Stairmaster_
I really enjoyed the story and how the whole theme of starting over tied to each of the characters as well as the nature of the game itself. Unfortunately the battle system was not as good as it could be, but I would like to see it developed and fleshed out more, because I do feel like it has a lot of potential.
Tied with Yakuza 0 and Kiwami 2 for best game in the series.
Tied with Yakuza 0 and Kiwami 2 for best game in the series.
2015
Very good Metroidvania with a lot of super creative and interesting power ups. The pixel art was really good too, especially for the Rusalki (although the main character sprite is nothing special). Unfortunately it's brought down by having to collect power nodes which increase your damage output; this is fine on paper, but if you don't really try to find them bosses (and even regular enemies!) felt much harder than they needed to be, especially with so many of them spamming hard to dodge attacks. It's a Metroid game to play if you've run out of actual Metroid games.
2012
2013
One of the best games on the 3DS, although I got it day 1 in February 2014 and didn't finish it until June 2022 – eight years later. This is because I don't like that you have to play the game six times, but at least the characters are fun, the music is fantastic, and the story is pretty good! It also has one of the best implementations of the Final Fantasy job system ever and is highly customizable, which means the game welcomes you to break it, which is a lot of fun. New job combinations popped into my head all the time as I was playing it, and felt very rewarding when it worked – one of my favorite combinations which I used in the endgame was making Tiz a pirate/swordmaster, which allowed him to use the pirate's 4x damage output without using any MP, which let him always hit at max damage (9999).
This game is really good, but you have to have the patience to get past the tedium.
This game is really good, but you have to have the patience to get past the tedium.
2017
2016
2019