(Played about equally on Windows PC and Steam Deck)

Holy shit, Hi-Fi Rush really is that good! Every aspect of the game is absolutely full of passion and style; the fact that this was published by Bethesda is absolutely shocking. This is the kind of game I'd only expect to see from an indie developer nowadays. The combination of the rhythm and hack-and-slash genres isn't entirely new (see 2020's No Straight Roads), but this game just does it so well. I found myself bopping my head to the rhythm more often than not. The cast of characters was also very entertaining; Chai and CNMN were probably my favorites, but just about everyone else was really good too. I also really appreciated the bits of dialogue from the robots throughout each stage + the conversations with the team at the base; I made sure to listen to all of them. And of course, the rock soundtrack was really great too, from the bangers composed for the game to the inspired choices of licenses tracks for some of the bosses and stages. Not that I needed to use it myself, but the fact that they went through the effort of making entire alternative songs so that streamers won't get copyright claimed is also commendable. I did have two small issues with the game, though. First, the way Chai controls doesn't work particularly well for the platforming you need to do throughout the game. It's not too bad, though, and I was definitely used to it by the end. Second, several fights can get chaotic, whch made it hard to tell what was going on on my first few tries. Again, though, this wasn't that bad either; the game has infinite lives and generous checkpoints, so I never worried about losing progress whenever I lost.

So yeah, Hi-Fi Rush is absolutely something special. I'll definitely be sticking with it a little while longer to get some S-ranks and do some postgame content. I'm also certain I'll come back to it sooner or later after that to play through it once again. Hopefully the success of this will lead to more uniquely fun projects getting greenlit by big companies in the future! If not, though, we still have plenty of indie devs making all kinds of creative games for us to play.

but if we do get something like this again can we like. get some notice beforehand

i did not expect it to be THIS good. it got me crying and laughing so much it's such a goofy game sometimes and at the same time manages to tell a serious heartwrenching story, the combat is satisfying as fuck and visually great it's a fucking dopamine rush and i just love the concept of the hub being this town that is genuinely full of life and things to do, you could spend half your time just walking around the city completing sidestories or playing minigames or doing your own thing and have so much fun, it has left me with a burning desire to play all of the other games

I was actually kind of excited about this game for several reasons. The art for this game is probably some of the best I've ever seen for the series, the costumes for the characters look good, the music is great, and most importantly it would bring parts of the compilation that never got an official release to the West finally, like Before Crisis. All for the best price of free. I was disappointed when they announced the game was going to be a gacha, and I have a strict mental block of not paying a penny to mobile game microtransactions, but I figured this game is so approachable to me I might as well give it a try. Yet somehow they still managed to drop the ball in so many ways and so hard at those with this game. I genuinely couldn't even get past the opening bombing mission; it was just so mindless and an obvious cash grab.

First off, they advertised that all compilation titles would be playable at launch in some degree, when that just obviously never happened. All that's been available at launch is the Midgar section of the original game, the first few chapters of Crisis Core, and some new story for First Soldier. To be honest, ever since Remake launched I've grown so tired of Midgar content because that's all they've been able to advertise for a while now. And yet these few chapters are all based in Midgar. It's all becoming repetitive, especially since both the original game and Crisis Core got remade recently.

Second off, I REALLY hate how you're forced to play other chapters of other games before playing the chapter I want to play. I was really only interested in the other compilation titles and maybe the First Soldier story, because everything else has been done to death already or is still being remade. I don't really want to play the bombing mission for the 30,000th time, I'm tired of it. I don't want to play Crisis Core again, when that game is already designed to be as replayable as possible. Yet here we are, still at square one. I get that this game will feature episodic releases, but if I'm not hooked in at the start there's no way I could really care for anything else. I just want something new again, so it really sucks that I have to play everything I've already gone through dozens of times just to get to the First Soldier story I may be interested in.

Third, the combat system was designed to be more in line with traditional ATB based JRPG combat, which is great for people who want that more traditional experience, but this is just a joke made in spite of that kind of system. It's not even ATB, it's just "wait for bar to fill up, press button". It's not fun at all. At least with the original FFVII, you had so much more freedom with your commands when your bar does fill up, but with Ever Crisis it's just pathetic. Really hard sell on this.

Finally, the gacha elements are everywhere. I get that this game is a gacha, so they're supposed to get you to gamble your life savings away, but everyday I've gotten notifications on my phone saying shit like "5 STAR PULL GUARANTEED!!! NEW COSTUME!!! DRAW NOW!!! GIVE BIG DADDY SQUARE ENIX MONEY!!!" There's even achievements in game for logging in everyday and pulling something from the slot machine. I think they might as well just lock away parts of the game behind gacha elements with how in your face it all is.

Overall, a MASSIVE disappointment. If you like gacha games I guess it's for you, but with probably being the biggest fan of FFVII I know amongst my small circle of friends this game just sends me into an ephemeral rage. I'm sorry. 3/10.