640 reviews liked by Spinnerweb
Sonic the Hedgehog
1991
Gotta go fast!
After Sonic Adventure has served as my personal gateway into the series and Sonic Adventure 2 gave me an even better experience, I can proudly call myself a fan of the series now. A fan who only played 3D Sonic. That being said, Sonic Origins opened up a whole new dimension to me: 2D Sonic!
Here's a quick rundown of the zones: Green Hill was surprisingly the least engaging zone for me, but I can appreciate it for how iconic it is and being a good introduction with a timeless theme. I didn't have an issue with Marble Zone's methodical approach for the most part, although some of the random pop-up spikes felt a little cheap. Spring Yard is fine, but gets repetitive after a while. Now, Labyrinth Zone seems to be pretty universally hated, but I didn't find myself having much of an issue with it and thought it was rather refreshing after going through Spring Yard, the underwater sections were cool. Star Light Zone had cool catapults and Scrap Brain was... rather hard compared to the rest of the game - but that makes sense, it's the last level for a reason! The final fight itself though was a bit underwhelming and the ending was cheap.
But in the end, I enjoyed my time with the Blue Blur's debut game, even if most of the level design goes against the whole "gotta go fast" motif, which apparently is a dealbreaker for many. And while 2D Sonic is fun, I'd be lying if I told you I didn't miss the homing attack from Adventure at first.
After Sonic Adventure has served as my personal gateway into the series and Sonic Adventure 2 gave me an even better experience, I can proudly call myself a fan of the series now. A fan who only played 3D Sonic. That being said, Sonic Origins opened up a whole new dimension to me: 2D Sonic!
Here's a quick rundown of the zones: Green Hill was surprisingly the least engaging zone for me, but I can appreciate it for how iconic it is and being a good introduction with a timeless theme. I didn't have an issue with Marble Zone's methodical approach for the most part, although some of the random pop-up spikes felt a little cheap. Spring Yard is fine, but gets repetitive after a while. Now, Labyrinth Zone seems to be pretty universally hated, but I didn't find myself having much of an issue with it and thought it was rather refreshing after going through Spring Yard, the underwater sections were cool. Star Light Zone had cool catapults and Scrap Brain was... rather hard compared to the rest of the game - but that makes sense, it's the last level for a reason! The final fight itself though was a bit underwhelming and the ending was cheap.
But in the end, I enjoyed my time with the Blue Blur's debut game, even if most of the level design goes against the whole "gotta go fast" motif, which apparently is a dealbreaker for many. And while 2D Sonic is fun, I'd be lying if I told you I didn't miss the homing attack from Adventure at first.
I enjoyed the story, but it did feel a bit padded. Some story relevant characters should have really had portraits but didn't, which does makes this feel low budget.
"I just moved here, but Aoba sure is a great place." (Young Man)
Before starting this review, I need to say this kind of works as my combined thoughts on Innocent Sin and Eternal Punishment. My score is indicative of just this game, but I never felt like I wanted to make a review for both since the gameplay is practically identical and I'd just be repeating myself a lot.
Eternal Punishment has some seriously missed potential. There are some great ideas here that are tough to appreciate from the gameplay that is present.
Being that Eternal Punishment is a direct sequel to Innocent Sin, it reuses a ton of assets from the original game, with the major culprits being the dungeons and music. Logically, the reused dungeons make sense as they pertain to the story's happenings, but I think there comes a point where, in development, the creators should have asked themselves if that was truly an ideal way to entertain the player. I would have liked to see how the settings have changed atmospherically in the sequel, but all we got were map layout updates. I was also disappointed by the game's soundtrack this time around. Most songs are either remixed or just reused entirely. There's some new songs though, one of which is the Aoba Park theme which is a beautiful track, and this remix of the Mountain Trail theme, but I enjoyed Innocent Sin’s OST more since all the music was brand new.
It's clear the developers drew some inspiration from Phantasy Star when making this combat system. Combat revolving around auto-battling, a 5-character party, and most notably, fusion spells. Differing from PSIV, you're able to switch around turn orders mid-battle, which is a great addition for fusion spells considering PSIV had you making your characters defend to link the turns for people with varying speed stats. I honestly never really ended up using these in Innocent Sin and Eternal Punishment, as a lot just seemed worse than their non-chainable counterparts. An instance being when you use spells that target groups of enemies that share the same element, you can be prompted to turn it into a fusion spell that only attacks one enemy instead, which was inconvenient in standard battles with enemy groups. You can opt out of using the fusion spell before it happens in battle, which is another great addition, so it's not really an issue. The only time I ended up really using them was when combining two elements to do a bit more damage in boss fights. A major oversight, or intended mechanic, depending on who you ask, is the defend trick, where you cancel auto-battle and make everyone defend after their action. It's tedious to use in standard battles but proves extremely effective in boss battles due to you taking close to no damage. It really does make me believe it's an oversight, unless the developers thought it would be too useless to waste an extra turn defending. A cool aspect of the combat was the ability to have characters be able to switch their personae without wasting a turn, which led me to use it quite frequently. Turning anyone into a healer out of the blue was very helpful.
EP is known to be one of the harder entries in the SMT franchise, and I was well aware of this from friends. I know it sounds condescending, but I thought it was going to be a case of Persona 5 fans playing an older RPG, but Eternal Punishment is one of the harder RPG titles in the PS1 library, in my opinion. The difficulty was kind of mixed in its tedious structure along with its slow combat and frustrating encounter rate. By tedious structure, I am referring to demon fusion, which is done by gathering spell cards through demon negotiation. When fusing demons, there are different arcanas of cards they will give you pertaining to their arcana. Later on, demons will give you more and more per negotiation as the card requirements for fusions rise for higher-leveled personae. It's pretty easy to find a way to entertain them for cards, as there's multiple character combinations that work, but the strategy you want to go for is to form a contract with them, which usually has a very small amount or 1 specific character combo that raises their joy stat. The reason you want to do this is because after contract formation, when you entertain them for cards, they'll give you wild cards, which you can give to someone in the velvet room to change into any arcana you want. Considering there's over 20 card types in the game, this is the most convenient method of fusing personae. There’s different personae to fuse in each arcana of cards, which explains why you’d want the wild cards for complete freedom of your team's builds. It’s frustrating to find the joy-raising action to initiate these contracts, part of it being that they’re integral to the gameplay. There’s an art to demon negotiation; you’ll be able to tell what works sometimes from your characters' personalities meshing well with the demons, but it is by no means consistent. It’s something that’s fun at first but quickly becomes tedious when you're tasked with doing it more than a few times. It felt like I was just aimlessly trying anything that might work, which most times resulted in the demon getting mad and you having to enter a new encounter to try again. The salt on the wound is that making them mad will have them break your contract… Persona 2 is best played with a notebook nearby to write down the correct prompts for these demons. Even though the end result is a team with some killer personae, it's a goal that’s hard to work towards with all the tedium associated with it.
Now, the slow combat. Not only is the game some of the slowest combat on the system, but it is also grindy as all hell. Throughout the game, you’ll need to fuse new personae a lot to stay on top of the game's difficulty. To unlock the moves on each persona, you’ll have to use any of their moves to get them to slowly rank up to their max level of 8 and get each move associated with them. Why would you want to rank them up all the way? Because sometimes the personae will have an integral move like healing everyone, or attack moves which you'll need for them to be useful. This was by far the most annoying part of the game's combat. When I’d get to a skill-check boss fight, I’d have to back out and grind up new personas, which got really irritating. I honestly wouldn’t mind the idea of it if they’d rank up quicker, because later on it started to tread on multiple hours of grinding. You can get them to skip 2 ranks from finishing battles with fusion attacks from a lucky mutation, but I could never get this to happen, so take that as you will. Even though I have a lot of complaints about this game's systems, it’s still fun to make builds for your characters with persona fusion. You can add a stat boost card and a card to add a certain move during the fusion, which adds a good layer of customizability. There’s also a level-up bonus for each persona to add a point to a particular stat, which is something you need to think about so you can boost your character's strengths. It’s as fun as the rest of the series in that regard; there’s still a bunch of pondering time spent in the velvet room, but it’s hard to look past the requirements of doing so.
I will say, though, that Eternal Punishment has great boss fights; almost every boss in the game will make you switch up your strategy and punish you if you don't. For instance, there's one fight later on where the boss heals a set amount of HP passively every turn, so you'll need to utilize fusion spells to maximize damage while balancing out support for your party. They were always a challenge to look forward to, and I was always preemptively aware that there would be a challenge that I'd have to face when outside boss doors in dungeons, no matter how high level or good my personae were.
By far the most endearing aspect of Eternal Punishment is its cast of characters. It's really nice to see a game tackle aspects of adulthood in such a blunt way in a real-life setting. These characters are people that most can truly relate to. By the time they started revealing a lot about them near the end through flashbacks, I got a bit emotional. These characters have realistic internal conflicts, not some shit out of Persona 5. I do wish there was more of it throughout the game. It may be the absurd amount of time spent in dungeons, but it really feels like there were barely any cutscenes for these characters to develop. Of course, the ones we have are great, but I wanted more.
I'm being told I should have played the PSP releases of these games, but I always like playing original releases because I like to admire what games did at the time of their original release. Part of the reason P1 is so interesting to me is that it is an early 5th generation title, and it was up in the air what to make next since there wasn’t really a blueprint yet. I feel more in tune with the innovations associated with games when I play their original releases, since a lot feels lost to me when I look at HD re-releases. Just looking at the UI in these titles and how they tried to make P1 overly accessible with the fast movement and out-of-place soundtrack, which completely alters the heavy atmosphere the Revelations version has, it was evident enough that these were not the definitive ways for me to play these titles. For the P2 games, though, the redone soundtracks actually sound really nice, but the battle UI looks and plays awful. So, that's just in case anyone was wondering why I played these versions instead.
What can I take away from these games? I will never complain about lengthy combat animations again. Kidding, but not really... These games definitely got me more interested in trying out the classic SMT games, and newer SMT games, for that matter, and I liked P2’s structure as opposed to the later entries in the Persona series. If you like this game and feel like I’m missing something, feel free to let me know in the comments. I’m curious to know aspects of why people enjoy this game.
Side Note: Whenever I play SMT games, something befalls me every single time. When I was playing Nocturne, I was incapable of sleeping for a week for some reason? During Revelations, I got hacked on every single account I own from what I think to be my cookies getting logged, and yes, even my Backloggd was hacked. Can you believe the nerve of someone to hack a Backloggd account? Someone must really hate me. During this game, I got sick for the first time in like 2 years and feel like shit. I fear for my life next time I go back to this series. I'll end off this review by reminding everyone to use 2 Factor sign in for your accounts. Stay safe out there, fellas...
Before starting this review, I need to say this kind of works as my combined thoughts on Innocent Sin and Eternal Punishment. My score is indicative of just this game, but I never felt like I wanted to make a review for both since the gameplay is practically identical and I'd just be repeating myself a lot.
Eternal Punishment has some seriously missed potential. There are some great ideas here that are tough to appreciate from the gameplay that is present.
Being that Eternal Punishment is a direct sequel to Innocent Sin, it reuses a ton of assets from the original game, with the major culprits being the dungeons and music. Logically, the reused dungeons make sense as they pertain to the story's happenings, but I think there comes a point where, in development, the creators should have asked themselves if that was truly an ideal way to entertain the player. I would have liked to see how the settings have changed atmospherically in the sequel, but all we got were map layout updates. I was also disappointed by the game's soundtrack this time around. Most songs are either remixed or just reused entirely. There's some new songs though, one of which is the Aoba Park theme which is a beautiful track, and this remix of the Mountain Trail theme, but I enjoyed Innocent Sin’s OST more since all the music was brand new.
It's clear the developers drew some inspiration from Phantasy Star when making this combat system. Combat revolving around auto-battling, a 5-character party, and most notably, fusion spells. Differing from PSIV, you're able to switch around turn orders mid-battle, which is a great addition for fusion spells considering PSIV had you making your characters defend to link the turns for people with varying speed stats. I honestly never really ended up using these in Innocent Sin and Eternal Punishment, as a lot just seemed worse than their non-chainable counterparts. An instance being when you use spells that target groups of enemies that share the same element, you can be prompted to turn it into a fusion spell that only attacks one enemy instead, which was inconvenient in standard battles with enemy groups. You can opt out of using the fusion spell before it happens in battle, which is another great addition, so it's not really an issue. The only time I ended up really using them was when combining two elements to do a bit more damage in boss fights. A major oversight, or intended mechanic, depending on who you ask, is the defend trick, where you cancel auto-battle and make everyone defend after their action. It's tedious to use in standard battles but proves extremely effective in boss battles due to you taking close to no damage. It really does make me believe it's an oversight, unless the developers thought it would be too useless to waste an extra turn defending. A cool aspect of the combat was the ability to have characters be able to switch their personae without wasting a turn, which led me to use it quite frequently. Turning anyone into a healer out of the blue was very helpful.
EP is known to be one of the harder entries in the SMT franchise, and I was well aware of this from friends. I know it sounds condescending, but I thought it was going to be a case of Persona 5 fans playing an older RPG, but Eternal Punishment is one of the harder RPG titles in the PS1 library, in my opinion. The difficulty was kind of mixed in its tedious structure along with its slow combat and frustrating encounter rate. By tedious structure, I am referring to demon fusion, which is done by gathering spell cards through demon negotiation. When fusing demons, there are different arcanas of cards they will give you pertaining to their arcana. Later on, demons will give you more and more per negotiation as the card requirements for fusions rise for higher-leveled personae. It's pretty easy to find a way to entertain them for cards, as there's multiple character combinations that work, but the strategy you want to go for is to form a contract with them, which usually has a very small amount or 1 specific character combo that raises their joy stat. The reason you want to do this is because after contract formation, when you entertain them for cards, they'll give you wild cards, which you can give to someone in the velvet room to change into any arcana you want. Considering there's over 20 card types in the game, this is the most convenient method of fusing personae. There’s different personae to fuse in each arcana of cards, which explains why you’d want the wild cards for complete freedom of your team's builds. It’s frustrating to find the joy-raising action to initiate these contracts, part of it being that they’re integral to the gameplay. There’s an art to demon negotiation; you’ll be able to tell what works sometimes from your characters' personalities meshing well with the demons, but it is by no means consistent. It’s something that’s fun at first but quickly becomes tedious when you're tasked with doing it more than a few times. It felt like I was just aimlessly trying anything that might work, which most times resulted in the demon getting mad and you having to enter a new encounter to try again. The salt on the wound is that making them mad will have them break your contract… Persona 2 is best played with a notebook nearby to write down the correct prompts for these demons. Even though the end result is a team with some killer personae, it's a goal that’s hard to work towards with all the tedium associated with it.
Now, the slow combat. Not only is the game some of the slowest combat on the system, but it is also grindy as all hell. Throughout the game, you’ll need to fuse new personae a lot to stay on top of the game's difficulty. To unlock the moves on each persona, you’ll have to use any of their moves to get them to slowly rank up to their max level of 8 and get each move associated with them. Why would you want to rank them up all the way? Because sometimes the personae will have an integral move like healing everyone, or attack moves which you'll need for them to be useful. This was by far the most annoying part of the game's combat. When I’d get to a skill-check boss fight, I’d have to back out and grind up new personas, which got really irritating. I honestly wouldn’t mind the idea of it if they’d rank up quicker, because later on it started to tread on multiple hours of grinding. You can get them to skip 2 ranks from finishing battles with fusion attacks from a lucky mutation, but I could never get this to happen, so take that as you will. Even though I have a lot of complaints about this game's systems, it’s still fun to make builds for your characters with persona fusion. You can add a stat boost card and a card to add a certain move during the fusion, which adds a good layer of customizability. There’s also a level-up bonus for each persona to add a point to a particular stat, which is something you need to think about so you can boost your character's strengths. It’s as fun as the rest of the series in that regard; there’s still a bunch of pondering time spent in the velvet room, but it’s hard to look past the requirements of doing so.
I will say, though, that Eternal Punishment has great boss fights; almost every boss in the game will make you switch up your strategy and punish you if you don't. For instance, there's one fight later on where the boss heals a set amount of HP passively every turn, so you'll need to utilize fusion spells to maximize damage while balancing out support for your party. They were always a challenge to look forward to, and I was always preemptively aware that there would be a challenge that I'd have to face when outside boss doors in dungeons, no matter how high level or good my personae were.
By far the most endearing aspect of Eternal Punishment is its cast of characters. It's really nice to see a game tackle aspects of adulthood in such a blunt way in a real-life setting. These characters are people that most can truly relate to. By the time they started revealing a lot about them near the end through flashbacks, I got a bit emotional. These characters have realistic internal conflicts, not some shit out of Persona 5. I do wish there was more of it throughout the game. It may be the absurd amount of time spent in dungeons, but it really feels like there were barely any cutscenes for these characters to develop. Of course, the ones we have are great, but I wanted more.
I'm being told I should have played the PSP releases of these games, but I always like playing original releases because I like to admire what games did at the time of their original release. Part of the reason P1 is so interesting to me is that it is an early 5th generation title, and it was up in the air what to make next since there wasn’t really a blueprint yet. I feel more in tune with the innovations associated with games when I play their original releases, since a lot feels lost to me when I look at HD re-releases. Just looking at the UI in these titles and how they tried to make P1 overly accessible with the fast movement and out-of-place soundtrack, which completely alters the heavy atmosphere the Revelations version has, it was evident enough that these were not the definitive ways for me to play these titles. For the P2 games, though, the redone soundtracks actually sound really nice, but the battle UI looks and plays awful. So, that's just in case anyone was wondering why I played these versions instead.
What can I take away from these games? I will never complain about lengthy combat animations again. Kidding, but not really... These games definitely got me more interested in trying out the classic SMT games, and newer SMT games, for that matter, and I liked P2’s structure as opposed to the later entries in the Persona series. If you like this game and feel like I’m missing something, feel free to let me know in the comments. I’m curious to know aspects of why people enjoy this game.
Side Note: Whenever I play SMT games, something befalls me every single time. When I was playing Nocturne, I was incapable of sleeping for a week for some reason? During Revelations, I got hacked on every single account I own from what I think to be my cookies getting logged, and yes, even my Backloggd was hacked. Can you believe the nerve of someone to hack a Backloggd account? Someone must really hate me. During this game, I got sick for the first time in like 2 years and feel like shit. I fear for my life next time I go back to this series. I'll end off this review by reminding everyone to use 2 Factor sign in for your accounts. Stay safe out there, fellas...
I would like to thank @duhnuhnuh for gifting me this game, as a part of their massive Steam Key giveaway, and I’d recommend checking it out if you’d like to try some games out for the cost of absolutely nothing.
Shantae and the Seven Sirens is sure the fifth video game entry in the Shantae video game series released on video game consoles in 2020.
Going back a few years, Shantae and the Seven Sirens feels bizarre. It entered development around March 2018-ish, and was revealed about a year later, simply as Shantae 5. It was somewhat exciting to me, as someone who hadn't played a Shantae game yet but was definitely interested in the series. I grew up watching the Shantae Pirate’s Curse commercials on the 3DS, so I knew all of the characters, and I also heard that FUCKING MUSIC! But fast-forward a few months, it was eventually revealed that it would be a timed Apple Arcade exclusive, and I think the Shantae fans died a little inside, but rest assured, the game was fully released… to no avail! I had genuinely not seen anybody talk about the new game. The Steam reception seemed positive, the Metacritic scores were solid, so what happened? It wasn't until my Summer of 2022 Shantae binge that I would beat and finish almost every game in the series, save for two. Shantae (the first one), because of a crash that was seemingly exclusive to Switch and 3DS, and Seven Sirens, and by god. I could tell why this game went under the radar. It was really… meh, for the lack of a better term. I had only played till about the first zone, but the game really lacked the fun factor of Pirate’s Curse, nor did it have the phenomenal level design of Half Genie Hero,and overall, it was just really fucking easy. Over a year later after release though, the game received a brand new update which gave it a Definitive Mode alongside 3 other modes, which was nice, although it also released to basically no fanfare. Did every Shantae fan just… disappear between 2018 and then? I wasn't aware of the new update as I was using a less than legal copy, but now that I have the Steam version, it's time to give the game another look. With the Definitive Mode, is Shantae and the Seven Sirens a worthwhile package? Or does it give me scurvy? The biggest issue is it’s lack of risk taking with the tried-and true Shantae formula, unlike the previous 3 games, making it feel very by the numbers as yet another entry in the Shantae franchise. And none of the games have felt so... generic before. Let’s pop open the hatch, and see why Seven Sirens is so disappointing (to me, at least).
Right off the bat, I do have a few praises regarding how WayForward implemented these 4 new game modes. While the Definitive Mode takes precedence over the Legacy Mode, if you wish, you can also revert to the Legacy Mode on a save by save basis, which is pretty nice. But also, another negative right off the bat. The graphics. I don’t like em, never have and never will; hell, I’ll goes as far as to say that the aesthetics are fundamentally flawed. A majority of this game’s graphics are follow the style of Half Genie Hero, but there’s a big issue with how the game is presented. Half Genie Hero was a beautiful game, being presented in the 2.5D art style that looked incredible on the eyes. The background had so many layers, the models were high quality, it was a really pretty looking indie game. Compare this screenshot to this one from Seven Sirens and the problem should be immediately apparent. Seven Sirens is presented in a 2D plain, and it looks flatter than my man boobs, not to mention the occasional model in the overworld which just looks out of place, like the many plants you’ll find. The cutscenes are the strongest visual aspect to the game. Studio Trigger animated the intro to the game, and it looks great. It's a bit too general for my tastes, as Risky really isn't a major part of the story, but it still looks frantic and fun overall. The in-game cutscenes aren't as fast paced as the first, but it still looks okay to me. But aside from the in-game cutscenes, it just doesn’t look appealing to me, akin to how the soundtrack never caught my ears.
You can really feel the loss of Jake Kaufman in the sound department here. The soundtrack of each individual Shantae game has been mostly solid, maybe save for the first game, but at least that released on GBC, and the compositions were actually pretty catchy. The composition team behind Seven Sirens was lead by Professor Sakamoto, and a variety of composer contributed to the soundtrack. But, what happened here??? All of it takes a chiptune-esque approach, which is fine (albeit odd for a hand-drawn graphic platformer), but it simply doesn’t sound memorable, nor really all that good. There’s a few decent songs here and there, but for the most part, the music is just… noise. No cohesion or anything., just… music… It’s easily my least favorite soundtrack in the entire series, and I really hope they can clap back with Advance.
When it comes to the game itself, it’s... odd to say the least, at least when it comes to progression and structure. Classic Shantae (2000 and Risky’s Revenge) had a big open map, while the Modern Games (Pirate’s Curse and Half Genie Hero) had much smaller, multiple maps. Sure, Half Genie Hero made it a level-by-level structure, but you still had to use your abilities to explore through to progress. It worked, although it was awkward at times to backtrack. Seven Sirens returns to the Classic Shantae style while also mixing in Modern Shantae, to somewhat mediocre results. Unlike previous Shantae games which had you use your abilities to progress, Shantae and the Seven Sirens opted for a more “find x item, bring it to here” design. It’s not terrible, but a part of me really missed the more character based progression of the previous games. It gave you an “Aha!” moment, but Seven Sirens doesn’t really do that all too well. At best, I really felt a sense of satisfaction that I was at least making progress, but what game fails at that? Maybe it’s because the abilities themselves... kind of suck.
Seven Sirens attempts to integrate the animals into your moveset, but it doesn’t really feel as great at how Pirate’s Curse did it. In Pirate’s Curse, you were always using all of your abilities at once. Not because you necessarily had to, but it was really fun to do so, and most of the level design in that game encouraged that. Big, flat open plain with a bunch of enemies you don't want to deal with? Annihilate their asses with the Dash. Seven Sirens, on the other hand, fails at this. I really only enjoyed the Newt Dash. The rest are kind of okay. You use them to progress. That’s it. No practical uses outside of combat, like Elephant, or Monkey from the classic games. But, if Shantae is a belly dancing genie, watt about her dances though? So… the dances. They’re all pretty annoying. Not only do they eat up your magic, meaning players going for the most combat-positive upgrades are essentially shot in the foot. But the dances themselves are really, really boring. Shantae uses an element, changes something in the current room, get the thing you need, move on. Needless to say. It’s not FUN. It’s so boring, like, is this REALLY the best you could do? What if the transformations changed your player character, but they all have different movesets which provide individual benefits? As it stands, the current system, it’s really not all that great.
As for the level design… it’s just your average Metroidvania level design. Well, what’s the issue? It’s JUST your average Metroidvania level design. Enemies are present in the map, everything connects together, use ability (without any inherent satisfaction to be had as it’s the most predictable thing you can fucking imagine), move on. Seriously, what happened to the level design in between Half Genie Hero and Seven Sirens? The levels aren’t dynamic at all, and not even the fucking enemies are different. It’s just so… AVERAGE. Ugh. At least the enemies are occasionally fun to fight, but good lord. Not to mention the multi-staged fetch quests throughout Paradise Island. Shantae’s fetch quests, at least since Pirate’s Curse, have been pretty reserved. Usually you have to return to an area only once, rarely twice, and never again. And it was actually fun, since all of your abilities were awesome to use, complimenting the previous level design. Sure, Half-Genie Hero wasn't as great in this aspect, as the animals weren't integrated into your moves, but at the very least you had the teleport dance, as well as less backtracking in general. Seven Sirens is absolutely loaded with this, but unlike Pirate’s Curse, the moveset is just too unviable for general use. There's a few more than Pirate’s Curse, but once again, they're not all for general use. The best out of the few is easily the triple jump and dash. The rest are just awkwardly bad. The shell is too unwieldy for general platforming, and hitting a big enough enemy completely stops it. It's thankfully manually charged, unlike Pirate's Curse, which was a bit finicky, but it's still eclipsed by the Pirate's Curse dash. And the Drill and Frog just kinda… sucked. They're just too slow and tedious, good lord. That's the best way to describe this game. It's not doing anything innovative, just existing half of the time. And it infuriates me. There needs to be a case study on how Seven Sirens fails at competent modern Metroidvania design. Rather than expressing its level design through your own player character, it remains stagnant by only requiring the bare minimum of you, leaving it as the least engaging of the centrilogy, soon to be hexology. Advance better not have these problems, because this game is severely lacking in the fun factor of the previous games.
But why are we traveling through this big, open world, gaining new abilities and rescuing these half-naked women? Well, look no further than the plot. Shantae and her friends are invited to “Paradise Island” (seriously???), an island filled with sunshine non-stop. It's here where Shantae meets four other Half Genies, as a plot point established in the first game; Plink, the smallest one, Vera, the best one, Zapple, the strong one, Filin, obviously Rottytops, and Harmony, the tallest one, holy shit. All of them get ready for a massive Half-Genie Festival, but on the night of the festival, all of the genies (sparing Shantae) disappear. Determined to find answers, Shantae explores all throughout Paradise Island in search of the Half-Genies. Risky Boots is encountered but denies any foul-play at hand The Half-Genies and even the bosses themselves are pretty one-note for the most part. It's about as video-gamey as plot structure gets. Find Half-Genie, kill Siren, bam, onto the next thing. Oh, but surprise surprise, Risky Boots was behind the entire thing!!! Well, partially at least. Because the Empress Siren made a deal with Risky if Risky kidnapped the 5 Half-Genies. Soooo… yeah. Almost entirely Risky’s fault. But here’s the thing. If Risky wanted to kidnap the genies, how in the HELL did she not take notice to Shantae? Shantae is Risky's arch nemesis; she’s SEEN Shantae do her genie moves in previous games. Why only leave Shantae? Why not kidnap them all? Sure, It’d be overkill, but nobody else would be able to rescue the Half Genes, let alone Rottytops and friends while they’re lazing about. Oh, and the Empress Siren? She just feeds off of the Genies to survive because Harmony’s mother placed a spell on her. Then she practically kills Risky, and then plans to become immortal by taking everyone’s life force. They fight, a shitty boss battle occurs- WAIT.
I’m completely with Yuzrnaime on this, the fights are genuinely TERRIBLE. Not only do they have an UNHEALTHY amount of HP, a majority of them sped long periods of time in invulnerability. IT’S GENUINELY IRRITATING. I’d type out a long ass rant, but I’m writing this at 2AM. Bitch, PLEASE. But once you kill Empress, she dies, Risky comes back, Shantae and friends leave, the end. Sweet dreams.
Seven Sirens is certainly one of the most disappointing games I've ever played through. As a follow up to the two best entries in the series, it really falters. It's a game with 80% hot air in between it's content, succeeding at almost nothing it does in the remaining 20%. I didn't feel terribly angry while playing, just mildly annoyed. Shantae's abilities? Occasionally fun, but mostly annoying. The world map? Generic and mostly annoying. The dungeon designs? Among the worst in the series for simply how annoying they are. The bosses? Padded out and annoying. The music? Bland, and more importantly, annoying. I left Seven Sirens mostly ambivalent to its content, no desire to really play it, but most importantly, annoyed. I feel annoyed at this game's very existence. Not angry. Simply. Annoyed.
Shantae and the Seven Sirens is sure the fifth video game entry in the Shantae video game series released on video game consoles in 2020.
Going back a few years, Shantae and the Seven Sirens feels bizarre. It entered development around March 2018-ish, and was revealed about a year later, simply as Shantae 5. It was somewhat exciting to me, as someone who hadn't played a Shantae game yet but was definitely interested in the series. I grew up watching the Shantae Pirate’s Curse commercials on the 3DS, so I knew all of the characters, and I also heard that FUCKING MUSIC! But fast-forward a few months, it was eventually revealed that it would be a timed Apple Arcade exclusive, and I think the Shantae fans died a little inside, but rest assured, the game was fully released… to no avail! I had genuinely not seen anybody talk about the new game. The Steam reception seemed positive, the Metacritic scores were solid, so what happened? It wasn't until my Summer of 2022 Shantae binge that I would beat and finish almost every game in the series, save for two. Shantae (the first one), because of a crash that was seemingly exclusive to Switch and 3DS, and Seven Sirens, and by god. I could tell why this game went under the radar. It was really… meh, for the lack of a better term. I had only played till about the first zone, but the game really lacked the fun factor of Pirate’s Curse, nor did it have the phenomenal level design of Half Genie Hero,and overall, it was just really fucking easy. Over a year later after release though, the game received a brand new update which gave it a Definitive Mode alongside 3 other modes, which was nice, although it also released to basically no fanfare. Did every Shantae fan just… disappear between 2018 and then? I wasn't aware of the new update as I was using a less than legal copy, but now that I have the Steam version, it's time to give the game another look. With the Definitive Mode, is Shantae and the Seven Sirens a worthwhile package? Or does it give me scurvy? The biggest issue is it’s lack of risk taking with the tried-and true Shantae formula, unlike the previous 3 games, making it feel very by the numbers as yet another entry in the Shantae franchise. And none of the games have felt so... generic before. Let’s pop open the hatch, and see why Seven Sirens is so disappointing (to me, at least).
Right off the bat, I do have a few praises regarding how WayForward implemented these 4 new game modes. While the Definitive Mode takes precedence over the Legacy Mode, if you wish, you can also revert to the Legacy Mode on a save by save basis, which is pretty nice. But also, another negative right off the bat. The graphics. I don’t like em, never have and never will; hell, I’ll goes as far as to say that the aesthetics are fundamentally flawed. A majority of this game’s graphics are follow the style of Half Genie Hero, but there’s a big issue with how the game is presented. Half Genie Hero was a beautiful game, being presented in the 2.5D art style that looked incredible on the eyes. The background had so many layers, the models were high quality, it was a really pretty looking indie game. Compare this screenshot to this one from Seven Sirens and the problem should be immediately apparent. Seven Sirens is presented in a 2D plain, and it looks flatter than my man boobs, not to mention the occasional model in the overworld which just looks out of place, like the many plants you’ll find. The cutscenes are the strongest visual aspect to the game. Studio Trigger animated the intro to the game, and it looks great. It's a bit too general for my tastes, as Risky really isn't a major part of the story, but it still looks frantic and fun overall. The in-game cutscenes aren't as fast paced as the first, but it still looks okay to me. But aside from the in-game cutscenes, it just doesn’t look appealing to me, akin to how the soundtrack never caught my ears.
You can really feel the loss of Jake Kaufman in the sound department here. The soundtrack of each individual Shantae game has been mostly solid, maybe save for the first game, but at least that released on GBC, and the compositions were actually pretty catchy. The composition team behind Seven Sirens was lead by Professor Sakamoto, and a variety of composer contributed to the soundtrack. But, what happened here??? All of it takes a chiptune-esque approach, which is fine (albeit odd for a hand-drawn graphic platformer), but it simply doesn’t sound memorable, nor really all that good. There’s a few decent songs here and there, but for the most part, the music is just… noise. No cohesion or anything., just… music… It’s easily my least favorite soundtrack in the entire series, and I really hope they can clap back with Advance.
When it comes to the game itself, it’s... odd to say the least, at least when it comes to progression and structure. Classic Shantae (2000 and Risky’s Revenge) had a big open map, while the Modern Games (Pirate’s Curse and Half Genie Hero) had much smaller, multiple maps. Sure, Half Genie Hero made it a level-by-level structure, but you still had to use your abilities to explore through to progress. It worked, although it was awkward at times to backtrack. Seven Sirens returns to the Classic Shantae style while also mixing in Modern Shantae, to somewhat mediocre results. Unlike previous Shantae games which had you use your abilities to progress, Shantae and the Seven Sirens opted for a more “find x item, bring it to here” design. It’s not terrible, but a part of me really missed the more character based progression of the previous games. It gave you an “Aha!” moment, but Seven Sirens doesn’t really do that all too well. At best, I really felt a sense of satisfaction that I was at least making progress, but what game fails at that? Maybe it’s because the abilities themselves... kind of suck.
Seven Sirens attempts to integrate the animals into your moveset, but it doesn’t really feel as great at how Pirate’s Curse did it. In Pirate’s Curse, you were always using all of your abilities at once. Not because you necessarily had to, but it was really fun to do so, and most of the level design in that game encouraged that. Big, flat open plain with a bunch of enemies you don't want to deal with? Annihilate their asses with the Dash. Seven Sirens, on the other hand, fails at this. I really only enjoyed the Newt Dash. The rest are kind of okay. You use them to progress. That’s it. No practical uses outside of combat, like Elephant, or Monkey from the classic games. But, if Shantae is a belly dancing genie, watt about her dances though? So… the dances. They’re all pretty annoying. Not only do they eat up your magic, meaning players going for the most combat-positive upgrades are essentially shot in the foot. But the dances themselves are really, really boring. Shantae uses an element, changes something in the current room, get the thing you need, move on. Needless to say. It’s not FUN. It’s so boring, like, is this REALLY the best you could do? What if the transformations changed your player character, but they all have different movesets which provide individual benefits? As it stands, the current system, it’s really not all that great.
As for the level design… it’s just your average Metroidvania level design. Well, what’s the issue? It’s JUST your average Metroidvania level design. Enemies are present in the map, everything connects together, use ability (without any inherent satisfaction to be had as it’s the most predictable thing you can fucking imagine), move on. Seriously, what happened to the level design in between Half Genie Hero and Seven Sirens? The levels aren’t dynamic at all, and not even the fucking enemies are different. It’s just so… AVERAGE. Ugh. At least the enemies are occasionally fun to fight, but good lord. Not to mention the multi-staged fetch quests throughout Paradise Island. Shantae’s fetch quests, at least since Pirate’s Curse, have been pretty reserved. Usually you have to return to an area only once, rarely twice, and never again. And it was actually fun, since all of your abilities were awesome to use, complimenting the previous level design. Sure, Half-Genie Hero wasn't as great in this aspect, as the animals weren't integrated into your moves, but at the very least you had the teleport dance, as well as less backtracking in general. Seven Sirens is absolutely loaded with this, but unlike Pirate’s Curse, the moveset is just too unviable for general use. There's a few more than Pirate’s Curse, but once again, they're not all for general use. The best out of the few is easily the triple jump and dash. The rest are just awkwardly bad. The shell is too unwieldy for general platforming, and hitting a big enough enemy completely stops it. It's thankfully manually charged, unlike Pirate's Curse, which was a bit finicky, but it's still eclipsed by the Pirate's Curse dash. And the Drill and Frog just kinda… sucked. They're just too slow and tedious, good lord. That's the best way to describe this game. It's not doing anything innovative, just existing half of the time. And it infuriates me. There needs to be a case study on how Seven Sirens fails at competent modern Metroidvania design. Rather than expressing its level design through your own player character, it remains stagnant by only requiring the bare minimum of you, leaving it as the least engaging of the centrilogy, soon to be hexology. Advance better not have these problems, because this game is severely lacking in the fun factor of the previous games.
But why are we traveling through this big, open world, gaining new abilities and rescuing these half-naked women? Well, look no further than the plot. Shantae and her friends are invited to “Paradise Island” (seriously???), an island filled with sunshine non-stop. It's here where Shantae meets four other Half Genies, as a plot point established in the first game; Plink, the smallest one, Vera, the best one, Zapple, the strong one, Filin, obviously Rottytops, and Harmony, the tallest one, holy shit. All of them get ready for a massive Half-Genie Festival, but on the night of the festival, all of the genies (sparing Shantae) disappear. Determined to find answers, Shantae explores all throughout Paradise Island in search of the Half-Genies. Risky Boots is encountered but denies any foul-play at hand The Half-Genies and even the bosses themselves are pretty one-note for the most part. It's about as video-gamey as plot structure gets. Find Half-Genie, kill Siren, bam, onto the next thing. Oh, but surprise surprise, Risky Boots was behind the entire thing!!! Well, partially at least. Because the Empress Siren made a deal with Risky if Risky kidnapped the 5 Half-Genies. Soooo… yeah. Almost entirely Risky’s fault. But here’s the thing. If Risky wanted to kidnap the genies, how in the HELL did she not take notice to Shantae? Shantae is Risky's arch nemesis; she’s SEEN Shantae do her genie moves in previous games. Why only leave Shantae? Why not kidnap them all? Sure, It’d be overkill, but nobody else would be able to rescue the Half Genes, let alone Rottytops and friends while they’re lazing about. Oh, and the Empress Siren? She just feeds off of the Genies to survive because Harmony’s mother placed a spell on her. Then she practically kills Risky, and then plans to become immortal by taking everyone’s life force. They fight, a shitty boss battle occurs- WAIT.
I’m completely with Yuzrnaime on this, the fights are genuinely TERRIBLE. Not only do they have an UNHEALTHY amount of HP, a majority of them sped long periods of time in invulnerability. IT’S GENUINELY IRRITATING. I’d type out a long ass rant, but I’m writing this at 2AM. Bitch, PLEASE. But once you kill Empress, she dies, Risky comes back, Shantae and friends leave, the end. Sweet dreams.
Seven Sirens is certainly one of the most disappointing games I've ever played through. As a follow up to the two best entries in the series, it really falters. It's a game with 80% hot air in between it's content, succeeding at almost nothing it does in the remaining 20%. I didn't feel terribly angry while playing, just mildly annoyed. Shantae's abilities? Occasionally fun, but mostly annoying. The world map? Generic and mostly annoying. The dungeon designs? Among the worst in the series for simply how annoying they are. The bosses? Padded out and annoying. The music? Bland, and more importantly, annoying. I left Seven Sirens mostly ambivalent to its content, no desire to really play it, but most importantly, annoyed. I feel annoyed at this game's very existence. Not angry. Simply. Annoyed.
Review applies to both this game and Kirby's adventure which this is a remake of. This is an extremely solid follow-up to Kirby's Dream Land. Taking everything that already works from the first game and giving Kirby the new iconic copy ability that changes everything, and makes Kirby who he is today.
A great platformer with a relaxed but fun difficulty. Kirby's (Adventure) knightmare in dreamland keeps you on your toes offering you new copy abilities to play with until the final levels. Copy abilities offer some good replayability due to the fact that it offers you mutliple ways to play.
Nothing here reaches the heights some other parts of the series do, but it is consistently good the whole way through. I like to consider Kirby's Adventure the original Super Mario Bros of the franchise where it is a great foundation to the rest of the series, but still has potential to reach the great heights it eventually does.
A great platformer with a relaxed but fun difficulty. Kirby's (Adventure) knightmare in dreamland keeps you on your toes offering you new copy abilities to play with until the final levels. Copy abilities offer some good replayability due to the fact that it offers you mutliple ways to play.
Nothing here reaches the heights some other parts of the series do, but it is consistently good the whole way through. I like to consider Kirby's Adventure the original Super Mario Bros of the franchise where it is a great foundation to the rest of the series, but still has potential to reach the great heights it eventually does.
Psychoballs
2018
Is this an early 2010s Flash game? You guys remember Flash right, not like I'm a generation apart from the average BL user. As the first review for the game, I have a big responsibility as the game's salesman, even though I grabbed it for free. Special announcement for our colorblind friends: cease & desist!! This game is all about da colors, and as Hector Salamanca said: I need to see your balls! POC balls. I am also the game's only player as of writing this review, so nobody is gonna understand anything or verify my claims, but I'll behave. The first lie is no sign of human life in the game, clearly contrasting with the cover art shown here. You remember old arcade games doing that? Do people love humans or something. Maybe if I were one it'd click.
I feel like a hacker playing this, turning the wheels to the rhythm of my heartbeat trying to get into mainframe. Ayo tho the game has no theme at all, it quite frankly... looks like turd, and we ran out of lore 5 minutes ago. It's a gameplay comes first ahh typa deal, the basic system is good but short of great, great at being short. I'll stop teasing you, it's a collection of levels (visually the same) taking place inside the Super Mario Brothers pipes, Yoshi keeps producing eggs into the fucking pipes, I never liked that dino honestly and that gringo said that balls will go in any empty holes it comes across and you huh spin the thing and throw the balls where it belongs, which is another spinny thingy, well you get the gist of it, combine 4 of the same colors in one spin thingy spinny and it explodes 🤯🤯 of happiness. Pat yourself on the back.
While doing all this makes a nice dance, it doesn't make you feel like the belle of the balls. It works enough for how simple it is, but clearly more could have been done. It controls like a mobile game despite swearing off that platform, so who knows what's happening behind the curtains. I think a collab is needed to breathe new life into this. Fortnite did it, no excuses. Deadass I think this game barely afforded one restaurant meal to the dev 💀 he doesnt want to see any colors for the rest of his life I bet. Btw the colors are the traditional red, blue, green, but there is a kinda beige kinda brownish kinda yellowish one. I seldom see this one. A rare species sighting indeed this oughta be the game's true catch after all.
I feel like a hacker playing this, turning the wheels to the rhythm of my heartbeat trying to get into mainframe. Ayo tho the game has no theme at all, it quite frankly... looks like turd, and we ran out of lore 5 minutes ago. It's a gameplay comes first ahh typa deal, the basic system is good but short of great, great at being short. I'll stop teasing you, it's a collection of levels (visually the same) taking place inside the Super Mario Brothers pipes, Yoshi keeps producing eggs into the fucking pipes, I never liked that dino honestly and that gringo said that balls will go in any empty holes it comes across and you huh spin the thing and throw the balls where it belongs, which is another spinny thingy, well you get the gist of it, combine 4 of the same colors in one spin thingy spinny and it explodes 🤯🤯 of happiness. Pat yourself on the back.
While doing all this makes a nice dance, it doesn't make you feel like the belle of the balls. It works enough for how simple it is, but clearly more could have been done. It controls like a mobile game despite swearing off that platform, so who knows what's happening behind the curtains. I think a collab is needed to breathe new life into this. Fortnite did it, no excuses. Deadass I think this game barely afforded one restaurant meal to the dev 💀 he doesnt want to see any colors for the rest of his life I bet. Btw the colors are the traditional red, blue, green, but there is a kinda beige kinda brownish kinda yellowish one. I seldom see this one. A rare species sighting indeed this oughta be the game's true catch after all.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ApO-n7fDHeY
SeeS CAndIES
SeeS CAndIES
I never thought starting this year that by the end of April I would have finally played all 4 of the original classic Phantasy Star games. They have been on my bucket list for years and the experience has been a mixture of surprises and Phantasy Star IV: The End of the Millennium is no exception.
To start with I really want to get this out the way that this game is by far the best of the 4 games. It takes all the good parts of Phantasy Star II and builds on them in all the right aspects while still linking the story of every game in the series together. It really feels like it ties the plot up for all of them while still being able to play it on it's own. It's an incredibly well made experience with a couple of aspects that really stood out in particular.
Story wise the game takes place 1000 years before Phantasy Star III and 1000 years after Phantasy Star II which in turn was 1000 years after Phantasy Star I. We are once again in the Algol star system following mercenary hunters Alys Brangwin and her apprentice Chaz Ashley on planet Motavia. They have been hired to take care of some monsters that lead them on a steadily longer world saving adventure than they could have anticipated. The writing and story of Phantasy Star IV is a massive increase in quality over it's predecessors with full comic like panel cutscenes, genuinely funny jokes, facial expressions and stand out personalities making the story moments actually a delight rather than simply a cardboard set of instructions for the next location. This was such a pleasant realisation within less than 10 minutes of starting that this was going to be a much different experience than I initially thought.
The game moves at a fast pace generally and while certainly not linear I would say it seems very focused so it's quite clear in most cases where to go but still plenty of space for side exploring and without being super grindy. The combat is still turn based and the dungeons are third person. The most interesting thing about the combat is how kind of insanely ahead of it's time it feels. Though it has the basics of the genre in that you can attack, use magic and items it also lets you can set up macros from a list prior to fights. These serve as pre selected moves for your whole party for that turn. For example I had 'macro A' set up as my opening gambit to cast buffs for defence, attack, speed up and a strong attack spell so I didn't have to manually select them each time with 'macro B' as all attack, C as spells etc. Certain combinations of spells or skills would also unlock extremely strong special attacks like a combo though you would have to experiment or look them up to know what they are and set them off in the right turn order uninterrupted.
Another stand out feature I didn't expect is the game also has a hunt system at the guild so at this point I am really feeling like Final Fantasy XII took the gambit system, hunt system and Star Wars influences entirely from Phantasy Star IV... It's obviously more limited here to only a dozen or so and are essentially side quests you (sometimes) get rewards for but with the improved dialogue, characters and towns it all comes together to make the game and world feel very alive for a title in this era.
Visually it's colourful and crisp and the aforementioned anime scenes are fantastic. I love the art style and designs that Phantasy Star II really solidified for the series. I've generally enjoyed all the music in the games so far but like everything it feels like Phantasy Star IV just cranks it up to eleven with every track creating this crunchy electronic bass the megadrive was so good at. There is even a great Phantasy Star 1 remix as part of the OST.
Honestly I really loved Phantasy Star IV and it is easily in my top games to recommend for the megadrive for it's pacing, production values, compact design and scenes but there is one thing that does hold it back from a five star award from me. It goes through party members at such an insane pace it's a bit strange with characters constantly coming and going sometimes within the space of a dungeon or two. They were often the ones I liked most leaving me consistently with Chaz who, and let's be polite to him, is an unlikeable idiot. It is however only a small nit-pick really in an otherwise fantastic RPG I would recommend.
+ Anime scenes and dialogue make the game feel slick with personality.
+ Macros are such a great feature for setting up combat instructions in a seamless way.
+ Music is fire.
- Going through party members like disposable cutlery with the story pacing.
To start with I really want to get this out the way that this game is by far the best of the 4 games. It takes all the good parts of Phantasy Star II and builds on them in all the right aspects while still linking the story of every game in the series together. It really feels like it ties the plot up for all of them while still being able to play it on it's own. It's an incredibly well made experience with a couple of aspects that really stood out in particular.
Story wise the game takes place 1000 years before Phantasy Star III and 1000 years after Phantasy Star II which in turn was 1000 years after Phantasy Star I. We are once again in the Algol star system following mercenary hunters Alys Brangwin and her apprentice Chaz Ashley on planet Motavia. They have been hired to take care of some monsters that lead them on a steadily longer world saving adventure than they could have anticipated. The writing and story of Phantasy Star IV is a massive increase in quality over it's predecessors with full comic like panel cutscenes, genuinely funny jokes, facial expressions and stand out personalities making the story moments actually a delight rather than simply a cardboard set of instructions for the next location. This was such a pleasant realisation within less than 10 minutes of starting that this was going to be a much different experience than I initially thought.
The game moves at a fast pace generally and while certainly not linear I would say it seems very focused so it's quite clear in most cases where to go but still plenty of space for side exploring and without being super grindy. The combat is still turn based and the dungeons are third person. The most interesting thing about the combat is how kind of insanely ahead of it's time it feels. Though it has the basics of the genre in that you can attack, use magic and items it also lets you can set up macros from a list prior to fights. These serve as pre selected moves for your whole party for that turn. For example I had 'macro A' set up as my opening gambit to cast buffs for defence, attack, speed up and a strong attack spell so I didn't have to manually select them each time with 'macro B' as all attack, C as spells etc. Certain combinations of spells or skills would also unlock extremely strong special attacks like a combo though you would have to experiment or look them up to know what they are and set them off in the right turn order uninterrupted.
Another stand out feature I didn't expect is the game also has a hunt system at the guild so at this point I am really feeling like Final Fantasy XII took the gambit system, hunt system and Star Wars influences entirely from Phantasy Star IV... It's obviously more limited here to only a dozen or so and are essentially side quests you (sometimes) get rewards for but with the improved dialogue, characters and towns it all comes together to make the game and world feel very alive for a title in this era.
Visually it's colourful and crisp and the aforementioned anime scenes are fantastic. I love the art style and designs that Phantasy Star II really solidified for the series. I've generally enjoyed all the music in the games so far but like everything it feels like Phantasy Star IV just cranks it up to eleven with every track creating this crunchy electronic bass the megadrive was so good at. There is even a great Phantasy Star 1 remix as part of the OST.
Honestly I really loved Phantasy Star IV and it is easily in my top games to recommend for the megadrive for it's pacing, production values, compact design and scenes but there is one thing that does hold it back from a five star award from me. It goes through party members at such an insane pace it's a bit strange with characters constantly coming and going sometimes within the space of a dungeon or two. They were often the ones I liked most leaving me consistently with Chaz who, and let's be polite to him, is an unlikeable idiot. It is however only a small nit-pick really in an otherwise fantastic RPG I would recommend.
+ Anime scenes and dialogue make the game feel slick with personality.
+ Macros are such a great feature for setting up combat instructions in a seamless way.
+ Music is fire.
- Going through party members like disposable cutlery with the story pacing.
Genshin Impact
2020
Bury the book
Infinte rng takes over my mind
Setupping
Fallen short on energy, summon the strength of booking
Chorus
I AM THE 4COST THATS APPROACHING
RESETTING, UNTIL I GET PENTAHIT
I AM RECLAIMER OF MUSKREEF
BORN IN ABYSS,
I HAVE BEEN BOOKED
MY XIANGLING IS A DEMON OF DEATH
Restarted I am Critcarded
A Bennet’s Burst In dark divide
Catalyst memory
Polar Star chasing time
Inherit the reset, Surrounded by swirl
Can’t Book Away
Keep resetting the chamber, Keep reading the line, between the pages
Funnel away
Through vacant floors, i won't surrender
The truth funnelled in eyes of GODBA
Disappear into Billbilli
Lost Resets left behind.
Kazuha's pulling enemies
Riptide, I've come to take what's mine
Chorus
I AM THE 4COST THATS APPROACHING
RESETTING, UNTIL I GET PENTAHIT
I AM RECLAIMER OF MUSKREEF
BORN IN ABYSS,
I HAVE BEEN BOOKED
MY XIANGLING IS A DEMON OF DEATH
Restarted I am Critcarded
A Bennet’s Burst In dark divide
Catalyst memory
Polar Star chasing time
Infinte rng takes over my mind
Setupping
Fallen short on energy, summon the strength of booking
Chorus
I AM THE 4COST THATS APPROACHING
RESETTING, UNTIL I GET PENTAHIT
I AM RECLAIMER OF MUSKREEF
BORN IN ABYSS,
I HAVE BEEN BOOKED
MY XIANGLING IS A DEMON OF DEATH
Restarted I am Critcarded
A Bennet’s Burst In dark divide
Catalyst memory
Polar Star chasing time
Inherit the reset, Surrounded by swirl
Can’t Book Away
Keep resetting the chamber, Keep reading the line, between the pages
Funnel away
Through vacant floors, i won't surrender
The truth funnelled in eyes of GODBA
Disappear into Billbilli
Lost Resets left behind.
Kazuha's pulling enemies
Riptide, I've come to take what's mine
Chorus
I AM THE 4COST THATS APPROACHING
RESETTING, UNTIL I GET PENTAHIT
I AM RECLAIMER OF MUSKREEF
BORN IN ABYSS,
I HAVE BEEN BOOKED
MY XIANGLING IS A DEMON OF DEATH
Restarted I am Critcarded
A Bennet’s Burst In dark divide
Catalyst memory
Polar Star chasing time
I hate to rag on this game when I'm (at present) the only review here but I picked this up based on the previous Immortal Mantis game which was a reasonably fun experience if a little basic.
This one however? I had to grab a pen and paper for the first puzzle, no big deal, you can't expect to always be spoon fed answers. The second puzzle however? First a bunch of wire-matching where the hint is on a separate screen (back to the pen and paper) and then I have to pick the right video tape based on a VERY ambiguous clue. I have to guess how the developer meant me to interpret it.
I chose wrong.
Instant failure; back to the start of the scene. The wire puzzle solution is scrambled meaning it's back to the pen and paper.
Not a pretty start to a game and if that's how it presents itself at the outset, I'm not interested in continuing.
This one however? I had to grab a pen and paper for the first puzzle, no big deal, you can't expect to always be spoon fed answers. The second puzzle however? First a bunch of wire-matching where the hint is on a separate screen (back to the pen and paper) and then I have to pick the right video tape based on a VERY ambiguous clue. I have to guess how the developer meant me to interpret it.
I chose wrong.
Instant failure; back to the start of the scene. The wire puzzle solution is scrambled meaning it's back to the pen and paper.
Not a pretty start to a game and if that's how it presents itself at the outset, I'm not interested in continuing.
