Just as good of a re-examination of a genre-defining game as Remake. Fantastic music, combat that hasn't changed a lot but just enough to be worthy as a sequel, and very strong character moments from the whole cast (A VERY impressive feat with a cast like Avalanche.) Triple A grease (forced walking segments, forced climbing segments, lots of railroading, Ubisoft Tower Open World design, and others!), a touch of pacing issues that you can really only blame on the game starting directly into FF7's minigame gauntlet, and some very minor vo/writing icks keep the game from being a perfect game on its own, but as a sequel you can't go wrong.

This game is like a gigantic, leaking, topping stuffed street vendor burger. Amazing throughout but I really wish it was a biiiiit shorter and now I need to go shit for 5 hours.

To elaborate the game is very fun. The art/visual style is very appealing (I LOVE the little emotions on the hud!) , the music is bouncy and fun, the systems/movement is polished to a razor's fucking edge and just doing shit is wonderful BUT after world 5 (peak of the game to me) the level themes and layouts start getting stretched REALLY thin and worlds 9-11 have the ugliest level design the game has to offer. Granted the game's worst level is equivalent to the best level in SA2 so it's not the end of the world but enough to dock points. Also the animated cutscenes were cute but dragged on forever.

EDIT: The bonus levels being super short was massively disappointing. Was hoping for more of a Star Road deal but it just seems like padding to me.