Suikoden 1 really sits in an odd place for me, as it put me on to one of my favorite series and favorite games I've ever played. At the same time, the game that directly follows this one really muddles my perception of this one, to the point it feels like a prequel in my mind despite innovating and paving the way for those later games. This game is iconic in its own right, with some great plot beats and characters that really made me feel for them as members of my party and characters in the story. Some of that carries over to the sequel as well, to the point where I really can't reccomend 2 without playing 1 first, even if I personally wouldn't revisit it as soon as I would 2. A great game in its own right, and I have some really good memories attached to it.

This game fucks so hard. Notorious for some, I went in really expecting to hate it especially on my first playthrough with Mega Man but this really blew me out of the water with how good it is. It is challenging as hell, and definitely feels like a step up on difficulty from 7 and 8 before it, but it really hits that Mega Man sweet spot of feeling frustrating but still beatable. For most of the runtime anyway. The SNES Mega Man games really have a habit of being incredibly great right up until the final bossfights. This gauntlet isn't really as bad as Wily Machine 7 if I think about them, but I think I hated them a little more in the moment due to the sheer quantity of challenging bosses this endgame has. Two playable characters who both can get through the story with different strengths and weaknesses really gets a lot of points for me though. I haven't given 10 a fair shake as each character, but in my humble opinion right now this is the best multi-character setup in the classic series. One of the best, despite what people will tell you!

Gamers, I do not like Mega Man 10 very much. Big disclaimer for my opinions on this one, I played this after playing the previous 9 games over the course of a few months or so, and was beginning to feel some burnout. Because of that, I chose to play as Proto Man in this one, in hope to change up the gameplay a bit. Holy fuck, was this a mistake. I hope that my problems with this stem from the increased damage taken while playing as Blues, but I really do not want to replay it for a while. The robot master stages are alright, but once I hit the castle stages this became nearly unplayable. I recognize that I am likely being dramatic about this one, and when I think about it it probably isn't as bad if you play through with Mega Man first, and the design isn't really bad per se, but every time I picked it up I dreaded it. It'll be my least favorite entry until I decide to give it another shot, and I'll probably like it then, but until then, bad review!