I think I could write a book on my thoughts, good and bad, for this game but I'll try to keep it short. I really liked it and enjoyed this game a ton. It's easily my favorite final fantasy.

The combat is stellar, the music is awesome, and the cast is great. As someone who doesn't like mini-games (especially when games force it in the story), I surprisingly enjoyed the mini-games with maybe only 2-3 exceptions. The boss fights were also amazing especially the final boss.

While I liked the ending, for the most part, unfortunately I think the story is a bit all over the place with pacing. It's still an enjoyable story but the pacing is weird and sometimes not good. Despite that, the fun gameplay and great character moments made up for it so it wasn't too much of a bother.

The open world was unfortunately very generic. I don't think it's bad but when I saw people hyping it up to be one of the best open world games ever, I was a bit disappointed. It's a generic checklist open world with a very predictable formula. Again, it's not bad but it just left me disappointed. Still enjoyed it though since there are some great moments with characters from doing the activities.

I'm excited for Part 3 and hopefully addresses my issues with this game (and I wouldn't mind if they went back to linear like remake or just did semi-open world).

One of the most unique RPG's I've ever played with incredible story and characters. The game has a nice contrast of being very whimsical but also very dark. The OST is awesome and the combat, although very simple, is enjoyable and has a unique spin on status effects with emotions. In an unexpected way, it's also one of the creepiest games I've ever played (even more than many horror games I've experienced).

Easy recommendation especially for anyone looking for a unique/different experience from a JRPG.

My second time playing FF7 Remake but this time with DLC and on the PS5. I definitely had more fun playing this the second time. The PS5 enhancements make a big difference and the combat feels also more smoother and fun to play. Some of my issues from my first playthrough still persist: terrible side content, horrible driving sections, and a little too much gameplay padding near the end (and this is coming from a gameplay-first guy).

Aside from that, I've come to accept the game for what it is. Still wish this was an actual remake and not a sequel but we'll take what we can get. Enjoyed the story a lot more the second time around. The Yuffie episode is amazing and she's definitely the most fun character to play. Also as a fan of crisis core, I really liked the ending of it.

While there may never be a definitive version of Persona 3, I think Persona 3 Reload is, at the very least, the best version of Persona 3 hands down. This is an incredible remake by Atlus that far surpasses the original. The music, art style, UI, and combat got a big improvement while still keeping the story and characters of P3 nearly 1:1 with the original.

My major issues with the game are stuff that I had issues with the original:
- The structure of the game can still get repetitive. I still prefer the palaces/dungeons of later entries
- The villains are still a little meh but they are slightly improved in Reload
- Some of the social links are not very good. They're not awful but later entries are just much better in quality. The fully voiced VA in each rank was great though

I wouldn't have minded if Atlus did rewrites and redesigns for these issues but I can also respect that they stuck to their guns and kept these things 1:1 to preserve the good and bad of Persona 3 similar to how Bluepoint Games did a near 1:1 remake of Demon's Souls to preserve its original design in a modern version.

While I still prefer P4G and P5R more as games, I think Persona 3 Reload has my new favorite final boss and ending in the Persona series. The music and scenes popped off in the end and had more impact than when I played the original. This is a must play for JRPG fans

Cyberpunk 2077 was already an incredible game and Phantom Liberty only made it better. I haven't played the game in 3 years, I decided to do a full replay with the new DLC and free updates and boy was it a blast. I managed to do another 100% achievement run for the base game and it was just as fun going for it as it was 3 years ago. While the DLC was great and the ending was incredible, the new 2.0 updates were the highlight for me. They made an already great game more incredible.

Cyberpunk 2077 stands as one of the greatest western RPG's of all time and also somehow manages to be an incredible first person shooter with satisfying gunplay. The story and characters are great and the questing is fun and always entertaining. I can't wait to see what CDPR has cooking for the next game in this awesome universe.

A must-play for fans of western RPG's.

Great game and one of the best games of the year. Easily worthy of all the praise and awards its received. The choice and consequence is incredible, the gameplay is fun af, the build crafting is addicting, and the characters are amazing. I think the best and most underrated aspect is the co-op. This is one of the best co-op games ever and I don't think I would've enjoyed this as much playing solo. Strategizing, making choices, and working as a team with a buddy was super satisfying and always kept play sessions fun even in the slower parts.

I only have a couple issues with the game. First, there is some jank (especially towards the end) and Act 3 was a little bit buggy but nothing gamebreaking to ruin the overall experience (as of the last patch in 2023). The camera can also be wonky at times especially in battle. Finally, the UI is kinda bad but that seems to be a problem with the entire industry as of late and I'm a little more forgiving since this game has so many systems it needs to convey which is probably a nightmare to design for the UI team.

Overall a fantastic game and one worth playing. This is one of the best Western RPG's in a long time especially if you value choice and consequence in the narrative. I look forward to the DLC they unapologetically kept hinting at in the epilogue.

Another From Software banger yet again. It's crazy how this studio just puts out quality ass games over and over again and back to back. They just released Elden Ring last year and put out another GOTY contender the following year.

The mission structure, mech customization, fast paced visceral combat, story, and boss fights are all top notch here. I think my only complaint is that certain bosses just spam way too many attacks and sometimes the same high damage AoE attack but that's about it.

I plan to return next year for NG+ and this score may go up after I finish it. Great game and easily Top 10 for the year

This feels more like Dead Space Replay more than Dead Space Remake. I beat the original about 2 years ago and really liked it. As I beat the remake today, my thoughts have quite literally not changed. It's still the same Dead Space I liked 2 years ago. It's the exact same game with very minor changes aside from the obvious graphical upgrade and voiced protagonist.

Gameplay is fun, atmosphere is good, story is solid, the weapons are cool and just like the original, I did not find this one scary at all. The original and remake are great games.

I am glad they did 1:1 remake instead of FF7-esque where they drastically changed things. Did this game need a remake though? Honestly, no but it is good that it is accessible to a more modern audience on current hardware via the remake. I would still recommend this over the original since its technically an upgrade and its on modern hardware but the original still holds up incredibly well.

I also played Dead Space 2 after beating the original Dead Space 2 years ago. That game holds up incredibly well so I really doubt my opinion will be any different when it inevitably gets a remake. I would love EA to remake Dead Space 3 and have a do-over though. I still have not played that one since I hear bad things about it all the time so that game could use a remake more than these two.

Very good game despite it being a port of a psp game from a decade ago. I had a fun time throughout the whole adventure.

The story was good despite a very unnecessary epilogue that provided almost nothing. The characters were alright and if we are counting this cast as part of mainline trails, its probably my least favorite cast. I didn't really get attached to anyone but they were solid overall. No one was incredibly bad or annoying but no one was remarkably great. The best part of the narrative were the lore bits that may or may not be connected to the mainline series. It could be a whole lot of nothing or it could be very connected in ways we have yet to realize. Very cool stuff.

The gameplay was a lot of fun. The platforming sections were enjoyable and only had a few annoying parts but not enough to ruin the game. The action combat and RPG mechanics are very simple but fun and compliments the platforming gameplay. I also like how weapons and armor changed appearances unlike the mainline Trails games. Lastly, music was very good and reminds me of Sky/Crossbell era ost's.

Very fun game and if you're a Trails fan, I recommend playing this one after you beat all the mainline games that are available to you. You will get more out of the lore and (potentially?) the fore-shadowy hints the game has. If you are not a Trails fan and are wondering if this is a starting point, it can be but I recommend you play the mainline series. This game is not representative of the mainline games at all in terms of gameplay, length, story quality, graphics, etc. You may also not really care for the story or lore if you start with this one.

If you told me Lies of P was developed by From Software, I would've actually believed you. This is by far the best Souls clone ever and it still manages to do enough to separate itself and be its own thing.

The universe of the Lies of P is like a mix of Bloodborne and BioShock Infinite, two of my favorite game universes ever. It has the atmosphere and tone of Bloodborne while having the aesthetic, tech, and familiar lore from BioShock. I think the most surprising aspect of this game is how good the narrative is. For a souls game, its surprising well told and covers interesting and deep themes. The characters in Krat had interesting stories that actually made me go out and do the side quests. The moral dilemmas they present to you, accompanied by deep choices, were all difficult and even thought-provoking at times; it all played well into the game's themes. This is an exceptional universe and it doesn't feel like it was stitched together for the sake of being cool. I'm super excited for them to continue with a sequel.

The gameplay of this game is quite literally From Software in the best ways. The way everything feels, the sound effects, the quickstep/rolling, the movement, the attacking all feels like something out of a From Software game. If you've played a From Soft game, the gameplay feel and experience mirrors those games. Even the level design and encounter types are very reminiscent of From Software in both good and bad (troll) ways, but mostly very good.

What Lies of P does to differentiate itself are its systems. The weapon assembly system is quite unique allowing you to mix and match blades to create weapons with different stats and skills. The quartz system is an interesting take on adding a skill tree to a Souls game while not making it generic. It encourages exploration and completing quests to find these rare items to significantly boost your characters abilities and power. The Legion arms are this game's version of the guns from Bloodborne, but act more like prosthetic arms from Sekiro. They add more variety to combat and each bring their own strengths and weaknesses to different situations.

The enemy variety and boss quality is also surprisingly good. There are a lot of different enemies, attack types, animations, and status effects. Every main boss even has a unique second phase and were all consistent in difficulty throughout the experience. The quality bar they have achieved, while not exactly on From Soft's level yet, is quite close and very impressive considering this is the studio's first attempt at a souls game. I think my only major complaint is that some of the boss balancing does favor summoning or is a bit too overtuned. Otherwise, the difficulty is just right.

Overall, this was a fantastic game and easily is now in my Top 3 games for the year without a doubt. This is an excellent foundation in both design and universe. This satisfied my Bloodborne and BioShock craving that I've had for many years and I look forward to what they have cooking for a sequel. Let's just hope it doesn't end up like Dark Souls 2.

Starfield is 5 steps forward for Bethesda Game Studios but also two major steps back. BGS is one of my favorite devs of all time making some of my favorite games ever. Despite being an widely regarded as an RPG developer, my favorite aspect of their games has and will always be their Open Worlds. Even though the shooting, writing, main story, choice and consequence, and quests have been severely improved, the open world and progression is incredibly disappointing.

The first major step back was the open world. This game doesn't feel like an open world game and is simply just a fast travel simulator. Although it tells a great sci-fi story, it lacks the sci-fi atmosphere I really wanted out of it. Fallout had an incredible post-apocalyptic and survival feel going while Skyrim had a fun sense of fantasy and adventure. In Starfield, I rarely felt like a space explorer due to the lack of worlds to explore. You simply just fast travel to a location and its just a dungeon surrounded by randomly generated environments. I never had the expectation that all 1000+ planets were going to have their own unique open world map but I was expecting at least 3 planets to have their unique open world map while everything else was randomly generated. I feel like all I got were a couple cities that were seemingly dense due to the high volume of NPC's and then a whole lot of randomly generated worlds. It feels very soulless at times.

The second major step back was the RPG progression. Bethesda needs to stop watering down their mechanics. Fallout and Elder Scrolls had a stat point system to tailor your character. In Starfield, you can pick background traits (which were absolutely useless ) and perk trees. The perk tree is even worse than Fallout 4 imo. It's just a generic skill tree that you see in every AAA open world game you see today. At least Fallout 4 had some stats requirements you had to fulfill. I really hope the next BGS game they go back to a Fallout 3/NV-esque system or at least back to Skyrim because the progression in this game was dull. In all honesty, its more of a first/third person shooter than an RPG which is just sad.

Despite my complaints, Starfield has many good things going for it. The main story is easily their best one. The lore of the game is excellent. The writing is a big improvement and they actually have choice and consequence. The faction quests were fun and interesting all the way through (even if there were some odd overlaps here and there).The skill checks could be more improved though but it's an improvement from their past works.

In terms of combat, the space combat is excellent and fun but I wish it was more balanced. They need to have ship parts be purchasable because the drop rate for them is so rare in space combat. The ship customization is also way better than the player customization. The shooting in the game is also their best but unfortunately, the AI is so bad and none of the encounters in the game were challenging at all, even on higher difficulties.

Overall, Starfield is a great game. I do want to try the NG+ at some point since it seems unique and cool. One of the best games of the year and can easily be Top 10 for 2023.

After beating Trails into Reverie in the official English localization, I had the urge to replay this game so I just went for it. I never played this game with injection so it was nice to play this game like an actual video game.

Spoiler Free Review:

Kuro no Kiseki hits a lot harder the second time around and I can confidently say this is my second favorite game in the series and was close to being my favorite. The character cast is absolutely top notch and I much appreciate how they handled the characters in this game compared to the previous Coldsteel arc.

Van Arkride is my all-time favorite protagonist. He has such a great and fun personality with amazing interactions with every character in the game, something I think many stories don't focus nearly enough on. These interactions make the stories so much better and elevate all the characters and their personal story arcs. Van strikes a great balance between being super comedic but also serious and dark. The former makes him such a fun and entertaining protagonist to follow while the latter is slowly building up to his mysterious background which culminates into, in my opinion, the best backstory of any of the protagonists in the series. He is only one of the many GOATed characters in this game. Big shoutouts to Aaron, Elaine, Risette, Shizuna, and Agnes, who I didn't appreciate much on my first playthrough but grew to love the second time around.

Story wise, they nailed the pacing of the game, managing to strike a good balance of steady worldbuilding with high stakes narrative moments. One of the issues many had with the CS arc was how it took a while for interesting things to happen but in Kuro, interesting story moments and mysteries are always presented at a good pace to keep you intrigued at what happens next. This all culminates into an incredible finale and ending, which on my first playthrough I thought was just good, but on my second replay was a LOT better and hit way harder seeing how the whole game was building up to this moment. Despite still having "JRPG moments" you come to expect from the genre, the story is more dark but more importantly, mature which is a welcome change.

Gameplay wise, this is hands down the best orbment system in the series and the best game mechanically. Everything flows so well and the gameplay was always consistently fun. RPG's with systems that are fun to tinker with to create broken builds is always a great time. I just wish the nightmare mode was just a little harder like Kuro 2.

The OST is another thing I came around on. I thought it was just good the first time but after listening to it more for a couple months and this second playthrough, I grew to love it and only really have complaints about the battle music. They really need to get that sorted out. It's not bad but it could be much better. Final boss track still kino tho.

Lastly, if you are planning to play this game early, get the NISA version. I played the CLE version and its a pretty bad port. Lots of pop-in and the loading times are horrendous. I tinkered with my settings but nothing seemed to improve performance. From what I've seen from the NISA PC version, it is wayyyyy better.

Side note: I hope NISA voices more English lines like they did with Reverie. The JP voice acting is phenomenal but they really ran out of budget in some instances and don't voice the whole scene. I think adding more voice acting could elevate this game even further. Looking forward to playing it in English and crossing my fingers they nail the casting.

My favorite final fantasy game but I have a lot of issues with it.

The foundation of the combat is great and it feels good to play. It feels fast paced and satisfying especially with later Eikon powers. The last Eikon in particular cranked the fun factor up to 11 for me. The boss fights are also incredible with some of the best set pieces ever in a video game. Combined with a great OST, these are definitely some of the best boss fights of all time. Unfortunately, the regular enemies are braindead and lack any sort of challenge. Speaking of challenge, the normal mode is way too easy and the I do think the game has a balancing problem. Even without the accessibility rings, the game is just very easy even in the boss fights. I would've like to see some extra challenge or a hard mode available from the start to fix these issues.

Despite having a great Action Combat foundation, it's a crime this game was classified as an RPG. It has some of the most lackluster RPG elements I've seen in a long time. In his effort to try and give a positive spin on Japanese RPG's and bring in new types of players into the series, I think Yoshi-P forgot how to make an RPG. It hurt the games progression and customization. Loot is absolutely boring, there are barely any meaningful upgrades besides increasing your stats by +5 each time, and there are a lack of exciting customization options.

On top of this, the quests are mostly pretty bad and incredibly boring. I will admit, the quests in the last stretch of the game were great but it did not redeem the overall quality of them. The rewards for these quests are also terrible. 99% of the rewards are just crafting materials and the crafting system in this game isn't even that complex nor does it have many items to craft for a game that is bloated with crafting materials.

Last thing that bugged me was the lack of a sprint button. It made traversing the hideaway very tedious and greatly affected my enjoyment of those non-main story missions.

Story-wise, it's overall solid. I don't think its as bad as critics say but its also not as great as fans of the story say. It has some great moments and Clive is a fantastic character even if he is very familiar if you've played many JRPG's. The cast was solid and I liked a lot of them. Shoutouts to best boy Torgal and based Uncle Byron! Unfortunately, some people didn't get as much time or attention as I wanted. Jill was a solid character but a bit disappointing for someone who is supposed to be the "heroine" of the game. The villains are also weak in this game. I don't think they're bad but they left much to be desired. Clive vs the main villain of the game had some interesting back and forth discussion on the games themes but it didn't hit as hard as it should of because they chose a god-like entity as the villain over a human who I could sympathize with. The pacing of the game is also a bit of a rollercoaster but looking back, there was really only one moment were it took a nosedive. The world is solid but feels very familiar to other games I've played in the past with the whole slavery and magic crystals thing.

Despite my issues, the story was still very enjoyable. It didn't hit me on an emotional level but that's fine. The game is a fun ride and if you're looking for a high budget, cinematic, AAA-ass experience, this game is for you.