Dragons Dogma 2 starts off super strong with a more fully realized world then the original. It's still very good by the end but it loses something as the difficulty doesn't ramp up appropriately in the late game and enemy variety remains underwhelming. Exploring its world and coming across unique areas is fantastic but just let down by the lack of really unique rewards given that in most cases you can buy the best stuff in shops. The Spinx stands out as something actually cool and unique with amazing rewards but the game really needed more of that. Story is something you may as well ignore since it isn't good but quest design at least is refreshingly more free of handholding then most modern RPG's. The various classes are all very distinct and fun to play. That's by far the highlight of this. Ultimately this is a great game despite the flaws but it is so close to getting to where it needs so it can be a masterpiece that said flaws stand out.

I'll keep this one short. The way they've fleshed things out is amazing. This game alone took me 67 hours which is longer then the original did. I like the major side quests but the Ubisoft checklist type map objectives and hit or miss mini games can get old so can't say it's perfect though. But otherwise I was very high on everything else. Games in a weird spot where the ending is one thing which can retroactively taint or heighten my opinion on this depending on how the third part is executed. Wait and see on that.

Persona 3 is one of my favorite games of all time. I was so excited to play this and have a lot to say now that I’ve finished this version.

A visual facelift is a mandatory thing for a remake. It looks in line with 5 which is good. Lighting could be darker to match the overall tone of the original game but otherwise everything is good in this department. Not much else to say here.

Reload brought with it various quality of life improvements that it really needed. Annoying AI control of you party members is gone (but credit to portable doing this first), skill inheritance is no longer random even though it was easily manipulated with reloads, social links are no longer breakable, Tartarus is better (more on that later), the annoying fatigue mechanic is gone, the ability to rewind to prior days and many more small things I can’t even think of off the top of my head. They add up to it being a more polished game then its original..

I did not mention the combat additions like shift and theurgy among the quality of life mechanics as I have more mixed feelings there. Shift is welcome in so far as it brings combat in line with 5 given its essentially the baton pass mechanic, however its presence from early on make random battles much more trivial as setting up all out attacks before enemies can even do anything is quite easy with it. The theurgy mechanic is the main new addition that is way too powerful for this game. They’re super moves each party member can do and the level of burst damage they allow is absurd and can trivialize bosses. I think all these things are cool conceptually but without adjusting balance for them they just make the game quite easy on normal difficulty in comparison to the original game. It's not pokemon easy or anything but if you played any Persona before you’ll notice the balance being off. For that reason I’d recommend at least trying higher difficulties though I know people who usually enjoy those also say these mechanics make those easier then they should be as well.

Tartarus was the biggest issue with the original game as its 200+ floors of samey randomized hallways. Conceptually it's still the same here but each major area is a bit more visually and structurally unique which is welcome compared to the original and they’ve added some small things to make exploring the tower interesting. Also the removal of fatigue and the game giving so much sp recovery items that it feels much less like a chore to get through. It's not as radical as some may have wanted, such as making sections more like 5’s palaces, but if you're familiar with the original this is still much better.

Nothing significant was changed about the main story or the social link aside from rewrites to romanceable ones so you can now remain friends instead of being forced to be a cheating asshole if you do all their social links. 3 does have an issue with packing most of its story into the last few months but that story is fantastic. This does cause interesting story development to be slow at the start but the payoff is absolutely worth it with the best ending of any of the modern persona games. Nothing else to say there as the journey shouldn’t be spoiled. For social links leaving most completely untouched is admittedly more of a mixed bag. 3 was the first Persona to do them and as a result many are not as good as future social links end up being (looking at you Moon). But there are bright spots like the Sun here which is possibly the best social link these games have ever done.

I should note, while male party members do not have social links the game did add new events for each of them to fill in that gap. This can’t have an arcana associated since all those are taken here but they do make sure you have a chance to further bond with them anyway and even give rewards like small stat boosts and unlocking a persona at the end of their storylines. Only issues with these are they are time sensitive so possible to miss out on whole storylines if you don’t know that and the personas unlocked were not locked in the original which can cause issues making special fusions that call for a persona locked behind those. Aside from those there's small events you can have with each party member where you can read, watch tv or garden together at night which can unlock special passive abilities for everyone if done enough.. It’s a welcome addition given how little to do there can be at night.

This remake is what I’d endorse as the best version to play but unfortunately I must recognize it continues the problem of not having all previous versions content as the female main character and her unique social links are absent. P3 Portable will always have a reason to be played if you’ve never seen that. Even so Reload still gives the complete original story with FES’s additions and new ones of its own and many quality of life changes so if anyone was looking to play 3 for the first time Reload should be the easy pick to point them towards.

I picked this up despite the pessimism surrounding the game due to my love of Rocksteady's previous games. Honestly I don't hate it like I expected. Traversal for each squad member is fun and unique, graphically it's quite good and combat can be good at times as well. "Can be" because the mission design is horrible and repetitive, the main issue this game has and one that can't be ignored.

I didn't love the idea of everyone using guns but aside from that the characters do feel distinct. Each ones traversal is very different from the others and things like making huge leaps with Kingshark or throwing you speedforce powered boomerang are very satisfying. Their melees and other unique attacks also serve to further differentiate each other in satisfying ways.

I have some issues with core games as a service elements. Not because I hate that, I've played way too much destiny for that to be the case. Some classic mistakes for this kind of game are found here like a lot of meaningless loot with perks that are not particularly exciting unless its actual endgame stuff. Every mission needs and end screen showing rewards and results and that honestly is just an annoying interruption. There must be a way that stuff could be given via the UI without needing it own screen keeping me from getting back in game. More importantly most missions are designed so they can recycle the same structure over and over so they can easily make more hoping to keep players busy.

To elaborate on that, 99% of missions in this game come down to the same handful of short and generic objectives that you do over and over. Protect these zone, collect the thing enemies drop, blah blah blah. The only unique somewhat memorable things breaking this up are when you do the handful of major boss fights. Enemy variety doesn't even grow adequately over time to make it feel slightly less monotonous. It always boils down to kill the purple guys on rooftops in the end. Missions for your support squad all have unique twists added on top of these missions. That sounds like something that should help right? No. Many are just annoying, the ones that aren't feel like the twists don't matter.

I do like the story, its executed well and has a proper tone for a Suicide Squad game but I'd be lying if I said I did not resent it for being set in the Arkham universe. There are narrative decisions made here that'd be totally fine in a game not carrying Arkham's baggage. But they chose to carry that series legacy on and it feels like this game does not respect what happened in it. Ultimately its all their continuity to do what they want with but its a bummer how some things work out.

The game is kind of ugly, performs bad, and crashed a half dozen times for me. A REAL monster collecting RPG would be twice as bad on all counts like Pokémon Scarlet/Violet! Kidding about that of course, but really this game also has those kinds of issues even if not as bad. It'd be a lie to say those issues don't also bring this game down. That said, really fun game though with more then enough monsters to collect to satisfy me and the synthesis mechanics make team building quite addicting.

The game has all the charm one should expect from a dragon quest game. There's also more to love here if you're a fan of IV specifically as seen by the main character being the main villain of that game. Even if you never played a Monsters game, if you like the main series at all this is worth checking out.

Making stronger monsters through synthesis is fun since you can make some stupidly strong ones once you understand it. However I do have to knock it a little for some of its mechanics being unclear like, what exactly does the sparkle you sometimes get mean, how would one ever figure out shit that require 2 monsters fusing that are fused from two very specific monsters, etc. Some great quality of life things however do deserve praise, such as the ability to reverse search as well as narrow down the monsters to ones you've never gotten before or ones you can't synthesize at the moment so you can see things you need to make them.

Did I unnecessarily grind to get broken monsters making the game trivial until the post game fights? Yes. Was this super satisfying so I don't care about it being easy as a result? Very much so. If that sounds appealing I'd suggest giving this a try.

Interesting game but takes a while to get past the more mundane tasks you need to do to get to the actually interesting gameplay loop at its core. I really can't blame people not seeing past that given how important that stuff is to the first few hours. It takes a while even to realize not only can you start to ignore that but you really should.

The idea behind this game is that you are a young adult woman running a laundromat owned by your asshole dad. Your character isn't interested in that but there are a few arcade machines in the back that are more fun/interesting which you focus on instead. The initial mundane tasks previously mentioned relate to doing laundry. At the start the few arcade machine only make so much money, you need more to buy more machines and really ramp up the arcade part of your business. As a result your main source of income has to be doing the laundry which requires you be on top of it to really make anything or else you are paid less for taking too long. This leaves you small gaps to actually play the arcade machines which can make for a frustrating experience as alerts for laundry interrupt you.

In the laundry's defense, it makes sense for the narrative being told and is gamified to reflect it as well. In a weird way once you are past the need to do the laundry you almost miss like some messed up Stockholm syndrome situation.

The arcade games gain popularity the more you play them and even more by completing certain goals for each machine. This leads to them generating more money per hour. You can also adjust difficulty and cost of each machine as their popularity increases to maximize the money they make. There's also benefits to placing less popular cabinets next to popular cabinets so they get a popularity bonus from that placement. The sooner you understand these mechanics the sooner you can ditch the laundry and have the machines rake in the cash, only taking breaks from playing more to manage things like broken machines that occasionally need attention.

The arcade games vary in quality. They're knockoffs of classic arcade games and the like. Many are fun in short bursts but a few don't quite play right in comparison to their obvious inspirations. Its really cool they did dozens of these games and even if I have issues with how some play they all show the devs love for this period in gaming history.

This loop of playing more to make more, placing cabinets strategically to boost popularity, and growing your space for the arcade as the story plays out to buy even more machines thereby making even more is the best part of Arcade Paradise. It's a shame its a bit too tough/takes too long to see past doing laundry to get to it.

I did not have a GameCube growing up but was always a massive Pokémon fan. Colosseum and its sequel were always at the top of my list of games for it I wanted to play as a result even if I knew there were better games like Smash available. Nearly 20 years after its original release I finally played/finished it.

Pokémon has plenty of spin offs but its fascinating to see one that keeps the core mechanics while its handed development off to a new team. Many design choices naturally feel very different compared to Game Freaks own as a result and are more in line with more traditional JRPG's.

Starting the players level in the mid 20's with an Espeon and Umbreon is an interesting choice. It feels intended to cut through that early stages of the game where the mechanics are boringly basic and it mostly works. The only issue I have is maybe they take it a bit too easy on you the first few hours but given that you're stuck with only two non-shadow Pokémon for a while that's understandable.

Making this double battles only, which was a new concept in gen III, was a great decision and honestly something I wish the man games would take a chance on. The format allows for more Pokémon to be viable and more interesting strategies that you can't see in normal 1 v 1 style battles. This game showcases some good basic example of doubles strategies at points like pairing Pokémon weak to Electric moves with one that redirects those moves with the Lightning Rod ability.

In terms of difficulty I feel this definitely harder then other games in the series were at the time it was made. My main issue is that a good amount of this difficulty is because grinding becomes necessary at some points to keep up with most trainers. This is before the days of giving more experience to lower level Pokémon fighting higher level ones or experience share applying to all Pokémon and it actually made me appreciate those things. For fighting bosses, the player being a bit under leveled is clearly by design given the levels of enemy trainers before and after them. This is valid choice but there can be points when the level gap gets too severe and you clearly need to grind a bit and that brings things down.

Shadow Pokémon and how you obtain them are a really cool concept. To start with how they're caught, it's an interesting choice to have you steal other trainers Pokémon. As a kid I and many others I knew at least once tried it in the main series to of course find that's not allowed. So empowering you to actually do this taps into this childhood fantasy. These stolen Pokémon needing to be shadow Pokémon only you can successfully excuses the moral issue you'd otherwise face. this system also adds another layer to battle as you try to stall to catch the shadow Pokémon putting yourself in danger of losing the battle as a result.

In regards to Shadow Pokémon as something you use, face off against, and need to purify, my feeling are more mixed. The concept is that they Pokémon's heart has been closed off making them a fighting machines. Problem with this is that these Pokémon suck in shadow form. They only get access to Shadow Rush at first which sounds nice as a 90BP attack that hits everything for neutral damage. Problem is that's physical only meaning special attackers are screwed and a decent attack with same type attack bonus would be preferable aside from when you face bad matchups. The only time the move is appropriately overpowered as the concept is meant to be is if a Pokémon goes into hyper mode where its critical hits 95% of the time. Shadow Pokémon do get access to other moves as you purify them but that's a grindy process. Adding to these Pokémon being underpowered, in opposition of the shadow Pokémon concept, they can't gain levels until they're purified meaning yet another handicap for them. I get why its like this to encourage purification but its at odds with the core concept of shadow Pokémon being fighting machine.

Overall the game was a good time and it didn't overstay its welcome, only took ~24 in game hours to complete.