This game sucks and that's incredible. There is so much bad here that alone could warrant a 1/10 score for a lesser game, but here I genuinely just adore the whole package, and those familiar with Yoko Taro's other games know full well that the bad design is just part of the experience. It's repetitive, maps suck, some of the music makes me want to burn my ears and it repeatedly overstays it's welcome, but proceeding through it just nets you with a sense of satisfaction I have hardly experienced elsewhere. You might love it or hate it but I would definitely say it's worth at least a try from any gamer who enjoys character actions and j-media in general.

If I could sum up my thoughts on my Drakengard/Nier playthrough so far, I could honestly summarize every game in the series with the sentence "Kinda shitty and unfocused game that's frustrating to play but eventually brings it all together at the last minute". Graphics look awful, the characters are all annoying (we get it, you fuck and you kill people, please talk about literally any other subject now thanks), and gameplay is really only marginally better than previous entries. I was fully ready to give this game below 2 stars before the ending, but the execution really does come together better the further you play on. Unfortunately we all have a limited amount of time on this Earth, and if I'm going to recommend a game to anyone, I'm going to suggest titles that are fun to play the ENTIRE way through.

Also I'm going to have to pay like $36 dollars to get the story DLC for this game which is.......definitely a mark against it, considering I'll have to also navigate the headache that is loading money onto the PS3 store.

Drakengard 3 is an experience like no other and in so many ways it's a downright masterpiece.

The way that it tells its story and how it strangely makes you care for the characters through the different routes & endings is something special. How all those branches come together to give you small pieces of information on this world & this story. From the bigger picture stuff with Accord and the connection to the other DrakeNier titles, down to the smaller scale, self contained story of Zero, the intoners and their servants. It was an amazing experience and was also enhanced even further by the incredible soundtrack. Keep in mind, the story isn't perfect, as some characters are a bit underdeveloped (the DLC apparently fixes this but I didnt play that yet...), but it's still an extremely impactful narrative with a thematic throughline that hits all the emotional peaks that it needs to and it does so in a way that can only be done within this medium, while also trying things that I've never seen before in a game...

But talking about the medium, it is still a game, and sadly it's not great to play.
I still found myself having fun and it's a major step-up from the original drakengard but it's still lacking. The level design is extremely repetitive, the combat is clunky, there are awkward difficulty jumps, it feels unbalanced with some weapons being completely useless, the sidecontent is just repetitive missions inside reused areas, your companions feel useless in battle, and I could go on but in conclusion, it kinda just plays like shit. Especially because on top of all this the game has terrible performance with a ton of screentearing and you're lucky if it hits 30fps for more than a few seconds. (it somehow never crashed tho)

But despite the gameplay issues I'm glad that I played it myself, I doubt that this game wouldve impacted me in this way if I just watched it. So even with the flaws, and even if it's hard to recommend, this game is pretty fucking incredible... but it has a few too many flaws for it to get 5 stars

Played on RPCS3 at 4k 60fps, so no performance issues on my end.

The gameplay's better than Drakengard 1, for sure. The lock-on is more competent, but because of the increased size and movement of enemies, and the way they're mixed and match, you'll probably have a harder time seeing. There's the addition of a perfect-block, and certain encounters basically force it to be mandatory (which is good). A regular block drains your stamina-meter which is also used for "special" attacks. Bosses won't sit still for your combos without doing stunning them with perfect-blocks, and perfect-blocks instantly put an end to the ridiculous poise and defense-buffs possessed enemies get. Normal combat escalates quite a bit in difficulty, which was surprising as there are no difficulty-settings in Drakengard 3. The side-missions unlocked in branch D all but necessitate the infinite blood outfit (which in turn gives you infinite use of the game's powered up mode which speeds you up, slows everyone down, and increases your attack quite a bit).

There's a bit of platforming, and a tiny learning-curve of trial-and-erroring which ledges can be grabbed and thinking to do a special attack in midair to extend a jump slightly. There are jumps you cannot make otherwise.

The weapon system returns, but getting them is quite easy this time. Instead of having to hit arbitrary and cryptic sub-mission goals, they're in chests lying around in missions, given for side-missions, or bought in the store. The game makes it easy to track down chests as it shows which chests have been grabbed already in order of appearance, so you can replay specific verses to pick up something if you miss it. Upgrading weapons is a monstrous chore though. Instead of it just being based on kill count, it requires an unnaturally high amount of gold. Both to buy them, and to buy all the upgrade materials you need. You will be grinding for a long time if you want this done.

Dragon combat, I'd say, is a downgrade. Instead of the flight-simish combat of Drakengard 1, you're either in basic rail-shooter stages or in simplistic action stages where most attacks are guided by a generous lock-on.

The story, once again for a Taro game, reveals itself as secretly interesting if you can stick it out. The first branch was rather miserable to me as it was just antisocial anime-dialogue getting spewed by a bunch of stupid people for hours. It made me appreciate the dull medieval fantasy storytelling of the first game in hindsight. Eventually, you find out a weird robot can manifest hypothetical branches where things turn out differently, and this robot basically trial-and-errors you into branch D so you can actually succeed with your goal. This kinda meta-storytelling renders every ending equally valid in a way other "open to interpretation" stories don't by highlighting the divergences so literally. This robot also steps out of its meta observational role to help you directly in branch D, which fits with NieR's tradition of self-sacrifice to make the ending happen.

I did want to go over the rhythm section that closes off Branch D. It's weird to compare it to the similar section that ended Drakengard 1. It's "easier" as far as the patterns go, but it's grueling as far as its length and timing those inputs. I thought it was pretty fun, but I like rhythm games a lot. YMMV

I don't think it gets interesting enough to justify the curious, but that's from the perspective of someone who played Drakengard 1 and both NieR games. This game would be wild to someone who hadn't seen a narrative like it before, but I can't really judge it from that perspective now.

2/5

MIGHT be my most insane review yet, i don't know what is it with this game, but drakengard 3 is an experience like no other, if you play drakengard 3, there'll not be a single game out there like this one. it isn't NECESSARILY a good thing, however. but to me, Zero is one of my favourite characters in media. I just love her so much it is insane, this game is either someone's favourite game, or someone's most hated game. to me, it is almost undeniably an unique experience like no other- if it's a good one though? despite the combat being kind of sluggish, to me, it is an amazing one