What an experience, in more ways than one...

The story was honestly great. First off, Harry Mason? Definitely a contender for best video game dad. No amount of man-made horrors beyond his comprehension will deter this man from finding his daughter. You can call it bad, but I think his voice acting just sells how much he doesn't care about anything other than his objective, despite how absolutely fucked up Silent Hill is. The rest of the cast felt kinda secondary. Apart from Dahlia, there's no else you can really care about, they're just there. Cybil? Didn't care. Lisa? Sad, but ultimately indifferent. Kaufmann? Lol

The other experience comes from the gameplay. This was my first "tank controls" type game, and it took some getting used to, but it wasn't so bad. Walking around the foggy town was just as interesting and unnerving as everyone else makes it out to be.
My god, the puzzles though. I applaud anyone who legitimately solved the school piano puzzle. And a special fuck you to the blood bag in the otherworld hospital blending in with the environment so well that it took me quite some time to find it.

The environment is great, the game's age and design give it such a vibe, there wasn't a single place where I didn't feel unsettled and alone.
Wandering around in the city, whether it was nighttime or foggy, hearing the radio static grow and shrink as I progressed to the next destination, it all made me uneasy all the time despite how easy it is to cheese some of the wandering enemies. I commend it for taking a technical difficulty and making it work so well

Honestly. don't let this game's age get to you. It's a beautiful experience beginning to end, with some weird voice acting in between (at least to me, the only other Konami game I played was MGS1 and that had some solid voice acting. They couldn't care to give this one some too?)

Wow, that was lame
I thought the fact that the first boss was a literal military tank would mean the rest of the game would be fun, but no not really. None of Reimu's shottypes feel too good, and having no focus or hitbox indicator really fucks with my muscle memory. I've had many embarrassing deaths because of it...

Bosses aren't fun. For most of them, you are not getting it on your first go, they cheapshot you so much you'd think Hideki Kamiya directed it. And to add insult to injury the end of every stage before reaching the boss just has random bullets come from nowhere to follow you and keep you on your toes just when you think it's over. I'll just keep laughing at people wanting Mima to come back

(Unrelated but shoutouts to Neko Project for having some of the worst navigation on an emulator in order to set it up properly. There's so many categories that could've all been in one section)

This game was honestly awesome. Had this been another game, with characters named differently, I would've appreciated it a little more. As it is, the story is good if a little basic, the characters are somewhat likeable, but the dialogue is painfully cringy 9/10 times, Donte's voice actor sounds like he doesn't care that he's playing a character at times. Just look up some cutscenes online and tell me his screams aren't forced.

Combat though? It's insanely fun, I (somewhat) love how it was handled in this game. Rebellion's moveset is really good, and the other weapons are almost all good. I had no issues balancing between Angelic and Demonic weapons for certain types of enemies, it made the game way more fun and engaging for me. No enemy really pissed me off honestly, except maybe Witches, their shields take too long to break. My only issues would be the lack of a lock-on (although I heard they added it in the Definitive version but I got no console so), it really screwed with me as I was so used to some moves from previous games relying on it (Stinger, for example). Also, was it just me or Devil Trigger NEVER activates when you want it to? I mashed the activation a lot before it actually triggered

The presentation, holy shit. Limbo is an incredible set-piece, every level was so elevated from its acid trip, constantly changing level design. The arenas for Bob Barbas and Lilith's Club + her boss fight were absolutely insane eye candy and so memorable. Music was kinda hit or miss, sorry Combichrist and Noisia but I couldn't tell the difference between your music at times, it blended too much into the background while fighting for me to pay attention to the music. Some tracks did stand out (Throat Full of Glass, WTF Is Wrong With You People?, Empty and Lilith's Club were all bops), but it's not enough.

Honestly, don't let other people deter you from playing this game, it's really fun at its core and it's up to you to see if you liked the story or not. As a fan of the series, all I'll say is avoid DMC2 because that is not fun