There's an amazing 40-50 hour game in here somewhere! Had a blast until side quest and minigame fatigue caught up with me, despite all the story sections feeling great, and Queen's Blood being a nice Triple Triad follow up. A trim here or there would really elevate the whole thing.

Some incredible visual set pieces and boss battles run head-first into a world, and an almost endless amount of repetitive fetch quests, that honestly feels quite empty.

Had a fun time playing, and the ending sections pull everything together nicely, just everything outside the main story feels very shallow.

I enjoyed playing this game, and can see why it's often cited as the "best" in the series, but coming to it after originally enjoying the PS1 entries, and playing on a tiny DS screen, it's hard to get super invested in the systems around an admittedly interesting RPG narrative. Happy to have finally played through it, but probably won't be compelled to dive through it again.

Wahoo!

Has probably the best cutscene of all time, which involves throwing a baby around a graveyard to avoid members of a Korean mafia?

It's fun, short and sweet. Nice to jump back into the world, but there's not a lot of depth to it, which is fine!

VERY frustrating ordering this dog-thing around, but VERY rewarding when it works!