The graphics are quite nice and some of the lore text was pretty interesting to read... I guess there's a bit more action in the game, but it was still mostly mind-numbingly easy on 'Normal' difficulty, and I am not wont to play through it again. Pretty boring, and even playing it with a friend just made me worry about wasting my friend's time and energy... then I played some without them and completely ruined our co-operative playthrough, as the enemies all scaled above them and they simply could not contribute to our co-operative playthrough anymore.

It's okay, I guess.

Well, the story was good. I liked the overall plot, and the prose was enjoyable to read. I also found the setting of Planescape to be one of the most interesting and compelling video game settings I've seen, and the characters felt like characters, as opposed to tools for the player to progress the story through. This did, however, have its downsides -- there were a few times where progressing required following a random dialogue tree with a random named character. It wasn't particularly troublesome due to my tendency to fully embody the very inquisitive archetype of The Nameless One, asking everyone every available question, but it did feel a bit off.

The main issue with the game is the combat -- there are notable stretches of gameplay which pretty much devolve into dungeon crawls. The tactics I utilised seemed quite simple and boring, but also most effective -- drawing aggro with Morte and then wailing on the enemies one-by-one as they did not fight back. You would quickly figure this tactic out if you played the game. What this ultimately means is that a lot of the game is spent on rather tedious gameplay which does nothing to aid the story or worldbuilding -- the good parts of the game.

There is not much more to say here: the story was quite moving, the gameplay was bad, but tolerable. It's pretty short for an RPG, at around 23 hours, so I'd recommend it to any prospective player.

Most tactically interesting Planescape: Torment encounter (mild spoilers for a late-game boss fight): https://youtu.be/nAKLjyG7OHw

It's just kind of boring. The game is pretty fun if I play it for an hour or two at a time, going on a standalone adventure from a town to a dungeon and back. However, if I do try to sit down with the intention of making progress and completing the game, it quickly becomes stale and puts me off the whole thing.

The emergent gameplay systems aren't as developed as that of Divinity: Original Sin 2, but I still had some fun engaging my lateral thinking to avoid just a bit of the combat funnel.

In terms of combat, I can comfortably say that I prefer Wizardry 8. D&D 5e's combat system is rewlly not the greatest in my opinion, and while the use of light can add a bit of tactical decisionmaking to battles against vampiric forces, it ultimately boils down to out-damaging the enemy a lot of the time; Status effects such as fear rarely proc due to the dice rolls involved, and wear off quickly, meqning that pure damage often ends up being a better investment of a turn.

One bonus, and what has given me the most fun in the game, is the custom campaign maker. It's easy to use and, while still painfully limited compared to what developers have created for their own campaigns, still allows you to flex your creative muscles and have some fun doing it.

I’ve had Persona 5 in my library for way over a year now, and playing it has been a long time coming. I was honestly somewhat apprehensive to, I really disliked Persona 4, so even though I’ve heard nothing but great things about Persona 5, I was afraid something similar would occur. My main motivation to playing Persona 5 in the first place was that one of my friends started playing it, and I didn’t want to be spoiled. This entire preamble is to lead up to this; for the past 8 days I have done nothing but play Persona 5. 104 hours total, beginning to end. My perception of time has been fundamentally altered because I was so engrossed and invested into Persona 5, these past 8 days have all blurred together into some amalgamative mass. If it isn’t already obvious by all of this, I absolutely loved my time with Persona 5.

Way before getting into where this game just absolutely works, I love how much style is put into this game. UI, animation, music, everything in this game has this particular style to it that’s addictive. Even when I’m 20, 40, even 60 hours into the game, I hear certain music tracks, or see certain animations, and I get that same level of excitement that I do seeing them for the first time. And in a similar vein, the game’s UI is absolutely stellar. It took a little bit of time getting used to each button being a battle command, instead of having to scroll through a list of actions, but once I got used to it, it really felt great.

I also absolutely love Palaces. They feel like properly planned out and designed dungeons, and I love how they’re able to fully and completely fit the theme they’re going for. I’ll try to avoid comparing Persona 5 with Persona 4 as much as I can, but I want to highlight that I really didn’t like how the main dungeons of Persona 4 were all procedurally generated, it made Palaces such a breath of fresh air. I love the stealth mechanics, being able to hide from enemies and ambush them from the shadows always felt great to do. I would say most palaces are rather good, with only one not being as strong as the others, but that’s mainly because the puzzles in that palace are rather basic. It might be contrarian to what I mention prior, but I also really love Mementos as a dungeon. It is procedurally generated which would make it seem like I would dislike it, but I think it’s the balance between Palaces and Mementos that allows me to actually enjoy Mementos. It’s a dungeon you can take at a sort of piecemeal way, as you’ll be able to slowly gain access to lower parts of Mementos as you progress with the story. You can then alternate between Palaces and Mementos, allowing for a sort of balance between them, which I really appreciate.

I’m also really enamored by the combat system of Persona 5. This is the first MegaTen game I’ve played that doesn’t feature the standard Press Turn system, so it was definitely another thing I had to get used to. Even then, Persona 5’s gameplay system is absolutely masterful. Persona 5 does sort of feature a press turn system, though not in the exact same way. One More functions about the same as a Press Turn, but of course it only activates when downing an enemy. There’s also of course a specific turn order in battle, instead of player and enemy rounds. But going back to One More, it leads into one of my favorite mechanics in the entire game, Baton Pass. Baton Pass works basically as a free switch to an ally to use their action, but you can chain it up to a total of 4 times. Increasing power, recovery, and even lowering the cost of skills if you chain it high enough. It becomes an absolutely addictive system that I love both utilizing, and in a way, abusing.

And this leads me into what I think is what kept me playing all this time. What allowed to sit through and play 104 hours total of this game with only sleep being a break. That of course is none other than the game’s story. Immediately before the game even gets going, it has absolutely one of the best cold opens I’ve seen in a game, and it serves well as a tutorial section too. It sets up so much intrigue that made me want to see more and more of what is going on in the game. As well, the character writing is so good. The main party’s dynamic is really good, and it feels like they’re a proper group of friends. As well the villain of each arc can at times be cartoonishly evil, but I think that exemplifies the world and the themes that Persona 5 is trying to go for. This idea of young rebels fighting against a corrupt society that allows for these cartoonishly evil villains to avoid punishment, and forcing them to realize their actions and live with the understanding of what they’ve done. It’s something immaculate. There’s also just so much else I could talk about here, though I won’t as I don’t really want to spoil anything specific here. The last few arcs of the game are amazing, I love the Royal story content, and the end is absolutely perfect. Persona 5’s story is everything I really hoped it to be, and more.

Goro Akechi

Unlike in Persona 4, where I went only for the Social Links of the main party, I actively engaged with as many social links I possibly could in Persona 5. I’m not going to go into elaborate detail into all of them, that would be the absolute death of me. I would say for a good majority of them, they were really good, and I love how some sort of tie into Mementos and doing Mementos Requests. Its nice that the game opens up a lot of night options to allow you to try to at least get 2 social link rank ups in a day if you plan well. There were definitely some characters I didn’t feel as strong about, but there were few, if any characters I actively disliked. I tried my best to get as many social links done as I can, and I’d estimate I probably got about 90% complete. I completed 18 social links, but I was pretty high in the other ones, ranging between ranks 5-8. I also really like the bonuses that some social links give, some of them are absolutely busted too. One of Ryuji’s bonuses particularly became the perfect level-grinding method. Though it does feel weird examining the mechanical reasons to raise Social Links, it feels good to raise social links not solely because of the mechanical boons, but because I care about these characters.

I’ll say this as well, but I wish I was able to really compare the differences between base Persona 5 and the content exclusive to Royal. While the last major arc of the game (if you unlock it) is Royal exclusive, there’s noticeably differences solely based upon certain characters existing. Maruki and Kasumi are Royal exclusive characters, but they exist through nearly the entire main storyline of base Persona 5. What is it like when those characters aren’t there, what changes? This thought makes me wonder what other changes exist in Royal, and since I don’t have a way of playing the original Persona 5, I have no way of comparing. I should specify I’m not saying this as a negative, it’s more just a thing I’m curious about more than anything.

It feels weird being done with Persona 5. Yet again, I must reiterate, I have done nothing but play this game for the past 8 days. I really do feel like for me, Persona 5 is an unforgettable experience, not only because of the game itself, but because of the environmental circumstances around me that not only brought me to play the game, but while I was playing the game as well. I don’t know if I can bring myself to replay the game anytime soon, it was over 100 hours long after all, but maybe a few years from now I’ll revisit it. I’m glad to have played a Persona game I ended up absolutely loving.

to start off, i think i wouldn’t be doing my due diligence if i didn’t mention the fact that i do have some nostalgia for this game, specifically for the original N64 version. even though i was born after the original came out, it was still a formative part of my childhood. i have many memories playing OOT on the N64 at my grandparents’ house with my sister, and even though i never got very far at that time (i was bad), it was still very special to me. fast forward some years, and i did finally beat OOT on Wii Virtual Console with my sister. i've loved zelda games in general for basically my whole life. i was link for halloween twice. i have a vivid memory of when i whistled the song of storms at my sister’s baseball game and it actually started raining. i was like 8, and i had to convince myself i didn't have magic powers of some sort. needless to say, this game and this franchise is immensely important to me.

yeah, this game still fucks (original thought is dead!!! long live original thought!!!). to be fair, i have watched so many goddamn randomizers of the original game, so it’s not like i was returning to a world long forgotten by my little decrepit 20-something mind, but still. fucks.

obviously, the biggest points to make about this game come from what’s new and fresh in the remake. i would not classify myself as anywhere near being an fps snob, but 20 fps on the N64 version is a little distractingly low frequently. the 3DS runs this game at a stable 30 fps for basically the entirety of the game; i only noticed some slight performance issues when an extreme number of particles/ pickups were on screen. the visuals are updated, yet still feel pretty faithful to the overall style of the game. there’s some texture changes here and there, and some things look drastically different, such as adult link’s face, but it’s not a complete rewrite of the ‘look’ of OOT. the dual screen of the 3DS does some WORK for this game. you have the on-screen minimap up top still, but you can also see the world and dungeon map on the bottom screen while everything else is happening, which makes navigating dungeons so much more friendly. on N64, you’d normally only have 3 C-buttons to bind items to, but here you have the X and Y buttons, as well as two “I” and “II” buttons that you can also map items to. additionally, there's a dedicated ocarina button, essentially freeing up yet another slot due to how frequently it's used. even though it does still pause the action to interact with your equipment screen, getting in and out is sooo much more fluid than it ever was on N64. items can fit into any slot on the items screen, which is kinda nice so you can organize them how you want, but it also ends up becoming incredibly cluttered extremely fast, as you swap out items and they end up in different spots than you may have originally intended. personally, i would rather have discrete, locked, item slots in your inventory so you can just use muscle memory to tap and select, but this is an extremely minor nitpick. gyro controls are here, and man are they welcomed. usually it feels a little clunky to aim with just the stick on N64, but gyro lets you fine tune your aim that makes sections such as horseback bow+arrow so much more comfortable.

the ocarina has got to be one of the coolest items in any game i’ve played. yeah, it’s a neat idea to have a little instrument with magical properties that can do things from making it rain, to changing the time of day, to warping you across the world, but the implementation is absolutely ingenious. it’s actually absurd how Koji Kondo was able to write insanely iconic themes that are all limited to begin with the same selection of 6 notes you can play on the ocarina. i always get chills learning new songs. Zelda’s Lullaby, Saria’s Song, the Song of Time, Song of Storms, i could go on and on. they’re all so distinct and memorable. it would have been trivial to have the functionality of the ocarina be subjugated to selecting a song to play on a menu, but no, they make you play the notes yourself. granted, you’re not playing the full song, as that’s out of the range you’re given, but you are still the one playing the notes that launch into the performance. when i was younger, i even had a little 6-hole sweet potato Ocarina of Time that i would constantly play little tunes from the game on. it’s so fuckn neat, it’s only right that the game gets its name after it.

one thing i absolutely adore about 3D zelda titles is how discrete their worlds and items are. while the following RPG mechanics are certainly not inherently bad qualities to have in a game, there’s no leveling up or XP or an excess of only slightly different weapons stats-wise. instead, there’s hard, discrete lines drawn in the sand of the game design. you don’t have 242 HP or something, you have an integer number of heart containers evenly divided into quarters. 4 heart pieces make a whole. there’s not 20 different pieces of armor, there’s three distinct tunics. same for swords. same for boots. you could say: hey, why would i not want more equipment in my game? to me, the answer is intentionality and milestones. when you get anything new, be it a dungeon item, or a heart container, or a new song, it feels significant. also, you immediately start thinking, oh shit, what else could i do with bombs? didn’t i see some cracked rocks in that one area? im about to blow type-shit, truly.

dungeon-talk speed round!!! (some spoilers for dungeons and bosses, my friend)
- inside the deku tree? yeah, i guess you could say i’m inside the deku tree. great intro dungeon that gets you accustomed to the structure of a 3D zelda dungeon without overwhelming you with ANY small keys or a complex dungeon map. Gohma is a spider that’s also shaped kinda like a hand, and i think i’ll cheers to that.
- dodongo’s cavern? boom. now we start getting more use out of the new dungeon item we’re graced with. king dodongo absolutely ate that shit.
- inside jabu-jabu’s belly? this place looks fucking disgusting, and also you have to carry a wet child-princess with you. i actually think it’s fine?? Barinade is honestly pretty neat and one of the most fun bosses in the game to me.
- forest temple? poe noe! those ghouls took the fucking flames on the elevator! however will we get to the boss now?
> the fairy bow:
phantom ganon is an aesthetically amazing fight, and i love the callback to deflecting orbs at Agahnim that gets intensified against the real ganondorf
- fire temple? rock guys in jail :(. hammmerrrr. gyro aim does some real work here because you can turn Volvagia into a pin cushion with the bow. unfortunately this strat does not work well on an airplane because usually they hate it when you turn in your seat and 3DS (verb) the person’s face next to you.
- ice cavern.
- water temple? THIS ONE IS MY FAVORITE /gen I LOVE WATER TEMPLE HOLY SHIT!!! it fucking chugs in the original N64 version, but here? we got better indications of the water levels post-lullaby. we got iron boots that aren’t on the gear screen, but are X,Y,I,II equippable. it’s actually sooo fun. i am a complete and utter FOOL for multi-state dungeons in zelda-like games. Morpha: water tentacle? poke him in the corner :). poke poke poke.
- bottom of the well.
- shadow temple? pretty fun and inventive uses for the lens of truth. also you can put on slippy shoes. I LOVE HAND-BASED BOSSES LIKE,, gosh and also he’s literally playing the bongo, and he name is the bongo, but two of them two of them.
- spirit temple,,, 🤤. pretty neat. Twinrova is honestly a super neat concept for the boss, but waiting for good rng on the final phase is bleh.
- gerudo training ground :O
- ganon’s castle? yeah so uhm,, you do a bunch of little ‘trials’ i think they’re called. wait a damn minute… trials? like,, like from MST aka medallions, stones, trials?? holy shit, that’s kinda a deep pull from Nintendo, referencing an extremely niche internet community. guess who got they goron tunic eated by a fucking like like in the shadow trial that then also voided out, causing the room to reload and the voracious garb gobbler to no longer possess their crimson vesture? twas i. and yes, this is the worst thing to ever happen to anyone. ganon’t.

while i don’t think this one has the best characters, nor story, nor dialogue, we have some quite fun inclusions. we got: evil maya fey, :3, sark, and this motherfucker is eating beans (!) ok but seriously Sheik is a banger character with a banger theme. so badass. Link’s sword flourishes also go hard. not as hard as they would later go in Twilight Princess, but OOT was ground zero for those sick moves of his.

it’s extremely nice that the map indicates whether or not you have all of the gold skulltulas in a region or dungeon, but i wish it was a little bit more specific sometimes. for example, the world map will display “Market” as one of the visitable locations, but the tracker for the gold skulltulas actually includes the path to hyrule castle as well. so, if you’re looking in hyrule castle town at night for gold skulltulas, your ass is looking in the wrong place!! also, even though the shard of agony is a very welcome inclusion that’s more accessible than the rumble-pak-requiring stone of agony on N64, it is still only helpful if you actually know where to walk around to look for grottos. also, i can understand wanting to not lock an item with utility behind the full 100 gold skulltulas, but ‘infinite money’ is really just not interesting. rupees are so useless–especially by that point in the game–that i would honestly rather just have a unique do-nothing item on the gear screen a-la Hestu’s gift.

there’s also a new ‘hint’ system of sorts through a Sheikah Stone in your house as a child and the temple of time, but i didn’t use it. hopefully it helps figure out some slightly more obscure parts of the game!

also new to the game is a “boss challenge” mode, which lets you refight any of the bosses up through Twinrova. it’s a cool addition, i suppose, but i don’t super care. there’s also a Gauntlet that you unlock after winning all the refights, which acts as a boss rush sorta mode where you can pick between two chests with some random items after each boss and have persistent health and ammo, but i didn’t find it to be too interesting either. still, i think it’s a fairly neat idea to include. some of the items that you can get from the chests are absolutely laughable though. like yeah thanks for giving me the giant’s knife, game. if you’re gonna have a time-attack boss rush mode, it’s a little annoying to also have to pray for good rng with your loot on top of Twinrova.

overall, i’m really glad that i replayed this game and finally got 100% completion. this is the longest review i’ve written for this website, and i’m afraid it’s a little bit messy and not friendly to read, but hey, we just be trying shit out. this is a real special game for a lot of people for a reason, and i’ve really gotta get around to playing majora’s mask all the way through one of these days. it’s unfortunate that the MM 3DS remake seems to make a lot of ‘unnecessary’ changes that i’m not well versed on, but i will trust the fans of the OG.