Sea of Stars has sick character and enemy designs, a good setup for the plot, a battle system that initially shows a lot of potential, intricate dungeons encompassing plenty of puzzle mechanics... and then fails to progress in any of these aspects. The character writing is horrendously stale, with the deutoragonists Valere and Zale being almost NPC-like with how every sentence they speak is related to either their duty as protectors of the world, or their love for their best friend. You learn nothing about their interests, goals, fears, doubts, or insecurities beyond that. The remaining cast has slightly more personality to them, but even by the end of the game, if you asked me to describe each cast member with only 3 words, I would only be able to do this with 1 member of the playable roster. Every conversation felt as if it was just there to move the plot forward, with the characters themselves not growing as people at all... mostly.

The battle system has good ideas behind it, but is far too limiting in practice as each character only gets three skills: an attack that deals damage, another attack that also deals damage but with AOE, and a third healing/utility skill. There's a system to interrupt the enemy's spellcasts by hitting them with specific elements that show up next to them, but in the end it just limits your options further by forcing you to use Damage Skill B as opposed to Damage Skill A or Utility Skill C. There are no player-inflicted buffs, status effects, or anything of the sort to manage, so pretty much every battle encounter plays out with the same flow and strategy.

The dungeons in this game are gorgeous and have lots of variety in aesthetic and general design. Looking at them was a treat, and I wish I could say the same for the myriad of puzzles within them. There are a good number of puzzles in each dungeon, but they almost feel like more of a chore than an experience due to how easy they are. Just one quick glance at the screen and 90% of puzzles in the game solve themselves, which is a shame as there are so many different mechanics brought up that could've made for a fun brain-scratching time in the same lieu as Golden Sun's dungeons.

I won't say much about the plot, but nothing shocked or excited me because the game went waaaaay too hard on foreshadowing events, with it being harder to care much about what was happening while I held no love for the characters. There are some cool lore bits and short stories to aid in the worldbuilding, which I felt was a cool part of the game. The world itself is interesting, backed by the sick character designs and beautiful spritework as mentioned before, so while I won't remember the plot or characters a year down the line, I will occasionally think back and say, "Damn, Sea of Stars was a pretty game."

Doesn't match the "spectacle" that other Fromsoft games have, but it swings very hard and manages to stand well on its own. Combat is incredibly fun and some of the best in the genre; just don't get starry-eyed over seeing this game has parries and forget that sometimes you should just dodge an attack instead. The "magic" system equivalent is pretty lame and limited, but the weapon variety helps make up for this. There are some pretty interesting sticks and swords to swing around with their own special mechanics. Very much looking forward to more from these devs.

Went through the 3rd and 4th gen Armored Core games in anticipation for this, and 6 is my new favorite. Movement feels amazing, the characters have a surprising amount of personality and memorable quirks, the "spectacle" aspect is A1, the boss fights are cool and pretty challenging your first time through the game, and the game just... sounds good. Single-player alone has lots of replay value, though I'd say the game feels too easy after the first playthrough thanks to having better parts, OS Tuning upgrades, and just having a better grasp of the game. Any challenge at that point will largely come from intentionally running sub-par builds. Even S-ranking missions is just as easy as rushing to the objective, ignoring every enemy that you aren't forced to destroy, only making sure that you don't die to boss.

The biggest complain I have is that the online experience is absolute garbage. PvP itself is fun, but there's no matchmaking, 1v1 lobbies only allow one match to play at a time while everyone else spectates, while the spectator view itself is pretty bad and even prevents you from leaving the lobby OR the game, and there are no ping/connection indicators for this not-so-great netcode. Even sharing builds and decals with other players is jank, as instead of there being an in-game gallery showing what people are uploading, you have to find their Share Code on Twitter/Youtube/Discord/etc. Every online feature for this game is such a disappointment, it's below the bare minimum but at least it "functions."

The game is great, though, one of my favorites from this year and my new favorite in the Armored Core series. Very much hoping for a Hard Mode similar to the 4th gen games. Or a Bloody Palace-esque mode so we can get really silly.

A pretty pleasant surprise of a game, with very obvious inspirations from Vanillaware. The environments looks great, with gorgeous or horrifying backdrops across the scenes, backed up by a good variety of enemies with pretty interesting lore if you take the time to look in the Monsterpedia. The story is pretty alright, nothing spectacular, but far from boring with some interesting backstories being fed to you as you go throughout the dungeons.

The combat is probably what I enjoyed the least about the game; enemies get juggled very easily while combo creativity isn't really there. Boss fights felt pretty forgettable, while any difficult encounters only felt challenging just because there was a bloat of enemies on the screen instead of any real interesting interactions going on. I also played on Very Hard for my first playthrough, so enemy health was very bloated and I'd sometimes just get one-shot or stunned to death from some attack with little telegraph to it or spell that had its sigil obscured by some other enemy or on-screen effect. So I'd recommend you pick a difficulty below that for your first playthrough.

Pretty good game, though.

FromSoft stop being afraid of making cool unique weapons that aren't greatswords. Let me kill a boss and use their gigantic arms as a cool fist weapon with an actual unique moveset I am begging I am so tired of big swords getting all the cool moves what do you mean out of 6 whips only 2 have a unique move while the rest start with KICK as a weapon art.

Game's cool, though. There were way too many instances of Fromsoft sticking a Bloodborne or Sekiro boss in the game with Dark Souls weightiness to it, but the build variety and exploration in this game feel great.

You can do a lot with a funny ball that can change elements and bounce off of walls. Easily one of the best action RPGs I've ever played, also with the most fun puzzles I've experienced outside of a strict puzzle game. Combat is fast and snappy with a variety of moves to change up your approach to combat on the fly. The boss fights are incredible, weaving in the puzzle-solving mechanics in a way that's a bit similar to Zelda, but requiring a lot more dexterity and quick thinking as it is still very much a fast-paced action game. There are accessibility options to reduce the difficulty of things if you worry that your gaming or geometry skills may hinder you (this is a game of angles).

Exploring maps and finding secrets always felt engaging and rewarding, and sidequests took advantage of the puzzle-solving nature of the game to give you more than just "go to this location and kill this enemy for some items and lore," with some sidequests even getting their own little mini-games. Story is pretty solid and grounded, nothing crazy, but with plenty of goofy, enjoyable characters.