I completed the game on Tactician difficulty today, and while it's a good game, I can't say it's great. Larian Studios is truly impressed with its creation of an immersive and highly interactive DND world, complemented by excellent voice acting and well-developed characters. Without a doubt, it stands out as the best entry for players new to the CRPG genre.

While it's a good game, I must admit that it falls short of being the best in its genre. This isn't entirely Larian's fault(and mostly not), but rather a consequence of the DND 5e rule set the game is based on. After Act 1, the combat becomes quite dull, with little incentive to control your enemies or build magic defense layers due to the concentration mechanics and their limited effects. The resistance mechanics, where damage is halved when resisted, are also problematic, effectively doubling the HP of many enemies and turning them into sponges. (and Larian gave tons of enemies physical resistance in Tactician difficulty) The combat encounters are well-designed in ACT 1 but diminished rapidly afterward, due to the higher levels of 5E gameplay becoming monotonous, as the most effective strategy is often using normal attacks to hit your enemies, I finished the game like a breeze with these strat but it's far from fun and engaging.

While Larian's efforts are commendable, the game does have some drawbacks beyond the 5E rule set. The main story is just alright and somewhat boring, more like a forgettable Hollywood summer action movie with no thought-provoking events, idea conflicts, or philosophical dialogue. This lack of depth makes the game so much weaker when compared to classic CRPGs like the old Infinity games(including its predecessor BG2/TOB), VTMB, FNV, KotOR2, or Disco Elysium. Although the characters are likable and interesting, they can also come across as bland and occasionally cringy(I won’t allow Gale’s backstory if he is my PC). Overall, the game feels more like a mimic of a tabletop RPG with an ordinary story module, a competent Dungeon Master, and a group of just alright players.

Larian definitely deserves the praise they got, but also really needs to work on combat and overall RPG system and story/character writing.

Oh and optimal-wise the game runs well but it crashes when some bosses die/use certain skills, maybe it is my AMD gpu being AMD gpu.

I remember trying this game out a year ago, and feeling like I wouldn't be able to commit my time into it at all. Few months later, I decided that I'd pick out a couple of games I was somewhat interested in and attempted to play them through completion, and one of those was Earthbound, despite my lukewarm response before this point. I delved in, and took my time to progress at a gentle pace. It took me several months to beat, but the journey has taken me back to how playing a video game felt as a child. It's a warm experience that surprised me several times, and only kept getting better as I got towards the end, which then elevated itself into a personal touchstone.

Death Stranding is a very ambitious triple A title that instantly sets itself apart from the rest of the market but suffers quite heavy from the lack of proper direction in every single front of the game imaginable, mostly in the gameplay department.


Let's get the obvious stuff out of the way first

Death Stranding's core gameplay loop sucks, there's no denying that, even if you like the game. It's a walking simulator through and through, walking from point A to point B through various different terrains with tools like ladders and climbing ropes is all there is to the gameplay 80% of the time. But the funny thing is even the tools you're given to cross some of the trickier terrains are rendered completely useless 1/3rd into the game, I literally did not ever need them outside of the first few hours of the game. The vehicles they give you as you make progress have controls so janky that I opted out for walking anyway. Even if the gameplay is complete utter tedium incarnate, there was a lot of ways it could've been improved upon through meaningful upgrades but there was absolutely none in the game.

The combat encounters and the bosses are just boring set pieces where you have to just mindlessly perform one single action repeatedly and the shooter segments feel straight out of an unfinished third person person shooter. I know they were thrown in to spice things up a bit but they're so poorly executed to the point it just makes me want to go back to doing deliveries and walking from point A to point B

Death Stranding actually has a pretty well realized world but the way the worldbuilding is handled in this game really shows the amateurish nature of Kojima when it comes down to writing. You're fed with mumbo jumbo sci-fi info dumps after every single deliveries you make through the no name NPCs you meet basically incentivizing you to not give a shit about anything they're saying. It won't be an exaggeration to call half of the game nothing but pointless exposition dumps. As for the rest of the narrative, it's okay, I was somewhat hooked on the final stretch of the game despite the poor writing. The poor writing mostly stems from cringe-inducing dialogues so jarring that it completely takes you out of the scene but looking at the narrative from a broader perspective, it's just okay, nothing offensively bad.

If there's anything to like about Death Stranding it'd be the atmosphere and the art direction halfway past the game. But, it honestly does nothing for me when the gameplay itself is just a bunch of nothing for the most part

This was a game I couldn't for the love of god sit through more than 2 hours at once without feeling completely burnt out except for the final stretch. Trying to beat the whole thing while resisting the urge to completely drop it was a real struggle haha

not to beat a dead horse but persona 5 is the epitome of style over substance

one of the most overhyped games of all time, and i kind of regret the 140 hours i sunk into it when i played it initially in 2019. i liked it at the time but it was also the first big jrpg i had played at the time, and the more games in the same genre or that tackled the same themes i experienced, the less love in my heart i had for persona 5. theres a lot there but other than the aesthetics (which im not a fan of) and the music (which is basically just baby's first acid jazz sampling) there isn't much to whats there. the characters give you the facade of being deep and intricate when they get introduced but unless you're akechi or fucking morgana you either don't get development past your introduction or that development practically gets disregarded for the rest of the story.

the story itself is also noncommittal to the idea of rebellion that it sells itself on. empowering the underdogs of society but only in a way that supports that status quo. we wouldn't want to actually try to say anything now would we? the closest thing to challenging the status quo that these kids actually do is by targeting a single corrupt politician.

i know there was a lot of drama a while ago about people experiencing the game by watching it and how that "isn't how you're supposed to" but you genuinely lose out on nothing and i honestly might have a higher opinion of this game if it was just the story bits and not the insufferably droning jrpg with a 3/10 dating sim tacked onto it.

overall i just genuinely do not like this game and after 3 years of stewing on those feelings i don't think much is going to change my mind. i think a large part of that is that i don't like the presentation much (it wore off on me pretty quickly when i initially played and i never reacclimated to it) and the ost is only really good for 2 or 3 songs unless you've just never listened to any form of jazz fusion or its derivatives.

i wouldn't call persona 5 a bad game but with how long it is and how much time i invested into it, i can't help but be frustrated with how shockingly little i actually got out of the experience positively.