The Last Guardian is the last PlayStation 2 game ever made. Perhaps to some this implies the technical aspects of PlayStation 2 games - and while to an extent this is sort of true - I’m referring to the heart of its design and the fact that games like The Last Guardian will never be considered AAA ever again.
It was the last drop to fall from the wrung cloth of PlayStation 1 and PlayStation 2 design philosophy [of first party Sony titles]. That era of game design lives on within indie games. Even the new Ratchet and Clank game on PS5 (a fantastic game) does not fully embrace its PS2 roots. It has traces of it, but it completely wraps itself with modern game design ideas.
The Last Guardian visually looks quite modern, and Trico is shockingly advanced on an animation level, but its narrative delivery and level design is completely married to its predecessors. One of which was intended to be a PlayStation 1 title.

Ico not only has a similar gameplay blueprint as The Last Guardian, it even shares a console generational bridge within its development. Ico started as a PS1 game and eventually stretched itself onto PS2 which helped it realize its full potential. It is now regarded as one of the most influential video games of all time (or has this reputation as “your favorite game developer’s favorite game” or “the best game you never played”. Play Ico, it’s really good!) The Last Guardian had similar obstacles. It was teased as a PlayStation 3 title and even had a trailer included in the ico/shadow of the colossus HD remaster for PS3. Of course most of the conversation around this game is about how this caused poor performance to manifest in the Playstation 4 version. The PS3 game that became a PS4 game tends to be its legacy for a lot of people who didn’t pay the game any mind. Some people I know even sold the game a couple days after buying it because it just felt like a PS2 game and they heard it was too short. If you’ve played any GenDesign (previously Team Ico) video game, it was most likely Shadow of the Colossus. Some people perhaps assumed that The Last Guardian would build upon Shadow of the Colossus’s open world nature. Instead it sort of reverts back to the level design of Ico and incorporates mechanics from both titles. There’s really not even any combat except as an observer.

The Last Guardian makes you play the inverse role of both previous GenDesign titles. Instead of protecting your companion [Ico], you completely rely on your companion to fight for you and help you cross obstacles. Instead of fighting gigantic creatures [Shadow of the Colossus], you befriend one and collaborate with it. Even game design ideas that are typically seen as the worst parts of any game are the defining aspects of this trilogy. Ico is a permanent escort mission. Shadow of the Colossus has a big empty world with ‘nothing to do’ in it. The Last Guardian forces you to rely on companion AI to complete most tasks. You don’t even get a stick to hit dudes with! These are all typically low parts or criticisms of a lot of games. Escort missions are rarely praised as a fun thing, open worlds with nothing to is considered lazy design, and complaining about companion AI is still a topic of conversation in modern games. Take Resident Evil 5 for example. A really fun co-op game, but when you play alone and rely on the AI of your companion it ruins the game for many. Some people say The Last Guardian is exactly that. A good game that is commonly interrupted by Trico’s faulty AI. However I truthfully believe that Trico is one of the best examples of AI being at its most effective.

Of course I’m not going to pretend that the AI is perfect. No AI is. The huge amount of variety in your actions that the AI needs to take into account for anyone who plays it is astronomical. There will for sure be times of error and things not working as intended. However, I firmly believe the tedium and contrast of Trico’s AI early on compared to later is completely intentional. Trico is in the literal sense - an NPC that serves as a game mechanic. But if you’re not boring and use your imagination, Trico is a real animal. Trico is believably a wild animal at first as well. Trico is the world’s most most advanced tamagotchi. Trico does not trust you at first because he doesn’t know you. Like most animals, you need to put in time and effort to develop your relationship. He fights for you and you tend to his wounds. You can pet Trico, get rid of obstacles that scare Trico so he can progress, you feed Trico. The game doesn’t diminish our imaginations so much as to include a “trust meter”. The trust is developed in real time and displayed through gameplay. You will notice that commanding Trico becomes vastly easier. It’s like training a dog. Sometimes you need to tell a dog to sit multiple times before it does, but eventually it takes no effort. Trico’s AI behaves in this way.

The Last Guardian forces us to experience tedium early on because when you develop a bond with Trico, moments of danger become incredibly visceral. I imagine a lesser game having a relationship bar that shows you the stats of what kind of bond you currently have with Trico. Allowing this to play out through visual gameplay alone makes it feel like a genuine relationship that we develop ourselves. The boy we control doesn’t fight and lacks a traditional way of taking damage in combat, but when Trico takes damage, it almost feels worse than getting hurt ourselves. Removing spears from Trico and cleaning blood from his feathers isn’t always required, but we feel drawn to do so because…well I can’t imagine what kind of freak wouldn’t have an ounce of empathy for this creature in those moments.

I specifically recall playing this game the week it released. I was still living with my parents and I thought I was home alone. Headphones on and blasting the volume far too loudly, I experienced a moment that made me yell [out of concern for Trico]. I reacted as if one of my actual pets was about to be hit by a car. Not knowing my dad just came home, he burst in and said he thought I had been hurt or that I was having a nightmare. It’s a hilarious memory for me and I still wonder how confusing it was for him to see me emotionally reacting to a video game like that. That’s the core of this game to me, genuine emotion. This trilogy of games goes beyond simple game design for me. Shadow of the Colossus will forever remain my favorite game of all time, and the Last Guardian was completely fulfilling to me as a follow up from these developers. The Last Guardian represents a delayed ending to my favorite era of video games. It feels like a miracle this even came out. What should’ve been a PS3 game became a PS4 game. It held on a little longer just like Ico. It struggled to fully take advantage of the new hardware, and its introduction to a more general audience was rather divisive as it isn’t the kind of game people associate with the PlayStation brand anymore. PlayStation still makes great games, but the ps1 and ps2 era was exploding with experimental ideas and creativity. The Last Guardian was the final breath of this era. To a lot of people it was simply a weird follow up to that Shadow of the Colossus game that they’ve seen some YouTube videos about - but to me it was a continuation of an era that influenced everything I love about video games.

I recall articles circulating about The Last Guardian being officially cancelled. I remember the disappointment I felt. I felt like it was inevitable but I didn’t want to believe it. Thankfully these reports were miscalculated and the game made a return at E3 one year. To see it open the show with roaring applause was wild. PlayStation is a completely different brand today, but in that moment it felt like they returned to themselves. I know not everyone can connect with this. Modern Sony games have a fantastic quality to them and people really love them. I love some as well! Video games aren’t about Sony or Microsoft though. It’s about the developers and people who make them. GenDesign is no longer supported by Sony, but I won’t be any less excited when they reveal their fourth game. The Last Guardian probably shouldn’t have come out at all, but the fact it was given a chance was really important. None of GenDesign’s games had consistent development. They either switched platforms or completely changed what kind of games they were early on. Fumito Ueda says that he doesn’t try to tell a specific story himself, but that he wants the development of the game to guide what kind of story it ends up telling. Making these games is probably messy, but there’s something so human and different about what they become.

The Last Guardian was the last PlayStation 2 game ever made. The future of games is still super cool though, but when GenDesign makes their return, part of me might hurt a little knowing that their art isn’t valued enough to receive the support of a company like Sony or that it won’t be considered AAA. Times have changed, but the stuff we love still lives on through amazing artists despite not being first party for some huge corporate product. The Last Guardian is probably one of the best games of all time that plenty will never play, but I encourage you to do so regardless!

I’m not sure this is a common enough occurrence to call it a trend within game development, but I’ve noticed that a few games I love are reluctant sequels that likely wouldn’t have been made if the creator had a say in the matter. Kojima wanted Metal Gear Solid 2 to be the last game, yet he was obliged by Konami to make a third, thus creating what’s considered the greatest game of all time by many. We Love Katamari is another example of this, and the game itself is completely on the nose about its obliged creation.

That’s not an insult either, It totally uses this tone to amplify the game. I think it’s an incredible test of creativity to make a sequel to a game that really shouldn’t have one. How do you even make another Katamari game that doesn’t feel like more of the exact same. The whole game is essentially one verb: roll.

Katamari Damacy uses this verb to craft one of the most enjoyable games of all time. There’s a lot more underneath the foundation of this singular action. The first Katamari game slowly builds up a tension around our motivation as players. You wanna roll up cars, buildings, all the big stuff! For so long you struggle to even craft Katamaris that are large enough to engulf a single person. The payoff of this game is the eventual rolling up of the whole planet. You start off rolling up coins, batteries, ants, (an insane variety of assets), and soon you are picking up entire islands, rainbows, volcanos. All of this to the joy of one of the greatest soundtracks in video game history. It’s even surrounded by a strangely pure narrative and humor that’s localized to perfection. These games are hilarious.

So you have a game where you just roll up stuff level by level, each time getting bigger, with an occasional specific objective (such as roll up the biggest bear, roll up fish etc). How do you further enhance that formula?

We Love Katamari tackles this challenge in a possibly obvious way, but its simplicity is incredibly genuine and smart. Without Keita Takahashi, a sequel could’ve been as basic as “roll up even bigger stuff, dude”. Maybe a simpler control scheme to expand the audience to people who couldn’t grasp the bizarre dual analog stick control scheme of the first, maybe add something resembling more obvious combat or platform-like scenarios. Health bars! Jump buttons! Instead we have a sequel that doesn’t try to outdo itself in scope alone.
We Love Katamari does have levels where you just get big and roll up big things, but it hammers down on the idea of goal based motivation. There’s almost a more strategic and puzzle like element to this game. You won’t always be aimlessly rolling up whatever you see to get as big as possible. You’ll have levels - like the campfire mission - where you have to roll a katamari on fire around and keep it burning as long as possible. Roll up snow to craft the perfect snowman. Really simple ideas that go beyond the basics of the first game. There’s still a meditative and zen feeling to the experience, but it feels a bit more engaging, and honestly less frustrating at times since bumping into things is less punishing. Everything else about its presentation is on par if not a little better than the first game as well. The meta narrative of catering to katamari fans is on the nose, but it’s not trying to be subtle. It’s hilarious, but it gets away with it because it does pull off being a fantastic sequel. I think the first two Katamari games are genuinely some of the funniest games of all time, if not the funniest.

Some people weren’t as hot on the more specific goals of the gameplay, but I think it shows off why this weird style of gameplay is so much fun.
This game aptly inspired a lot of “katamari-likes” (or whatever the proper term for these would be). Mobile games where you play as a thing and you absorb things to get bigger and bigger and bigger. It takes that satisfying element of Katamari Damacy and simplifies it down to the immediate payoff. There’s not really a buildup to it. They’re “just so satisfying” to play. These mobile games are harmless, but they miss the point of what makes games like Katamari Damacy satisfying. Not that they’re trying to be anything more than what they are, but Katamari Damacy being grouped with games of the like is a disservice to what Katamari Damacy is. I mean, the eternal mode where you get to roll stuff up aimlessly is indeed fun and satisfying, but the build up and payoff to get to that point makes it even better. There is an intended frustration to the process. You get hit or bump into things and your katamari loses items and shrinks, you get stuck in a tricky area, you have to put in a lot of effort to get up simple obstacles, and sometimes the King of Cosmos will condescendingly criticize the size of your Katamari at the end of a level. He still takes the katamari and lets you continue, but now the game is about pleasing your space dad too. The game is full of interesting problem solving and motivation, even if the actual gameplay is repetitive and simple.
We Love Katamari takes all of this into account and shows off the fine details of what makes these games great. It would be easy to go bigger and whackier, but instead we get a Katamari game that has more technical design behind its levels. It’s the same type of game at heart, but it’s full of little changes to presentation and gameplay motivation to makes it feel different from its predecessor. It’s fun, endearing, creative, beautiful, funny, and genuine. This is the last Katamari game made by the original creator. I believe he took this concept and maxed it out to its full potential.

They tried to franchise it out even more without him, but nothing ever stuck like the original two games. They’re isolated and amazing pieces of art and entertainment. Genuinely some of the best games of all time. We never needed a ton of sequels, though I’m really glad that We Love Katamari turned out the way it did.

Structure is Xenoblade’s strongest attribute - narrative and geographical. So much of my experience is driven by my anticipation to see a new area and experience its music. It’s a little hard to go back to the first game and lose the ability to switch characters during combat like in 3, but there is an intentional puzzle-like satisfaction in making your ideal party and prioritizing who needs the benefit of your control. It seems intentional for sure. Melia and Shulk aren’t super reliable unless directly controlled, but the flow of combat totally shifts depending on your party. I particularly love to play as sharla and choose when to attempt the headshot art on enemies, usually partnering her with characters who can constantly topple and daze enemies. It’s hard to not want to play as shulk for the whole game though, but there is a rewarding feeling to mixing it up. I try and prioritize different members every time I play and I’m always surprised at how many new strategies and combos I previously neglected.

Xenoblade’s strongest trick for me is the unveiling of new sights. Walking through a tight canyon with no music, suddenly approaching a wide open zone as its music kicks in. Climbing a structure for several minutes and looking down to see how small the world below you looks. The scope is so effective, especially for the hardware it was constructed on. Monolith Soft are experts at making the world a strong characteristic of the game.

This is my fourth time beating this game I think. I still hold it precious and it is one of my all time favorites, but the flaws are very evident to me and are harder to ignore. Xenoblade 3 is one of the best games when it comes to giving every character a strong purpose, backstory, and interactions with other party members. Nobody really feels neglected. Xenoblade 1 certainly favors a couple of characters. Fiora especially comes across as incredibly shallow. There’s definitely a problem with all the female character’s motives being driven by their assigned male counterparts. It’s worst for fiora, but I still like all of them. Melia certainly has a lot more going on with her own people and Sharla has several moments of agency. The game’s story is very focused on our connections to other people, so I don’t think my previous critique is immune to rebuttal. You can say Shulk’s whole character revolves around Fiora, but it simply comes down to the writing, not the overall concept of the characters. The presentation of their personal motives and desires lack a good balance. That being said, I love every party member. Individually there’s criticisms to be had, but as a collective group and what they stand for is fantastic.

Xenoblade 3 is my favorite of the trilogy, but 1 still has a few things that were never surpassed for me personally. The idea of two civilizations living on two dormant gods is incredibly creative and makes for a wild map to explore. The OST still contains my favorite songs in the series, though not my much considering the ridiculous quality of the trilogy’s entire OST. Xenoblade doesn’t have the best towns in the genre at all, but 1’s towns felt the most fleshed out to me, as little as there were. Helping reconstruct colony 6 is cool. The starting colony has a wonderfuly cozy design and geography. The Nopon village has a cool vertical design that feels completely distinct from the colonies you visit. 3 may be my favorite, but it’s mostly colonies that look the same and The City. I do wish xenoblade focused on fun towns to hang out in.

Side quests are also a point of contention for people but I don’t mind them being excuses for quick EXP or items. My only problem is how one NPC will give you 7 quests back to back and you have to talk to them multiple times. At a certain point I stop collecting side quests and to this day I can’t think of one that had an interesting narrative hook. I probably missed out on some good stuff, but they don’t encourage keeping up with them.

I’ve criticized the game a lot, but my 5 star rating still holds strong. It’s always going to be one of my favorite games. Its release on the Wii got me back into JRPGs at the time after being away from the genre for a good chunk of time. I’m so glad this became a whole series with Nintendo and I love the entire trilogy. There’s something special about Monolith Soft’s approach to world design. Nobody does it like them. The only game to make me think “this reminds me of xenoblade” was my recent experience with FF7: Rebirth.

Huge games usually need to find exploring its map not boring; whether it’s a mount or vehicle. I’m surprised no xenoblade game has tried to introduce its own version of a chocobo (let’s ignore the mechs in X for now). I would love a fun way to get around faster, but not once have I dreaded making my way through these worlds on foot. They’re easy to hang out in and get into battles every couple minutes. Encountering a giant gorilla named “Delirious Daniel” that is level 99 is a great aspect of these worlds too. It doesn’t scale with you, yet somehow it’s paced so perfectly that you never feel too ahead of the curve or too far behind. The clockwork-like design it must take to pace the games out like that is intimidating to think about. These designers are legends, I can’t wait for Xenoblade 4.
(Also please re release X. Thank you)

This solidifies Xenoblade 3 as one of my all time favorite games. The base game already left this impression but I was still leaning towards the first game as my favorite. I think with this DLC it pushes it to being the best in the series in terms of character writing and gameplay mechanics. I really adored this. I’m a casual Kingdom Hearts fan and love 1 and 2 but didn’t invest myself in the side games enough for 3 to be satisfying, but now I think I know what it feels like to have done that. Everything in Future Redeemed felt like a loving payoff for investing myself in this series. The base game was a great conclusion imo, but obviously lacked those fan service elements which is where this expansion came in - though not at the sacrifice of new characters and providing more context to 3 overall. It didn’t overdo its fan service which I appreciate.

I’ve been with the series since it came to the states on Wii. It started as a weird game my friend showed me one day while at his apartment. It was inside of a Wii that he purchased from Goodwill oddly enough. I was so intrigued I tracked down an at the time rare copy to play it myself. I was instantly obsessed. I knew it was an all timer the second I beat it.
I remember how excited I was for X as well but it being detached from 1’s narrative was disappointing to me at the time despite being really fun. With the series complete now I really wish I had a way to revisit X - it was a ton of fun.
Then of course came 2, an actual sequel. When it came out I was insanely put off by the writing and dropped it - eventually I returned to give it a second chance a year later after hearing so many good things. It was 100% worth it. XC2 is a masterful game despite my issues with it. It’s a shame so many wave it off based on questionable writing moments and character designs, but I’m so glad I gave it a second chance because I adore it now and its expansion.

XC3 based on its trailers was obviously the game tying 1 and 2 together. I was beyond excited for it - maybe one of the games in my life I’ve anticipated the most prior to release. I love it so much. This trilogy is incredibly special to me. The themes strike me in a very deep personal way. The characters are some of my favorites in all of gaming, and the combat systems are my favorite in the whole JRPG genre. Takahashi is a true architect. The world he’s crafted feels like an unreal accomplishment. I wish I had experience with gears and saga too. I trust that anything he is involved with is at least ambitious and thought provoking.

I can’t wait to see what’s next from him. Im glad the story around the Klaus experiment ended in such a satisfying way. Not a single xenoblade entry or expansion was lacking in quality - maybe future connected was a bit whatever in terms of the story, but it was a free addition to an amazing remaster that adds some necessary context for 3 so it succeeds in its goal.

This has been vague but I’m intentionally staying spoiler free. I just wanna say that Matthew also turned out to be a brilliant protagonist. Nikol and Glimmer maybe don’t get as much focus as they deserved, but every character here was well done and worked perfectly for the story here. It makes me want to replay 3 immediately as I know this expansion will only improve everything about it. So many things are given new contexts and make a perfect game even better. Xenoblade 3 is a masterpiece. This trilogy as a whole is a masterpiece. Each game has specific flaws of course, but the big picture of it all works too well for me to dwell on those.

Video games are at a point where generational legacy is starting to become a thing. Not in a forced corporate way, but in a natural and authentic way that comes with time. Movies, music, television etc have had a much longer timeframe to solidify themselves as a form of media that most people absorb. Video games have had a large audience for some time, but only within the last couple generations have felt more permeant in society.
The people making some of the earliest examples of iconic video games are still alive and a lot are still active in the industry. Zelda is a prime example of that (Nintendo in general is a prime example of that). A lot of IP shift creative directors after a couple entries. It’s rare that a series is so consistently guided by its original creators. Sometimes this can cause limitations in experimenting with style, but other times it’s essential to what makes a series what it is. BOTW and TOTK had a new director, but the creators of the franchise are still there to guide it.
The mainline Zelda franchise for sure has some divisive entries and games people aren’t fond of, but I think there’s at least a little objective truth to the consistency of the series’ quality. A lot of game series rarely let themselves change as much as BOTW changed zelda. Even something like Mario resorted to a more classic and familiar 3D format with Odyssey. BOTW nearly abandoned every staple of its original structure but maintained enough of what makes the series special to keep fans excited. Some of course do not like this new format as much, but it’s astounding how widely accepted it was almost immediately. I remember wondering how they could make something bigger and better than BOTW upon release. Of course with hindsight, that game’s problems became far more apparent, but not enough to detract from my admiration of it. TOTK would not be possible without the groundwork there.
I had a lot of impressions of what TOTK could be, but was honestly blown away at the sheer scope and emotional depth of the game. Im so used to game developers holding themselves back to leave room for sequels, limiting what the player can do so level design is easier, or completely sacrificing narrative for gameplay or gameplay for narrative. TOTK ends up having not only a fantastic narrative with a lot of story telling ideas that remind me of older game design philosophy, but a gameplay hook that contains mechanics that would make sense in their own focused linear puzzle games.
I do still feel like there’s room left to improve for future entries, but I’m surprised they let themselves pour so much into this game knowing they’ll have to follow it up one day. Developers just don’t do that.

I believe I’ve invested around 130 hours into totk and likely have 100 to go despite completing the main story. I don’t want to leave this world. I was worried that returning to the same hyrule in a sequel could feel lazy, but instead it felt like returning home after so many years. Not to mention the sky and depths. It’s impossibly huge. The sky and depths aren’t there to make up for them reusing BOTW’s map, they’re there to compliment it. Funnily enough I’ve spent most of my time in base Hyrule because it hardly ever resembles the previous game. They somehow found a way to let us experience breath of the wild’s world for the first time again. We often say there’s games we wish we could play for the first time again, and TOTK is that wish being granted.

TOTK commonly reminded me of my favorite games of all time. Elements gave me a feeling that only shadow of the colossus or death stranding provided. At times I was reminded of Outer Wilds - learning of a long extinct race and solving a mystery to arrive somewhere that you could go to right from the start. The environmental talent of Xenoblade (for obvious reasons). It was made for me - which I know plenty of people say, but I think that kind of wide appeal at that level says a lot about its design. It’s truly special. I once worried Elden Ring was so good that the next Zelda game might feel disappointing in comparison, but they both achieve such specific goals that I’m glad they don’t eclipse each other or provide the same experience. There are comparable elements of course, but playing one doesn’t cast shadows on the other.

The dungeons in this game do put the Divine Beats to shame, but I still think the scope of them need to be expanded, or they should be okay limiting you so you can’t easily skip over a meticulously designed dungeon so quickly and easily. I still respect that dungeons retain the freedom you have in the overworld, but with there only being a set amount of them in the game, providing an experience specific to them is an idea I hope they go towards. Or just make them all huge like hyrule castle at least. Still, these are all pretty great, and 2 of them I’d even call fantastic.
The boss fights were a weak point in BOTW, but TOTK provides some of the best fights in the whole series. The cinematic scope of the story and ending also blew me away, and I don’t feel any narrative sacrifices were made to achieve the non linear structure - especially given how charming, emotional, and charismatic a lot of side quests are. For real the only other zelda game to bring me back to the feeling of side quests in majoras mask - though instead of a more sinister and dark tone, they’re usually sentimental and uplifting. There’s a strong theme of community here. Every major town has an adventure worth completing for the narratives alone. It’s amazing to see side content have so much love put into it. BOTW had its moments with side quests, but the quality and quantity here is far superior.

Not sure what else to say without digging into spoilers. This is a special game. It feels like something I’m going to go back to constantly until the next Zelda game comes out. It’s the only game I’ve played in my life that resonated with me so much that I wondered if it was a contender for my new favorite game of all time. I’m not sure I can make that claim currently, but it’s a new all timer for me, possibly a top 3. I love it so much.

I found an old photo of myself at age 7 while visiting my parents several months ago. I was in a veggie tales T-shirt, wearing a paper crown, and holding a Playstation 2 copy of Kingdom Hearts. I don't remember if I requested the game myself after seeing a commercial for it, or if my parents got it for me because it looked like a cute Disney game. Somehow, it has been over 20 years since that birthday. The amount of times I have played Kingdom Hearts 1 is equivalent to my other all time favorites (shadow of the colossus, metroid prime etc). Simply looking at the box art freaks me out still. It's like getting a split second reminder of what it felt like to see this artwork as a 7 year old kid - 0 context as to what any of it represented. This might be one of my earliest memories I can recall where a specific piece of artwork captivated me this much. I even remember trying to trace the cover art with pencil and paper. I can feel the shape of Sora's hair and his jacket swaying behind him. The shapes and colors inspired me to want to draw. Am I an artist today because of this box art? the answer may SHOCK you.
The Kingdom Hearts series is joked about excessively these days. Most of the conversation is about how impossible to understand these games are (hot take: KH is not that complicated. If you can understand Metal Gear, you'll be fine).
I love Kingdom Hearts 1 because whenever I play it, it's like I'm back in my old bedroom - captivated in ways I didn't understand. As a child we don't stop and think "this level design is flawed" or "the melody of this tune is sublime and creates great atmosphere" - we just accept it, almost blindly. I think that's why nostalgia is powerful to me. I get to remember what it felt like to not absorb media exclusively through some kind of critical lens. "Nostalgia goggles" is often used as a negative term, but why do we shame ourselves for enjoying media simply based off the idea that we liked it growing up - therefore playing it as an adult elicits specific emotions and memories precious to us.
Kingdom Hearts 2 is the better game overall, but 1 has this specific texture to it that could not be replicated even by its superior sequel. I have no idea what I was thinking as a 7 year old during the weird and nightmare-like tutorial of Kingdom Hearts, but when I replay it as an adult, I feel like I'm able to physically manifest those memories, which is something few things are capable of. Movies and music can bring me back in a similar way, but unlike those (where I only utilize sight and hearing) I can physically reenact playing something that I played 20 years ago.
Sure I probably play it differently now, but to go back into this world, to control it, and to interact with it again is a type of nostalgia that's so specific to video games. I honestly believe it stirs the same part of my brain that visiting my old hometown does. Watching a childhood favorite movie or looking at old photos is one thing, but being somewhere physically evokes a stronger sense of "I was here once, and these things really happened". I'm on destiny island again. Riku is obliterating me again. That stupid ledge won't let me jump onto it and Riku is going to win this race again. I'm back in this world and interacting with it. I really played this in my veggie tales t-shirt and paper crown 20 years ago. I slowly learned that the "cool dude named cloud" was from a game called final fantasy 7, which inevitably lead me into discovering JRPGs as a whole genre. I watched Advent Children in shock as the "ninja girl from kingdom hearts" said cuss words.
Kingdom Hearts commonly refers to mysterious doors that need to be opened, which makes this analogy perfect. Kingdom Hearts opened so many doors into the medium of video games for me. I wanted more games like this. I wanted more weird and complex stories that felt magical and impossible. I even wanted to go outside with my friends more. I wanted the wooden sword from Medieval Times because I wanted to be like Sora. I wanted to be as optimistic as Sora. I wanted my friendships to be my power like Sora. I didn't think it was cheesy as a kid because I really believed in the validity of my experience and my feelings as a response to it. No shame or embarrassment. Not worrying about plot holes or the narrative stability of a video game story. It was real and I took it despite its flaws, just like any good friend would do for me.
Kingdom Hearts is a lot of things to me, but most importantly I think it's this physical thing I can latch onto to remind myself that my childhood was real. My feelings then were real and they have carried over into the present.
I'm a different person now than I was 20 years ago, or even 10 years ago, but whenever I go back to Kingdom Hearts, I know that my heart is still the same one that I had back in 2002. He's still here, and he helps me remember how far I've come, and that sometimes it's okay to go back for a while.

Final Fantasy VIII-3 hasn’t left my mind. The fixation has lasted much longer than is probably called for. I’ve reviewed it already but that review was mostly my reactionary feelings and thoughts in a very general sense. Nobody asked, but I want to let out some thoughts that branch beyond the game itself and discuss the aura around it and its place amongst remakes and remasters that continue to populate the industry.

Despite the facade that we are tired of remakes and want more original ideas, it’s fascinating how many are widely beloved and celebrated. Perhaps we’re embarrassed to admit that we love repackaged nostalgia. I hear about remake fatigue so often but it seems to dissipate when “one of the good ones” comes out. I’m in favor of more work being put into new games (or sequels even) rather than remakes and remasters, but I can’t help but admit to myself that almost every huge remake has been pretty great to play, and it’s also wonderful to play older games on new hardware. It’s convenient and helps people avoid spending 100 dollars on a GameCube game. I’m not sure I would have ever played Baten Kaitos without it receiving a remaster. So many celebrated remakes are pretty 1:1 as well, with only the slightest of adjustments that could go unnoticed easily; the discussion is usually around the visuals alone. Preserving those original experiences seems important to the business of remakes. The most skepticism I can recall around a remake was Resident Evil 4. It ended up being very faithful and safe in terms of its changes and it went on to receive GOTY nominations. Dead Space received a very faithful remake and fans are devastated that we aren’t getting a remake of 2. So many games that “didn’t need remakes” became examples of “the good ones”. Some people try to claim that Final Fantasy VII never really needed a remake and all they wanted was a visual overhaul remaster adjacent kind of thing. While true that plenty of people were never clamoring for a remake of VII, it would be wrong to say that the idea of a Final Fantasy VII Remake did not consistently surround the legacy of VII.

Fans of Final Fantasy VII wanted a remake of it as soon as they played it; wondering why the characters couldn’t have realistic proportions all the time. Why can’t the game look like the cutscenes? Final Fantasy VIII came out and already we saw what VII could have visually been instead. Final Fantasy X happened and we then wanted VII to have voice acting too. Final Fantasy XII released and a fan receiving the first copy said “Please remake Final Fantasy VII for the PlayStation 3” into the microphone. There’s a lot of remakes, a lot of them are good, and plenty of them we never really asked for, so how is it that the one game that begged to be remade upon its birth stubbornly refused to be remade for so long? Sometimes it’s hard to believe that it exists and that we’re 2/3 games into this trilogy.

Final Fantasy VII is the only game that could be remade in this way. A lot of the original creators are on the Remake project. The developers that made games we grew up with are getting older. Retirement is close for many and has arrived for others already. This is the last chance we have to get this from them. It’s not just about remaking a game because it needed quality of life upgrades, it’s about remaking the culture around it. The FF7 remake games are remaking the fan theories people had around the original in the 90s. It’s remaking the experience of leaving midgar for the first time. It’s remaking the biggest spoiler in gaming and finding ways to replicate our original experience. It remakes experiencing the music for the first time. There’s a world where we got a standard remake of FF7 that goes on to be “pretty good, but not as good as the original”. Some remakes release to little fanfare and feel unnecessary. Some remakes want to replace the original or be the default version we go to when we think of it. FF7 could never be replaced. It’s why games like Ocarina of Time will likely never receive more than what the 3DS version provided. Some games are too big for themselves. Some remakes are destined to be hated by fans solely because it isn’t the original game. The FF7 remake games know this. Never have I played a remake of a game that so strongly loves its original self. Nothing about the Remake series feels like a replacement. It’s an extension of the original in every way, refusing to ignore what made it resonate with us. I’ve seen countless people play the original game for the first time because of these games or in preparation for them. It’s a huge conflict for many people, wondering if they need to play the original game or not. Resident Evil remakes are great games, but I don’t imagine many people feel a weird sense of guilt by not experiencing the original games before or after. The creators of FF7 are proud of their work and don’t want it to be forgotten. These remakes may be different and change story beats or add a plethora of original ideas absent from the original, but it’s all in service of its blueprint. It only seeks to emulate what the original accomplished.

Final Fantasy VII Rebirth is what we’ve all been waiting for. I don’t think we’ll ever have a set of games like these ever again in terms of concept and development. Love letter is far too mild for what this is. These are developers who loved a piece of art so much that they couldn’t say no to making it for us again. There’s discussion about other Final Fantasy games that should be remade and I often see people say “hopefully it won’t be like the VII remake”. I love FF VIII and IX, but we do not exist in a world where those had similar reputations as VII and would warrant a similar approach. It’s almost a misunderstanding of what the VII Remake project is about. It isn’t simply remaking a game because it seemed like an easy check to cash, it’s tackling the nightmare that was the never ending demand for it and what angle to approach it; fully in relation to us and our expectations as fans. No video game calls for such a remake other than Final Fantasy VII. The fact so many people have gone back to play the original PS1 game is amazing. I may never play the original resident evil 1 because of how good the GameCube remake is, but because of the way the VII remakes are turning out, I will always see it as another branch on the tree.

In a way it’s preserving art by remaking it. Something like the Silent Hill 2 remake has a gross vibe to it because the original game isn’t easily accessible, and here we are making a radically different version of it in a world that won’t let you properly experience its original self. Final Fantasy games are wonderfully ported and preserved across so many systems. We can play the original VII whenever we want. The Remake series may be divisive, but its approach to examining itself begs you to not forget where it came from. It preserves its place amongst gaming as an art form. Sure it can be played in isolation, but it is radically improved when you carry the experience of the original game with you. It reminds me of a film adaptation of a novel. Video games remake themselves to improve ideas and visuals or to introduce itself to a new audience that will never play the original. The VII remake project aims to avoid that. It’s still remaking itself within the medium of video games, but the novel to film comparison is to say that it provides a new experience rather than a definitive one. You may prefer one over the other, and that’s okay. I don’t think the point is to have a better game than the original, but to let both coexist with each other and go down in history together, side by side. It’s a wonderful thing.

5 stars instinctually feels excessive for a game with so many problems, but it hardly leaves my mind when thinking of this series. 2 should have never had a sequel, but 4 is such a fascinating chapter in the series when it comes to Kojima himself and the fans of the series.
Despite my issues with it, I still believe 4 contains the best highs of the series (and also the lowest lows)
The BnB unit is terribly written but make for halfway okay boss fights most of the time. The story over explains everything from the prior games and almost ruins certain story elements or character motivations. As much as I recognize the bloated writing in 4, I still find myself captivated by it. This game equates to Kojima making sure he will never have to make a sequel ever again. It doesn’t leave a single thread loose. Old Snake represents the game itself. He’s old, not as heroic as he used to be, falling apart but forced to play his role in this conflict, held to the standards of his past etc. I also find tremendous humor in the fact that this is yet another Metal Gear game that refuses to let you play as the “ideal” solid snake. 2 took that away from you, 3 was close enough but is still a completely different character, and 4 brought him back as an elderly man that’s always coughing and throwing his back out. Unless we count Twin Snakes, Kojima never let us play as Snake in his prime again. It’s very representative of the series. Kojima didn’t want to follow up 2 so he made 3 a prequel. He didn’t want to direct 4 but fell to the pressure of his fans that practically forced him to take back control. Snake feels like his self insert in this game. Not to paint kojima as a deity figure that created the series on his own, his whole development team deserves equal praise, but snake’s role in 4 feels like a mirror to how this series just won’t end even though it should.

This isn’t really a criticism. We Love Katamari is one of my favorite games and it too was a sequel that likely shouldn’t have existed because the director didn’t want to make a sequel - but instead of half assing it due to obligation, they used those expectations of a sequel to create a very specific tone and style that had a strong voice behind it.

MGS4 is a train wreck but it feels like a game made by a team that really loved its fans and wanted to go out with a memorable bang. Despite the obvious narrative problems and incomplete gameplay ideas, MGS4 succeeds in having one of the most emotionally engaging finales of any video game ever made. It kind of lands on its feet somehow despite its almost intentional desire to ignore pacing structure. It’s such a weird game. Nothing like it exists, even within the series it’s a part of. I love it even if I feel like I should hate it sometimes. Complicated feelings like this are meaningful to me. I don’t rate this 5 stars because it’s mechanically perfect and an ideal example of game design or story telling, I rate it high because it just feels monumental when I engage with it. My favorite experiences aren’t what I consider objectively perfect, they’re the ones that stick with me and refuse to let go.
I value a flawed game that feels special to me over a technically perfect game that doesn’t provide a strong personal experience (which includes being simply fun). Personal experiences are important in art and I object to the obligation of grading a game like a homework assignment based off the standards of others. It’s why I only use star ratings when it’s a 5 star. I like to highlight games I’d consider my favorites, but my time with games or movies shouldn’t be boiled down to a math equation. Some people enjoy that process which is totally fine, but this is my subjective way of engaging with media. My experience is more important than my rating.

I’m incredibly curious how the public will react to MGS4 when it inevitably is ported to modern systems. Will reevaluation be favorable? It won’t impact how I view the game, but I have a feeling it’ll be far more jarring than when it initially released. It’s going to be fun to talk about it again with a bunch people who play it for the first time, whether they love it or hate it.

92 hours clocked in and I still want to go back for more. This is a dream game. This is a landmark title in my personal gaming history. Remake felt a similar way but in a much more contained way. I adore it and everything it set out to do, but it was clearly a fraction of what was to come. Rebirth sits among the best experiences I’ve ever had with a video game. It reminded me of the first time I played Xenoblade Chronicles 1, being blown away by every environment and piece of music. It brought me back to playing Kingdom Hearts 2 for the first time with its constant narrative mystery and ridiculously fun and snappy combat. I can’t fully express how impossible it feels that this exists. Maybe to some it’s nothing more than The Witcher 3 with JRPG elements, but the way this game approaches the series legacy and history is unlike any remake I’ve seen, including the previous entry. It completely understands the spirit of the original. So many mini games that are actually fun. A card game that’s finally better than triple triad. It has the best towns I’ve experienced in any jrpg. In general it really revived the idea of the jrpg town being a place to look forward to and interact with. Too often do post 16-bit jrpg towns act as simple checkpoints and rest stops. There’s wonderful exceptions of course like DQXI, though it does feel rare.

Not a single side quest lost my interest either. A lot of them have unique mechanics or expand on some aspect of the world in an engaging way. It puts Remake’s side quests to horrendous shame. Even if the quest itself is a standard monster hunt, the developers know that the characters are the most important aspect of the story and turn every quest into a bonding experience. It adopts a dating-sim approach in a way. Choices pay off and almost feel like a personality test. Despite my efforts to go on the gold saucer date with Aerith, I ended up getting paired with Red. He’s my favorite character and the game knew that. It’s a very clever and simple little trick it pulls. I’m sure with more intent to artificially raise my relationship with certain characters I could have forced different scenes to play out, but I really loved the natural results I ended up with.

Playing this every day after work with my fiancé was a warm and comfortable tradition. The amount of emotions we experienced was unforgettable. Rebirth is a legit funny game a lot of the time too, only occasionally having an eye roll of a joke. The way these characters play off of each other and feel like real people is not a surprise after remake, but man is it nice to get 90 more hours of it.

I could go on forever, even without digging into spoilers. I know that Rebirth will likely be even more controversial than Remake, but I love seeing the discussion around it so far. Currently the final chapter is overtaking the conversation, but the wider scope of every chapter in this game warrants discussion. There’s sooo much here to reflect on.
I also love that we have some big questions answers but not all of them. I’m equally as eager for part 3 as I was for part 2. Something brilliant is happening here, and I hope those who flinch at things being different are able to look through what’s on the surface and see how it’s all still here. The discussion on what a remake of FF7 should be will never go away, but I believe what we’re getting is itself a reflection on that. It’s a swan song for these developers and probably their last chance to make this happen before they enter retirement. Discussion around remake felt like it lasted all the way until Rebirth. Rebirth will certainly keep us busy until part 3 is out. I can’t commend the creative team behind this game enough. Not only is this likely the best final fantasy game ever made, but it feels like what a modern final fantasy was always meant to be. Even if the story isn’t fully to your liking, the pacing and exploration on top of the tightly designed combat system and boss fights make for a modern reflection of classic final fantasy. Final Fantasy VII Rebirth is special. I can’t help but feel like this will end up as the greatest gaming trilogy of all time.

There’s solid vindication in replaying a game you used to hate and changing your mind about it.
I first played Final Fantasy XIII about 10 years ago when I first moved out on my own. Being 19 at the time I was a bit more susceptible to wanting to mirror the opinions of people I followed online. I always heard FF13 was trash. I knew every problem with it but not any of its positive qualities. I went in expecting to hate it; I went in with a content creator’s mindset of picking it apart for humor. I got to chapter 9 back then and quit (I couldn’t beat the boss and I did not fully understand the combat system). I didn’t give it a fair chance. I wasn’t willing to be honest with a piece of media if it had a reputation that preceded all of the discussion around it. Well, I’m here almost a decade later and I’ve finally completed the game. It’s good! Some aspects of it are even brilliant. Some other aspects hold up as I thought they would, but overall I’m glad I gave this game a fair try. It deserves some praise.

Let’s get negatives out of the way. Final Fantasy XIII is pretty bad at first impressions. A lot of stuff that’s actually good about the game is not apparent until a couple chapters in. The concepts of the story seem convoluted and overly confusing and the combat seems incredibly one-note. It takes far too long for the game to unlock all of its mechanics (especially being able to customize your party order). I don’t really agree that it’s only fun halfway in though. I think that’s a slight exaggeration. That’s when it is finally at its best, but I was enjoying it earlier on as well.

The world building feels pretty non existent. It’s near impossible for me to picture what normal life on Cocoon is like. There’s a point to this as you’re meant to constantly be on the run and in danger with no time to rest, but I really felt the absence of towns and talking to NPCs. There’s only a couple of moments in the first half where you get to freely walk around an area with 0 combat encounters. It’s so hyper focused on the main party’s motives that you loose focus of what life is meant to be like in this world outside of that. It makes me not care about the world for most of the game.
I could hammer down on this point, but it provides a really unique experience for the series. At the time this was more of a problem with people because they feared this was the future of the series. We now have sequels and new numbered entries that intentionally go against the game design ideas of 13. Remaining upset at 13 for this is a bit silly. It now has its own unique identity as a final fantasy game and we have since received games that rectify its problems that most fans had with it. Replaying it with this in mind helped me enjoy most of the experience. I still believe the linearity makes certain stretches very boring. There’s a lot of run and fight and run and fight. Some levels are stretched so thin that there’s a sense of thankfulness when you finally trigger a cutscene.

Hope comes across as insufferable for a while and his drama with Snow is so strange to me as it boils down to miscommunication. It’s a shame because he’s a decent character when the melodrama settles. Melodrama is the keyword for the first half of the story. It’s a bit grating, but I loved when the characters were finally united and working together. It’s a decent main cast! Generally I think Hope ends up being the character who sees the most growth. I really like Sazh and Fang as well as soon as they’re introduced. Lightning is ragged on for being a copy of Cloud. I get that from the opening chapter, but I can’t picture cloud taking a character like Hope under his wing in a big sibling kind of way. If you know Cloud’s whole story then you would know there’s not much tie to lightning’s characterization other than what texture of “cool person” they are designed to be. I honestly think it’s because there aren’t a lot of stone cold, stoic, aggressive, more emotionally suppressed female characters. People say she shows no emotion, but she does, they just aren’t happy bubbly feminine emotions. She isn’t one of the best protagonists of the series, but her design is iconic enough to imply that she is. I’m split on some character designs here, but I love lightning, fang, and Sazh the most in this regard.
Vanille could be a cool character if not for her voice performance. Not that the voice actress did a bad job. It’s about the direction she was given. The constant moans and noises would make it awkward to play in front of most people, especially given her childish demeanor at first. It’s a pretty frustrating trope and it’s a shame it’s constant throughout most of her performance. Conceptually as a character I like her story and her pairing with Fang though.

______

Positives!

The Paradigm system is one of the best combat systems in the entire Final Fantasy series. It’s not even a question. I’m honestly baffled so many people (myself included in the past) claimed this game totally plays itself because of auto-battle. Again it’s an issue of first impressions. They shouldn’t have held mechanics from you for more than a couple hours, but when the combat starts requiring actual strategy it is unbelievably gripping. It’s about all you do for most of the game and I was always having fun coming up with new party formations. Looking up what paradigms other people use online was a fun experience too. Some bosses provided genuine challenge that I haven’t felt from many of the games. Giving paradigms recognizable titles is a genius design idea too.
The auto-battle is necessary. It’s possible to ignore it, but it isn’t a lazy decision to include it. Most of your decision making is from timing your attacks and switching between paradigms. The combat has a Xenoblade-like thought process for me. Choosing paradigms felt like selecting arts. Making sure you have the right paradigms for each battle is like customizing your arts load out. Having to manually select every attack would make it tedious. Sometimes it is necessary to do this, but I never found myself mashing X outside of generic enemy encounters. There’s so much to keep track of with your party and it’s so fast paced and engaging. I never felt like I had to turn my brain off. Some of the best FF games are guilty of having Mash X to win battles. FF13 appears to be the worst one for the opening chapters and that’s a huge problem, but when it finally kicks in it kept me on my toes constantly. The Stagger system is a work of brilliance too. I’m so glad they brought that idea back for FF7 Remake.

Final Fantasy XIII screams “high budget” as well. I cannot believe this is a PlayStation 3 game. The visuals hold up shockingly well. Even more so now that I’m playing XIII-2 and can see the comparison. The artistry and design work is fantastic. I especially love the details in the UX. The pause menu is sleek. I love the short clips of the characters that play on their respective screens. The font choices, the look of the crystarium. You can tell they had time to polish this game to a ridiculous shine.
And obviously the music is perhaps some of the best in the series as well. So much jazz influence. You can tell it’s composed by a classically trained pianist. One of the best main battle themes as well. Certain boss or character themes are a bit lacking, but generally I found the music to stay in my head whenever I wasn’t playing it. Such a triumph of a soundtrack.

It caught me off guard how many CGI cutscenes there were as well. I usually expect a couple (in the beginning, middle, and end) but you get so many throughout the game that it feels like watching a high budget movie that looks far better than Advent Children. They were always a nice reward when completing chapters.

I also sense a lot of passion and care when it comes to the concepts of this story. The story telling itself is a bit questionable, but the concepts and all the terminology are so in depth that I could see something similar coming from a FromSoftware game and fans would eat it up trying to unravel the world. It’s a really solid ending too and not one that felt incredibly obvious or typical of Final Fantasy.

The people who made Final Fantasy XIII were clearly excited about it. There’s a lot of mistakes and shortcomings that came from their philosophy behind making it, but it’s a uniquely textured video game because of it. It stands on its own now. I’m glad it didn’t become the standard for the series, but I’m not glad it was ripped to shreds so much that they seemingly became ashamed of it. A remaster of these games would be amazing. I think it’s cool to see some revisionism for it. It’s not one of my favorites in the series, but I can understand why it may be for someone else. I love that I can look at this and appreciate it for what it is and respect the artists behind it instead of labeling it as trash and disregarding anything I could love about it.

I was born in 1995 so I’m not going to pretend I was around and aware enough to remember Final Fantasy VII’s initial release. In fact I didn’t know about Final Fantasy as a series until I played Kingdom Hearts 1 (which I did play upon release at the age of 7). I didn’t know that Kingdom Hearts had characters from other video games. I thought characters like Leon, Cloud, and Aerith were original. My sister and I loved Kingdom Hearts. I remember one day my sister was showing me stuff from Final Fantasy VII on the family computer. I was confused because I was seeing these “kingdom hearts characters” in a setting that wasn’t kingdom hearts. This is how I discovered Final Fantasy. I remember we then rented the FF7: Advent Children movie and I thought it was really cool to see “kingdom hearts characters” in a more mature setting. Yes, Advent Children is technically the first non-kingdom hearts final fantasy media I fully interacted with (sorry). I eventually borrowed a copy of the ps1 game and played it. I loved it of course and became infatuated with the series as a whole. Final Fantasy VI is my favorite, but VII has such a specific charm to it because of its characters and setting. Even if other FF games are technically better, those characters were never topped in my head. Perhaps the best party of JRPG characters in history (only closely matched by xenoblade for me personally)

We all thought we wanted a remake of Final Fantasy VII on PlayStation 2, then PlayStation 3, and eventually we got one on PlayStation 4 and 5 (sort of). FF7 but with modern graphics and voice acting was a dream for so many. We had spin-offs for 7 that fulfilled these modern quotas, but they weren’t remakes, simply spin-offs of drastically varying quality. The eventual announcement of the FF7 remake was wild. It felt like it may never happen, but here we are awaiting FF7 Rebirth - the second installment of this new trilogy.

I don’t think it’s a hot take to say that FF7 remake is divisive. It’s a trilogy rather than 1 singular game, it alters some stuff in between the lines of the original story, and it ends on a bafflingly confusing note (unless you have familiarity with the PlayStation 1 game). FF7 Remake is not a remake in the game design sense of the word. The word ‘Remake’ in the title is more of a verb than a noun. It’s not a product that is a remake, it’s a subtitle for the intentions of a certain character. That’s why the sequel is Rebirth, not Remake Part 2.
This isn’t a revelation to fans of this game at this point, but I reiterate this because the fact that it isn’t a straight forward remake is wildly interesting to me. We all thought we wanted a simple remake of the Ps1 game, but do we really? Would we be happy experiencing the same story with the same twists? To build up this trilogy for years only to know the outcome of it all from the start feels like a boring alternative. I can understand people wanting just that, but I prefer our current timeline, even if I would still love the straight forward 1:1 approach.

FF7 Remake did not just remake the original game as a stealth sequel, it is also remaking the cultural reaction that the original game had. Instead of the conversation being “I can’t wait to see X character die in 4K 60fps” the conversation is theories, speculation of what certain things meant, “will this character even die?”, confusion, excitement, and mystery. It’s like the first game is coming out all over again. In today’s binge-culture, FF7 remake being 1 game may have devalued this cultural remake as well.
Spacing out the story so we are inclined to talk about it in parts as it’s built up (instead of rushing to the end and spoiling it for everyone immediately) has made enjoying this game such an engaging social experience. Yes it’s also a way for Square to make more money, but having everything fleshed out to this degree is honestly amazing to me. I love how much detail is added to this world in the remake. The characters are also the best they’ve ever been (which is a relief because they weren’t great in any other games in the 7 compilation. Crisis Core is the best we had in all of that).

A lot of people who worked on the original game are working on this trilogy. I’m not sure if the meta commentary was fully intentional, but I love the idea of this game being a critique of modern remakes. Bending the knee to consumer demand only to be attacked when it wasn’t as good as the original thing. How could a remake of FF7 ever fully please its fans? Remakes often disappoint fans. The developers using this opportunity to creatively input the demand for a faithful FF7 remake within a game called FF7 Remake is…bold. This has of course turned a lot of people off, but I find it clever and smartly written.
The true cleverness lies within how this is handled though. FF7 remake still IS a completely faithful remake of the original. It’s more fleshed out with additional material between the lines, but nothing is removed from the story. It’s all here. I’m confident the next games will still have everything from the original game too, even if structure changes to fit a modern style. FF7 remake being called a remake isn’t a lie, but it is a clever misdirection without being false advertising. Surely they knew people might react negatively to this, but the dedication to telling a new story through the mask of a story that’s already been told is a cool risk that pays off beautifully in my opinion.

FF7 remake is potentially faithful to a fault for some. The level design is still that of a PlayStation 1 game. There are some modern aspects to the game design, but it’s kind of funny that this game was approved to be made as is after the last FF game was a big open world spectacle. We’re back to ps1 levels and linearity. I’m confident Rebirth will deviate from this, but Remake is looking to ease us into a modern FF7 game rather than throwing us in immediately.

It also has the best combat of the whole series so far. FF7 Remake blends the feeling of turn based decision making with action. The characters have a repetitive xenoblade-like banter that I love, and the visual design is completely believable as an evolution on what’s been established as FF7’s aesthetic. The music is also some of the best in the industry. The ps1 sound font is dated enough that modern recreations likely don’t insult many people. I even feel like we have the best version of one winged angel now, which is saying a lot since it’s probably the greatest video game song of all time.

Final Fantasy VII Remake is polarizing to many. Even if it’s considered divisive, partaking in conversations about this game with people and listening to other’s experience with it has been endlessly entertaining. I can’t remember the last time conversation stuck around for so long with a new video game. The fact we have two more games to talk about when they release is so exciting. Even more exciting knowing that nothing is certain. We don’t know what’s going to happen but we also kind of do. What a unique situation for a fanbase to be in. Final Fantasy VII remake is the definition of risk. This could’ve gone so wrong and completely destroyed any good faith around the sequels, yet it feels like people are mostly excited for the future. I know I am at least.
I thought I simply wanted a 1:1 remake of the ps1 game, but being confused and having questions doesn’t have to be a negative thing.

You know when people say “I wish I could erase my memory and play X game again”? To me, this new trilogy feels like that becoming a reality. Final Fantasy VII is coming out and we don’t actually know what’s going to happen. We do get to experience it for the first time again in a weird way.

This one’s a doozy. Always heard Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII was the worst. Not just the worst of this specific trilogy but one of the worst final fantasy games in general.
Is it though? I really dug this game. It’s genuinely fascinating to me. It may even be my favorite of the trilogy and I liked XIII a decent amount. There’s so much I love about Lightning Returns. It has problems but from a gameplay experience I enjoyed it almost the entire time. I feel like I liked it as much as Crisis Core for example.

Lightning Returns is clearly lower budget. The hilarious Spirit Halloween-esque adornments used for NPC character designs. The awkward dialogue. Hope talking so much that he interrupts himself or doesn’t get to finish a sentence because you’re doing a quest. The horrible performance. It comes down to a lack of polish with its presentation. The core ideas, mechanics, themes, and especially the music are really great and unique for the franchise. Especially the combat system.
Customizing clothes and trying to make schemas look as stylish as possible was delightful. Schematics are a lot of fun. It feels like a pure split of action and turn based. I was never bored of fighting because even when it was easy I was still engaged by the action-like inputs and having to pull off perfect guards. It has a similar flow as the paradigm shifts but the execution in battle feels completely unique. It’s very clever. It feels like a would-be prototype for 15’s combat.
The music is amazing too. So many tracks depending on the area, time of day, multiple battle themes. It’s so varied. There’s some weird vibey ambient tracks that I adore now as well. Dark moody jazz pieces, a lot of textured percussion, brief moments of vocal melody, it’s great.

The game also exudes a weird uncanny mood in a way that I dig. Perhaps not always intentional, but a world where everyone knows they’re about to die has a somber tone to it, even if a lot of people just go about life like nothing is going to happen. I like the Snake / Otacon relationship Lightning and Hope have here, even if they’re a bit robotic. Lightning is hilarious in this game though. Despite the narrative device of her not having human emotions I loved her personality at times. She’s so stern and cold. Telling children they have meaningless existence, throwing moogels into the sky, she has a fun presence here. The writing often sucks though. She over explains everything for the player a lot and Hope will repeat things you just learned. It’s a bit much sometimes but it never made the game annoying to me. I think people are far too cynical about how boring and uninteresting lightning is.

I want to go out on a limb here and observe a potential meta element as well. There’s high chance this wasn’t the idea behind the story, but I feel like I enjoyed it decently enough because of this connection whereas most people take this story far too straight.
Final Fantasy XIII and its original big picture ideas for the future of the Final Fantasy series series obviously died out upon backlash. Seeing these characters mourn that their world is coming to an end and people will forget about them is incredibly dour. It feels like they’re reflecting on the failure of their world and lamenting that it has to come to an end. Their lives didn’t go how they expected and it’s time for a new world to be born. Then VersusXIII became XV. A new world. It’s oddly reminiscent of XIV’s reset as well. I have never seen this observation made so I’m not sure if this is me looking into it too much or if so little people cared enough about XIII to afford it this kind of emotion. On paper this story is really stupid and silly, but the context of what XIII’s world was to a lot of fans and the developers makes me feel a strange sense of mourning and investment when it all comes to an end. Their world had to end but they all get to live a calm and happy life in the end which I find a charming resolve for a band of characters that were often hated by fans and lived in constant stress and misery in the games.
Lightning Returns is a weird game. There’s such a stigma around it and I never expected the game to be as cool as it was. It deserved a second look from the fans. It’s my favorite of the trilogy and overall a cool final fantasy game. There’s a lack of polish and you can see through the cracks a lot. I just really loved the core experience, the tone of the world, the music, the depressing mood around the story, and finally my own personal observations between its story and the real world development of XIII. A remaster that cleans up the visuals would be genuinely exciting to me. I don’t adore this trilogy but I’m glad I finally played them and gave them a fair shake that I didn’t afford it in the past. I’m gonna miss the world of XIII in a weird way but I’m happy to move on.
LR > XIII > XIII-2

An update. I recently read my initial review of this game and didn’t find myself fully agreeing with it anymore. Not to a drastic degree - I still really love this game and adore my experience with it, but quicker than any other game I’ve played, I’m finding the recency bias has dissipated to an alarming degree.

I still stand by a lot of my initial thoughts, but having time away from the game has made its issues red hot. I believe it is still a big improvement over BOTW in most ways, but I think I’m seeing through the cracks a lot faster now than with BOTW.

Last week I went back to do more post-game stuff - side quests, filling out the depths map, shrine completion etc, and I found myself hitting a wall with some of the redundancy. This game is carried by its first playthrough. The Depths blew my mind when I first discovered them. What once was exciting and mysterious is now shockingly redundant and predictable. The Depths don’t offer much once you know the pattern of their design. The excitement of having an entire 2nd map lasts most of the game, but going back to it after beating the campaign made me realize I wasn’t motivated or excited to fill it out any further. I was motivated in a check list kind of way. The sky islands are a gorgeous diversion with occasional surprises - but just like the depths, they cease to offer more excitement once you discover the pattern. They’re horribly similar half the time. Getting the gliding suit was a wonderful experience, but so many islands are obsolete and lose purpose once completed. At least with Hyrule you never feel like returning to certain locations is totally pointless. Sadly the sky islands dwindled down to the point where I only went to them when prompted by a quest.

I still stand by the base Hyrule map being amazing. I replayed BOTW before TOTK and never found Hyrule to feel redundant with its main areas. Seeing the world develop is organic and wonderful. Catching up with characters from BOTW was nostalgic and charming. This is clearly where most of the development time went. That and the general narrative which I love. There are some story moments that are so brilliantly and subtly done. Nothing about the story felt lacking to me and there are several highlights that resonate as being some of the series’ best.

Overall, I can’t stand by my previous statement that this could be up there for my favorite zelda game or one of my favorite games in general. I still love it and my first time with TOTK will go down as one of my favorite video game experiences, but I don’t think I could replay it and enjoy it nearly as much. The abilities are still a game design achievement though. I completely get why this would be someone’s favorite zelda game and I’m certainly taking a strange stance atm, but I’ve fallen out of love with it at an alarming rate. My time trying to return to it rattled me with how rigid and unmotivated I felt to do anything else outside of walking around and enjoying the visuals (when it’s not cloudy and grey). I really expected to dive head first into completing all the shrines, side quests, and light roots etc. Even content like the koroks and holding the signs up were blatantly tired to me halfway through my first playthrough - to the point where once I had enough inventory slots I started ignoring koroks. I did maybe 25 of the signs before I began to skip them.

The lead up to the dungeons are superb and possibly better than the dungeons themselves to a degree. There’s so much room to improve for future games. I don’t wish for Nintendo to drop this formula (I mean they confirmed they won’t), but I hope they tone it down for the next one. We don’t need each game to get bigger and have more busy work. The side quests were mostly great in TOTK, but I do think there’s more padding than good well designed content upon reflection. It’s not bad padding though, but padding shouldn’t also be compensating for something.

Also a random tangent: I love the fuse mechanic, but I can’t be the only one who HATED walking around with certain fused weapons and shields. I never fused a shield unless it was circumstantial because I didn’t want a giant rock on my back. I always wanted to walk around with the master sword when I had it because it bugged me how dumb link would look half the time with a bunch of garbage glued to his weapons.
It’s just a nitpick - I love the mechanic - but I just wanted to have normal looking gear sometimes. There’s some cool looking fused weapons for sure, but most are really goofy. I want to look cool when exploring, and despite how fun fusing is, you quickly end up only fusing the same few monster parts over and over. I likely had less than a dozen monster parts I’d rely on for arrows and weapons by the end.

TOTK blows my mind in a lot of ways, and my adoration for it hasn’t exactly gone away. I’ll always love how in love with it I was, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was released from some kind of spell upon beating it. I’d love for the next zelda game to have a smaller focused open world, and perhaps a more linear approach to progression. The do anything anywhere idea has been great for two entries, but I’m pretty confident the magic of that is totally drained after TOTK. We don’t need another shake up or brain melting revolution of game design, just a tighter version of what exists. Getting items in a certain order during the story and having an actual difficulty curve would be very welcome. I’m more excited than worried for the future of zelda. I still believe they put their all into this one. It’s not likely they’ll use this specific hyrule and its characters again, so a fresh slate with these ideas as a blueprint will undoubtedly lead to something even better.

Still one of the best things ever. My second playthrough of this was a breeze. I did all the hero quests and most side quests my first time, wanted to see how the game felt without going too much out of my way to finish side content; honestly surprised how beautifully balanced the game felt without the bonus EXP from side content. This is easily the best cast of characters in the trilogy and the pacing of the story is wonderful. There’s so many places you might never see in this world too which I love, it feels huge and open. I miss having more conventional towns outside of the city, but the way this world functions alleviates that as a big problem. It’s not a JRPG where chilling and hanging out in towns is a priority, it’s a bleak and stressful world to be in at times, if often beautiful and quiet in the right moments. Visiting colonies still has a town-hopping charm to it, all due to the people within them. The game is littered with nice quests and dialogue to experience. The ability to obtain intel and discuss them at rest stops is such a brilliant mechanic that I want every RPG to have. The colonies may not be much in terms of level design, but as big checkpoints where you can catch up with your buds and gather some quests is such a brilliant substitute.

I love how insanely dramatic Xenoblade 3 is as well. Character dialogue is likely 50% motivational speeches and I love it. The game drowns in its concepts and ideas. Drowning might be a bad comparison, it really just dives in and gracefully swims through its concepts. I love Final Fantasy XIII, but I think Xenoblade 3 is a great contrast to it in which it gracefully introduced terminology, world building, language, and conflict in a coherent way that doesn’t require reading a wiki.

Xenoblade 3 is devastatingly beautiful. It’s hope, love, anxiety, fear, and any other important emotion anthropomorphized into a piece of narrative art. Not to mention it has one of the best combat systems in anything I’ve ever played. The whole series is a pure blast to play, but 3 is on another level of snappiness and customization. I can’t comprehend where a 4th game could go with its mechanics. Xenoblade combat pulls off a wonderful trick of feeling familiar in each game without sacrificing new ideas. On the surface all 3 games are completely different systems at their core, but they all retain the wonderful flow and problem solving of the first game.

It’s a masterpiece. It’s probably the best game on the Nintendo switch and it’s my personal favorite of the trilogy. I don’t need xenoblade to last forever, but I’ll follow Monolith Soft wherever they decide to go next.