It's somehow better and worse than Yakuza: Like a Dragon, with the better side being the more refined, consistent, and very satisfying gameplay and huge amount of (mostly) quality content within, and the worse side from RGG's crazy ambition of shoving two games worth of narrative ideas that ends up with Kiryu's strong portion of the game eclipsing Ichiban's weaker side of the story, which is a bit disappointing because when it was just one party with both of them and the two new characters (Chitose and Tomizawa) who are really cool, I was loving where the game was going initially. While I loved Kiryu's part of the game and felt slightly underwhelmed with Ichiban's second-half of the story, I still feel overall I had a great time with the game and its story and characters old and new, and hopefully they can finally retire Kiryu as a character when he basically has a three-part epilogue now.

With that being said though, I really hope to God they scale back to LaD7 with its tighter story and content, I genuinely do not think I could handle another Like a Dragon entry this long and bloated for the next 10 years despite my enjoyment and I would not blame anyone who feels like the content and narrative overload makes the game worse for them.

It’s no secret that I love Kingdom Hearts and especially Kingdom Hearts II as it was the very first video game franchise I’ve ever became a fan of, however, there is one secret I do have: I never played the Final Mix version until now.

Crazy, I know! Played the vanilla game so many times day in and day out growing up, remembering being so jealous knowing that Japan had an exclusive (at the time) version of the game where you get to challenge all of the Organization XIII and more, and even witness the numerous re-releases of Final Mix in the West, but for some reason, I only just now recently gotten around to experiencing the game, and man I really wish I started sooner.

The same overall package is still here. The grand stories, the memorable characters, the iconic music, the worlds, and the incredible fast-paced combat, but now there’s more and it’s completely fine tuned to perfection. The changes under the hood makes the combat feel even more snappy and satisfying, the new additional boss fights feel like a dance that can overwhelm either yourself or your opponent, the inclusion of Cavern of Remembrance adds even more depth to the gameplay with its movement and enemies, and overall the entire experience is just amped up to a 10. I know the whole “power of friendship” troupe can be so overdone in a lot of media, but I think KH2 does it best while it can be as cheesy as the first game, it fully embraces it without shame and wears it proudly on it sleeves, which works so well because Kingdom Hearts overall is essentially a shonen anime with Disney and Final Fantasy characters. Even with how absurd it can get for some people, there’s so much heart in the writing to where you can’t help but to at least find it extremely endearing.

I feel like I could REALLY go on about this, but I think I wanna save a much deeper depth into KH2 for a review in the future. I think right now it’s hard to fully capture the words and things I wanna say, because this game and series left such a strong impression on me and the impact it has had on me is something that very few games or even pieces of media have ever accomplished, it really altered how I view the medium and understanding of video games and what they could be. Growing up with KH2 has left me wowed and in awe of what an amazing game looks like, and with Final Mix, it gives me another example of what a masterpiece can look like.

What I thought would be a bizarro battle royale that's slightly cringe ended up being (kinda) that but more cringe, with Ace Attorney-inspired elements and contents that absolutely make this a product of its time...

...but I also like it? It's weirdly endearing in a way seeing a decent amount of likable and/or fascinating characters trying to sort and debate their way out of insane circumstances and the mysteries into their situation with some great ass OSTs, fun court mechanics, and overall just a unique vibe and aesthetic that can be apart of an embodiment of the late-2000's - early-2010's.

but damn this bear is fucked up bruh.

A more refined Xenoblade 2 experience that I wish was of similar scope to the mainline games that ultimately ends up tripping itself by asking the bold question “what if we made 6+ hours worth of optional content mandatory at the eleventh hour?”.

I fully get from a ludonarrative standpoint asto why they made side quests a crucial element of the writing, but given the urgency of the story at that point, that’s not something that should suddenly be of importance to get to the end and I wish that element was incorporated into the game in a way that doesn’t outright kill its momentum in order to inflate playtime. Still a more consistent experience compared to the base game and a good time with some great OSTs, but it did leave me wanting more out of what we got with its characters and writing.