Weepboop
BACKER
2012
The tragic beauty of the story told in Spec Ops: The Line has been told in so many video essays and others' reviews that I won't touch on too much of it, other than that I'm extremely glad to have actually experienced it full hand.
Spec Ops tells a harrowing tale of the horrors of war and the horrific nature of Western involvement in the Middle East. Playing through this game is not pleasant at all, beginning as a typical third person cover shooter and delving very quickly into the psyche of a soldier in command of a nightmarish operation.
I knew going into this that it wouldn't be sunshine and smiles at all, and that was definitely the case. I think this is a very necessary playthrough for folks if they can catch it on sale. It's short and rarely overstays its welcome in any segment of the gameplay, allowing the dark story to stay at the forefront of the player's experience. Visuals, storytelling, and voice acting all accent what is an excellent campaign experience.
The main drawback within Spec Ops is the combat, and I think many others would agree. For a fair comparison it feels like the first Uncharted game, where you're tasked with making some fairly difficult shots with a not so friendly targeting and recoil system. Thankfully the game gives you guns that have some serious "Umph" but it can get quite frustrating. Lack of enemy variety and the excessively short TTK on the main character added to major gripes I had with the non-story aspect of the game.
As I've mentioned, there are others who have done phenomenal jobs dissecting this game and I strongly urge everyone to check those out. For those who find that story is the most important aspect of a game, and want to experience one of the better ones out there, Spec Ops: The Line is your game. It's not perfect, but it's a standout title.
Spec Ops tells a harrowing tale of the horrors of war and the horrific nature of Western involvement in the Middle East. Playing through this game is not pleasant at all, beginning as a typical third person cover shooter and delving very quickly into the psyche of a soldier in command of a nightmarish operation.
I knew going into this that it wouldn't be sunshine and smiles at all, and that was definitely the case. I think this is a very necessary playthrough for folks if they can catch it on sale. It's short and rarely overstays its welcome in any segment of the gameplay, allowing the dark story to stay at the forefront of the player's experience. Visuals, storytelling, and voice acting all accent what is an excellent campaign experience.
The main drawback within Spec Ops is the combat, and I think many others would agree. For a fair comparison it feels like the first Uncharted game, where you're tasked with making some fairly difficult shots with a not so friendly targeting and recoil system. Thankfully the game gives you guns that have some serious "Umph" but it can get quite frustrating. Lack of enemy variety and the excessively short TTK on the main character added to major gripes I had with the non-story aspect of the game.
As I've mentioned, there are others who have done phenomenal jobs dissecting this game and I strongly urge everyone to check those out. For those who find that story is the most important aspect of a game, and want to experience one of the better ones out there, Spec Ops: The Line is your game. It's not perfect, but it's a standout title.
I love you
But when you're gone
There'll be Nothing else
I'll be all alone
All alone
It's more Plague Tale!.. for better or for worse. I might as well start off with what makes it good, and there's defintiely some weight there. Plague Tale: Requiem is a whole lot more "serious" than its predecessor in that its a darker and more depraved game, which in theory doesn't make any media "better" but with a topic as traumatically heavy as the Black Plague, I think is necessary. Requiem doesn't shy away from death in its most cruel and encroaching forms. Characters close to Amicia and Hugo will perish, entire populations will vanish, and the two constantly weigh the consequences of their actions and quest to right the proverbial ship. The game doesn't only do this through the story, but with the backgrounds and environments that the two travel through. After spending much of the first game in Guyenne, the growing party spend much of Requiem in transit. While many of these locations are luscious at first, thanks to some amazing environmental work by Asobo, they quickly descend into dilapidated warzones dripping with plague-borne ooze and despair. I think this allowed me to get more emotionally invested in the game than its predecessor, I found myself groaning less at the dialogue/conversations because I was consistently grossed out by what I was looking at, which is a good thing. Overall I think characters were written much better; Hugo was way less annoying than in the first game, Lucas was actually fun to be around, Arnaud plays a good guardian, and Amicia leans in to the derangement necessary to defeat the evil at hand. While I'm not a fan of Amicia's voice actress, the writing of her character made her a very compelling sibling protagonist.
The story was also quite good in Requiem, though I don't think it (nor Ragnarok) should have been nominated for this at the game awards. Ultimately the themes don't get too deep, other than trying to find a cure for Hugo and defeating the Plague Rat issue, but The Last of Us didn't get too deep either outside of being a story more about humans against humans. I'm not trying to compare the two, because The Last of Us 1 is nearly a flawless game, but I think the commonality in a worldwide destructive illness and how humans react to it tie the two's stories, rather than being more philosophical. Plague Tale 2's narrative jumps around a bit and has some fairly obvious twists, but I found it compelling enough to see it all the way through the end, because it was satiating enough and the writing of characters made me kind of want to see their resolutions.
Now it may read that I was more favorable on the game than I was with Innocence, which is true to a point but there were a number of things not improved from first title to sequel. The first being the combat, it's still really bad... it's samey and motonous and any fighting involving the sling and crossbow take waaaaaaaay too long. If you're being attacked by multiple characters, it's effectively just a kite simulator in which you have to find an impediment to enemy movement, run five steps away, throw a sling, run five steps away, repeat. Even though you can upgrade the sling motion (which was hard because the game doesn't regularily give you enough resources to do this,) it's not enough to give you any flow to fighting. Amicia still has to rev it up and watch as the enemies run a little too fast at her, often times requiring other ammo types to defeat. This was also annoying, and ultimately was my problem with Scarlet Nexus (I bet you didn't think I'd include that here.) In Requiem, much like Scarlet Nexus, the player is given a ton of tools for defeating the enemies. But this is a guise to hide enemy variety, because just like with SN each of these concoctions made by Lucas are used for a certain enemy type. This means that the player doesn't really have agency to how they want to fight (which is key in gaming) but just has to match the type of alchemical item to whatever enemy is running at them, that got annoying and always will in games.
Another issue I had with Requiem, that I also had recently with GoW: Ragnarok, is the just constant puzzling for absolutely no reason. I'm staunchly anti-puzzle, but I can excuse it in games like Resident Evil or Zelda where they make it flow well enough with the game or encourage the player to succeed through self-discovery. Requiem's puzzles are just there... they're not hard, they're not fun, they're just there, and are EVERYWHERE. You're rarely given a hint, and the obnoxiousness of the puzzles being there just to pack in gametime only frustrated me throughout the narratively intense moments in the story.
Requiem was also rather buggy with enemy movement, often times if you were about to exit an area after sneaking through a plethora of guards and had alerted just one, they would teleport through a wall and stop you. I get that the devs wanted you to "sneak the right way" by either taking out all the guards or getting through undetected, but it got annoying how often I was penalized from reaching the objective while an alarm was raised. Maybe there's a "git gud" here but I found it far more annoying than not.
While A Plague Tale: Requiem is exactly what I was looking for Innocence's sequel narratively speaking, the constant puzzling for the sake of puzzling and lack of improvement to combat is not enough to warrant a higher rating. I wouldn't recommend Plague Tale as a series, but if you want a story taking place in a unique period in gaming (The Hundred Years War/Black Plague,) maybe you should start the under twenty hour A Plague Tale: Requiem
But when you're gone
There'll be Nothing else
I'll be all alone
All alone
It's more Plague Tale!.. for better or for worse. I might as well start off with what makes it good, and there's defintiely some weight there. Plague Tale: Requiem is a whole lot more "serious" than its predecessor in that its a darker and more depraved game, which in theory doesn't make any media "better" but with a topic as traumatically heavy as the Black Plague, I think is necessary. Requiem doesn't shy away from death in its most cruel and encroaching forms. Characters close to Amicia and Hugo will perish, entire populations will vanish, and the two constantly weigh the consequences of their actions and quest to right the proverbial ship. The game doesn't only do this through the story, but with the backgrounds and environments that the two travel through. After spending much of the first game in Guyenne, the growing party spend much of Requiem in transit. While many of these locations are luscious at first, thanks to some amazing environmental work by Asobo, they quickly descend into dilapidated warzones dripping with plague-borne ooze and despair. I think this allowed me to get more emotionally invested in the game than its predecessor, I found myself groaning less at the dialogue/conversations because I was consistently grossed out by what I was looking at, which is a good thing. Overall I think characters were written much better; Hugo was way less annoying than in the first game, Lucas was actually fun to be around, Arnaud plays a good guardian, and Amicia leans in to the derangement necessary to defeat the evil at hand. While I'm not a fan of Amicia's voice actress, the writing of her character made her a very compelling sibling protagonist.
The story was also quite good in Requiem, though I don't think it (nor Ragnarok) should have been nominated for this at the game awards. Ultimately the themes don't get too deep, other than trying to find a cure for Hugo and defeating the Plague Rat issue, but The Last of Us didn't get too deep either outside of being a story more about humans against humans. I'm not trying to compare the two, because The Last of Us 1 is nearly a flawless game, but I think the commonality in a worldwide destructive illness and how humans react to it tie the two's stories, rather than being more philosophical. Plague Tale 2's narrative jumps around a bit and has some fairly obvious twists, but I found it compelling enough to see it all the way through the end, because it was satiating enough and the writing of characters made me kind of want to see their resolutions.
Now it may read that I was more favorable on the game than I was with Innocence, which is true to a point but there were a number of things not improved from first title to sequel. The first being the combat, it's still really bad... it's samey and motonous and any fighting involving the sling and crossbow take waaaaaaaay too long. If you're being attacked by multiple characters, it's effectively just a kite simulator in which you have to find an impediment to enemy movement, run five steps away, throw a sling, run five steps away, repeat. Even though you can upgrade the sling motion (which was hard because the game doesn't regularily give you enough resources to do this,) it's not enough to give you any flow to fighting. Amicia still has to rev it up and watch as the enemies run a little too fast at her, often times requiring other ammo types to defeat. This was also annoying, and ultimately was my problem with Scarlet Nexus (I bet you didn't think I'd include that here.) In Requiem, much like Scarlet Nexus, the player is given a ton of tools for defeating the enemies. But this is a guise to hide enemy variety, because just like with SN each of these concoctions made by Lucas are used for a certain enemy type. This means that the player doesn't really have agency to how they want to fight (which is key in gaming) but just has to match the type of alchemical item to whatever enemy is running at them, that got annoying and always will in games.
Another issue I had with Requiem, that I also had recently with GoW: Ragnarok, is the just constant puzzling for absolutely no reason. I'm staunchly anti-puzzle, but I can excuse it in games like Resident Evil or Zelda where they make it flow well enough with the game or encourage the player to succeed through self-discovery. Requiem's puzzles are just there... they're not hard, they're not fun, they're just there, and are EVERYWHERE. You're rarely given a hint, and the obnoxiousness of the puzzles being there just to pack in gametime only frustrated me throughout the narratively intense moments in the story.
Requiem was also rather buggy with enemy movement, often times if you were about to exit an area after sneaking through a plethora of guards and had alerted just one, they would teleport through a wall and stop you. I get that the devs wanted you to "sneak the right way" by either taking out all the guards or getting through undetected, but it got annoying how often I was penalized from reaching the objective while an alarm was raised. Maybe there's a "git gud" here but I found it far more annoying than not.
While A Plague Tale: Requiem is exactly what I was looking for Innocence's sequel narratively speaking, the constant puzzling for the sake of puzzling and lack of improvement to combat is not enough to warrant a higher rating. I wouldn't recommend Plague Tale as a series, but if you want a story taking place in a unique period in gaming (The Hundred Years War/Black Plague,) maybe you should start the under twenty hour A Plague Tale: Requiem
2017
Is this the price I’m paying for my past mistakes?
I’m a big Platinum games fan, I’ve played most of the games in their catalog (with Bayonetta and MGS:R being my favorites outside of Nier) but it wasn’t the combat of this game that made me fall in love with it, it was the story from none other than the eclectic Yoko Taro. A complete playthrough of Automata requires beating the game three times through and reaching five endings, for any other game that might seem monotonous and boring, but with this one I felt like I constantly needed more. The characters you meet in the first playthrough can seem a bit one dimensional or certainly archetypal (A2 for instance is basically a tsundere,) but on subsequent playthroughs for endings B-E are entirely different. Nobody in Nier: Automata is easily explained, no piece of philosophy or plotpoint can be arrived at within a short minute long explanation. Everything in this post apocalyptic world is a mystery to be unraveled through the players interaction. What are the humans we are fighting for doing? Why did Earth eventually fall into ruin? Can robots and androids feel emotion?
Jaw dropping settings galore exist within Automata, from the breathtaking desert ruins to the haunting Amusement Park to the Ruined City that Devola & Popola call home base. There is never a moment that I felt was boring or lacked emotion within this game. The story and environment packaged with the greatest soundtrack to ever grace a video game by the amazing Keiichi Okabe made Nier: Automata at top five game for me.
I’m a big Platinum games fan, I’ve played most of the games in their catalog (with Bayonetta and MGS:R being my favorites outside of Nier) but it wasn’t the combat of this game that made me fall in love with it, it was the story from none other than the eclectic Yoko Taro. A complete playthrough of Automata requires beating the game three times through and reaching five endings, for any other game that might seem monotonous and boring, but with this one I felt like I constantly needed more. The characters you meet in the first playthrough can seem a bit one dimensional or certainly archetypal (A2 for instance is basically a tsundere,) but on subsequent playthroughs for endings B-E are entirely different. Nobody in Nier: Automata is easily explained, no piece of philosophy or plotpoint can be arrived at within a short minute long explanation. Everything in this post apocalyptic world is a mystery to be unraveled through the players interaction. What are the humans we are fighting for doing? Why did Earth eventually fall into ruin? Can robots and androids feel emotion?
Jaw dropping settings galore exist within Automata, from the breathtaking desert ruins to the haunting Amusement Park to the Ruined City that Devola & Popola call home base. There is never a moment that I felt was boring or lacked emotion within this game. The story and environment packaged with the greatest soundtrack to ever grace a video game by the amazing Keiichi Okabe made Nier: Automata at top five game for me.
2023
Cocoon is a gorgeously presented nothing-burger of a game that utilizes fairly intricate sequencing and light puzzling to manifest a rather milquetoast experience.
I'm not a fan of puzzle games in general, so take this shortform review with whatever grain salt you wish, but I grew bored pretty quick and the allure of the world's mystery fell flat as I continued through each zone. I can't overstate how beautiful Cocoon is, and how well the sci-fi adjacent soundtrack pairs with the actions and intrigue of the landscapes you are walking, jumping, and teleporting through, but that is effectively the only thing I enjoyed about it.
When I find myself growing tired with a game, I ask myself "why?" Why am I continuing with it, why am I pushing forward? I didn't really have an answer with Cocoon other than that it was a lazy Sunday with nothing to do and no plans made, so I pushed through. The monotony wore and wore as I went on and regretfully was too much for me to find really any enjoyment out of it. Though the environments were lush and there was clearly love put into it, I felt Cocoon was overall a drab experience.
I'm not a fan of puzzle games in general, so take this shortform review with whatever grain salt you wish, but I grew bored pretty quick and the allure of the world's mystery fell flat as I continued through each zone. I can't overstate how beautiful Cocoon is, and how well the sci-fi adjacent soundtrack pairs with the actions and intrigue of the landscapes you are walking, jumping, and teleporting through, but that is effectively the only thing I enjoyed about it.
When I find myself growing tired with a game, I ask myself "why?" Why am I continuing with it, why am I pushing forward? I didn't really have an answer with Cocoon other than that it was a lazy Sunday with nothing to do and no plans made, so I pushed through. The monotony wore and wore as I went on and regretfully was too much for me to find really any enjoyment out of it. Though the environments were lush and there was clearly love put into it, I felt Cocoon was overall a drab experience.
2019
Yakuza 5 times the dissapointment.
This is a weird playthrough for me, as I played this game in between a LOT of social engagements that left me introverted out coupled with a lack of sleep which resulted in me being quite tired bwhile playing a lot of Yakuza 5. I'd come home from wherever, boot it up, play for a few hours, nod off, then go to sleep. That almost never happens with me in games, when it's my time to turn off for the night, I'll do it, but I stuck with Yakuza 5 because I was hoping for that moment in the story that I'd be motivated to stay up like I had the other games. I kept playing and turning it on in the hope that I'd get to that ONE chapter that kept me going into the wee hours of the morning, but it never came. I was greatly dissapointed in everything after the initial Kiryu arc, and even that felt rough to me.
I found none of the locations outside of Kamurocho particularly inspiring, Fukuoka was pretty but I didn't really like the side content, in particular doing any of the street racing. I kind of liked Kiryu doing a whole Iriqouis Pliskin-Solid Snake kinda thing under the alias "Taichi Suzuki" but it didn't lead anywhere important enough for me. I think if this game purely followed Kiryu living in secret, or attempting to, I would have been far more entertained. Taiga's locales (gameplay I'll get to) bored me with a grave degree. You spend a lot of time in some claustrophobically small environements and zones as him with questionably boring to bad gameplay and story beats that I found it hard to imagine that this was the same franchise I'd been playing. Haruka' story largely taking place in Sotenbori was fine but man, that city has been largely unfun to run around in after Majima made it his stomping grounds in 0. Akiyama in Kamurocho was good, I love Akiyama and love Kamurocho. Shinada in Nagoya was rough, as I found the city lifeless and largely boring.
Story-wise this wasn't necessarily the weakest Yakuza I've played on paper, as Yakuza 3 exists and I'm still not really sure what I was supposed to take away from that, but man the length that draws and draws this mediocre at best story harms the overall game greatly. They attempt to tie four stories (really five but I'm compressing Akiyama and Haruka into one) in the same manner that Yakuza 4 did but it was at the expense of me caring really at all. They take a loooooooot of time setting up Shinada's tragic baseball downfall and Taiga's prison escape/road to redemption, but to me it completely fell flat. The risk taken for exposure here didn't land, it bored me quite a lot when coupled with the monotonous gameplay of three of the four scenarios. Lastly about the story, Haruka's idol segment is a complete and utter miss. I didn't find it compelling at all, as it felt honestly like a story I'd seen before plenty of times in anime/games about uninspired music, boring (and again not new) teen drama, logical holes, and unendearing characters. Nobody outside of Park in Haruka's story had me asking for more out of them. In the nature of my first paragraph, I kept playing though because I believed something was going to happen that would make me jump up and say "Wow, now I'm interested!" but it never came. The beef between Tset and Haruka was juvenile and handled very poorly from a plausible plot perspective, and the rhythm game sections were just, bad.
I've written just about Yakuza combat being poor in just about all of my reviews of the series thus far and... surprise! It's still bad, this time maybe the worst I've experienced. Boss fights are just downright brutal, with most mainstory bosses (especially in the final gauntlet,) having no hitstun, ability to break out of combos, and a stun that penalizes you for trying to string together more than two hits in a combo. Most of this game's combat from a boss-fight perspective is playing the waiting game to get your chip damage in while also item checking to make sure you've bought enough sushi sets to fully heal you through whatever garbage you're about to endure. The last fight in this game could legitimately have been condensed by about fifteen minutes. Kiryu plays like he always has (minus Yakuza Kiwami 1) which is alright, Taiga still has a one dimensional brawler style, Akiyama is the most fun (because his kicks lend themselves to a faster paced style,) Haruka's rhyhthm fights were just annoying, and lastly Shinada's baseball-style felt like a weaker and even more numbing version of Taiga's. Nobody in this game really felt fun to play, but maybe I'm still chasing the ghost of playing Majima in Yakuza 0. The bear hunting stuff in Taiga's chapter had me really confused, it felt like a side story/optional scenario that they could have made optional as the mechanics were rather grueling.
I probably could have written a better review and condensed my thoughts in a manner that were more coherent of critique than complaints, as I usually try to, but this really just felt numbing to me. It didn't feel like a game I should exhaust more effort into writing about in great detail, it just... felt like something I spent a lot of time on that was mediocre at best. I had this same feeling when playing Soul Hackers 2 but at least that had Jack Frost.
I can't believe I'm saying this, but I'm truly hopeful that Sonic Frontiers, which I'm playing next, has more for me than Yakuza 5. I can't recommend Yakuza 5 unless you're set on completing the saga of Kiryu Kazuma.
This is a weird playthrough for me, as I played this game in between a LOT of social engagements that left me introverted out coupled with a lack of sleep which resulted in me being quite tired bwhile playing a lot of Yakuza 5. I'd come home from wherever, boot it up, play for a few hours, nod off, then go to sleep. That almost never happens with me in games, when it's my time to turn off for the night, I'll do it, but I stuck with Yakuza 5 because I was hoping for that moment in the story that I'd be motivated to stay up like I had the other games. I kept playing and turning it on in the hope that I'd get to that ONE chapter that kept me going into the wee hours of the morning, but it never came. I was greatly dissapointed in everything after the initial Kiryu arc, and even that felt rough to me.
I found none of the locations outside of Kamurocho particularly inspiring, Fukuoka was pretty but I didn't really like the side content, in particular doing any of the street racing. I kind of liked Kiryu doing a whole Iriqouis Pliskin-Solid Snake kinda thing under the alias "Taichi Suzuki" but it didn't lead anywhere important enough for me. I think if this game purely followed Kiryu living in secret, or attempting to, I would have been far more entertained. Taiga's locales (gameplay I'll get to) bored me with a grave degree. You spend a lot of time in some claustrophobically small environements and zones as him with questionably boring to bad gameplay and story beats that I found it hard to imagine that this was the same franchise I'd been playing. Haruka' story largely taking place in Sotenbori was fine but man, that city has been largely unfun to run around in after Majima made it his stomping grounds in 0. Akiyama in Kamurocho was good, I love Akiyama and love Kamurocho. Shinada in Nagoya was rough, as I found the city lifeless and largely boring.
Story-wise this wasn't necessarily the weakest Yakuza I've played on paper, as Yakuza 3 exists and I'm still not really sure what I was supposed to take away from that, but man the length that draws and draws this mediocre at best story harms the overall game greatly. They attempt to tie four stories (really five but I'm compressing Akiyama and Haruka into one) in the same manner that Yakuza 4 did but it was at the expense of me caring really at all. They take a loooooooot of time setting up Shinada's tragic baseball downfall and Taiga's prison escape/road to redemption, but to me it completely fell flat. The risk taken for exposure here didn't land, it bored me quite a lot when coupled with the monotonous gameplay of three of the four scenarios. Lastly about the story, Haruka's idol segment is a complete and utter miss. I didn't find it compelling at all, as it felt honestly like a story I'd seen before plenty of times in anime/games about uninspired music, boring (and again not new) teen drama, logical holes, and unendearing characters. Nobody outside of Park in Haruka's story had me asking for more out of them. In the nature of my first paragraph, I kept playing though because I believed something was going to happen that would make me jump up and say "Wow, now I'm interested!" but it never came. The beef between Tset and Haruka was juvenile and handled very poorly from a plausible plot perspective, and the rhythm game sections were just, bad.
I've written just about Yakuza combat being poor in just about all of my reviews of the series thus far and... surprise! It's still bad, this time maybe the worst I've experienced. Boss fights are just downright brutal, with most mainstory bosses (especially in the final gauntlet,) having no hitstun, ability to break out of combos, and a stun that penalizes you for trying to string together more than two hits in a combo. Most of this game's combat from a boss-fight perspective is playing the waiting game to get your chip damage in while also item checking to make sure you've bought enough sushi sets to fully heal you through whatever garbage you're about to endure. The last fight in this game could legitimately have been condensed by about fifteen minutes. Kiryu plays like he always has (minus Yakuza Kiwami 1) which is alright, Taiga still has a one dimensional brawler style, Akiyama is the most fun (because his kicks lend themselves to a faster paced style,) Haruka's rhyhthm fights were just annoying, and lastly Shinada's baseball-style felt like a weaker and even more numbing version of Taiga's. Nobody in this game really felt fun to play, but maybe I'm still chasing the ghost of playing Majima in Yakuza 0. The bear hunting stuff in Taiga's chapter had me really confused, it felt like a side story/optional scenario that they could have made optional as the mechanics were rather grueling.
I probably could have written a better review and condensed my thoughts in a manner that were more coherent of critique than complaints, as I usually try to, but this really just felt numbing to me. It didn't feel like a game I should exhaust more effort into writing about in great detail, it just... felt like something I spent a lot of time on that was mediocre at best. I had this same feeling when playing Soul Hackers 2 but at least that had Jack Frost.
I can't believe I'm saying this, but I'm truly hopeful that Sonic Frontiers, which I'm playing next, has more for me than Yakuza 5. I can't recommend Yakuza 5 unless you're set on completing the saga of Kiryu Kazuma.
2020
I became interested in this game after Jan Ochoa on GiantBomb had been hyping it up a loooong time ago but didn't buy it because I was preoccupied with work and longer JRPG's at the time. Now that it's out on game pass I finally got a chance to check it out. Umurangi Generation is a short camera-based experience in which you snatch photos around a dystopian landscape crafted in an awesome artstyle. The commentary about society and politics in the environment is probably explained elsewhere very well, but I found it to add to the intrigue of the game to a positive degree.
The best part about Umurangi though without a shadow of a doubt is the ThorHighHeels soundtrack, the world needs more ThorHighHeels. Definitely check this out if you have Game Pass.
The best part about Umurangi though without a shadow of a doubt is the ThorHighHeels soundtrack, the world needs more ThorHighHeels. Definitely check this out if you have Game Pass.
2022
Triangle Strategy is a breath of fresh air in the current market of games, and an amazing return to form for the Tactics RPG genre. After putting around 50 hours into Octopath Traveler, I was a little weary of what this team would offer when they first announced Project Triangle Strategy. I will admit though, when I saw that they were pivoting from the grindy JRPG sphere into Tactics, that piqued my interest greatly as FE:3H is one of my favorite games of all time. The initial advertising and trailers pinpointed a new focus into story, something Octopath lacked greatly. With the spotlight on story and a navigation into a new genre for the team, I put in an order for Triangle Strategy without having played any of the demos and going in mostly blind.
What I got out of the experience was an absolutely gorgeous and well crafted strategic experience. The presentation of this game is top tier in every aspect. The 2D-HD pixel art is incredible especially when paired with the elegantly designed backgrounds. Every navigatable zone felt different from the rest in terms of art, every side character discernable from the others, every cutscene full of life. I was genuinely impressed with how nostalgic of an experience this felt like for an era of games I never got to play, solely due to the phenomenal execution of the art direction. Castles felt regal and realistic, despite their 2D limitations, making me wonder what a Chrono Trigger or FFVI would look like in this style if redone by this team.
Gameplay was also very well done for this game, however is unforgiving if you play lazy! I went in on normal, as I do with most games, and found myself having to play a LOT smarter than I did with FE:3H or any other tactics game I've played as of the past few years. Enemies constantly seek synergy attacks and will crit whenever given the opportunity, bosses hit like a truck, and you are penalized by the opposition for grouping on top of each other. Missions are also set up to make you think each time, with only a few main story (and mock battle) missions making the objective to clear out all enemies. Often there is a gimmick attached that begs the player to adhere to a certain playstyle in accomplishing objectives. Sometimes these could be a little aggrivating, but over all I felt were a great refresh in creating a non monotonous experience. Each character in your fairly large party feels unique, something that goes MILES further than you might imagine. Creating a carefully crafted party throughout the game is rewarding, as playstyles for using certain party members carry different results in varying ways. Some of my friends used a build that relied on Anna (the assassin) getting as many attacks as possible, whereas I relied mostly on ranged mages and archers to get my melee characters into combat safely. I loved this aspect, as even FE:3H felt like I had my Mages and Physicals that all were prescribed to "do damage." In Triangle Strategy, each character compliments the others with something they bring to the table. My tank Erador was great for grabbing aggro and taking the brunt of damage, my archer Rudolph was great for setting traps and playing the midrange, and my mage Frederica was perfect for taking out heavy armor. I enjoy games that emplore the player to use their full arsenal.
Now previously I mentioned that this game had a heavier focus on story in comparison to the team's previous effort with Octopath, and it does. The game is loooong, and there are a TON of cutscenes with story relevant dialogue and discourse amongst the three kingdoms of the game's land. This might be a lot for some people, however I found it to be a great way to add life and fluff to a game rather than making it a battle between the good guys and the bad guys. Politics and economics take the forefront of Triangle Strategy's story, but neither are talked in a way that is necessarily offputting or grating. This serves as a double edged sword however, as the brevity that the game's narrative speaks with on any possible themes doesn't go much further than telling the story as it is. The political infighting of the Glenbrook houses and their neighboring kindgoms is... simply that. For some people that is alright, and for me it was just that, simply alright. The story being not AMAZING is one of the major things that prevents this game from getting 4.5 stars. I still do think the story was enjoyable, and the narrative was quite good, but I think "good" is how I would describe it, not "great." All in all that's alright, because the story was just enough to go along with the fun mechanics of the gameplay and perfect art/music direction.
Triangle Strategy is a genuinely enjoyable experience and a great return to form for the Tactics RPG genre. Anyone who is a fan of the old school tactics games should consider checking out the demo. I had a great time playing this game.
What I got out of the experience was an absolutely gorgeous and well crafted strategic experience. The presentation of this game is top tier in every aspect. The 2D-HD pixel art is incredible especially when paired with the elegantly designed backgrounds. Every navigatable zone felt different from the rest in terms of art, every side character discernable from the others, every cutscene full of life. I was genuinely impressed with how nostalgic of an experience this felt like for an era of games I never got to play, solely due to the phenomenal execution of the art direction. Castles felt regal and realistic, despite their 2D limitations, making me wonder what a Chrono Trigger or FFVI would look like in this style if redone by this team.
Gameplay was also very well done for this game, however is unforgiving if you play lazy! I went in on normal, as I do with most games, and found myself having to play a LOT smarter than I did with FE:3H or any other tactics game I've played as of the past few years. Enemies constantly seek synergy attacks and will crit whenever given the opportunity, bosses hit like a truck, and you are penalized by the opposition for grouping on top of each other. Missions are also set up to make you think each time, with only a few main story (and mock battle) missions making the objective to clear out all enemies. Often there is a gimmick attached that begs the player to adhere to a certain playstyle in accomplishing objectives. Sometimes these could be a little aggrivating, but over all I felt were a great refresh in creating a non monotonous experience. Each character in your fairly large party feels unique, something that goes MILES further than you might imagine. Creating a carefully crafted party throughout the game is rewarding, as playstyles for using certain party members carry different results in varying ways. Some of my friends used a build that relied on Anna (the assassin) getting as many attacks as possible, whereas I relied mostly on ranged mages and archers to get my melee characters into combat safely. I loved this aspect, as even FE:3H felt like I had my Mages and Physicals that all were prescribed to "do damage." In Triangle Strategy, each character compliments the others with something they bring to the table. My tank Erador was great for grabbing aggro and taking the brunt of damage, my archer Rudolph was great for setting traps and playing the midrange, and my mage Frederica was perfect for taking out heavy armor. I enjoy games that emplore the player to use their full arsenal.
Now previously I mentioned that this game had a heavier focus on story in comparison to the team's previous effort with Octopath, and it does. The game is loooong, and there are a TON of cutscenes with story relevant dialogue and discourse amongst the three kingdoms of the game's land. This might be a lot for some people, however I found it to be a great way to add life and fluff to a game rather than making it a battle between the good guys and the bad guys. Politics and economics take the forefront of Triangle Strategy's story, but neither are talked in a way that is necessarily offputting or grating. This serves as a double edged sword however, as the brevity that the game's narrative speaks with on any possible themes doesn't go much further than telling the story as it is. The political infighting of the Glenbrook houses and their neighboring kindgoms is... simply that. For some people that is alright, and for me it was just that, simply alright. The story being not AMAZING is one of the major things that prevents this game from getting 4.5 stars. I still do think the story was enjoyable, and the narrative was quite good, but I think "good" is how I would describe it, not "great." All in all that's alright, because the story was just enough to go along with the fun mechanics of the gameplay and perfect art/music direction.
Triangle Strategy is a genuinely enjoyable experience and a great return to form for the Tactics RPG genre. Anyone who is a fan of the old school tactics games should consider checking out the demo. I had a great time playing this game.
2001
This review contains spoilers
Listen to my story... this may be our last chance.
Final Fantasy X is the peak of Square Enix's flagship franchise, why? It tells the perfect story that hits every beat and will leave you both sad and in awe.
The 45 hour journey begins with a braggadocious young adult playing spherical water polo and quickly transforms into something so special that I was glued to my monitor right away. Tidus, the star player of the Zanarkand Abes is taken away from his home and placed in the world of Spira with seemingly no purpose. Eventually he will meet a young girl by the name of Yuna and neither of their lives will be the same.
Musically, FFX is again a masterclass from Nobuo Uematsu. "To Zanarkand" is an all time favorite by most out of all Final Fantasy tracks, and "Yuna's Theme," "Besaid," "Spira Unplugged," "A Fleeting Dream," and "Fight with Seymour" are all timeless. FFX saw Uematsu go more ethereal and spiritual than he ever had before. Finally he had voice acting to go along with his songs, he could create background music that would still serve a purpose yet not become more memorable than the occurrences of the game at hand, it was a perfect job of making the game experience feel enhanced through the power of sound.
The setting of FFX is easily my favorite in the series; in FFVI you saw a typical fantasy world that was interspersed with machines, FFVII went into the future with Midgar yet remained fantasy, FFVIII went to space, and FFIX remained a medieval fantasy as a love letter to Final Fantasy of yore. FFX had the most striking departure from this and created a world reminiscent of the pacific island nations. The locales and cultures you visit are impressive and unique to gaming, you meet people who spend their whole life on the ocean and have a spiritual culture. Places like Besaid, Kilika and Luca are all varied and easy to remember, especially when you witness the destruction and sorrow that visits them.
The characters of FFX (outside of the story) are easily the best case the game has for its greatness. The great thing about a game based on a great journey/pilgrimage like FFX is that you have a great way to measure character growth. How was character Y at their journey beginning, and how are they now? No character in FFX be it hero or villain is the same at these two spots in the game. The most stark difference is in the heroic three of Tidus, Yuna, and Wakka. Tidus starts the journey out like I previously mentioned as a cocky athlete, son of one of the greatest in the sport to ever have existed, he’s jovial and has little to no filter and sees no wrong in his actions. Throughout the journey he begins to humanize and slow down in his extroverted nature. As he sees all the tragedy befalling Spira, Tidus realizes that being all happy go lucky can often be a detriment to the hopes and dreams of those around him. His caring for Yuna moves quickly from funny friend to concerned lover. People oft remember him for the infamous “HAHAHAHA” scene outside Luca, but should bring to mind the Macalania Wood endeavor crying scene first. How do you go from one of the best in your respective field to starting out anew in a foreign world, fighting against the most devastating force in the history of time immemorial? There is no correct answer, however Tidus does a pretty damn good job showcasing the way to do so. Another great character is Wakka, a fun loving Polynesian Blitzball player who loves to do no more than worship Yevon and play sports. At the start of FFX he is one of the first characters you meet (after Sir Auron,) and he comes off as your best bud who sees no wrong but as time goes on, his shell begins to come off. You soon learn about the tragedy that befell his brother at the hands of foreign weaponry, which explains Wakka’s simply put racism toward the other major ethnic group (the Al Bhed) in the game. He struggles with seeing Al Bhed as equals because of something he’d seen with his own eyes and cannot for the life of him admit that the religious organization he belongs to is responsible for some seriously seedy happenings. Throughout the game we see Wakka go from your funny uncle archetype to your mature best friend, everyone wants a friend like Wakka at the end of this journey. Yuna is the last of these three and oh man, if you want to nominate a “greatest video game heroine” she is without a shadow of a doubt number one. The daughter of the last summoner to defeat Sin (the games primary antagonist and world ending massive demon,) the pressure of greatness was put upon her at birth. From dusk till dawn she has trained and trained to become a summoner because of her bloodline, the expectations put on her are massive from the first time you meet her. Yet despite this insane work ethic and seemingly insurmountable pressure, Yuna is still just a normal girl at the end of the day. After conquering her first trial she attempts to bring luggage with her before Wakka reprimands her and says something along the lines of “this isn’t a vacation Yuna” thus forcing her to leave much of her good and trinkets behind. She often cracks silly jokes, laughs, and even oversleeps on her pilgrimage to become the high summoner to a point where you think she’s just “princess from video game who will eventually win because she has to” but you eventually get to her breaking point. There comes a time in FFX where she bares all to Tidus and admits how scared she is, breaking into tears because she knows the end of the journey of the summoner who defeats Sin ends with death. You get a mostly realistic viewpoint of how a girl plucked from her home to save the world would act in a scenario like this: panicked and afraid, yet cognizant of the great responsibility before her.
I’ve touched on it greatly already but the story of FFX (to me) leaves every other Final Fantasy story in the dust. Not only does it involve an impressive journey beginning in Zanarkand and ending in magnificent glory, but the story beats and multi-leveled themes along the way give it an extreme amount of depth. Conversations about racism, religion, depression, and anxiety all are involved and to a great extent. Characters often shift from good to bad, from reasonable to unreasonable, and the situations Tidus and crew are placed in are rarely ones that go in their favor. There are twists galore regarding the fate of each member of the crew guarding Yuna, as well as the villains they face off against. Though on paper or looking at a guide you can imagine how the game just goes from zone to zone, dungeon to dungeon, temple to temple, it’s often the places in between that give the story the most weight. The nights that the crew spends camping out or resting at a travel agency where Tidus or Yuna will sit outside and give a monologue about their journey and the pain and sadness that comes along with it.
FFX is my favorite SINGLE player game ever, and is a fantastic multi-faceted story about a young man and woman on a journey to save the world from an enemy more sinister and impactful than I’ve seen before.
Final Fantasy X is the peak of Square Enix's flagship franchise, why? It tells the perfect story that hits every beat and will leave you both sad and in awe.
The 45 hour journey begins with a braggadocious young adult playing spherical water polo and quickly transforms into something so special that I was glued to my monitor right away. Tidus, the star player of the Zanarkand Abes is taken away from his home and placed in the world of Spira with seemingly no purpose. Eventually he will meet a young girl by the name of Yuna and neither of their lives will be the same.
Musically, FFX is again a masterclass from Nobuo Uematsu. "To Zanarkand" is an all time favorite by most out of all Final Fantasy tracks, and "Yuna's Theme," "Besaid," "Spira Unplugged," "A Fleeting Dream," and "Fight with Seymour" are all timeless. FFX saw Uematsu go more ethereal and spiritual than he ever had before. Finally he had voice acting to go along with his songs, he could create background music that would still serve a purpose yet not become more memorable than the occurrences of the game at hand, it was a perfect job of making the game experience feel enhanced through the power of sound.
The setting of FFX is easily my favorite in the series; in FFVI you saw a typical fantasy world that was interspersed with machines, FFVII went into the future with Midgar yet remained fantasy, FFVIII went to space, and FFIX remained a medieval fantasy as a love letter to Final Fantasy of yore. FFX had the most striking departure from this and created a world reminiscent of the pacific island nations. The locales and cultures you visit are impressive and unique to gaming, you meet people who spend their whole life on the ocean and have a spiritual culture. Places like Besaid, Kilika and Luca are all varied and easy to remember, especially when you witness the destruction and sorrow that visits them.
The characters of FFX (outside of the story) are easily the best case the game has for its greatness. The great thing about a game based on a great journey/pilgrimage like FFX is that you have a great way to measure character growth. How was character Y at their journey beginning, and how are they now? No character in FFX be it hero or villain is the same at these two spots in the game. The most stark difference is in the heroic three of Tidus, Yuna, and Wakka. Tidus starts the journey out like I previously mentioned as a cocky athlete, son of one of the greatest in the sport to ever have existed, he’s jovial and has little to no filter and sees no wrong in his actions. Throughout the journey he begins to humanize and slow down in his extroverted nature. As he sees all the tragedy befalling Spira, Tidus realizes that being all happy go lucky can often be a detriment to the hopes and dreams of those around him. His caring for Yuna moves quickly from funny friend to concerned lover. People oft remember him for the infamous “HAHAHAHA” scene outside Luca, but should bring to mind the Macalania Wood endeavor crying scene first. How do you go from one of the best in your respective field to starting out anew in a foreign world, fighting against the most devastating force in the history of time immemorial? There is no correct answer, however Tidus does a pretty damn good job showcasing the way to do so. Another great character is Wakka, a fun loving Polynesian Blitzball player who loves to do no more than worship Yevon and play sports. At the start of FFX he is one of the first characters you meet (after Sir Auron,) and he comes off as your best bud who sees no wrong but as time goes on, his shell begins to come off. You soon learn about the tragedy that befell his brother at the hands of foreign weaponry, which explains Wakka’s simply put racism toward the other major ethnic group (the Al Bhed) in the game. He struggles with seeing Al Bhed as equals because of something he’d seen with his own eyes and cannot for the life of him admit that the religious organization he belongs to is responsible for some seriously seedy happenings. Throughout the game we see Wakka go from your funny uncle archetype to your mature best friend, everyone wants a friend like Wakka at the end of this journey. Yuna is the last of these three and oh man, if you want to nominate a “greatest video game heroine” she is without a shadow of a doubt number one. The daughter of the last summoner to defeat Sin (the games primary antagonist and world ending massive demon,) the pressure of greatness was put upon her at birth. From dusk till dawn she has trained and trained to become a summoner because of her bloodline, the expectations put on her are massive from the first time you meet her. Yet despite this insane work ethic and seemingly insurmountable pressure, Yuna is still just a normal girl at the end of the day. After conquering her first trial she attempts to bring luggage with her before Wakka reprimands her and says something along the lines of “this isn’t a vacation Yuna” thus forcing her to leave much of her good and trinkets behind. She often cracks silly jokes, laughs, and even oversleeps on her pilgrimage to become the high summoner to a point where you think she’s just “princess from video game who will eventually win because she has to” but you eventually get to her breaking point. There comes a time in FFX where she bares all to Tidus and admits how scared she is, breaking into tears because she knows the end of the journey of the summoner who defeats Sin ends with death. You get a mostly realistic viewpoint of how a girl plucked from her home to save the world would act in a scenario like this: panicked and afraid, yet cognizant of the great responsibility before her.
I’ve touched on it greatly already but the story of FFX (to me) leaves every other Final Fantasy story in the dust. Not only does it involve an impressive journey beginning in Zanarkand and ending in magnificent glory, but the story beats and multi-leveled themes along the way give it an extreme amount of depth. Conversations about racism, religion, depression, and anxiety all are involved and to a great extent. Characters often shift from good to bad, from reasonable to unreasonable, and the situations Tidus and crew are placed in are rarely ones that go in their favor. There are twists galore regarding the fate of each member of the crew guarding Yuna, as well as the villains they face off against. Though on paper or looking at a guide you can imagine how the game just goes from zone to zone, dungeon to dungeon, temple to temple, it’s often the places in between that give the story the most weight. The nights that the crew spends camping out or resting at a travel agency where Tidus or Yuna will sit outside and give a monologue about their journey and the pain and sadness that comes along with it.
FFX is my favorite SINGLE player game ever, and is a fantastic multi-faceted story about a young man and woman on a journey to save the world from an enemy more sinister and impactful than I’ve seen before.
Ghost Tricked.
I don't know where I went wrong but Ghost Trick is the first game in a long time where I can say I'm completely indifferent to the experience I just had. There will be no longform writeup on my end other than to commend the updated visuals from the DS original and witty humor that graces this beloved puzzle game along with some slight negations. I lost myself in the story and couldn't really be asked to care about any of the characters as I didn't find them compelling or interesting in any real sense. I'm glad others had fun with Ghost Trick but it's a game I'll probably forget, and unfortunately makes me less willing to ever place Ace Attorney.
My immersion was greatly shattered when I realized how arbitrary the four minute time allowance was on the cases, because it's not anything you have control over but rather sequence timing set by the game.
I don't know where I went wrong but Ghost Trick is the first game in a long time where I can say I'm completely indifferent to the experience I just had. There will be no longform writeup on my end other than to commend the updated visuals from the DS original and witty humor that graces this beloved puzzle game along with some slight negations. I lost myself in the story and couldn't really be asked to care about any of the characters as I didn't find them compelling or interesting in any real sense. I'm glad others had fun with Ghost Trick but it's a game I'll probably forget, and unfortunately makes me less willing to ever place Ace Attorney.
My immersion was greatly shattered when I realized how arbitrary the four minute time allowance was on the cases, because it's not anything you have control over but rather sequence timing set by the game.
2015
What Tangled Webs we weave... Yakuza 0 is a complete masterclass in storytelling and character writing that jettisons the story of two of gaming's most beloved characters into the forefront of the medium's best.
I went into Yakuza 0 thinking that I was about to embark on a silly quest of comraderie based humour and slapstick comedy after years of viewing the franchise as an outsider with a plethora of close friends intensely into RGG's flagship franchise, but what I came out with was an experience far more incredible than I'd ever imagined. The 0th entry into Yakuza is an invigorating story of love, compassion, and betrayal that will have the player gripped to their screen for more than twenty intense hours.
When I'd first played Yakuza 0 a couple years back during its initial foray into Microsoft's game pass, I couldn't get myself to stick to the brawler based combat and lack of english voice cast (which Yakuza 7 would soon receive,) and I put the game down less than a few hours in. Upon my second try, something changed and I'm not really sure what it was. After spending more time playing character action and brawling games, Yakuza's fairly basic combat became actually quite fun. Memorization of combo's isn't too necessary, nor is dodging and blocking ad nauseum, all you need to do is learn how to make dudes hit the pavement. I realized how much fun you could have picking up bikes off the side of the street and swinging them blindly at a crowd of up to ten, or how comical it was tto run around as a man with an eyepatch armed with a metal bat throughout the city of Osaka. Something about the comic-book level of ridiculousness of Yakuza's combat helped me appreciate it more, it was laughably simple, in a way that allowed me to put more stock into the story than the fighting within. Yakuza, like many of its contemporary Japanese games, is filled with mini bosses and spontaneous encounters, however given the aforementioned ease of combat, this strangely never got annoying. Anytime I was approached by the random groups of foes on the streets of Kamurocho/Sotenbori, I welcomed the fight, which is something I rarely do in games that drop encounters on you out of the blue. With the deutoragonists, I stuck to the same fighting styles which I respect RGG Studio for allowing to occur. With action games that utilize combat styles/actions you are usually coerced to flash through them in combat and take advantage of certain enemy weaknesses. A series like Devil May Cry comes to mind, where Dante utilizes Royal Guard/Trickster/Swordmaster etc for various reasons. In Yakuza? I was able to stubbornly stick on Slugger with Majima and Kiryu's Brawler equivalent throughout the entire game. I appreciate game's that allow the player to find a playstyle they like within the game's presentation and run it through using strategy's in combat that relate specifically to that style. In terms of difficulty I found that Yakuza was perfectly situated, I had to apply thought and logic to boss battles in avoidance of enemy attacks, but never did I feel pressed and had to repeat encounters as I never actually got a game over (well, once intentionally after a game crash.) Yakuza 0 basically says "Oh you've grasped the mechanics of the game well enough, keep applying that mindset and you'll succeed."
The most impressive aspect of Yakuza 0 to me, and this is probably the takeaway many others will have, was the excellence that its cast was written. Mob movies and media all boil down to their creation and navigation through conflict and uncomfortable situations. How do you write a cast of characters in a way that is compelling and tells a story that utilizes said cast to their fullest extent? Many forms of media struggle with this, however Yakuza 0 nailed it. You have two greenhorns as the protagonists, men who have never taken a life, who are braun and strong yet are not incredibly experienced in the realm of violence. Kiryu and Majima's respective pasts are dark and muddied, with the latter losing an eye as a result of vigorous torture, so they are no strangers to the dark world of organized crime, yet they quickly find out the degree of cuthroat ruthlessness and wit that is required to climb the ranks. Throughout the game's seventeen chapters we witness these two grow in intelligence, strength, scope, and notoriety. Kiryu, distant from friends and family finds out what it is liked to be kicked to the curb and begin anew. Majima, ever the servant to a power that sees him as means to an end must find a way to carve out free will. These two show degree of emotional intelligence and variety that I completely surprised me. Throughout the last five to six years or so I thought Kiryu was just a silly himbo, a big man with muscles who had funny mannerisms and incredible comedic timing. I believed Goro Majima was a whacky and zany madman who knew only how to commit violence and hurt others. Throughout my twenty-four hours of playtime I discovered that my preconceived notions of the series' most beloved characters could not be more wrong. Kiryu was desperate to improve the conditions of those around him, an intelligent man that was grateful for any allies he could have and knew how to unite friends for a common cause. He was someone that people were willing to lay down their lives for through his actions, not his promises and dellusions of grandeur. Majima was a bitterly flawed man that encountered suffering and loss almost everywhere he went. As the game's story progresses, his patience and compassions is continuously tested to points that nearly break him. I was blindsided to find out the variety of emotion that Majima could show. I've written this review only mentioning those two thus far, but the entire cast of recurring characters is just as impressive. Tochibana is a benevolent and mysterious figure I came to love as the game progressed, Nishkiyama felt like a true brother to Kiryu in the way they argued and showed love for one another, Nishitani was completely insane in a way that made him an endearing counterpart to Majima's parallel crazyness. Makoto, Lee, Oda, and Reina were more characters that were the perfect ingredients to an incredible cast. As per usual I don't like to delve into spoilers in my reviews, but I found that the MANY foes and villains of Yakuza 0 were equally as impressive and uniquely sinister. Their motives were believable and struggles for power made sense within the universe. The mistake many games and films make is having a villain who wants to be a bad guy for bad guy's sake, whereas Yakuza 0 carefully draws out motivations for each foe and their reactions to adversary involvement. The conflict of the "Empty Lot" isn't necessarily realistic, but in the world of RGG makes the following actions sensible and easy to follow.
Despite taking place in only two locations, Kamurocho (fictional Kabukicho in Tokyo,) and Sotenbori (fictional Dotenbori in Osaka,) the game is filled to the brim with life and things to do. The neon colours that lined the real life 1980's are used to full effect, the hustle and bustle of Japan's postwar booming economy is laid out right in front of the player's eyes. Each street and neighborhood is teeming with life and business, there's a believable atmosphere to the world with folks out and about with their significant others and families. It's difficult to recycle environments for a game that has the length of Yakuza 0, but it's done to a great effect here. It helps that you split protagonist's after doing two chapters with one, so you're never stuck in one place for very long, but the cities and story path are crafted well enough that it wouldn't even be an issue if this weren't the case. I found myself taking full advantage of each city's nightlife, making sure to bowl, sing kareoke, throw darts, and dance to my fullest extent. I became familiar with the streets and business and it began to feel homely, the result of an excellent job in world design.
As far as the presentation otherwise, the graphical fidelity of Yakuza 0 was defintiely good enough, especially for a game that has been out for a good amount of years. It's nothing that wow'd me away, but the faces in cutscenes were rather impressive and the world was beautiful. It got a little rough around the edges when it came to conversing with sidequest NPC's or enemies you'd scant come across but I found this to be easily forgiveable. The game ran well minus an annoying crash in chapter nine and had little stuttering throughout the whole playthrough. One more thing I'd like to applaud Yakuza 0 for was the ability to alt tab and completely stop any gameplay. This made it easy to respond to messages and things outside of the game, something I desperately wish more titles would take advantage of. I know it's not the most important element in a game, but the ability to pause whenever, wherever is a legitimate boon to how I will receive it.
I had some frustrations with Yakuza 0 but they were largely minute. The "biggest" of these was the anime-esque "people die when they are killed" mantra that I see impacting most shonen titles I've watched. Now, one thing you should already know is that Yakuza 0 is decidedly not an anime, but it surely shared this feature with the medium. You could count that if you witnessed what was an on-screen death or boss-defeat, that they were most certainly not actually defeated. I'm sure there's a drinking game for this out there somewhere.
In summary, Yakuza 0 is an incredible "beginning" for the Yakuza franchise and its introduction of the sinister Goro Majima and heroic Kazuma Kiryu. You'll be ready for a fight in one instance and jumping to grab some tissues the next. If you like stories about organized crime that are heavy on emotion and narrative ambition, Yakuza 0 is most definitely for you.
I went into Yakuza 0 thinking that I was about to embark on a silly quest of comraderie based humour and slapstick comedy after years of viewing the franchise as an outsider with a plethora of close friends intensely into RGG's flagship franchise, but what I came out with was an experience far more incredible than I'd ever imagined. The 0th entry into Yakuza is an invigorating story of love, compassion, and betrayal that will have the player gripped to their screen for more than twenty intense hours.
When I'd first played Yakuza 0 a couple years back during its initial foray into Microsoft's game pass, I couldn't get myself to stick to the brawler based combat and lack of english voice cast (which Yakuza 7 would soon receive,) and I put the game down less than a few hours in. Upon my second try, something changed and I'm not really sure what it was. After spending more time playing character action and brawling games, Yakuza's fairly basic combat became actually quite fun. Memorization of combo's isn't too necessary, nor is dodging and blocking ad nauseum, all you need to do is learn how to make dudes hit the pavement. I realized how much fun you could have picking up bikes off the side of the street and swinging them blindly at a crowd of up to ten, or how comical it was tto run around as a man with an eyepatch armed with a metal bat throughout the city of Osaka. Something about the comic-book level of ridiculousness of Yakuza's combat helped me appreciate it more, it was laughably simple, in a way that allowed me to put more stock into the story than the fighting within. Yakuza, like many of its contemporary Japanese games, is filled with mini bosses and spontaneous encounters, however given the aforementioned ease of combat, this strangely never got annoying. Anytime I was approached by the random groups of foes on the streets of Kamurocho/Sotenbori, I welcomed the fight, which is something I rarely do in games that drop encounters on you out of the blue. With the deutoragonists, I stuck to the same fighting styles which I respect RGG Studio for allowing to occur. With action games that utilize combat styles/actions you are usually coerced to flash through them in combat and take advantage of certain enemy weaknesses. A series like Devil May Cry comes to mind, where Dante utilizes Royal Guard/Trickster/Swordmaster etc for various reasons. In Yakuza? I was able to stubbornly stick on Slugger with Majima and Kiryu's Brawler equivalent throughout the entire game. I appreciate game's that allow the player to find a playstyle they like within the game's presentation and run it through using strategy's in combat that relate specifically to that style. In terms of difficulty I found that Yakuza was perfectly situated, I had to apply thought and logic to boss battles in avoidance of enemy attacks, but never did I feel pressed and had to repeat encounters as I never actually got a game over (well, once intentionally after a game crash.) Yakuza 0 basically says "Oh you've grasped the mechanics of the game well enough, keep applying that mindset and you'll succeed."
The most impressive aspect of Yakuza 0 to me, and this is probably the takeaway many others will have, was the excellence that its cast was written. Mob movies and media all boil down to their creation and navigation through conflict and uncomfortable situations. How do you write a cast of characters in a way that is compelling and tells a story that utilizes said cast to their fullest extent? Many forms of media struggle with this, however Yakuza 0 nailed it. You have two greenhorns as the protagonists, men who have never taken a life, who are braun and strong yet are not incredibly experienced in the realm of violence. Kiryu and Majima's respective pasts are dark and muddied, with the latter losing an eye as a result of vigorous torture, so they are no strangers to the dark world of organized crime, yet they quickly find out the degree of cuthroat ruthlessness and wit that is required to climb the ranks. Throughout the game's seventeen chapters we witness these two grow in intelligence, strength, scope, and notoriety. Kiryu, distant from friends and family finds out what it is liked to be kicked to the curb and begin anew. Majima, ever the servant to a power that sees him as means to an end must find a way to carve out free will. These two show degree of emotional intelligence and variety that I completely surprised me. Throughout the last five to six years or so I thought Kiryu was just a silly himbo, a big man with muscles who had funny mannerisms and incredible comedic timing. I believed Goro Majima was a whacky and zany madman who knew only how to commit violence and hurt others. Throughout my twenty-four hours of playtime I discovered that my preconceived notions of the series' most beloved characters could not be more wrong. Kiryu was desperate to improve the conditions of those around him, an intelligent man that was grateful for any allies he could have and knew how to unite friends for a common cause. He was someone that people were willing to lay down their lives for through his actions, not his promises and dellusions of grandeur. Majima was a bitterly flawed man that encountered suffering and loss almost everywhere he went. As the game's story progresses, his patience and compassions is continuously tested to points that nearly break him. I was blindsided to find out the variety of emotion that Majima could show. I've written this review only mentioning those two thus far, but the entire cast of recurring characters is just as impressive. Tochibana is a benevolent and mysterious figure I came to love as the game progressed, Nishkiyama felt like a true brother to Kiryu in the way they argued and showed love for one another, Nishitani was completely insane in a way that made him an endearing counterpart to Majima's parallel crazyness. Makoto, Lee, Oda, and Reina were more characters that were the perfect ingredients to an incredible cast. As per usual I don't like to delve into spoilers in my reviews, but I found that the MANY foes and villains of Yakuza 0 were equally as impressive and uniquely sinister. Their motives were believable and struggles for power made sense within the universe. The mistake many games and films make is having a villain who wants to be a bad guy for bad guy's sake, whereas Yakuza 0 carefully draws out motivations for each foe and their reactions to adversary involvement. The conflict of the "Empty Lot" isn't necessarily realistic, but in the world of RGG makes the following actions sensible and easy to follow.
Despite taking place in only two locations, Kamurocho (fictional Kabukicho in Tokyo,) and Sotenbori (fictional Dotenbori in Osaka,) the game is filled to the brim with life and things to do. The neon colours that lined the real life 1980's are used to full effect, the hustle and bustle of Japan's postwar booming economy is laid out right in front of the player's eyes. Each street and neighborhood is teeming with life and business, there's a believable atmosphere to the world with folks out and about with their significant others and families. It's difficult to recycle environments for a game that has the length of Yakuza 0, but it's done to a great effect here. It helps that you split protagonist's after doing two chapters with one, so you're never stuck in one place for very long, but the cities and story path are crafted well enough that it wouldn't even be an issue if this weren't the case. I found myself taking full advantage of each city's nightlife, making sure to bowl, sing kareoke, throw darts, and dance to my fullest extent. I became familiar with the streets and business and it began to feel homely, the result of an excellent job in world design.
As far as the presentation otherwise, the graphical fidelity of Yakuza 0 was defintiely good enough, especially for a game that has been out for a good amount of years. It's nothing that wow'd me away, but the faces in cutscenes were rather impressive and the world was beautiful. It got a little rough around the edges when it came to conversing with sidequest NPC's or enemies you'd scant come across but I found this to be easily forgiveable. The game ran well minus an annoying crash in chapter nine and had little stuttering throughout the whole playthrough. One more thing I'd like to applaud Yakuza 0 for was the ability to alt tab and completely stop any gameplay. This made it easy to respond to messages and things outside of the game, something I desperately wish more titles would take advantage of. I know it's not the most important element in a game, but the ability to pause whenever, wherever is a legitimate boon to how I will receive it.
I had some frustrations with Yakuza 0 but they were largely minute. The "biggest" of these was the anime-esque "people die when they are killed" mantra that I see impacting most shonen titles I've watched. Now, one thing you should already know is that Yakuza 0 is decidedly not an anime, but it surely shared this feature with the medium. You could count that if you witnessed what was an on-screen death or boss-defeat, that they were most certainly not actually defeated. I'm sure there's a drinking game for this out there somewhere.
In summary, Yakuza 0 is an incredible "beginning" for the Yakuza franchise and its introduction of the sinister Goro Majima and heroic Kazuma Kiryu. You'll be ready for a fight in one instance and jumping to grab some tissues the next. If you like stories about organized crime that are heavy on emotion and narrative ambition, Yakuza 0 is most definitely for you.
2013
Booker Dewitt: Into the Spiderverse is a ~10 hour brain slog of an experience that dares to ask: how can we combine fetch quests, excessively rehashed enemy encounters, and a hamfisted possibly interesting meta-narrative all into the one game.
I wasn't a fan of the first or second Bioshock, but I had heard plenty of praise for Bioshock Infinite for bringing new and interesting life into the series. What I got from it was a horrendous "take" on socio-economic and racial inequality mixed with some of the worst FPS combat in the last ten years and a "your princess is in another castle" storyline.
I would rather play Doom 2016 while drinking sriracha from the bottle than re-experience Bioshock Infinite. The game was beautiful, but man by the end of it did I grow tired of how the gameplay was the same exact loop for hours and hours upon end. Seriously, if you cut out the entire middle portion of this game and just include the arrival in Columbia and the lore dump at the end, you probably have the same experience, except you don't have to fight the same exact fight over and over again. It's not hard to realize that throwing the same enemies at your player without any variation or explanation for an entire VIDEO GAME is NOT fun.
The guns were mildly rewarding, however you never have enough ammo. The powers were pointless, you can run through the game using only one. The characters were horrible: Booker is copy cutter chad-bro, Elizabeth goes from damsel in distress to omnipotent chad being, Comstock just sucks, and the abhorrent treatment of the African-American characters and their plight is downright disturbing. Other reviewers have done a good job pointing that last part out, and it's one thing that struck me as especially despicable.
Legitimately I do not understand what the hype of this game was about. The story sucks and could and should have been simplified, the narrative which could have been cool was completely mistreated and mistold, the combat is awful, and the conversation of racial and economic opression misses the mark as hard as it could.
I cannot recommend anyone play Bioshock Infinite.
I wasn't a fan of the first or second Bioshock, but I had heard plenty of praise for Bioshock Infinite for bringing new and interesting life into the series. What I got from it was a horrendous "take" on socio-economic and racial inequality mixed with some of the worst FPS combat in the last ten years and a "your princess is in another castle" storyline.
I would rather play Doom 2016 while drinking sriracha from the bottle than re-experience Bioshock Infinite. The game was beautiful, but man by the end of it did I grow tired of how the gameplay was the same exact loop for hours and hours upon end. Seriously, if you cut out the entire middle portion of this game and just include the arrival in Columbia and the lore dump at the end, you probably have the same experience, except you don't have to fight the same exact fight over and over again. It's not hard to realize that throwing the same enemies at your player without any variation or explanation for an entire VIDEO GAME is NOT fun.
The guns were mildly rewarding, however you never have enough ammo. The powers were pointless, you can run through the game using only one. The characters were horrible: Booker is copy cutter chad-bro, Elizabeth goes from damsel in distress to omnipotent chad being, Comstock just sucks, and the abhorrent treatment of the African-American characters and their plight is downright disturbing. Other reviewers have done a good job pointing that last part out, and it's one thing that struck me as especially despicable.
Legitimately I do not understand what the hype of this game was about. The story sucks and could and should have been simplified, the narrative which could have been cool was completely mistreated and mistold, the combat is awful, and the conversation of racial and economic opression misses the mark as hard as it could.
I cannot recommend anyone play Bioshock Infinite.
More than 13 Sentinels: Aegis Pacific Rim is an enthralling visual novel that will take the player through a proverbial and literal loop in its phenomenal take on the science fiction and artificial intelligence.
For those familiar with my writeups, they'll know I don't really touch on story spoilers and that holds especially true with visual novels such as this. I will say, this story had me interested the whole way throughout even if my retention of said story was questionable at best. It gets rather convoluted, but I enjoyed it nonetheless. The entire game being voice acted helped an astronomic amount with being able to parse the story's intricate narrative and keep me awake through its north of fourty hour (for me) runtime. Even reading a synopsis right now of what I couldn't fully understand/missed out on has helped me pull together what an awesome story this is. If you're a sucker for time travel in science fiction, 13 Sentinels is the game for you.
Previously I had been very adverse to Vanillaware's trademark character art style, but it really showed through in their most recent bout. Characters are all unique and varied from one another, realistic, and easy to remember... but the real hero is the drop-dead gorgeous environment/background art. Colours shine through and help breathe air into making the living parts of the game feel real. Trees have a beautiful green/red sheen to them, the sun shines on the school and cityscape with an artistic flare, and the actual city itself is strikingly detailed.
Gameplay in the RTS segment was funadmentally basic but also quite enjoyable. It's the right level of difficulty in a game like this where you have to think a little bit as to not destroy your party, but don't have to sweat it out in thirty minute long battles like you would in an Advance Wars. The visuals here were like eye candy for me though, lots of awesome bright colors, explosions, and lasers... what more could you ask for!
I'd strongly recommend 13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim for any fans of science fiction and/or visual novels.
For those familiar with my writeups, they'll know I don't really touch on story spoilers and that holds especially true with visual novels such as this. I will say, this story had me interested the whole way throughout even if my retention of said story was questionable at best. It gets rather convoluted, but I enjoyed it nonetheless. The entire game being voice acted helped an astronomic amount with being able to parse the story's intricate narrative and keep me awake through its north of fourty hour (for me) runtime. Even reading a synopsis right now of what I couldn't fully understand/missed out on has helped me pull together what an awesome story this is. If you're a sucker for time travel in science fiction, 13 Sentinels is the game for you.
Previously I had been very adverse to Vanillaware's trademark character art style, but it really showed through in their most recent bout. Characters are all unique and varied from one another, realistic, and easy to remember... but the real hero is the drop-dead gorgeous environment/background art. Colours shine through and help breathe air into making the living parts of the game feel real. Trees have a beautiful green/red sheen to them, the sun shines on the school and cityscape with an artistic flare, and the actual city itself is strikingly detailed.
Gameplay in the RTS segment was funadmentally basic but also quite enjoyable. It's the right level of difficulty in a game like this where you have to think a little bit as to not destroy your party, but don't have to sweat it out in thirty minute long battles like you would in an Advance Wars. The visuals here were like eye candy for me though, lots of awesome bright colors, explosions, and lasers... what more could you ask for!
I'd strongly recommend 13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim for any fans of science fiction and/or visual novels.
2017
Pyre is a resoundingly "okay" game that was honestly pretty good but unfortunately the runtime went a little longer than I felt it needed. For me it was a typical Supergiant experience: Top of the line visuals (namely in character design,) impressive work put in an original world, a dedicated Darren Korb soundtrack, and a unique gimmick that drives gameplay. I liked it quite a bit more than Transistor and Bastion, though not as much as Hades, because I felt like the gameplay loop until you have to repeat it ad nauseum was fairly entertaining. Space basketball is a pretty neat concept and I'd like to see it explored more in a game down the line, but the loop felt a little stagnant as Pyre went on. I will say that initially I was upset that I had to change up my party as the game went on to get the actual ending of the game, but I appreciated the nuances different character archetypes brought to Pyre. Ultimately I felt like some of battles against NPC's felt like they were simply waiting for my reaction or cheating the AI reaction timing to certain things, but overall it was fine.
In the end, I found Pyre to be a simply "good" game and nothing really more than that. The runtime went a bit longer than my liking, but I'd consider this to be one of Supergiant's better titles. I'd recommend it to anyone who can catch it on sale or is a fan of their material in general.
In the end, I found Pyre to be a simply "good" game and nothing really more than that. The runtime went a bit longer than my liking, but I'd consider this to be one of Supergiant's better titles. I'd recommend it to anyone who can catch it on sale or is a fan of their material in general.
2016
Came for the picturesque walk through the woods of Wyoming, stayed for the feels and everlasting sorrow of guilt made from past choices. Firewatch is a lonely game, you walk around alone, however you have a cheery and equally as quirky partner with you every step of the way. Your dynamic is interesting, almost like two peas in a pod, however you're chasing a ghost from the past and she's reminding you of a happier life.
Firewatch is a beautifully depressing journey through what it means to move on.
Firewatch is a beautifully depressing journey through what it means to move on.
2022
Live A Live? More like, Played A Game!
Square Enix continues its dive through reviving its golden era classics by bringing back a 1994 Japan-Only Cult Classic, Live A Live. Composed by Yoko Shimomura (Kingdom Hearts) and directed by Takashi Tokita (Parasite Eve, Chrono Trigger,) it's no wonder why this game has been loved by so many despite its initial commercial failure. Live a Live is a game that sets out to be many things at once, does it do so successfully? I came to the verdict of "Yes... mostly" but I would say overall, I am extremely glad I finally got to play it. I remember the JRPG Nintendo Direct that this game was (re) announced at, I had no idea what it was but was drawn to the HD-2D animation style that Square has jumped all over within the last four years. Projects like Octopath Traveler, Triangle Strategy, and the eventual Dragon Quest III remaster all have received the same graphical & UI sheen. I'd found the first two interesting experiences, for better or for worse, but the visuals and thought of reviving an old classic was enough for me to jump right on Live a Live.
Conceptually the game has you choose from seven protagonists, all of which exist within their own unique scenarios, locations, and groups of friends and foes. What jumped out immediately for me was the commitment to writing, designing, and composing for seven completely tonally different stories. How do you craft an experience for a Caveman, Cowboy, Ninja, and Robot that are conceptually different enough to not feel recycled, yet do remind the player that they are in the same game? Live a Live executes on this perfectly. The most important thing is having unique gimmicks/gameplay techniques for each character;
-Prehistory: A combat focused experience in which they is no voice acting, just grunts and huffs.
-Ancient China: You play as a shifu who cannot gain EXP because he has learned all there is to know.
-Edo Period: You are reminded that you can't wait to play another playthrough.
-The Wild West: A charming adventure reminiscient of the golden age cowboy shows like Bonanza and Gunsmoke.
-Present Day: Literally Blue Mage Street Fighter.
-Near Future: Using a world map to navigate against an extra-terrestrial force.
-Distant Future: A Psychological thriller.
All of these scenarios played fundamentally differently and my enjoyment jumped from peaks and valleys depending, but they held enough together in their stories and writing to feel like they were all connected. I don't want to speak more on the stories themselves and how they all relate as that's something the player should DEFINITELY experience for themselves throughout the 20+ hour total gameplay time. I enjoyed the Wild West chapter the most because it reminded me of watching those cowboy shows with my parents, the cheesy characters and jubilant music all felt like home, which is I guess what Live A Live really succeeds at. No pun intended with the game's themes but this does feel like a timeless game, I imagine folks who played this in the 90's are ecstatic at how well Square was able to revive their beloved game. I played this on my Nintendo Switch, but it did feel lifted right out of the golden age SNES catalog. It didn't jump out at me like a game I was playing in 2022, but rather a game I had been taken to 1994 to play for a few days.
The HD-2D engine seems to feel better with every game I play, as this is the third after the aforementioned titles. Square and the team responsible did a great job at making the pixel-esque environments feel alive yet retro at the same time. Trees and grass swayed in the wind as you run by, water flows with a beautiful glare, and dungeons feeltoo much like Octopath like more fleshed out versions of their 1980's/90's predecessors. The touched up arrangements of the Yoko Shimomura songs were phenomenal and memorable, this might be the first game in a LONG time where I actually cranked the music to max volume and toned down other effects for a bit. I jammed through every chapter as the songs were varied enough between overworld, battle, and boss fights. Megalomania is an all-timer boss fight theme.
Ultimately, Live A Live had some hiccups though, namely pacing issues in some segments (Shinobi, Near Future, [redacted due to spoilers] and an abysmal random encounter rate in certain scenarios that well to their credit, made it feel like a 1990's JRPG. The detractions had me facepalming and rolling my eyes a lot towards the end of the game, but I was In Too Deep as Sum 41 would say and stuck it out to complete what I'd set out for.
I am not sure if I could consider this a must play for others because of the way it burnt me out towards the end, however I am extremely glad I was able to experience an under the radar gem from a bygone era. If you appreciate or want to re-experience the golden age of JRPG's and Squaresoft, Live A Live is a great pickup. The scenario based experience makes picking up and putting down easy as you can start and finish most of the chapters handily in one sitting and pick up the next another day. I overall had a good time with Live A live, and would recommend it to those looking for something fresh in the JRPG-sphere.
Square Enix continues its dive through reviving its golden era classics by bringing back a 1994 Japan-Only Cult Classic, Live A Live. Composed by Yoko Shimomura (Kingdom Hearts) and directed by Takashi Tokita (Parasite Eve, Chrono Trigger,) it's no wonder why this game has been loved by so many despite its initial commercial failure. Live a Live is a game that sets out to be many things at once, does it do so successfully? I came to the verdict of "Yes... mostly" but I would say overall, I am extremely glad I finally got to play it. I remember the JRPG Nintendo Direct that this game was (re) announced at, I had no idea what it was but was drawn to the HD-2D animation style that Square has jumped all over within the last four years. Projects like Octopath Traveler, Triangle Strategy, and the eventual Dragon Quest III remaster all have received the same graphical & UI sheen. I'd found the first two interesting experiences, for better or for worse, but the visuals and thought of reviving an old classic was enough for me to jump right on Live a Live.
Conceptually the game has you choose from seven protagonists, all of which exist within their own unique scenarios, locations, and groups of friends and foes. What jumped out immediately for me was the commitment to writing, designing, and composing for seven completely tonally different stories. How do you craft an experience for a Caveman, Cowboy, Ninja, and Robot that are conceptually different enough to not feel recycled, yet do remind the player that they are in the same game? Live a Live executes on this perfectly. The most important thing is having unique gimmicks/gameplay techniques for each character;
-Prehistory: A combat focused experience in which they is no voice acting, just grunts and huffs.
-Ancient China: You play as a shifu who cannot gain EXP because he has learned all there is to know.
-Edo Period: You are reminded that you can't wait to play another playthrough.
-The Wild West: A charming adventure reminiscient of the golden age cowboy shows like Bonanza and Gunsmoke.
-Present Day: Literally Blue Mage Street Fighter.
-Near Future: Using a world map to navigate against an extra-terrestrial force.
-Distant Future: A Psychological thriller.
All of these scenarios played fundamentally differently and my enjoyment jumped from peaks and valleys depending, but they held enough together in their stories and writing to feel like they were all connected. I don't want to speak more on the stories themselves and how they all relate as that's something the player should DEFINITELY experience for themselves throughout the 20+ hour total gameplay time. I enjoyed the Wild West chapter the most because it reminded me of watching those cowboy shows with my parents, the cheesy characters and jubilant music all felt like home, which is I guess what Live A Live really succeeds at. No pun intended with the game's themes but this does feel like a timeless game, I imagine folks who played this in the 90's are ecstatic at how well Square was able to revive their beloved game. I played this on my Nintendo Switch, but it did feel lifted right out of the golden age SNES catalog. It didn't jump out at me like a game I was playing in 2022, but rather a game I had been taken to 1994 to play for a few days.
The HD-2D engine seems to feel better with every game I play, as this is the third after the aforementioned titles. Square and the team responsible did a great job at making the pixel-esque environments feel alive yet retro at the same time. Trees and grass swayed in the wind as you run by, water flows with a beautiful glare, and dungeons feel
Ultimately, Live A Live had some hiccups though, namely pacing issues in some segments (Shinobi, Near Future, [redacted due to spoilers] and an abysmal random encounter rate in certain scenarios that well to their credit, made it feel like a 1990's JRPG. The detractions had me facepalming and rolling my eyes a lot towards the end of the game, but I was In Too Deep as Sum 41 would say and stuck it out to complete what I'd set out for.
I am not sure if I could consider this a must play for others because of the way it burnt me out towards the end, however I am extremely glad I was able to experience an under the radar gem from a bygone era. If you appreciate or want to re-experience the golden age of JRPG's and Squaresoft, Live A Live is a great pickup. The scenario based experience makes picking up and putting down easy as you can start and finish most of the chapters handily in one sitting and pick up the next another day. I overall had a good time with Live A live, and would recommend it to those looking for something fresh in the JRPG-sphere.