I really want to love this game! It's beautiful, got great characters, the puzzles are fun, combat is decent, and has a nice story. But four things prevent me from really loving it.
First, it is an extremely linear game with Xenogears Disk 2 levels of lengthy cutscenes. That's normally okay except between the very linear cutscenes and fetch quests there's also dungeons that are more Zelda-like with secrets and abilities and puzzles stuff, and there is zero ability to backtrack through them to collect things you miss. Those two things work but also clash with each other.
Second, there's also a tonal clash. It's somewhat humorous and funny and look at these monkeys on a train lol. It's also... extremely sad. Like characters will die and genocide is a thing in the game. The clash is weird.
Third, speaking of monkeys on a train: there's an entire mostly comedic chapter right before the final area. It's unnecessary and tedious and half of it is an annoying as hell stealth section. That's an entire star off right there. There's just way too much padding. There are times when the padding is interesting, but not enough times.
Lastly, while the boss designs (especially towards the end) are very good, there are several boss fights that are essentially quicktime events where you have to smash a button repeatedly and there are no accessibility settings for that. Boo.
Also there are a couple weirdly racist things like the floating meditating turbaned guy that serves as set dressing?!?!
So yeah, I mostly enjoyed my time through it and glad I finished it, but it was frustrating as some points and I just... don't love it.
First, it is an extremely linear game with Xenogears Disk 2 levels of lengthy cutscenes. That's normally okay except between the very linear cutscenes and fetch quests there's also dungeons that are more Zelda-like with secrets and abilities and puzzles stuff, and there is zero ability to backtrack through them to collect things you miss. Those two things work but also clash with each other.
Second, there's also a tonal clash. It's somewhat humorous and funny and look at these monkeys on a train lol. It's also... extremely sad. Like characters will die and genocide is a thing in the game. The clash is weird.
Third, speaking of monkeys on a train: there's an entire mostly comedic chapter right before the final area. It's unnecessary and tedious and half of it is an annoying as hell stealth section. That's an entire star off right there. There's just way too much padding. There are times when the padding is interesting, but not enough times.
Lastly, while the boss designs (especially towards the end) are very good, there are several boss fights that are essentially quicktime events where you have to smash a button repeatedly and there are no accessibility settings for that. Boo.
Also there are a couple weirdly racist things like the floating meditating turbaned guy that serves as set dressing?!?!
So yeah, I mostly enjoyed my time through it and glad I finished it, but it was frustrating as some points and I just... don't love it.