Played this one after Soul Hackers. It’s really interesting to see how the series started, but it was a painful ride. The demon loyalty is somehow worse, with it being harder to raise and specific to different types of demons. Dungeons were expectedly worse, but some were outright evil. No-COMP zones, dark zones, warp puzzles, and Chinatown were frustrating (and it felt like that Chinatown required a manual or something to actually complete!).

At least the music was an improvement, even though almost all the bosses had the same theme. The story was also interesting, though you only get the meaty bits in the beginning and the end. In the middle, you’re just accepting cases as a Devil Summoner and completing the dungeons. This all being said, I’m glad I finished this game. It was an experience for sure, and I’m looking forward to playing the other older SMT games.

White is the first Pokémon game I’ve played in about a decade. Unfortunately, I think I’ve fallen out of Pokémon games. Maybe it’s because I’m comparing it too harshly against other JRPGs, but it felt like a slog to play through, especially with the leveling system. I hear it has one of the better stories of the title, and I can believe that. The cast was fun, and the bad guys actually made some sense. There also looks like there’s a ton of post-credits content. Too bad it was stuck behind Pokémon gameplay.

If I were to give a rating based on uniqueness, it would easily be a 5/5 game. But because of that, it's not exactly made for everyone. It's a dungeon crawler infused with word games and riddles directed by typing. The art direction is great, and the voiceover work is unbelievably extant; there's dialogue for a lot of different things. Also, it has fishing and card games! A necessity for every well-to-do RPG.

I had this feeling when starting this game, but even after finishing it, I think this is one of the most unique games I've ever played. Props to the devs!

An amazing narrative in a unique setting, held back slightly by the gameplay.

A Space for the Unbound is a game about growing up, through the eyes of our main character, Atma. We see him and his interactions with the other people in this little town in Indonesia, who are dealing with their own troubles. We all have some worry deep down; this game tells the story of these worries. Characters get a lot of development, making them feel more human, as they have relatable good and bad traits, and the music helped drive emotions. Small side-quests also helped build the context of Atma's relationships with other characters.

My only gripe throughout this whole journey was the gameplay. There was a lot of fetch quests, and although I loved exploring the town, it was tiring to walk 5 minutes to one end of the town to pick up one thing only to walk back 5 minutes to progress the story. Various collectables are missable too; once you miss it in one chapter, it won't show up in the next. I missed out on a small bonus scene post-credits and a couple achievements because of this, and I'm not willing to spend another 9-ish hours to redo that.

I think this game is a must-play for anyone interested in a coming-of-age story. While the gameplay can be weak at times, the narrative makes up for that by a lot. A lot of passion can be seen into this project, with the pixel art, songs, and the nods to Indonesian culture.

I can only imagine how revolutionary this game was in 1997, especially thinking about the transition from 16-bit sprites to polygon models. I had a blast going through the game, whether it was making materia combos, Chocobo breeding or going through the minigames in the Golden Saucer. Defeating the optional Weapons were challenging, but felt rewarding after pulling it off. 100%ing the game was only painful because of two achievements: Materia Overlord and Master of Gil.

Before playing, I was unfortunately spoiled by the FF7 Spoiler That Everyone Knows About. But after finishing the game, that event was just one of the many crazy plot points the story contains. Final Fantasy VII is worth playing; there is so much more than just that one scene.

It's easy to understand why this game is considered a classic; every JRPG fan should have this game clocked in their list, and if not, get to it!

One of the harder FEs with probably the easiest final final map (it literally took two turns; Roy can one-turn the boss at this point, and I had given him boots). Despite being an interesting set of characters, half the cast is difficult to use. Roy himself isn't very good since he doesn't promote until chapter 21, which is actually the penultimate chapter if you're not going for the true ending. Other than that, it's a pretty standard FE story, with interesting maps that aren't toooo annoying, although same turn reinforcements were. Building supports also takes way too long, though I'm pretty sure that's constant throughout the GBA games.