The story intrigued me more than the gameplay. From the context of this originally being a budget downloadable title, the gameplay loop was novel. It was more fun though, trying to piece together the story and interpret below the surface level narrative.

The flashlight monsters were fun at first, but they were incessantly vicious. Getting caught by one often lead to me getting jumped to death. The inanimate Shadow monsters were the most annoying to fight because of the physics behind them, and sprinting through a pretty samey forest to a battle arena got tiresome quick. If it wasn't for the incredible story, I wouldn't even give this 3 Stars.

This is a generational game, From start to finish, I feel like not a single second of my 87-hour playtime was wasted. The story was Epic (especially without save scumming), It felt just like those stories you hear of people explaining their DnD campaigns finales. I'm still in awe how true to tabletop this game is and how if you think it, you can probably do it. It's still kinda jarring because you don't expect that you can just push a boss, that's been wiping you out for 2 hours straight, mid-conversation off a cliff and skip the entire fight.

I just got bored, like annoyingly bored. I want to enjoy this game, but deep down, the core mechanics and systems are flawed and leave me with a bad taste.

The open world is a checklist for each area and while it looks fantastic, there isn't anything that stands out. The box art default design is the most concrete character design in the game. Which sucks because everything else looks like a procedurally generated monstrosity. Combat seems complex at first, but is incredibly drab.

My new go to example for Wasted Potential.

A thought-provoking JRPG that focuses more on the historical context of Frédéric Chopin and recreating it in a more fantastical world. The characters and world around such a weird premise is masterful, and with the help of an all star sound team along with Chopin's catalog, this is easily one of the best video games sonically.

Though the same can't be said for the actual story and gameplay of the game. The story was interesting at first, but felt too splintered to tell a complete story from start to finish, leaving me with more questions at the end than answered. While I enjoyed the unique pseudo turned based combat and its light and dark elements, there are difficulty spikes that can make you struggle on an otherwise relaxing journey. I just wished I got to explore this world more and get to understand how it all intertwines, but instead you are railroaded from dungeon to dungeon with small breaks in towns and breathers onto a bigger story.

I enjoyed my time, even though sometimes I loathed treading through another dungeon. If you're a JRPG fan, this is a must-play for me.

(side note: the PS3 version has more content and rebalances the game to be harder and grindier than the 360 version, so that might be a cause to some of my frustrations)