Pretty much everything you could hope for in a fully fledged sequel. I never beat the original cause of boring combat and overall jankiness and this improves on those a ton. Kat is such a likeable character, and this is tied for the game world I most want to live in. Just endless vertical architecture, all thoughtful and lived in.

I thought the stealth missions would be a one-off thing, but then it kept coming back, it's the worst part of the game, feels really shallow.

The game is really forgiving in terms of checkpoints and health, which I think helps alleviate some frustration caused by remaining jankiness or picky stealth moments. It never felt too handholdy for me, though there are some side missions that are basically just follow the dotted line.

The game is just OK, but really this was all about the characters for me, I truly wish all of them a happy life. In particular I love Yuri and his collected and supportive nature.

The story itself is whatever, it has some interesting themes (playing as the vigilante, climate change) but it predictably throws them out for the big jrpg ending. There were a lot of places and names to remember and I got a little confused near the middle. The party dynamic is really what kept me going.

I like jRPGs for the turn based pace, and this combat wasn't exciting enough to be a fun action game, so overall I wasn't crazy about the combat. It does get better as the game goes on, specifically when your agility gets high. It can be deep if you want it to, but you can also rely on the same combo for the whole game, and use guard/free run in between.

The game has a simple style that aged well, and the remaster is nice. The music is largely nondescript, the only ones that stood out are the intro theme and the Dahngrest music.

Most of the side quests are triggered by sleeping in some particular town or talking to some unmarked person, I wish there was some marking.

Final thoughts - why does everyone clown on Raven as an old man? He looks like he's 25. The credits sequence made me tear up a little even though I was not at all invested in the story. The Yuri/Flynn dynamic was really nice but the resolution felt a little weak.

Thanks for reading ^___^

Ton of content and super solid fighting. Graphics are getting dated at this point - original sf4 was 6 years old by this point - but the painterly style and nice animations make it look better than sf5. Maybe capcom's best mix of casual baiting and real tech skill. 1 frame links and advanced techniques mean there's still a large barrier for high level play. Elena backdash is kind of ridiculous. A great value purchase today, but as expected the only people left online are forgotten gods.

FGC net complained about this game a lot when it was out but sf5 made everyone realize how good they had it.