can count on my fingers the times it seemed advantageous to spend a turn using them instead of just attacking normally. There’s practically no challenge; most bosses consist of just healing while building up a bar that allows you to use a sequence of consecutive Deathblows to deal massive damage at once and defeat them easily. Money is also abundant for the first 80% of the game, so having the best equipment and infinite healing items is very easy, contributing to making everything even more tedious. On the other hand, we have the combat in mechas or Gears, which visually is incredible. The attack animations are extremely well done (this also applies to the human combat), the Gear models are very well crafted, and the HUD that resembles a real command screen is quite cool, but it suffers from as many problems as the previous combat. The main issue is the fuel meter; each Gear has a limited amount that changes depending on the equipped engine (engine, frame, and armor are the three parts that can be upgraded in a Gear). Each attack or skill consumes a certain amount of fuel, and if it runs out, you can basically say goodbye to that attempt and reload the save, as until the end of the game, the only way to recover fuel is by selecting the option in the battle menu, which spends a turn and recovers ~50 each time, which is a negligible amount. To give you an idea, the engine with the least amount of fuel has 1000. Yes, recovering 50/1000 PER TURN. In the first half of the game, it’s quite difficult to run out, but as you unlock more powerful Deathblows (which, consequently, consume more fuel) and when you unlock the action to heal the Gear (which consumes at least 400 fuel), you have to severely limit the actions you take to avoid running out of reserves before halfway through the fight. Some Gear bosses are ridiculously unfair, with attacks that quickly deplete your HP bar, forcing you to heal and consume fuel. Of course, you can break the game if you know which items to equip on which characters, but playing blindly is hellish. And it doesn’t stop there; remember the parts I mentioned above that can be upgraded? So, you upgrade them in shops scattered throughout the game, and the parts are expensive. But as I mentioned in the previous section, money is abundant in the first half, but in the second, prices inflate too much, and it’s practically impossible to have enough money to equip all the Gears with the best equipment without grinding. I can’t stress enough how necessary it is to have the best parts equipped if you want the slightest chance of beating the bosses. And there’s more; it’s a JRPG, so of course, there will be dungeons. As you might have guessed, they are also terrible. Most are straight lines with a few deviations here and there for treasure chests, and the ones that try to be more complex are even worse, becoming extremely confusing, and not in a good way like Megami Tensei, just in an annoying way. And of course, with the encounter rate through the roof. One, in particular, even tries to have platforming sections, PLATFORMING. WITH. ROBOTS. ON. PLAYSTATION 1. It doesn’t take a genius to imagine how poorly this controls and how imprecise it is. To wrap up the gameplay part, the world map is pretty bland; there are no side activities to do until right before entering the last dungeon, and even when they do appear, they are mediocre. It seems more like an excuse to take the player where they need to go rather than a world that's genuinely fun to explore. But at least the interactions and dialogues with NPCs in the cities are very good. Everything exudes inexperience, which is due to the fact that the team was really inexperienced. Most of the developers were new to the market, and the director himself, Tetsuya Takahashi, despite having worked in important positions in some Final Fantasy games, was only 22 at the time, and it was the first project he was directing alone. Understanding this, it’s clear where most of the numerous gameplay flaws came from.

Leaving hell behind and talking about good stuff, more than good actually, the story is exceptional. Almost all the main concepts and characters introduced have perfect arcs and conclusions. The dialogues are masterfully written, and the way everything makes sense in the end is brilliant. “Brilliant” is what you’ll find yourself repeating when trying to find words for this game’s plot. The way the game handles the psychology mainly of the protagonist, but also of other characters, is brilliant, heavily relying on the studies of Freud, Jung, and Lacan. Having at least a basic understanding of these figures’ work is crucial to fully grasp the story. The way the game deals with human relationships on all fronts—love, rivalry, friendship, enmity, selfishness, conflict with others and with oneself—is brilliant. Kaori Tanaka is easily one of the best writers to have worked in the industry. The few criticisms that can be made are related to some party characters who fall into the background for most of the plot after their arcs end and concepts that are quickly forgotten after being introduced, which are relevant to the plot, but nothing truly hinders it. Even hating the gameplay, I never felt like dropping it. The curiosity and desire to see how the narrative unfolds keep anyone playing until the end, and almost all the characters have extremely unique and charismatic personalities. Even in dialogues that don’t add much to the story, you remain interested simply because of who the characters are. Fei, Elly, Krelian, Citan, and Grahf certainly make it into my ranking of best characters of all time. It’s really something you don’t see in any game, even those focused on story. This is on par with the best stories ever told, and maybe, it’s really my favorite.

Graphically, the game is impeccable. It abandons the static backgrounds common in Square’s RPGs of the time and adds fully 3D environments with 2D character sprites, à la Persona 2, resulting in a beautiful visual. The art direction at several moments is breathtaking, and the rare pre-rendered 3D scenes are extremely cool. In combat, instead of the horrible models of Final Fantasy VII and VIII, we also have 2D sprites, which, like the Gears, are extremely well animated and beautiful. The only downside of the environments is that sometimes the camera simply doesn’t have a good angle to stay at, but it doesn’t interfere much.

The soundtrack stands alongside the best of the era. Unfortunately, there are very few songs, so you’ll hear the same tracks over and over again, which quickly becomes boring, but when a new composition appears, it’s another masterpiece.

Now, the elephant in the room... even if you haven’t played it, there’s a chance you’ve heard about the infamous second disc. It was here that the budget and time issues worsened, causing various gameplay sections to be left out and replaced with walls of text narrating what happened. Let’s face it, not having more sections of this wonderful gameplay isn’t a big loss, but it’s still disappointing to have a dungeon narrated to you instead of playing it. The real problem is that even some story parts, which would clearly be cutscenes, receive the same treatment. Unfortunately, chances for a remake of this game are rare, so the magnificent story has to be experienced in a less than ideal state, but it’s what we have.

In the end, despite several stumbles and parts that made me tear my hair out, Xenogears is an experience I will never forget, and I will always cherish it as one of the most engaging and brilliant stories I’ve ever consumed. I’m looking forward to seeing how the spiritual successors continued the legacy that started here. 9/10.

I think the relatively small Arkham Asylum location lent itself better to a more concise Die Hard-inspired narrative, but this story isn't Die Hard anymore, it's finally, truly, BATMAN now! The story and setting are fantastic, and the villain lineup in this game is impeccable, offering so many fun surprises and cameos that my fanboy heart nearly exploded! Catwoman is especially a wonderful addition, if a bit underused for the most part.

I have to say though, the Completionist work might be too damn much in this one. We need to get The Riddler on his meds again.

Senua's Slugfest: Hellbruh II

Man, this was such a let down for me that it's almost hard to put into words. Senua's Sacrifice back in 2017 was one of the neater gaming experiences I've had in recent years, a fantastic dive into the Celtic mythos coupled with a passionate tale of the general scorn and abandonment that those who suffer from mental illness have suffered for a heartbreaking amount of time. Even though it was largely basic in terms of gameplay, I felt like there was enough agency in movement and originality in the story to keep me going. Overall I gave it a four out of five stars, because the scant gameplay couldn't bog down what the message of the game set out to offer.

Senua's Saga however took the concept of the first game and somehow turned it into a numbing tech demo with a runtime almost insulting for the price its offered at. I played this on Game Pass, but saw it was lifted as $50 on retail websites, and even then it's not worth it. It feels like 75% of the gameplay loop of Hellblade II is walking through fantastically designed, yet unfortunately monotonous environments, at snail speed as voices speak into your character's ears. Trot, trot, trot you do with very little in the way of worldbuilding or interesting conversation with your party members. A story is there but its told in such a jolted and lazy fashion that I couldn't be bothered to piece things together. The other quarter of the game is boiled down to brainless puzzles that revolve around pushing the trigger buttons to open up pathways, and then combat that is so incredibly one note and boring that you could very realistically fall asleep while playing. Dodge, attack, dodge attack... ooh an npc runs into the enemy you're fighting and stabs them, but is killed by a NEW enemy... no way? Rinse and repeat that a million times until completion. Everything is boiled down to the same recycled one on one fight, sometimes the enemy has a different appearance, but every single one plays the exact same. I like to believe this was better in the 2017 title but man, I don't have the heart to know.

Hellblade II is a lazy glorified tech demo. It's beautiful and the cutscenes are something special, but you are missing absolutely nothing by skipping this game. For a game that was paraded as a flagship title for Xbox in the current generation, Senua's Saga is quite telling of Microsoft's gaming offering. Starfield, Senua's Saga, Halo Infinite... all have been so impressively garbage that they're being lapped by everyone else when it comes to putting out compelling video games. I'm not sad, I'm just incredibly disappointed. If you want good games in the creepy linear walking sim genre, just play the Plague Tale titles, at least those have something going for them.

Now I face out! I hold out! I reach out to the truth!

Persona 4 Golden is a fantastic entry into the Persona Series. Although the game does not have the most striking story or gameplay, what it does best are definitely its main cast of characters. Coming to this game after P5R, I thought I wasn’t going to like it as much as I did, but here we are, with a 5 star rating. I can’t really put my finger on it but there’s just something that this game does that make me love it so much.

Going to try keep this spoiler less, but I will talk about several characters. Now, first, let’s talk about the story. I think it’s really interesting that the game just starts talking about a marriage scandal straight away and you’re just so confused. Honestly, I thought I missed something when that started, but I guess not. The game slowly develops into a sort of murder mystery where the gang and you have to catch the culprit because the Inaba Police Department are incompetent and you don’t want anymore people dying. Honestly, a lot of the story parts just feel like filler, and some of them just don’t need to happen, but it definitely gives the game personality and allows the characters to develop. As expected from a murder mystery story, the game doesn’t really ramp up until the late game. The game is so formulaic that it starts to get a bit boring, but after Heaven, yeah, that’s where the good shit happens. I will say the culprit reveal did feel underwhelming, but it did make sense. I also enjoyed the final dungeon that occurs on the final day, it really highlights how close the protagonist and his friends have truly gotten. Overall, the story is good, but I wouldn’t expect an extremely stellar one.

Quickly, I want to talk about the setting. There’s just something about Inaba that is oddly nostalgic, and maybe that’s just why I love Inaba so much because it reminds me of where I grew up. I think the setting just also works in favour of the theme of the game, and how people in small towns still need to accept themselves for who they are.

Now, characters. There are just so many good characters. Yosuke, Chie, Yukiko, Kanji, Rise, Naoto, Adachi, Dojima, Nanako, Yumi, Hanako, etc, there’s a lot. Some personalities can get a bit much at times, like Rise’s horniness or Teddie, but other than those instances, I think the cast is great overall. Yosuke is the bro and I just love his character arc. They should’ve made a gay romance option for him. Chie has superb voice acting and has a very endearing social link. Yukiko is my spirit animal, however unfortunately falls under the spell of Priestess Social Link syndrome, but I also find it endearing nevertheless. Kanji is great and really shows the theme of the game. Rise is a double-edged sword, you either hate her because of her horniness, or like her because of her horniness. Joking, Rise has great moments in her social link as well that make her a great character, not to mention, some of her lines are just hilarious. Naoto is the same as Kanji, and probably one of my favourite social links. Adachi is a goof, and Dojima is essentially your second father figure. Nanako is the sweet sunshine child that must be protected because she’s more mature than the entire cast, and Yumi has one of the strongest social links in the entire series in my opinion. This sounds like a rant, but I just fell in love with the characters in this game.

Now the gameplay. The TV world is meh. I don’t love it but I don’t hate it. I hate how RNG dependant fighting the Reaper is though, no more jump-scares screaming ‘I Sense Death!’ I love shuffle time and how much customisation it has, from ranking up persona skills to increasing persona stats, to giving skill cards, to giving increased money or exp, I just love the system. Almost makes me sad that P5R didn’t have something similar. Fusing doesn’t seem all that different besides no extra velvet room functions, but I don’t mind it. I want to talk about the bosses, because I think each of their gimmicks are just really creative, and the bosses overall are just much more difficult than in P5R, even if they aren’t that difficult. They’re just really fun to take on. One thing I hate about the gameplay though is that you cannot do essentially any of the social links in the rain, it really sucks. Overall, good gameplay and very few complaints from me.

Music! IT SLAPS! Time to Make History, Your Affection, Reach Out To The Truth, Heaven, Specialist, Nevermore, Heartbeat Heartbreak are stellar. I also grew quite fond of the opening, Shadow World. Honestly, the songs in this game are bangers.

Overall, a great game, and I just love it so much. The P4 cast will always hold a special place in my heart. Despite having an above-average story, I believe the best part of this game are the characters and the themes that it brings to the table. I highly recommend playing this game, it’s awesome!

With Persona 3 Reload fresh in my mind, two years after beating Persona 3 FES for the first time, I've completed The Answer and the full story of Persona 3.

I heard a lot about The Answer in the two years between beating FES and deliberating playing this game. I heard that the gameplay sucks and that it's all around a bore, but having given it a shot, suffice to say I fucking loved it.

Something I anticipated was the lack of social link stuff and endless grinding, which yes, that was the worst part, but it didn't really detract from the experience? I figured that it would remind me of the first three Persona games more, and it kind of did. There is no down time in this game whatsoever, you're either grinding in a dungeon or watching a cutscene, so it was great.

The story here was totally fucking brilliant. I didn't realize how much I wanted this, but to see how SEES grieves over Makoto ... ugh! Heartbreaking! They all take it in different ways, but the main theme is that they aren't alone!!
Something else is I think it's nice to have this be a proper goodbye to everyone, and the Iwatodai Dorm. Had a lot of feelings watching them all talk about this being their last night in the dorms, having just experienced this in real life college as well, I can empathize, and makes me feel a little nostalgic. This is the last time I'll be playing in these dorms for at least a while, too, so yeah ...

This whole experience made me love Aigis so much more. First time playing FES I thought she was fine, nothing special, and I really warmed up to her in Reload, but she is absolutely incredible in this. Her actress does a phenomenal job!! So do the other performers in this, too, specifically Junpei's and Yukari's voiceover artists.

So much else to say about this that I loved -- the new environments, like the Arena were really nice to look at, the final boss was fucking DOPE AS FUCKING SHITTTTT he was so fucking cool looking!!! Finally understanding what really happened to Makoto was interesting, too, god.

And finally, "the answer" to life, which is friendship -- as totally corny as that answer is, I was getting actually emotional at this revelation while in the game. Seriously was on the verge of crying this game has moved me.

Overall a total banger. I can get past the annoying grindy bullshit because the story in this is incredibly endearing and a wonderful way to tie Persona 3 up in a nice bow. I love it.

truthfully, i finished this game weeks ago, and truthfully i still find myself stunned on what to say.

the final stretch of this game is so absolutely magnificent that so much of my gut wants to rate this a 5/5. the final two chapters, and the post credits scene, are beyond stunning. they encapsulate the story beyond measure, leave me full of love and melancholy and feelings so full i don't know what to do with them.

but my brain knows this is not a 5/5. there are some biiiig flaws to this game that i just can't deny. some, if not most, of the new characters feel a little underdone, their stories rushed or cut off or just not as good as i know they could have been with a longer story. the engine's combat is just not for me, there's only so much ragdolling hilarity before i wish enemies would just sit still whilst i crush them LMAO

some bigger feelings i would have towards this game would realm too into spoilers for this review, but all in all, this and yakuza 5 are, to me, the Ultimate Kiryu Kazuma games. they are so good at dissecting him and showing him to be a man so full of flaws, and a man you just want to be happy. he is so beautiful, and after Y6 i think about him a worrying amount. he used to not be in my top5 yakuza characters and now he's battling it out for number 1. he really did it. i love him. he is the reason my heart screams for this to be 5/5 stars!!! kiryu!!!! !! aaaaaaaaaa!!! !!!! !!!

Persona 3 was one of first video games I played where I felt myself become increasingly emotionally invested in the characters and the world as the game went on; eventually culminating in being the first game that invoked a cascade of tears upon my viewing of the ending. The subject matter was heavy but grounded and relatable, unlike many other JRPGs that strive to pull someone into their worlds only for it to feel a bit too alien and fantastic to have the same effect. As you could expect, Persona 3 has long been a favorite of mine as a result.

It would be very easy for me to put on my blinders and dismiss this remake as having no way of recapturing the feeling that the original invoked and I admittedly spent the first few hours pretty skeptical as I groaned over the new VAs, OST, and the lack of an ability to program your comrades as AIs. Thankfully, the more time I spent with the game the more I began to love it. While the new VAs can't quite stand up to the star-studded original cast, I respect the decision to give some newer talent the spotlight as opposed to sticking with the same industry mainstays we've grown accustomed to. The OST is a bit more of a mixed bag where I enjoy some of the new tracks (such as the fantastic new battle theme) while I'm not a fan of some of the rearranged tracks from the original (looking at you Iwatodai Dorm T.T). Presentation-wise, it looks sleek and stylish as you would expect but not quite as over the top and busy as Persona 5 which I appreciate; though I would recommend turning down the brightness a few notches from the default if you want the appearance of the game to be more in line with the original lighting-wise.

The amount of extra time dedicated to party members outside of Tartarus, specifically the ones without social links, is absolutely my favorite addition to the game as it really encouraged me to grow attached to and learn more about each of the characters who didn't get as much development previously. This really paid off with Aragaki in particular whom I did not feel nearly as invested in on my original P3 playthrough as I did in P3R.

I have some mixed thoughts on the large amount of additional tools/abilities provided in combat as they do result in the game being a tad too easy (I played on 'Hard' for reference) but they were to be expected and are overall pretty fun in execution. I especially enjoyed the new implementation of the Fusion Spell system which is far more intuitive and easy to take advantage of this time around. As alluded to previously, and I understand why a lot of players did not enjoy this, I was a fan of how your companions acted mostly independently in the original as it really made them feel like actual people, rather than merely pawns for the player to control. This really helped personify the characters and made me feel more immersed within the world; I don't believe it was too much of a hinderance either as the tactics menu provided plenty means of controlling them. I'd be lying if I didn't say I miss this system at least a little bit.

It's clear a lot of effort has been put into P3R to ensure that the soul of the original game is left intact while aiming to deliver a more thorough and fleshed out experience, which I can appreciate. Story and character-wise, I would say it certainly surpasses the original. Gameplay-wise, I think they dumbed down the dungeon crawling and combat a little too much but it's definitely more approachable and 'fun' now which I assume was their intention. Atmosphere-wise, it loses some of the lingering dread, uncertainty, and mystery of the original but only a small amount of each. I prefer the original overall but this was still a fantastic game and my time with it absolutely flew by.

PART 1: OK, MAYBE I HATE COMPETITIVE TEAM GAMES

Before I start this review, I want to use this Part to yap for a bit, so if you are not interested in it, just skip to Part 2! Where I’ll actually start talking about my actual experience with the game.

Around 4 years ago, when I quit playing League of Legends I kept seeking another competitive team game that would tick the same boxes for me, but every game I would try one out I would either end up disliking them or not taking them seriously enough to actually consider them my “main game”. Which would result in me dropping them, and moving on to the next shiny thing, but what they all had in common is that I disliked playing with other people, League left this mental scar on me where now I think every random player I meet online is one mistake away, whether it's from me or them, from flaming the fuck out of me. This happened with Paladins, Apex, Overwatch, Dead by Daylight, Hell, it even happened to me in the Versus mode of Left 4 Dead 2, where stakes couldn't possibly be lower.

Eventually, I started gaslighting myself into thinking that all Multiplayer games fucking sucked now, and the constant tryhard mindset was to blame for it. Of course, there are clear exceptions, like Splatoon or competitive games where it's just 1vs1 where I can blame either myself for my mistakes or my opponent for doing something I didn’t know how to play around.

During the same time I stopped playing League, I was getting deep into Final Fantasy XIV, while I have plenty of things to say about it, I’ll save them for whenever I review it in the future. The point is that when I started participating in endgame content, which is for the most part, PVE Focused, I found myself having that same fun I was looking for in multiplayer games that I had been seeking for a long time. The joy of sharing a clear with your team and cheering and being way more patient with each other, went far beyond than just being relieved of having ended a stressful match that was barely won.

This is something I also noticed while playing Souls games, Left 4 Dead 2 co-op campaigns, Phasmophobia or Lethal Company with my friends, and when I recently got into Helldivers 2, I was completely aware of this epiphany by now. Multiplayer games don’t actually suck, competitive team ones do, and it's now a new age for me, where I will use this realization to get into games I’ve never thought were for me, hell, maybe I’ll actually try getting into Monster Hunter despite my initial reluctance towards those series.

Now, let’s have a nice cup of Liber-tea over Helldivers 2.

PART 2: DEMOCRACY MANIFEST

When Helldivers 2 gameplay was first revealed I remember two key things about it, one of my friends was excited about it because it was a wild glow up from its predecessor, and it had this footage where the people playing it had one of those cringey scripted voice chat interactions. But for some reason I cannot find it on YouTube, I swear it happened at The Game Awards, but I’m starting to think it's my own case of Mandela Effect.

However, things started changing once the game actually dropped, and it seemed like its growth in popularity happened overnight. The next thing I learn, the game is having so many people trying to play it that the servers cannot keep up. This is something unprecedented, and it actually prompted me to take a look, what was going on over there that had everyone so fired up? And so I started checking out some streams, it’s a 4 player co-op third-person shooter where you can fight either Bugs or Robots. On the surface, I thought it was nothing special, then I caught a glimpse of the players using the in game Stratagems and throwing them around, making things blow up and causing as much collateral damage as possible, my interest was starting to get piqued, who doesn't like to cause a big explosion? But the biggest thing to accompany all of it, was the Galactic War system with its Major Orders, where every couple of days every player in the game is tasked with working towards a common goal to be rewarded with currencies and sometimes new purchasable weapons. Apparently, this is led by a guy called Joel over at Arrowhead that acts like a real-time DM and sends out the orders depending on what the players were doing.

But what really, REALLY convinced me that I had to buy the game, was the Malevelon Creek arc, where the community tragically lost control of this particular planet to Automatons, it was a massacre, tons of brave Helldivers and Super Citizens were slaughtered in the process, but the playerbase wouldn't stand by it, and vengeance was sworn on that day. It wasn’t until the Major Order to take it back was given where the players valiantly fought in the name of DEMOCRACY to bring it back to our side, and it was done at a speed that neither devs nor players could have even predicted.

This is something I had to take part of, there was one issue, however. At the time I was busy playing other games, so despite buying it, it wasn’t until recent weeks that I started playing it a lot more, it is one of my biggest regrets to not have been part of this when player counts still soared over 500k every day, but it still warms my heart to log in and see over 100k still playing actively. One of my most common fears with live service games is that at any moment where failure starts to be shown, it's only a matter of time when the publisher says it's time to turn the lights off, and all that time invested gets flushed down the toilet (RIP Knockout City and Rumbleverse, I still think about you two now and then), but Helldivers 2 seems like its here to stay, and I’m happy to be a part of it, to be spreading justice and freedom for as much as I can. To hopefully one day participate in a Major Order as iconic as The Battle for Malevelon Creek

If there's something I had to complain about the game is how some types of enemies are extremely obnoxious to fight against (I fucking despise Chargers and Hulks), and that Arrowhead has a weird philosophy when it comes to weapon balancing, I don't consider myself an expert in game design, but at the end of the day, this is still a PvE game, one that can become really fucking tough at times, if anything I think everything should be busted, so there’s no meta to be enforced by whatever toxic players might be out there and everyone can play their own way.

To wrap things up, on top of my brief rant about Competitive Team Games, there’s another type of game I dislike a lot nowadays and that’s not a controversial opinion, we are all tired of Live Services, games that don’t respect their customers and that think we all have unlimited time, games where just playing them isn’t enough. Gone are the 7th gen days when games would drop with a weirdly, yet charmingly designed Multiplayer mode whose servers barely worked in favor of rotating shops and time-limited Season Passes that unlock only fluff most of the time. Make no mistake, Helldivers 2 also has some of these tropes, but it appears that this time it remembered it still has a box price, so what would be the point of time gating battle passes and having absurdly expensive cosmetics? None, get all of that shit by playing, go out there, kill some bugs and bots, get that rising feeling of power when your Helldiver starts maniacally laughing because you kept firing for a full mag. Drink of the cup of Liber-tea.

Well that's that.

After beating FES the first time in 2022, I waited patiently, knowing that the remake for 3 was on the horizon. I said to myself for the longest time that if Persona 3 got the Persona 5 treatment it might become my favorite Persona game and----------- that was a false hope.

I had a blast with this game, re-experiencing Persona 3 again in this incredible new visual way, with a FANTASTIC new voice cast, and incredible additions to the battle system.

I was upset at first that the original cast was replaced with newbies, but they grew on me really fast. I especially love Fuuka, Aigis, and Ken's new voice actors, they do a tremendous job! Don't forget the rest of the social links also getting FULL voice lines!! One of the most impressive parts about this game!! Then there's Junpei's voice actor, who went WAY above and beyond, absolutely KILLED his performance!!! This game also made me like Aigis, which I previously did not, so kudos!!

The other thing they did with the characters is made me LOVE Shinjiro. He became one of my favorite characters, and I became genuinely emotional when he died in this game. I used him in my party, he fucking WALLOPPED the Shadows, he was the fucking goat. In the original game I totally didn't care about him, but everything about him in this game was totally brilliant. Made me love him!

I wish I did more of the Link Episodes, too, but from what I did they were great!

Gameplay wise, I found myself enjoying this game more than FES. Maybe that's a product of now having the entire Persona series behind me playing this one, so I know how to manage my time better with social links (something I found myself not a huge fan of in FES). I maxed out more social links than before, and I really appreciated the Link Episodes they added in this version of the game.

Combat was interesting, adding Theurgies made boss fights a snooze fest when I saved them up.

By far, though, the best part about this game is how they totally fixed Tartarus. They couldn't change what it was at its core, being a maze that you have to climb with randomly generated floors, but they made the experience on each floor SO much more memorable and enjoyable I am elated to say that Tartarus is not only STUNNING but FUN to explore!!! I am over the moon with how happy I am with how the game looks, it's so stunning in almost every way, and the visuals are at their best pretty much any time during the Dark Hour.
Every shot of Tartarus, from inside and out, is totally incredible. Every block has its own unique identity, while based off of the original blocks from the first game, they now feel so unique and make me really excited to explore each and every one.

I have a lot of nice to say about this game, it's a great step up from the original experience, and a well deserved remake for such a classic game. My expectations were not succeeded however, I think it did it's job in the end, but my hope for this game was that it would be Persona 3 presented in the way of Persona 5, which is almost what we got. It felt more like a PS2 game still, though, with a fresh coat of paint. I guess that can't be avoided, completely overhauling the game and going off-script to make it as grand as 5 would probably just be totally ridiculous, but that was my original assumption and desire from before the game was even revealed.

The first time I played FES, I got so bored around the middle of the game that I stopped playing to beat the Snow Queen Quest in Persona 1 ... luckily nothing like that happened to me here, I was engaged the whole way through, there were only a few areas where it felt sluggish, especially the end of the game where you have a week left before the final boss and you have no more stats to max out and no more social links to do.

At the end of the day, I loved it. Wanted to shed a tear at the ending scene because it's so moving. Love the impact of this game, it is so stunning, so enjoyable, and so classic to me. It's something I waited for for so long and now that it's over I am overjoyed, but I am definitely going to miss it!!

The next stop for me is The Answer, which I will be playing the PS2 version of because I don't really feel like waiting until September to play the Reload version (even if its improvements seem very good, whatever.)

Despite being my favorite game of all time, Xenoblade Chronicles 2 is not a perfect video game. I could spend a long time going over all the game’s glaring flaws and little things that could be improved. Or I could boot up the game and play it for 5 minutes and remember none of that actually matters.

First and foremost, Xenoblade 2 is an absolutely beautiful video game. Every location is absolutely stunning, sporting a distinct visual identity that’s always pleasing to look at. Gormott is a vast, sprawling plain with the endlessly cozy village of Torigoth tucked away in its corner. Uraya’s cool color palette across its vast swampland and beautiful Saffronia trees perfectly complements the comfort of Garfont Village and elegance of Fonsa Myma. Tantal’s harsh, snow-covered wasteland filled with ancient architecture builds a brutal backdrop for a desperate village struggling to survive. On top of that, Monolith took great care to make these places feel real. Every town is fully populated and every inch of wilderness teeming with wildlife.

It’s not just the locations that look good, either; every element of the game, from effects to menus, is perfectly stylized to fit the pseudo-sci-fi/fantasy world. Character design’s great too, with the game boasting a set of distinct cultures across the different titans in styles of dress and some absolute banger designs for the blades done by a variety of artists. Yes, I know it’s tempting to post a picture of Rex on Twitter with no context and say, “look at this idiot” or to post a picture of Pyra with no context and say, “dumb fanservice game”. But that’s ignoring the work that went into making a lot of creative, awesome-looking characters (and the fact you can easily get used to how Rex and Pyra look within an hour of playing the actual game).

Speaking of awesome, creative things, let’s talk about this game’s soundtrack. Every piece is an absolute banger and fits perfectly within its place in the game. The title screen immediately hooks players in, perfectly sets up the game’s sense of quiet contemplation, and later serves as a background piece in some of its most emotional moments. Each level theme perfectly captures the feel of the area it plays in, from the bustling trade hub of Argentum to the vast wonder of Gormott to the serene beauty of Uraya. The standard battle theme is on the same level as most games’ final boss themes, and every other one brilliantly accents its fight: the savagery of “Deathmatch with Torna”, the over-the-top showmanship of “Bringer of Chaos: Ultimate”, and “One who Gets in Our Way” seamlessly transitioning from the terror of getting spotted by Rotbart to the euphoria of felling a fearsome foe. Even the cutscene music is outstanding. “Counterattack” and “Over the Sinful Entreaty” are outstanding background tracks to some of the game’s coolest moments, “Past from Far Distance” is almost as haunting as the scenes it plays over, and songs like “Friendship”, “Walking with You”, and “Tomorrow with You” perfectly encapsulate the tenderness of Xenoblade 2’s best scenes. I can barely listen to the credits theme without tearing up.

On the topic of audio, the game’s English dub is often a point of contention. I get it, especially coming off of Xenoblade 1. Certain deliveries can feel a bit awkward, and you can get the sense that lines were recorded out of context. That said, I don’t think it’s bad, besides a couple things like Rex’s screams and Obrona’s voice. In fact, there are some great deliveries here, with characters like Zeke and Malos having especially entertaining voices behind them. I also love how the characters from different countries, as well as the blades, all have distinct accents. It’s a cool bit of texture that further develops the different cultures of Alrest, plus a lot of them just sound nice (I could listen to Morag and Nia talk all day).

All this style would mean nothing if the game didn’t have substance to back it up, and I am happy to report this game has substance in spades. Those beautiful locations are all fully realized semi-open worlds, with most of their landscapes being traversable. On top of the massive open spaces, every area is intricately designed with tons of memorable locales hidden away for players willing to explore. And these areas aren’t just big; they’re loaded with content. Every inch of every level has something interesting: a sidequest, a treasure trove, a landmark or secret area, a heart-to-heart, a unique monster, or even just a strong enemy. The size of the worlds is also perfectly tuned, making them big enough to feel impressive but small enough to be traversable. And the challenges each area introduces with side content, blade quests, and higher-level enemies means you can keep coming back to these places for the entire game. The towns are equally impressive, with a variety of buildings, shops, NPCs, hidden areas, and tons of dialogue serving up tons of content both from a story and gameplay standpoint.

Also, the Field Skills aren’t that bad. Sure, switching blades around to get the right skills in your party is annoying, but that’s it. It’s an annoyance, and nothing more. Nearly every skill check in the main story (and like, 80% of checks in side quests) can be cleared with guaranteed blades, and the process to unlock individual skills is very quick, requiring a few battles at most. Hell, the only time you need to pull blades for the main story is to clear the spider web in Chapter 7 (and even then, getting 1-2 common fire blades is trivial). It’s a minor bump in the road that doesn’t take away from the fantastic exploration. In fact, the focus on world design and exploration alone makes Xenoblade 2 an incredible video game.

But it’s not content to be incredible. It has to be the best there is, and “the best there is” is the best description I could possibly give for Xenoblade 2’s combat. Yes, it takes a while to get the full extent of it, but once you do, there’s nothing else like it. It takes the rhythm of a turn-based RPG and seamlessly transitions it into real time, making the player keep track of positioning, healing, enemy aggro, and Art usage. And on top of that, it introduces some truly phenomenal mechanics that elevate it above the other games in its series.

On paper, 2’s combat may look like a downgrade from the previous installments: you can’t Auto-Attack while moving, your Arts charge based on Auto-Attacks instead of cooldowns, and you only have 3 Arts per character. But look a little deeper and you’ll see how much it really adds. If you start moving and then stop, it resets the Auto-Attack timer, enabling the very useful and probably unintentional technique of “stutter-stepping”: continually move slightly to repeatedly perform your first Auto-Attack, speeding up combat even in the game’s early stages. Even beyond this, I enjoy the decision-making it presents: Do you stand still to deal more damage and charge your Arts or do you try to pick up items, grab HP Potions, and revive fallen party members? Speaking of Arts, the detail about only having 3 Arts is a straight-up lie. Each character can equip up to 3 Blades, which each have 3 Arts, 4 Specials, and their own unique abilities. This change in format gives the player plenty of freedom in deciding their loadouts, forces them to manage Blade cooldowns on top of other combat mechanics, and lets the game map arts and specials to the 4 main buttons, reducing the amount of necessary menuing in combat.

On the topic of Arts and Specials, I think it’s about time I explain the meat of the combat. As previously stated, using Auto-Attacks lets you use Arts, which lets you use Specials. Using Specials lets you perform Blade Combos, which can set up Orbs that let you perform better Chain Attacks. And if you break enough Orbs in a Chain Attack, you deal insane damage with a Full Burst. This also grants you additional EXP if you kill an enemy, which all but eliminates the need for grinding when used properly. Speaking of Blade Combos, each Blade Combo deals increased damage and damage over time, even at lower levels. Ergo, even if you don’t finish a Combo, you can still deal good damage to the enemy.

Xenoblade 1’s Break/Topple system is also reworked into Driver Combos. In 1, the best strategy for harder fights was to break enemies and then continually topple them until they could no longer move, which could feel a bit stale. In Xenoblade 2, Break and Topple have much more limited durations, but Toppled enemies can be Launched and Launched enemies can be Smashed. Launched enemies take more damage than Toppled enemies, and Smashing an enemy deals massive damage and spawns items. All stages of a Driver Combo also spawn HP Potions, increase the DOT and uptime of Blade Combos, and interrupt enemy Arts. This creates a much more dynamic system where you can constantly perform small actions to gain the advantage over the enemy, but there’s also a degree of risk when your Breaks don’t hit and you have to retry. Performing a Blade Combo while the enemy is inflicted with a Driver Combo also performs a Fusion Combo, dealing even more damage. On top of all that, Blades’ affinity increases over the course of a battle and grants you buffs when it maxes out.

This turns every combat encounter into a satisfying series of loops, where every attack builds into the next. At the start of a fight, you’re at your weakest, only using Auto-Attacks and a few Arts. But as the battles progress, your options open up. You start using Specials and Blade Combos to deal damage. You perform Driver Combos to gain advantages over the enemy and maybe even get a few items. And when your Party Gauge fills up and you’ve applied a few Orbs, you can unleash a Chain Attack and deal massive damage. There are few feelings in gaming as satisfying as performing a Full Burst.

And all throughout, the Cancel Attack system enhances the very experience of fighting. In a similar vein to Mario RPG’s timed hits, Cancel Attacks give you an advantage in combat if you press a button just as an attack connects. Auto-Attacks, Arts, Specials, and even Blade Switches flow seamlessly into each other for extensive chains of high damage and powerful effects. And the sound design just adds on to the satisfaction. Every attack feels crunchy. The feedback for cancelling makes the combos you pull off exponentially smoother. The cinematic angles for Blade Combo Finishers, Level 4 Specials, Fusion Combos, and Chain Attacks help them hit that much harder.

The combat does take a while to get into. You don’t unlock all the mechanics until the end of chapter 3 and it takes a bit longer than that to get all the really cool stuff. Needing to unlock Arts Chaining and 3 Blade slots especially can be a pain in the ass. The tutorials don’t help, either; they’re way too vague for a system this complex and it sucks you can’t re-view them. Also, the game never tells you how good the Art Recharge items are, which makes the early game a lot slower than it needs to be for most players. But if you’re willing to push through those early hours, to really sink your teeth into the battle system and unlock its full potential, there’s nothing else like it. (I recommend this video if you want a good tutorial).

The combat system is fantastic on its own, but it’s backed up by equally amazing character customization. Like I said before, each Driver in the party (with 1 exception) can equip up to 3 Blades at once. Each Blade increases the Driver’s stats, as well as having their own weapon class and element. Element determines what Blade Combos a Blade can perform as well as dealing more damage if an enemy is weak to it. Weapon classes and the Drivers they’re attached to determine which Arts a Blade can use, with 3 out of a potential 4 being usable at any time. The more a driver uses a specific weapon, the more they can upgrade the Arts for that weapon, granting stronger effects and lower recharge times. In addition, each Driver has an Affinity Chart: a skill tree you gain points for as you defeat enemies and complete quests. These grant some pretty useful passive skills, including the aforementioned Arts Chain. All these systems combined with 5 Drivers that can fill a 3-Driver party and the wide variety of Blades already offer a ton of options and a steady sense of progression throughout the game.

But then the Accessories and Pouch Items shoot the scope of customization through the roof. All drivers can equip up to 2 accessories (3 in New Game Plus). These grant passive bonuses ranging from stat increases, to damage increases, to more specific uses like reducing enemy break resistance or preventing enemies from blocking your attacks. One Driver can’t use multiple accessories with the same effect, but otherwise you can do pretty much anything. Each Accessory can completely change how you play the game, assisting in a variety of strategies and synergies. Pure attack, tanking, evasion, crit healing, and even soloing enemies are all possible thanks to this system. Pouch Items are really cool too, essentially being passive buffs you can give to your Drivers for a certain amount of time. Eventually, you can even equip 2 at a time, offering additional customization and power. Like I said before, the Art Recharge ones are the best, but other effects like Special Recharge and Increased Party Gauge can also be useful.

On top of all of that, Blades have their own customization and progression systems. Core Chips grant steady increases to attack power while offering a choice between Block Rate, Critical Rate, and various secondary effects. Aux Cores grant additional effects that help you deal more damage, take less damage, avoid attacks, and do tons of other things. Even more impressively, each Blade has its own Affinity Chart. As you fight and complete side quests with a Blade, you increase their trust with their Driver. In addition to increasing their damage, this unlocks the nodes in their Affinity Charts. Filling in those nodes is a bit more complicated: each one has specific actions tied to them, ranging from using Specials to defeating enemies to completing side quests. I love this; it encourages players to constantly use all the different mechanics and keeps progression from feeling stale, since you’re doing different things to get stronger rather than grinding. The nodes themselves offer a few different things: Red Nodes improve Blades’ Specials, Yellow Nodes improve Passive Skills, and Green Nodes unlock Field Skills.

This gives Blades a ton of utility in different strategies, which is only compounded by the Accessories, Core Chips, and Aux Cores. You could go for pure damage with heavy hitters like Mythra or Herald. You could use tank-class blades like Brighid to evade attacks. You could build entire strategies around blade-specific mechanics, like Dagas’ Kaiser Zone or Adenine’s boost to elemental weakness damage. And this is before you get into Tora and Poppi, who not only can perform Driver Combos by themselves, but have a unique progression system that lets you fully customize the abilities of all 3 Poppi forms. It’s truly incredible.

Now, there is one part of this system that often falls under scrutiny, and I do understand it: The Core Crystal Gacha System. Basically, a good chunk of the game’s Rare Blades are locked behind random drops from specific items. It can be annoying when you want a specific Rare Blade but can’t pull them, or when you do get that Blade on a different Driver than you wanted. That said, I think a lot of the criticism is overblown, and a good chunk of it probably stems from people’s gut reactions to the words “Gacha System”. First off, there are no microtransactions involved. All resources are earned by playing the game normally. In reality, the Core Crystal system barely differs from most RPG drop systems, and people never throw fits on Twitter about those. In fact, the game is actually really generous with Rare Blades: a lot of really good ones can be earned through either the main story or through side content. Plus, Common Blades are better than you might think, offering good stats, good Specials and some really useful Passives like Orb Master. That’s ignoring how generous the base chance is for getting Rare Blades and how easy Legendary Core Crystals are to farm later on. Is it a perfect system? No, it can be a hassle to get the last couple Rare Blades in the endgame, the game’s a bit too stingy with Overdrive Protocols, and there are probably better ways to encourage switching up your team on replay. But it’s not nearly as bad as it’s often made out to be. At worst, it’s a small blot on an astounding canvas.

There’s a lot more to do in Xenoblade 2 than just exploring the world and fighting things. Sure, those are your main means of interaction with the game, but there’s some pretty neat context surrounding them. Xenoblade 2’s sidequests are great, both from a gameplay and story perspective. They grant a variety of tasks, which mainly involve collecting items, fighting enemies, and exploring certain locations. While that might sound a bit repetitive, the way these basic elements are combined keeps the quests from getting boring. In addition, they all have pretty neat stories tied to them, some even extending through multiple sidequests. The quest chain involving the organizations in Mor Ardain is the obvious highlight, but I also love the Nopon History quest chain, the one where you build a school, the quest in Gormott involving the missing soldiers, and anything involving the Garfont Mercs, just to name a few. Even the smaller quests do a great job fleshing out the world and giving character to the various NPCs. You learn a lot about the different nations of Alrest just from seeing how these people interact in their day-to-day lives.

Blade Quests are another great addition. Every optional Rare Blade has their own dedicated side story, complete with fully voiced cutscenes. These help elevate the Blades from just being numbers on a sheet to being fully defined characters, with certain ones like Dagas having really good arcs throughout their quests. And of course, the Xenosaga fan in me will always appreciate KOS-MOS getting story relevance, even if it is self-contained.

Not only are these quests intrinsically engaging, but they offer great rewards. You get additional EXP, money, and SP (for Drivers’ Affinity Charts) for each one you complete. Blade Quests even grant additional abilities for the Rare Blades. This constant stream of rewards creates this really satisfying gameplay loop of completing quests, getting stronger, and taking on tougher quests. If you’re worried about becoming overleveled after doing all the side quests, don’t worry; all EXP gained from quests is completely optional. Don’t get me wrong, there are some stinkers among the quests. Ursula’s Blade Quest and the Nopon Doubloon quest are pretty annoying, and the compass isn’t too helpful for certain navigational challenges. But the batting average is pretty damn high, and the side quests are overall one of my favorite parts of the game.

If that wasn’t enough for you, Xenoblade 2 offers additional side content to keep you busy. Completing side quests and buying items in an area increases that area’s Development, which lowers prices and opens up new items in the stores. Buying all the items in a store even lets you buy the store, which grants a passive buff during overworld gameplay. This a lot to the game mechanically and thematically, since you’re helping people around the world through your actions and have much greater incentive to interact with the different shops. I also really like Salvaging as a way to integrate Rex’s passion into the gameplay and as a means of making money. (Seriously, you can get a ton of money with just a little salvaging. It’s insane.)

The last major mechanic I want to talk about is the Merc Group, which basically lets you send your idle blades on special missions. These are often used for Blade Quests, normal quests, and unlocking more of a store’s inventory. They also grant additional EXP, money, items, and help unlock skills for the blades. I love this feature. It adds to the sense of progression since you’ll probably have a Merc Mission running at all times, and also helps if you want to develop a Blade without using them in combat. It also makes all the blades feel useful, since you’ll often need specific field skills to start a Merc Mission or to have it complete faster. All this great content doesn’t even cover the additional difficulty modes, New Game Plus, or Challenge Mode, all of which add fantastic depth and replayability just by themselves. With all these different mechanics combined, Xenoblade 2 is a masterwork of game design.

But there’s far more to it than that. Many people say an RPG is only as good as its story, and this story is certainly as good as the RPG behind it. The story of finding hope in a dying world is done beautifully, and leads to quite possibly the best final act I’ve ever seen in a video game. It’s exciting, well-paced, and isn’t afraid to go dark places, but still remains a heartwarming and optimistic tale throughout. I won’t go into detail here for the sake of keeping this review spoiler-free and not tripling its length. Instead, I’d like to dispel a popular myth surrounding this game.

Many people have claimed the story is “tropey anime garbage” and that it doesn’t match the serious tone Xenoblade 1 had. Yes, the story has silly moments, but they pretty much vanish halfway into Chapter 4, and they never interrupt the more serious parts. There are only 10, maybe 15 minutes of these scenes over the course of a 100+-hour game. If that’s enough for you to dismiss a game, then I’m sorry, but I think that’s incredibly shallow. Plus, this game can actually be really funny when it wants to. Throwaway lines like Pupunin’s “wife ran out on me”, Heart-to-Hearts like the cooking disaster in Argentum, and pretty much everything involving Zeke von Genbu just make me crack up. Not to mention, Xenoblade 1 has plenty of light-hearted moments: Colonel Vangarre, Riki’s introduction, half of Reyn’s dialogue. Hell, one of the most emotional scenes in the game was turned into a meme by the fandom, which got big enough for Nintendo of America to post about it on Twitter. I think at least a little comedy is fully acceptable.

This fantastic story is backed by an even better cast. Every member of the main party is memorable, well-written and has at least a few great moments throughout the story. Sure, Morag and Brighid are a little underused and Tora has some…questionable moments, but that doesn’t make the overall cast any less lovable. Each of them supports the game’s central themes in some way, on top of having some great interactions both in the main story and outside of it. The villains are just as good, easily being my favorite cast of antagonists in all of Xenoblade. All the major antagonists and even a few of the minor ones have interesting roles to play in the story, complex motivations that intertwine and often clash, and wonderfully interact with both the thematic material and the main characters. Again, I won’t go into spoiler territory, but there is one character I will talk about quite a bit.

Rex is a fantastic main character. Sure, he may look like a dorky kid with a stupid outfit and subpar voice acting, but give him a chance and you’ll know why this kid made himself the Aegis’ Driver. Even in a world brought to the brink of destruction, suffering from the mistakes of its people, he keeps smiling. He helps everyone he can, tries to understand even the worst of humanity, and fights for its best. It’s amazing how profoundly Rex impacts the people and places around him just by being the good person he is. Not just Pyra and Mythra, but the other party members, the villains, and all the people you meet along the way. As amazing a portrayal as Future Redeemed gave Rex, it could only do so thanks to Xenoblade 2’s rock-solid foundation. And all this came from a humble salvager with a big heart.

Xenoblade Chronicles 2 will always be a special game to me. It came into my life at an important time and helped my broaden my horizons for what games were capable of. But even considering that, I think it’s a masterwork of game design and storytelling, and my appreciation for it only grows with each passing day. I know it’s not for everyone, but please, give this game a chance if you haven’t already. Don’t dismiss it because a YouTube comedy video made it look bad. I’m sure you’ll find something to love.