The second playthrough fell a bit flat, but the game remains great nontheless.
Triangle Strategy features an intricate story that can be played and enjoyed multiple times, as intended in the games' design. Decisions have consequences and shape the turn of events and players can see up to four different endings yada yada this has been done many times and what's actually setting this game apart: the story is pretty good on a subsequent try and if you enjoy political mysteries this game's gonna be a field trip. It's not the most complicated thing, but many twists can be foreseen just the right amount of time and a few will surprise you like red circles on a clickbait thumbnail.

Story-wise I cannot regret playing this again, but the gameplay elements were not balanced at all. So you really feel like the person responsible for common sense in game design did not show up for work at a certain point. Places visited before will not contain new items, and battles yield the same loot that they did beforehand. So you need high-tier materials and a lot of money and the game gives you three bananas. Leveling up in the second playthrough is more of a nuisance. There are plenty of characters to recruit and even more are playable in later playthroughs, but you cannot equip and pull up their stats fast enough and the game becomes a grind festivity. This is such an oversight in an overall well developed game.
As for positive elements of gameplay the developers outdid themselves on the flow of battles. Even though they can be long, it never feels boring to play them out. Difficulty can be changed anytime and whenever you lose a battle you don't lose the EXP gained by the characters. This is massive and I hope this will be the gold standard mechanic in all future games of this genre. Overall it was a nice experience.

A masterclass in tactical RPGs. Beautful spritework, a gripping plot that has 4 REAL, satisfying endings and tons of character moments and time spent off the battlefield. The soundtrack isnt super memorable, but its still great, offering grand orchestral pieces for battles and stripped back piano melodies for quiet moments. Every minute of the 30+ hour campaign feels earned, because much like Game of Thrones, the focus isnt just on the main characters. Its a grand narrative jumping between the political struggles of three countries (totally not Starks, Lannisters and Qarth) constantly.

I love the political intrigue and the focused, stripped back class system, making for a strategy RPG that manages to balance a busy storyline and create a gameplay system that doesnt collapse on itself. Focusing on fixed roles for each unit, but offering enough different ones to provide the typical class system variety. I like this because it makes sense. In the ever important story, Erador is a knight, Anna is a spy, Hughette is a mounted archer. Why does making them switch make sense?

Only issue I had was the voice acting, which varied from local Shakespeare production to high school student reading Animal Farm to the class. Maybe throwing voice actors you found on Newgrounds tons of old english dialogue with BIG WORDS is going to backfire?

All things considered, this is my GOTY going into the end of the year.

When I played through the first game, I game it a sort of middling review; the plot and design ethos were perfect, the tone was wonderfully funny without undermining it's characters, and it was so irreverent and caustic but at the same time so kind. But the gameplay was very difficult to adjust to; the physics were bad, Raz was incredibly floaty (and not just when he's meant to be) and the difficulty ramp was weird. I went into Psychonauts 2 extremely optimistic, having heard that it stayed true to the tone of the first game, now with much better combat and more consistent physics.

I went in optimistic and was thoroughly blown away. The gameplay is wonderful; movement is fast, snappy, and satisfying. Combat is much faster, and Raz can use multiple psy-powers at once. It's honestly some of the best, if not THE best combat I've EVER seen in a platformer game. The combat doesn't feel like a break from the platforming, but like it builds upon what's already there, and neither platforming nor combat distracts from the other. By the end of the first game I'd given up on anything resembling completionism; I didn't enjoy moving around the world enough to keep doing it more than I had to to progress the plot. But in this one, I put off the final section for three days because I was having so much fun with the gameplay and didn't want it to end.

And the plot and design! The game hasn't lost any of its stellar artistic sensibilities; the most beautiful levels of the first game are easily matched or outdone by every level in this one. And the first's plot is built upon in a genuinely beautiful way, making way for a deeper story, more characters, and all without losing any of the personality that made the first one feel so...well, personal. I loved the new characters and their relationships with each other; Bob and Helmut especially. I won't get into spoilers, but the game's overarching theme of 'people can do horrific, irredeemable things without being horrific, irredeemable people' is so, so lovely, and delivered with such empathy and care.

I have my personal quibbles, of course (Donatella you need to apologize properly to your son for being passive-aggressive and guilt-slingy!!!!) but honestly, I wouldn't hesitate to call this a very nearly perfect game. It's gorgeous, it's unique, the story is incredible and the gameplay feels really, really good. One of the best games I've ever played for sure.

The first half of this BioShock Infinite apology tour leaves much to be desired. As a staunch fan and defender of the core game's narrative despite its rampant flaws, Burial at Sea: Episode One seems content to make sure the BioShock critic of every stripe is dumbfounded and disappointed. Can I safely say this is Ken Levine's The Rise of Skywalker? I'll need to play the second part before I hand down that guilty verdict. Regardless, much of the problems from the base game carry over here: laborious FPS arenas, lacking level design, and the added bonus of copious 'member berries for fans of the original BioShock, all tied together into a narrative that undercuts BioShock Infinite's ending and adds more fuel to the fire for anyone with a negative disposition towards that game anyway. If I wasn't just coming off of revisiting BioShock Infinite, I'd probably call this expansion "perfectly cromulent." It isn't, however. It is remarkably worse.

Half-hour sections of truly inspired gaming layered between long sections of backtracking, fetching, and repeating things you have already done. Motion focused gameplay leads to mixed results but the successes outnumber the failings.

The sword fighting is unique and they do clever things with the precision aiming/analog sword control. I played almost exclusively in stick control "motion controls turned off" and while flicking the stick in a specific direction lead to some aggravation in some instances I feel like it was a net positive because by the end of the game the sword fighting is what I looked forward to.
The biggest negative I can hold against the game is it is just PADDED. If they would have boiled down the great parts of the game this would have been a classic. I get the impression they wanted to stretch the content out a little farther than they had fresh ideas for. You fight essentially the same boss 3 times... multiplied by 2 different bosses.

In the end, I enjoyed it. Sometimes I hated it. By the end I was glad to be done with it. It is near the bottom of the list of mainline Zelda games but not because it is a failure but due to the high quality of the series over the years.