Surprise game that I played while waiting for a certain somebody to return from Canadia to gift me Final Fantasy X.
This was surprisingly incredibly fucking excellent. I think the controls can be a bit of a weak point at times since it has no manual lock-on so it can't make use of directional controls in as intuitive a way as DMC does, but it handles the posture and parrying mechanics incredibly well. The dodging and parrying feels really good even if the sound and visual design isn't as distinct as in Sekiro, and getting to actually take part and perform these badass kung fu moves is incredibly fun. The game expects you to get good enough to beat it, there's definitely ways to cheese the bosses, but without that knowledge they can all definitely be hard to get through on a first go, and you can only retry so many times before realizing you're age 60 and have just a few deaths left before getting a complete game over. Going through levels again is great because as you get better, you start dying less, you begin to know how enemies attack and you can dodge and parry them so efficiently that enemies that were once pains in the ass are barely even a speed bump. Replayability is the game's strongest point, and it allows the 5 levels to be done in different ways to either challenge yourself or use different skills and builds or methods of fighting. It's one of those titles I just wanna keep replaying cuz fighting these bosses is just incredibly satisfying.
Can't say I remember the music too much, but when I did listen it fit the mood of the scene incredibly well, especially the true ending related tracks.
The art direction is stand out, though. Each level has a colour it bases everything on, and it's amazing. The third level, The Museum, has some of the best use of the game's art and it's incredibly pretty throughout. The final level also has strong art direction but with less of The Museum's avant garde-ness and more through the use of colour, dialogue, and atmosphere to set the tone. The game is a masterclass in that, and every level is memorable because of it.
Overall, this game has a billion and one good points, and not really that many negatives unless this isn't your kind of game. It's great, difficult, has great art direction, and the story while subtle really lends itself well and captivated me enough that I was interested in getting the true ending (very worth it, astronomical peak fiction).
This was surprisingly incredibly fucking excellent. I think the controls can be a bit of a weak point at times since it has no manual lock-on so it can't make use of directional controls in as intuitive a way as DMC does, but it handles the posture and parrying mechanics incredibly well. The dodging and parrying feels really good even if the sound and visual design isn't as distinct as in Sekiro, and getting to actually take part and perform these badass kung fu moves is incredibly fun. The game expects you to get good enough to beat it, there's definitely ways to cheese the bosses, but without that knowledge they can all definitely be hard to get through on a first go, and you can only retry so many times before realizing you're age 60 and have just a few deaths left before getting a complete game over. Going through levels again is great because as you get better, you start dying less, you begin to know how enemies attack and you can dodge and parry them so efficiently that enemies that were once pains in the ass are barely even a speed bump. Replayability is the game's strongest point, and it allows the 5 levels to be done in different ways to either challenge yourself or use different skills and builds or methods of fighting. It's one of those titles I just wanna keep replaying cuz fighting these bosses is just incredibly satisfying.
Can't say I remember the music too much, but when I did listen it fit the mood of the scene incredibly well, especially the true ending related tracks.
The art direction is stand out, though. Each level has a colour it bases everything on, and it's amazing. The third level, The Museum, has some of the best use of the game's art and it's incredibly pretty throughout. The final level also has strong art direction but with less of The Museum's avant garde-ness and more through the use of colour, dialogue, and atmosphere to set the tone. The game is a masterclass in that, and every level is memorable because of it.
Overall, this game has a billion and one good points, and not really that many negatives unless this isn't your kind of game. It's great, difficult, has great art direction, and the story while subtle really lends itself well and captivated me enough that I was interested in getting the true ending (very worth it, astronomical peak fiction).