Everyone is entitled to their own opinion. Not my cup of tea. Used all the recommended familiars that ended up making the story from start to finish with Shadar a cake-walk. I did all the quests up until the end of Shadar as well, but I was getting burnt out on them. Only did them for the somewhat useful stamp merit awards.

The funnest part to me was tokotoko farming. I was Level 90 with some really overpowered familiars when I took on Shadar.

Narrative wise, there was nothing for most of the game followed by somewhat of an exposition dump at the end which wasn't much in terms of content. The writing stayed closely similar to Dominion to the Dark Djinn on the DS.

Definitely a slow burn of an experience I honestly can't really recommend unless you're into this kind of thing. Who knows, you might enjoy it more yourself than I did.

I will say I agree that the art and cinematics were breathtaking.

Finished at about 41 hours

UPDATE

Got the 4th character also equipped with recommended familiars. Maxed all the characters levels, most familiars almost to max if not already. Had fun farming tokos again. Beat the White Witch at 48 hrs or so without doing anymore quests.

Really did feel like DLC <.<