The English translation is bad, the combat is dull, and the characters are all less interesting by their arcs' conclusions than they were at the start. But Gujian 3 was the best adventure I'd been on in a minute. The story isn't just fantasy, it's mythic. It's the Yellow Emperor. The beginning of invention, the kind of human ingenuity the game constantly lionizes. The protagonist and villain are these xianxia ass characters but every chapter we need to put the high magic elements of the story aside to talk about how good humans are, how much we learn from each other, from our ancestors. And, uh, how great emperors and expansive kingdoms are. Anyway! Some truly lovely levels in this. I journeyed through a storybook collection of locales, from an undersea palace to an oversized tree to the red banks of the ancient Yangtze. I'd do it all again if I didn't have to slaughter a hundred nearly identical demons each area.

Also that crafting system is an education.