This review contains spoilers
I only got the first ending. I probably do not intend to do the other endings, although I know they are there if I get bored. The story does not affect my score in any way since it nearly takes the backseat in this game. (There's some lore and character building through the board but I'll be real - I couldn't be bothered.)
The gameplay, the meat of the game, is absolutely fantastic. I do feel conflicted about some of the mechanics of the game, however. The aging system is great, and so is the actual skill tree. I'm not sure I really love the dragon statues part, since it seems almost impossible to level everything in a single playthrough which really bothered me. Even then I could stand it. However, I think two things in the actual combat bothered me - Focus Attacks and Grabbing.
The developers know their audience pretty well, and more importantly, they know their game pretty well. These two things are the best part of the game balance-wise and fun-wise. They know by the end of the game that people will be using them often. And so when they take them away for the final fight, it's meant to feel like a traditional challenge without any crutches. Unfortunately, I think it feels really bad to have them taken away from you in the final fight. This would be fine if they had built up to this at all. Maybe previous bosses would stop being susceptible to these types of attacks. Or maybe some of the random enemies stopped letting you grab them. Or something to that effect. Unfortunately, it feels like you get to the final boss and you have to start playing a different game. I think the player either really likes this because of the challenge and how it relates to the character, or they dislike it for how out-of-the-blue it is. I fall into the latter, because while I can see the value of showing how out of their depth our character is with this new enemy through the gameplay, it feels bad and makes the experience you gained/skills you obtained during the game meaningless. I can see the value of this fight - it's not for me. And it's by far the worst fight in the game. Again, I don't know if this changes on future playthroughs. I kinda don't care.
Lastly, this game, for whatever reason, on medium graphical settings, decided to crash my computer and my other applications multiple times throughout my playthrough. This was extremely frustrating trying to stream this game, and it cut me off during cutscenes and phase transitions. The worst part is that, if you're having a good run when this happens, you have to start before the boss fight but you keep all the deaths from the fight. I don't know why this game uses up so much RAM, but I was getting pretty pissed by the end of this game.
Overall, the game is great but flawed. It has a nearly perfect gameplay loop for the majority of the game, with a fatal flaw of performance issues/crashes, along with a frustrating final boss that is difficult in the worst ways.
The gameplay, the meat of the game, is absolutely fantastic. I do feel conflicted about some of the mechanics of the game, however. The aging system is great, and so is the actual skill tree. I'm not sure I really love the dragon statues part, since it seems almost impossible to level everything in a single playthrough which really bothered me. Even then I could stand it. However, I think two things in the actual combat bothered me - Focus Attacks and Grabbing.
The developers know their audience pretty well, and more importantly, they know their game pretty well. These two things are the best part of the game balance-wise and fun-wise. They know by the end of the game that people will be using them often. And so when they take them away for the final fight, it's meant to feel like a traditional challenge without any crutches. Unfortunately, I think it feels really bad to have them taken away from you in the final fight. This would be fine if they had built up to this at all. Maybe previous bosses would stop being susceptible to these types of attacks. Or maybe some of the random enemies stopped letting you grab them. Or something to that effect. Unfortunately, it feels like you get to the final boss and you have to start playing a different game. I think the player either really likes this because of the challenge and how it relates to the character, or they dislike it for how out-of-the-blue it is. I fall into the latter, because while I can see the value of showing how out of their depth our character is with this new enemy through the gameplay, it feels bad and makes the experience you gained/skills you obtained during the game meaningless. I can see the value of this fight - it's not for me. And it's by far the worst fight in the game. Again, I don't know if this changes on future playthroughs. I kinda don't care.
Lastly, this game, for whatever reason, on medium graphical settings, decided to crash my computer and my other applications multiple times throughout my playthrough. This was extremely frustrating trying to stream this game, and it cut me off during cutscenes and phase transitions. The worst part is that, if you're having a good run when this happens, you have to start before the boss fight but you keep all the deaths from the fight. I don't know why this game uses up so much RAM, but I was getting pretty pissed by the end of this game.
Overall, the game is great but flawed. It has a nearly perfect gameplay loop for the majority of the game, with a fatal flaw of performance issues/crashes, along with a frustrating final boss that is difficult in the worst ways.