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black panther for dudes who say oh my hylia

It seems like every long lasting RPG series has that one entry with a reputation for being one of the most meticulously crafted mechanical objects but also having some unique failing(s) in its storytelling, whether it's Fire Emblem Engage having maps that will be circlejerked for decades to come at the cost of some of the worst prose and cutscene presentation in an RPG or SMT IV: Apocalypse having a cast of party members so annoying that the option to kill them is a significant portion of its playerbase's unironic reason for loving it. Final Fantasy 5 serves this role for its respective series, as a game with a well crafted job/skill system (Random side note: I think it is extremely funny how the job system being seen as "too complex" is a major reason the game initially wasn't released overseas when in hindsight, it's incredibly tame in comparison to the level of systems bloat in the average 2020s AAA release) but also its goofier story that would seem out of place when put next to the other two SNES Final Fantasy narratives. However, this piece is not going to go over the game as a mechanical object, or really anything about it that's already near universally loved (Gilgamesh my beloved). When it comes to how I use this website, I operate by a rule that I only dedicate extended writing pieces to things that I haven't seen said and the positive qualities of FF5's gameplay have been said countless times by hardcore fans of the series. Rather, this is a piece dedicated to why the story resonated with me in a way that, while nowhere near the heights of what this legendary series has accomplished at its best, is still significantly more than what most would give it credit for.
To me, Final Fantasy V is a game about humanity's mistreatment of the environment. The game's inciting incident is the wind crystal shattering as a result of the inventor Cid creating a device to amplify the elemental crystals' power for the sake of increased productivity. This reason for the crystals' destruction is best exemplified by Karnak, a town whose use of the fire crystal for the sake of unnecessary opulence is visualized through the excess of flames within it, not serving any practical function beyond a flashy showing of the wealth its rulers live in. The destruction of all four of these crystals results in the return of main antagonist Exdeath, whose existence similarly ties into the general idea of the environment being mistreated both in terms of his origins as several evil spirits dumped within a tree as a failed solution to the problems caused by an evil sorcerer's quest for ultimate power and in terms of his sealing in Bartz's world 30 years ago by the Warriors of Dawn being a similar failed attempt at short term solution for a long term problem.
And around halfway through the game, the consequences of this collective disregard for the environment begin to show. Exdeath burns down the Forest of Moore in which he initially hailed from and obtains the crystals of the Warriors of Dawn's world, which are destroyed shortly after, resulting in the two worlds being merged together. This new merged world has a melancholy feel to it, conveyed through the lower energy overworld theme, visual imagery like the once active quicksand surrounding the pyramid dungeon becoming lifeless or the Forest of Moore's desperate attempt to cling to life, and the constant threat of whole stretches of land and their inhabitants being completely consumed by the void, which even causes you to go through the aforementioned pyramid dungeon with only three party members due to the presumed death of the fourth. In a stretch of a game that was no doubt the blueprint for the next entry in the series' biggest twist, it seems like humanity has doomed itself to destruction by its own hand.
However, by the endgame stretch, you should have mastered quite a few jobs on each of your four party members and been able to combine the best attributes of these mastered jobs to create a freelancer (or mime for the truly Gogopilled) that can't truly fit within the narrow roles of the old society. In my playthrough of the game, Bartz and Faris combined the stat boosts and counterattacking ability of a monk with the weapons and equipment of knights, Lenna transferred over the stat boosts from her brief stint as a berserker to her usual role as a support mage, and Crylle became a mime with both black and white magic as well as the HP +30% gained from her time as a monk. The ludonarrative purpose of the game's job class system is to be the radical transforming of societal roles necessary to prevent an environmental crisis and these new roles are what ultimately allow our four heroes to stop Exdeath once and for all.
Is Final Fantasy V making a truly radical political statement here? No, it's ultimately just another drop in the vast ocean of cheesy/defanged 90s environmentalist messages and its environmentalism especially comes off as milquetoast when you literally play as an ecoterrorist two games later. But with the various environmental crises our planet deals with only worsening three decades after game's release, it takes on a new meaning as representing both the impossible odds that humanity must overcome and a symbol of hope that we can pull through regardless. I long for the day where Bartz and friends can master the Marxist job class.

Probably the best single player mode in any kart racer, and also one of the best feeling. There's a really good feeling of weight to the karts, and its made even better by stuff like the boost you get from making high jumps and the different ways the game asks you to use your jump for reaching high speeds and out-there shortcuts. Also the drift boost mechanic has a good rhythm to it, and that on top of all the other stuff already mentioned helps races feel more involved and exciting than cup races in Mario Kart. I think this game also does some stuff that Diddy Kong Racing did in its single player better, like its version of the silver coin challenge.

The relic races are also a great twist on the usual time trial stuff in every kart racer, where each track does a great job of teaching you the layout and secrets of each track, and demands total control over the kart at its highest speed. Honestly some of the hardest challenges I've seen in a kart racer are from relic races here, I only managed to get one platinum outside of the bonus tracks.

Definitely great for anyone who really loved the adventure mode in Diddy Kong Racing and is looking for something else like that, as most kart racers don't have a mode like this. Unfortunately wasn't able to experience multiplayer, though I could imagine that being a lot of fun too. The Crash style and music doesn't do much for me, but I have to be honest that this one of the best feeling games of this genre I've played in a while.

I think it's really sweet that this whole game is just genuinely appreciative of the CDi games and the resulting YTP scene. It never punches down on its own source material or even defaults to some irony-poisoned take on the matter; it's just a continuation of games that, despite all reason, managed to resonate with people in their own weird way.

Gameplay wise this definitely shows in how the elevator pitch is pretty much just "CDi Zelda but playable". It's a rather short game that, crazily enough, isn't pushing any narrative boundaries, but the extra gameplay polish makes the quest hunting really palatable. One of my friends got into speedrunning it with some sequence breaks and has the world record so I'd say the world design has to be doing something right.

I know the main draw for most people is the meme factor, so I'd say it lands pretty well. Arzette is the distilled mythos of the CDi girlboss Zelda and her reactions to whatever arbitrary characters show up next are pretty good. The story isn't winning any awards, although Arzette's dad dying gives off some "overly verbose YTP lore" vibes which was fun. I don't think any of these people are going to end up iconic enough to where I'll see them singing Stronger than You next month but they were fine on their own. Really the only things that felt off were the blatantly sauceless Morshu and the one random Castlevania reference. Also I swear a Bubsy line snuck in somewhere.

Overall, I think it's a very cute game that provides a chance to reminisce on some old shitposty memories. Not really anything more than that, but I figure that was obvious from the get-go.

Obviously the core appeal of this is nostalgia for the weird cultural zeitgeist the CDi games have become but I have this deranged reading that the way it blends together the weird design choices of two infamously bad games (namely the fetch-quest style of progression) and the more conventional design choices of contemporary Metroidvanias was done as a parody of/way of taking the piss out of the latter

why did they start naming these games like this

like who asked for "Ratchet and Clank: We're gonna fuck you in the ass (with guns)"

A thoughtless retread of the original on NES with some tacky shock value slapped on near the end for good measure. Le sigh... modern remake culture strikes again.

I think what makes this one stand out as even better than the already really good base game is the way it taps into the same primal mystique that motivates us to put characters into games they shouldn't be (be it official bonus modes or fan mods) and works that into both the game design and the story. Plague Knight is an outcast, both in a narrative sense where they're shunned by the local villagefolk and forced to live in an underground lab and in a mechanical sense where it is abundantly clear that the main campaign's levels were not made with them in mind. Sometimes it's in the sense of unintentional side effects of a character with drastically different attacks, movement physics, etc. like many such cases in Propeller Knight's stage and other times it's parts of levels hard coded to not work like they did in Shovel Knight's campaign such as the flying bushes in Specter Knight's stage and the rainbow bridges in Polar Knight's stage. However, while this might seem like something that only works to Plague Knight's detriment, it also leans the other way around. Plague Knight's sheer quantity of movement options allow them to cheese many platforming challenges that would have given the cerulean coward trouble and the increased range and spammability of their attacks makes cheesing bosses even easier. Controlling Plague Knight feels like controlling a character modded into a game they very much weren't supposed to be (ex. that Sonic Generations mod from a while back that allows you to play as Mario 64 Mario, complete with their very specific movement physics) and also playing the role of the cartoon mad scientist character that Plague Knight is clearly riffing on; never having a chance of winning if you play fair and square but instead getting success through being a cheating bastard. The world wasn't made with Plague Knight in mind but goddamnit if they aren't going to hang on by any means necessary.
Also, Plague Knight and Mona are yuri to me.

There's an Alligator Goku in this one, absolutely a canonical work to the goofy guy game catalog

Also since alligators are stronger than humans that means Alligator Goku beats regular Goku confirmed canon

the P5 and it's consequences have been a disaster for the human race