Thunderplaya
11 reviews liked by Thunderplaya
Persona 5 Royal
2019
The presentation and gameplay were enough to keep me interested for the 90 hours I sunk into this game, but the more I look back on it the more I realize how little I like the characters and overall story compared to other Persona games I've played.
Infinite Wealth builds on Yakuza: Like a Dragon's already great combat system and makes improvements to general quality of life and game balance while unfortunately also lowering the difficulty quite a bit. The combat now feels a lot more refined and dynamic, and Kiryu's fighting styles are excellently incorporated within a turn based system. I think Hawaii was a great choice for a new location in a series that usually keeps things confined to very few and relatively similar locations. Having the story simultaneously progress in Hawaii and Yokohama by alternating between two protagonists and sets of parties allows for party members to each get more time to shine (aside from one party member who joins the party ridiculously late into the game). Seeing how Ichiban's friends interact with Kiryu was interesting and made me develop an appreciation for characters I previously wasn't too keen on, and I liked the new party members as well, especially Tomizawa. In hindsight Ichiban gets a bit only overshadowed in this game and his chapters get progressively less interesting after the halfway point. It feels like a step backwards to take the spotlight away from the series' new protagonist to this extent in only his second game, but clearly RGG Studio's primary goal here was to do Kiryu justice and retire him as a protagonist in a way that honours his character, which I would say they have done a fairly good job of. Side content was pretty solid and I loved the soundtrack as always. I don't think I've had this much fun with a game in a while.
I don't even like Persona like that but it's peak
Yakuza Kiwami
2016
This review contains spoilers
Yakuza Kiwami faces a unique challenge in that it tries to be a faithful remake of the series' first game from a decade ago while not contradicting the new characterizations given to some major characters like Majima and Nishiki in the very well received prequel preceding this release. In Nishiki's case this gap is bridged pretty successfully with the additional cutscenes detailing what he has been up to during Kiryu's time in prison. Though some of the dialogue that makes it sound like jealousy over Yumi was a core reason for Kiryu and Nishiki's falling out does feel a little weird given that these new cutscenes paint a new picture of mistreatment in the Tojo Clan and the loss of his sister as the major reasons behind Nishiki's downfall, alongside Yakuza 0 previously building up their brotherhood as something almost too strong to crumble over a woman. With Majima things don't play out as smoothly since at this point RGG Studio has to connect three different personas that they've created for this character over time, so you kinda get whiplash between Majima in the main story and Majima in side content. The Majima Everywhere system honestly loses comedic value after the first few encounters, and the skill learning system could generally be balanced a lot better. Personally I don't mind that the combat system is recycled from Yakuza 0; it works and it's fun to play. Kiryu being rusty after a decade in prison and having to relearn the Dragon style seems cool from a lore standpoint but doesn't go over too well in practice. On my second playthrough I rushed through the main story on a brand new save without engaging in any side content and ended up very underpowered by the finale. Especially the boss fight with Jingu sucks and is easily one of the worst in the entire series. Overall I think it's a solid game and remake, and I'm glad it exists to breathe new life into a very important entry in the series. It's not perfect but it will always have a special place in my heart for being one of the two original games to feature Nishiki.
Yakuza 5 Remastered
2019
By far my least favourite Yakuza game and the only one I can confidently say I will never replay. A lot of the issues with Yakuza 4 are carried over and amplified in Yakuza 5 due to the bigger scale of the game. It's overly ambitious to its own detriment and tries to do too many things all at once only to end up being an unenjoyable mess. The story is overloaded with too many important side characters and so long that after a point I started to lose track of who's who. The game definitely overstays its welcome and I was so ready for it to be over before I even got to Shinada's part but they kept introducing new characters and conflicts and I lost interest. Some of the individual sections like Haruka/Akiyama and Kiryu's were good while others like Saejima's straight up sucked. Maybe the side content is alright; I wouldn't know since I was so bored and fed up with the game thanks to the main story that I barely did any of it.
Silent Hill 2
2012
Comic Sans Silent Hill Ranch you will always be iconic
Fallout 4
2015
20 saat oynadım şimdi siliyorum new vegas yükleyeceğim tekrar fallout 4 bomboş bir oyun çünkü sadece sağa sola gidip boş boş ateş etme oyunu hani ateş etmek eğlenceli ama o da bir yere kadar
Prefacing this by saying I'm not marking it as completed because I didn't play two of the routes, even though I did see the game to its end. Charade Maniacs was one of my most anticipated otome games, as the concept of a whodunnit situation in an otome game sounded very promising. What I found instead was a mediocre game and a lot of wasted potential. The game evokes little to no sense of suspense or urgency in the player, which is really odd considering the premise. The unlocked routes felt like I was mostly reading through filler just to get to one not so impactful plot reveal towards the end of the route. The first two of the locked routes were pretty good and ended up being the only routes and love interests I can truly say I enjoyed, and then the game lost me again with the excessive info dumping in the final route. The romance being nearly nonexistent throughout the whole game doesn't help either. For being one of those otome games that expect you to read it to the end to uncover the overarching mystery it sure doesn't make it very interesting or rewarding for the player.
Amnesia: Memories
2013
Amnesia was my first proper otome game a few years ago and still remains my favourite. It's such a product of its time yet so timeless. The game makes great use of somewhat common tropes like memory loss and parallel universes to create a distinct sense of unease and mystery that even the more "serious" and mystery heavy titles in the genre haven't been able to replicate for me. At the same time it has plenty of lighthearted moments to balance out those aspects so the game never feels too serious in tone. I love the use of playing cards as a motif for the love interests and the ridiculousness and colour coding of the character designs. The sprites blinking and moving their mouths is also a really nice touch, and even though the mouths obviously don't match the spoken words I think it still looks very well done—especially compared to the few other otome games that were doing animated sprites at the time (looking at you, PS3 Hakuoki). Personally I don't have a problem with the nameless silent protagonist. It's a nice bonus when otome games have good MCs but it's not something I look for or expect. In this case I felt that the abundance of choice prompts and Orion serving as your internal monologue do a pretty good job at making you forget about the heroine being a blank slate (and to be fair, she does have a pretty good excuse for it). I think Amnesia is a must play for everyone who likes or is looking to get into otome games. Half a star off only because Kent's route is a bit anticlimactic compared to the rest of the routes, and because I don't like Ikki as a love interest. My recommended play order is Shin > Ikki / Kent > Toma > Ukyo.
Me & My Katamari
2005
I don't have many positive things to say about this game so I'll get them out of the way: I liked the island setting, being able to see different seasons and times of day, and the 8-bit ending sequence. Unfortunately trying to control a katamari without analog sticks on a handheld is frustrating and hurt my hands. The game is also VERY repetitive. Despite the small number of unique stages I think it took me the longest to finish out of all Katamari games I've played because of the jumping from level to level system, which only made the repetitiveness of the gameplay loop even more obvious. The music is obviously good but it feels disingenuous to praise Me & My Katamari for its soundtrack considering almost all of the songs are taken from the first two games and reused here without so much as remixing. Overall I can't bring myself to hate the game too much because it is still Katamari but I wouldn't replay or recommend it, especially not in this day and age where both Reroll games are available on Switch if you want Katamari on the go.