A freaky solid mesh of ideas from classic nes games but even moreso Mega Man and Castlevania (for better or for worse(most of the time for the better tho trust)). With the use of modern capabilities for mechanics, fun upgrades, and an even more fun personality. Shovel Knight's lasting impact can be felt on the indie game scene was for good reason as this game still is damn good even when the indie game market has had 10 years to live up to its legacy. My personal issues stem from the last third of this games levels really fucking love pits, spikes, and all the nes era stuff that typically one shots you and I would've liked a bit more of a challenge on the bosses but they're still very well designed just easy to cheese with the gadgets.

It's a fun time still a landmark Indie game and one I loved revisiting especially since I noticed how proudly they showed their inspirations this time around. Excited to check out the other campaigns finally!

"Why are you wasting your lives!?" "We’re just planning for the future. Right, Ken?"

Writing reviews for these huge games always seems like a daunting task, not even because I'm lazy but just because there is so much to talk about and it's hard to balance talking about everything, so I'll attempt to keep it condensed because this was an experience (in a positive light).

It took me around 6 times of playing this game's intro and dropping it because of various reasons to finally get hooked which I think is a testament to retrying games that don't initially click with you. This time though It really sunk its teeth into me and It kept me coming back despite sometimes the game doing everything in its power to discourage me. It may come as a surprise to those who were in VC with me as I fought some of those early Tartarus bosses but I have to say I think in many aspects I think this game is so well-designed to serve its story and themes that it actually made me revise why some of this stuff transferred over to p4 and p5.

The story of this game had me very interested once we hit a certain point and I can respect those first couple of months for being a bit more relaxed and letting you spend time with the characters but I will say it is the part I probably dread the most when I replay it for portable later this year but once it gets going I think it's really well-paced and keeps you invested with twists and turns and allowing enough time for characters to have mini-arcs with how the presence of death/Tartarus affects them and It's really enjoyable I loved Junpei and Yukari especially I loved them and how human they felt with Junpei apologizing and Yukari redirecting her anger of her father's death. This game tackles the subject matter in such an interesting way and It even had me consider how I live my life. The phrase "Memento Mori" has really stuck with me throughout. it permeated into my motivations and how I thought about playing the game I think. The weaving of the themes of the game into player choice and actually making it matter seeing the people you 10 ranked at the end is so cool, especially in this game.

I'll keep it brief about this game's combat but I am actually a fan of how it became a game of mitigating mistakes made by party members and coming up with solutions with the tactics to not get them to do dumb shit but the spikes in difficulty caused me so much frustration. I gotta say though it gives Tartarus this unique kind of character, it's unforgiving and adds to the oppressive atmosphere, it's funny though because in a call I was babying at intrepid knight but the rest of the game I feel like I had no huge problems with.

I already broke my promise about keeping it condensed but this game all in all is a smartly designed experience when it comes to injecting its themes and story into gameplay and player choice and it felt so good when the story was kicking, but between the slow couple of first months and some other issues with balancing it made me lose a bit of love throughout. I loved this game by the end but these are things I dread when replaying portable and maybe reload this year, I truly see why people say it is the best one I might even think that later on it is something I'll be thinking about.

Definitely glad I stuck through with this one that ending made me cry. I'm actually so tempted to start portable now.