It's exactly what was promised and kickstarted, a Suikoden successor. It is very much Suikoden with a lot of same great things and the same not so great things. I enjoyed it at the end of the day but hope a sequel can just improve on it.

+ Nice cast of characters
+ Sprite work is great
+ Camera work with the 2D/3D works really well in some areas.
+ Duels were great moments but wish there were more.
+ A lot more voice acting that I expected, almost everything is voiced.
+ Fun bosses
+ You can't really miss recruits due to timing like Suikoden just a point of no return near the end of the game to have collected everyone.

- Story is fine but I find myself saying Suikoden 2 did it better.
- Other than bosses combat is kind of w/e. There is combo attacks that are basically useless for their cost. Magic outside of party healing is not super useful, and single target healing is a static value which is weird.
- A couple of recruits are hard locked behind the Beyblade and cooking minigames. Both which are very long winded and not enjoyable due to poor balancing. Making getting these recruits pure chore.
- Technical problems, particular with shadow rendering leaving artifacts.
- The 3D colors/textures don't really mesh with the 2D sprites a lot of the time.