sinistral2099
1998
This game has a lot of plot holes, but it's still a largely enjoyable ride from start to finish.
Blossom Tales 2 improves upon almost every aspect of the original. The sprite art is more detailed, the cuteness is dialed up, the writing is sharper, the dungeons more finely tuned, nothing overstays its welcome. It is an ode to the childhood of someone who grew up in the 80's.
1999
What if, when making a sequel, you took everything about the original that made it unique and discarded it? Then, you created a UI that was even less intuitive? Then you retconned the plot and made it confusing beyond all belief? That's Parasite Eve 2.
I hated every moment of this game.
I hated every moment of this game.
2002
Robot Alchemic Drive (RAD) is a love letter to giant robot fights, tokusatsu movies, and kaiju films. The voice acting is hilariously bad. The control scheme is atrocious. The plot line is nonsensical. In spite of all this, the game is one of my favorite games on the Playstation 2. I'd even go so far as to call it a hidden gem. The game is very self aware of how ridiculous it is and leans into that. The result is a game that will make you laugh and smile while you play it. It's not difficult, but it is fairly long at 15-20 hours. It's developed by Sandlot and published by Enix (prior to the Square-Enix merger), and this game's engine went on to power the Earth Defense Force games. Give this game a chance and it will work its way into your heart.
This game has one of the most mature and well written stories in the franchise. That said, there are a lot of systems and mechanics that make this game hard to recommend. It plays like a single player MMO, almost as if Square was trying to recreate the feeling of its online predecessor, Final Fantasy XI, in a single player game.
2023
Total playtime: 103 hours.
There is nothing bad that I can say about Octopath Traveler II. The developers improved every criticism I had about the first game and delivered a truly remarkable gaming experience.
There is nothing bad that I can say about Octopath Traveler II. The developers improved every criticism I had about the first game and delivered a truly remarkable gaming experience.
2021
This game was originally localized for the NES but never released and that's a shame. It deviates hard from the JRPG formula that we know today, and really experimented in some neat and surprising ways. Not my favorite Final Fantasy, but definitely a worthy entry in the franchise.
Boring and doesn't respect your time as a player.
A short, and cute addendum to the Final Fantasy 4 story, but ultimately unsatisfying. The sprites in the PSP version are based on the mobile version of FF4 and FF4 The After Years and while the monsters look incredible, the party battle sprites look absolutely horrendous. Especially the ninja, Edge, as his face wrap covers the lower part of his eyeballs, which now take up 70% of his face.
2021
A very interesting story with a lot of plot twists that I did not expect. If I had one major complaint it would be that the game throws a lot of huge changes at you in quick succession without really giving any of them time to breathe. Narrative whiplash is real in this one, and dialogue later in the game indicates that even the developers (or at the very least, the localization team) were fully aware of the meme-ified levels character deaths.
I spent 300+ hours on Breath of the Wild, and I felt like there was a lot to do in that game. To say that Tears of the Kingdom has an overwhelming amount of content is an understatement. It uses the same map as Breath of the Wild but makes important changes to it that keep the sense of exploration fresh. If Breath of the Wild was a masterpiece, Tears of the Kingdom is a fully realized religious experience.
When I'd read that Ara Fell (not the Enhanced Edition) was an RPG Maker game, I did not expect to enjoy Ara Fell: Enhanced Edition (which is not an RPG Maker game). I played this on the recommendation of a friend (and viewer) and I was not disappointed. The writing is sharp. The sprite work is fantastic. The music is great. It's just long enough and doesn't overstay it's welcome. The large character art needed a bit more polish, and I wish the character classes had more options beyond the two that each are given. Really looking forward to seeing future games from this developer.
2021
Final Fantasy III was a game that was slated for a North American release but due to the release of the Super Nintendo, both Final Fantasy II and III never made it to our shores. It's really a shame. Where Final Fantasy II experimented with the formula in new and interesting ways, Final Fantasy III really honed it. Of the 8-bit era Final Fantasies, III really stands out as the best of them. The Pixel Remaster is faithful to the original (not the 3D remake that was released on later consoles).
My only complaint about the game is that the better jobs aren't unlocked until really late in the game, meaning that in order to fully take advantage of them you'll need to grind out job levels.
My only complaint about the game is that the better jobs aren't unlocked until really late in the game, meaning that in order to fully take advantage of them you'll need to grind out job levels.
If you're looking for a traditional JRPG experience, you will not find it in this game. The puzzles are rudimentary, the writing is bland, and the story is unimaginative. The maximum party size never grows beyond two characters, and the second slot is reserved for a cast of rotating guest characters. The music is actually pretty solid, and the main character's sprite has a couple of well done animations, but that is the extent of positives that I can write about this game.
2018
I'm tired of single player games adopting MMO design elements and trying to build a single player experience around them. I don't want to go into the menu and send a party request to an NPC. Everything in this game is super bullet spongy. The sprite art is really great, but the story did not grab me in the slightest.