All right, time to ACTUALLY write about this one. I have a lot of thoughts about this game; of all the titles I've played, this one is the one I have the most complex opinions on. Let's start with Yakuza Zero so I have something to compare it to. With Yakuza, I don't really enjoy the gameplay loop and it just isn't the sort of experience I want to play a game to have, but I can one hundred percent understand why people like it. There's a deep story (the conflict is over a plot of land roughly the size of my bedroom, I have a pretty large bedroom but still), lots of stuff to do and if you like doing stuff and going through a good story I think you'll get a lot out of it. Not something I liked, but something I wouldn't hesitate to recommend.

I have a hard time understanding why people like Persona 4.

The game is split up into visual novel social simulator portions along with dungeon crawling parts, but neither portion is particularly interesting. In theory, the visual novel sections make the game more palatable to wider audiences, the characters deeper, and the story more engaging. In practice, they bored me to tears with a sense of comedy that has excellent wit but fundamentally flawed premises for jokes, ruined the characters by placing them at the mercy of said jokes, and made me want to progress the story even less because every cutscene is so goddamn long. The dungeon crawling is very tedious with combat that lacks depth and it feels like you can't quit when you want because it's 100 percent optimal to complete each dungeon in a single day. This also has the side effect of making it feel like you can't play the part of the game you want when you want to play it. This is just two mediocre games clumsily stapled together that theoretically interact but in practice simply glance at each other as they move in completely different directions.

In most cases, dated views on things like women and the LGBT community are just "ah it's an old story, you just gotta accept it's like that", but here it actively hurts the themes the game is going for by not even denying, but refusing to consider in the first place the possibility that someone's true self could be queer. You're just confused, dumbass. I could go into detail about how the theme of truth is kind of confusing and it's not clear what they mean by it, but I just don't want to be angry like this anymore. I can't say I hate it, but thinking about Persona 4 makes me upset. Why is this on Wikipedia's list of games considered the greatest, again?

EDIT: gave it another half star this is now a 5/10 average game dark souls makes this shit look like a fucking masterpiece

Good if a bit shallow outside of the consistently excellent combat, albeit a little long given how small the world is. Some problems with the game; the sidequests are, for the most part, utterly garbage, and while the post game presents a unique challenge, the idea of repeating the same dungeons and overworld areas one more time is infuriating. One last thing, there’s a mission that seems to be mandatory in the post game that is the worst designed piece of content in maybe any game I’ve played in my life, in which you have to kill two enemies in a fight using one finishing move that requires one specific character to be in super saiyan mode, a status effect that happens seemingly at random which you LOSE once you use said move, so, you basically need to be very precise while using it and pray to the gods that you get that status twice in the same fight, which feels impossible, or force it through a very expensive item, in any case is a fucking waste of time and the main reason why I didn’t completed the post game.

This is mostly a gameplay review than story review because I did not buy it for the story, but I will say wow this might just be the most dialogue heavy fighting game I've ever played.

It's not the most deep fighting game ever but it's really solid and gets the job done. Anyone who's a big fan of Persona 3 or 4 and likes fighting games would get quite a bit of enjoyment out of this title. There are 22 characters on the character select screen but in truth it's really 20 fully unique fighters with about 10 clones. That is solid, especially considering it contains most of the important characters from the two games it is based on.

I've also played BlazBlue Cross Tag Battle which includes multiple characters from this game but in a 2v2 format rather than only 1v1. I'd love see to a sequel to this game that includes Persona 5 and hopefully older Persona game characters too with new mechanics and the option to play 2v2s and 3v3s. Possibly even include new battle mechanics such as a quick rush in movement option skin to FighterZ. I found most ranged characters to be a bit more annoying to deal with in this game due to there being less movement options. As a Naoto main I mainly just have to block and occasionally use my own ranged moves to counter ranged oriented characters which makes the game less fun. Mixing close and far range options together nicely is more ideal.

Overall even if you're not a Persona 3 or 4 fan it's still a decent fighting game. It would not be my first recommendation but it's definitely enjoyable.

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GOTY 2023

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Ok, I think this game is very easy to critizise just by the stuff we saw in trailers and the first couple of hours, I understand it is definately not what most people were expecting and I don't think being disappointed by it is unfair, but in my experience I disagree with a couple of the complaints made to this point, and I have to comment on some.

But first, starting with positives, the gameplay is very fun and even tho I still don't know if there will be ways to abuse it or make it feel like a joke, is very fair and balanced. It is definately not what I was expecting, becuase seeing the rings and their effects in the showcases, me and almost everyone would've thought they were inmensly overpowered, but they fit nicely into the gameplay and the maps and enemy locations are prepared with the rings in mind.

It is very difficult to balance a fire emblem game, and sometimes it's even fun to play unbalanced fire emblem games, but this one is still highly enjoyable even on higher difficulties, I don't feel as many bullshit as with three houses and the maps for now are one of my favorites in the series and I haven't finished the game.

Talking about difficulties, "Hard" actually poses a challenge, as opposed to, again, Three Houses which was a joke except on the "maddening" difficulty, which often used same-turn reinforcements and bullshit mechanics to keep it hard (infamous Reunion at Dawn). I still haven't touched maddening in this game, but hard does impose a bit of challenge and I am hopeful it will be as sweet in the highest difficulty, will update my review based on that.

Now, addressing the art-style, it is really different from the rest of the games so far, and I agree that the fact that this series changes it's style frecuently wouldn't be an excuse for badly designed characters and environments. So yes, Alear is not a compelling design, and I found a couple that weren't too great either, but the rest of them aren't bad at all.

You could complain that that are too separated from each other and they don't look like they are from the same game sometimes, I don't agree but even if it was the case, I like having a diverse cast and they fit in their own kingdoms and follow a trend in each one as if they had a different culture. They are mostly nice designs and I like the fact that they made them distinctive according to their region of origin, which they didn't do in past FE games with some exceptions.

Now, the graphics on the other hand, look gorgeous, even if you think they are generic, the bright colors and textures are very nice to the eyes and I found myself really digging the art style thanks to the backgrounds in battle, I really don't understand people that call this ugly because I don't see it at all.

Also, this game has top tier animations, for the attacks and dodges, it's one of the first games where I don't see myself pressing the skip button or turning animations off becuase they take too long, at least since the GBA games. There is one where, if the character has a high level, instead of just dodging an arrow he will break it with his sword mid-air and it's unnecessary, but it's still there and it's hilarious, things like that give this game more charm than any of the pokémon games on switch.

Now, talking about characters and story, maybe the story isn't anything special, that's definately true, it's not like Fire Emblem has any game with an incredible story, far from it, but this one follows generic story beats of old games. It's not horrendous, there aren't any stupid decisions or questionable plot points as in other games, but it isn't great.

On the other hand, I find myself also liking most of the characters in the game, maybe they aren't as focused and three dimensional as in three houses, but almost all of them have something interesting and the supports rarely feel annoying.

Alear is a step up for the avatar character, not as great as Shez I think, but it improves upon Byleth, feels more similar to something like Robin. Of course he isn't complex or anything, and I don't personally like avatars and would be happier if they stopped using them, but he is decent enough. Only thing I do have to mention is that the characters are jerking him off most of the time, and that is something that wasn't present with Byleth (that much) and does bother me, but it isn't a problem with Alear himself.

So, to keep things simple, Engage is a game that improves in gameplay significantly sacrificing a bit of the story significance that was in the previous entry, but that doesn't make it worse, just a very different experience that is focused on another group of people which are here for the strategy and want to have a good time with it. I think It succeeds in that regard and I couldn't be happier with how fun I'm having with the maps until now, even with the average story, I am still picking characters depending on how much I like them, and I am enjoying building them more than in the most recent entries at least.

Complaining about the tropes and art style is definately fair, but some of the critiques miss the point completely and makes it seem like Fire Emblem wasn't always about a game where you have to build your own army and strategic resource management. Three Houses is to blame for setting expectations to new players into other directions, (not that I'm mad with 3H or anything, I also adore that game, but the reasons are completely different, and I don't expect to find myself enjoying the same aspects, becuase shaking things up once in a while is what makes the series feel fresh with every new entry).

My last point, is a bit more of rant, and it's not from my experience of the game, but a response to some complaints I have heard that make little to no sense to me, I'll try to not extend myself too much.

First, the fact that this game is the 30th anniversary celebration title is false, people said it becuase of the leaks that came out which turned out to be true, but blindly trusting leaks isn't a good source of information, as a couple other things, like the fact that Gust was involved with the game, turned out to be false. Expecting it to be a celebration and being disappointed becuase of the ring mechanics, doesn't justify the fact that it is still a normal mainline Fire Emblem game, and it doesn't need to prove itself worthy or more special than any other title. Maybe it doesn't have to be the best in every department and it's focused on being a different experience and attracting different people (that's why it is so different to Three Houses despite coming on the same console).

If you are worried about the direction of the series and don't like this game, don't whine online about how this is "ruining" the series, the next entry will be completely different again, and maybe it will take a while but a new game may fit you taste as time passes, if not, you have more than 17 old games with infinite replayability that may please you.

This game is not going to damage the series and turn it into anything that it isn't just becuase you don't like the artstyle and story, it is still an excellent Fire Emblem game at its core, and many people such as me are enjoying it and will enjoy the next entries as much as this one becuase I simply can't find myself hating a game that looks and plays great (at least it's how I feel) as I'm sure the next games will too.

Not mad at people who don't like the game, but some came with the expectation of hating it just for the first trailer and ended up doing it becuase that's obviously what's going to happen if you have that attitude. Sad that a great part of the fanbase aren't enjoying it as much as I am tho, but again, you don't have to light up all the alarms, it is not a big deal.

Luckily a Genealogy Remake is coming next, hope that game satysfies the fans that enjoy FR stories becuase that is easily the best one of the bunch, very hyped for that game too.

This is one of those games that I think is designed with very casual gamers in mind or people just in for a calm experience. It's a short and simple game that is easy to get into.

That being said I don't think this game is for me. I love cats and sci fi but the gameplay is a bit too uninteresting for my taste. I would've preferred either a little more action or if there was just simply more to do. The gameplay loop is essentially just walking from point A to B while avoiding very few enemies. It wasn't really satisfying.