Retro
2015
Amazing game with a great story/substories, fantastic music and mostly great minigames. It even got me to learn mahjong from scratch and enjoy it. Combat was alright but becomes better with climax battles imo. Legend mode was a huge letdown since its just the same as hard with no checkpoints but required a new run.
2002
Liked the atmosphere for most of it but then you remember the dumb locks makes it so linear. Getting locked into the ending kinda sucked too.
Should have been included in the collection release. Other than stage 5 being really long it was an average game.
It's much better than the metroidvania. Most of the characters are fun to play as and I really like the different runs you could do. Wish you could start with any character but not a huge deal.
Very addicting game especially playing with all crew. Nearly everything is great except for the boss stages. They would either be too braindead easy with fliers or just annoying on anyone else. Good thing the 2 best modes don't have any boss stages. Character gimmicks were great otherwise especially if you learn how to do each minigame. Shame you have to wait a full year to 100% the game.
S Tier: Ashley, Orbulon
A Tier: Dribble, 18-Volt, 5-Volt, Penny, Mike, Cricket
B Tier: Wario, Red, Mantis, Mona, Crygor, Jimmy T
C Tier: Lulu, Kat, Pyoro, 9-Volt
Anyone who says 5 volt sucks is on something.
S Tier: Ashley, Orbulon
A Tier: Dribble, 18-Volt, 5-Volt, Penny, Mike, Cricket
B Tier: Wario, Red, Mantis, Mona, Crygor, Jimmy T
C Tier: Lulu, Kat, Pyoro, 9-Volt
Anyone who says 5 volt sucks is on something.
The first few hours are a huge slog with how slow you kill enemies or just sit there and wait for a parry. Picks up a lot in the middle and near the end. They really had to add that ending though...AM2R overall was the better game and had cooler additions but I really liked aeion abilities. Ignoring shinespark for a bad power bomb sucks but at least they brought back IBJ. Hopefully with Dread they learned a lot from the criticism.
2016
Good game but has some faults when compared to the game it heavily borrows from. Story was ok even with the dumb fetch missions. Majima everywhere was a great system that has lots of unique encounters as I was still finding them near the end of 100%. Less minigames/activities than 0 and dragon being neutered for a good chunk of the run kinda sucks. Climax battles were a joke hopefully the rest of the series has some good ones.
2017
Terrible story right from the get go and most of the characters are annoying to listen to. Throws a lot of information at you and with the campaign being very easy. Couldn't stomach through the rest of the boring game for the supposed good postgame.
2021
This review contains spoilers
They learned a lot from how boring SR was and made an amazing game. Way more focus on combat here and actually adding difficulty(until you get 1 item) is huge. You're able to get yourself lost way more than Fusion while also having great locked sections. They brought back shinespark which gives the best puzzles and lets you do some great sequence breaking. Finale was insane and somehow they managed to make a game without you know who. Time to get the other endings.
2021
Did the other endings. Hard mode is surprisingly easy and they really needed to nerf or properly balance 1 of the upgrades. Still fun as fuck to play.
Really liked the cases despite initially thinking the setting would be awful. DLC case was a step down from the final case and the previous game's DLC. Athena is still pretty useless in a crowded game. Ideally they would remove her or stop using 3 lawyers.
I like the more focus on bosses for this one and the alternate paths were cool. Other character was fun for a victory lap. Very good music makes up for how I couldn't understand anything on the wii port.
2017
First time seeing the dragon engine and have to say it was mostly great. Everything but combat was a large improvement over the old engine. Story was good until it became ridiculous at one point until the end of the game. 1 of the main minigames was pretty disappointing to actually play but the premise was great. The climax battles replacement is awful and hope to god its the last time.
Still mindlessly fucking boring after act 2
2021
Story is mediocre to bad, alignments are bad to awful but the music and gameplay are sick mostly. Essences might have been a nice idea but still needs a bit of refinement in probably their rerelease as do items since they are stupidly broken for the entire game. Seeing demons in the overworld is amazing even though there is a lot of notable ones missing or barred from showing up. All the major zones were great although dungeons are at the worst here. The series keeps churning out shit dungeons with 4, 4A, and now 5 even opting to patch a nerf to a current bright spot in a dungeon. Demi fiend was a joke even while trying to intentionally avoid all the easy cheese.