Bomb Rush Cyberfunk is a spiritual successor and love letter to the Jet Set Radio franchise, so for fans of that series this is an amazing game. The soundtrack, the art style, the gameplay loop, and even so many small details all bring me back to that series and overwhelm me with nostalgia. I think for people looking for that experience, this is the perfect game.

However, as a game that has to stand on its own merits in today's environment, I think Bomb Rush Cyberfunk is still very good, but definitely lacks in some categories. For the positives, the soundtrack of this game is incredible and probably my favorite soundtrack in the last five years. I love riding around the city and having banger after banger playing. The game also runs well and movement feels very smooth, which is definitely important for this kind of game. The character designs are fun and the level design is excellent.

The game does suffer in the graphics department due to its intention to mimic Jet Set Radio. I don't think this is the biggest deal because it is very intentional, and it is done well, but it brings some of the old jank with it. Characters will often clip through things (or themselves) in cutscenes for example. The gameplay is fun, but after awhile can feel very repetitive. It's basically a platformer that uses skating game mechanics for movement, but having those two combined means it loses a little bit of depth from either side. The story is fine but nothing groundbreaking.

Overall, I am absolutely in love with this game but I have to acknowledge it is definitely influenced by nostalgia. I would still heartily recommend this game to anyone looking for an interesting, stylistic experience or someone who wants a fun platformer.

I wanted to like this game so bad, at times I really did like it, but it falls so flat where story is concerned.

Its combat and progression is deeply engaging, its world is gorgeous and well designed, its skill system and party make up is so well balanced. The game is incredible to play when you’re running through dungeons or fighting bosses. The issue is that a game like this needs a story that propels you through the gameplay, a context you care about and that keeps you going, but it just doesn’t. There is no main plot or main story, it’s just 8 separate and disconnected character stories that are of no real interest or importance to anything outside of those very specific events for the stories to take place. I couldn’t engage with any of them beyond Agnea. The messages felt flawed and cack-handed; a man who wants to create a land of equality by coming a monarch? A man who wants to end poverty through capitalism? A woman who wants to kill her abusive parental figures and escape from a life of pain, only to go back on that for no logical reason? This game’s story is just simply broken, it’s a slog, it has no real point of investment and it’s a huge shame.

Where the Final Fantasy games these are obviously directly spiritual successors to used their enthralling plot as a means to make you care about everything you do, the stories here feel like a total after thought, just something that vaguely exists to give you an excuse to play it. But it’s not enough and the game suffers for it.

I’ve been trying to play this one and off for almost a year and the gameplay is so damn fun, the music and atmosphere are tremendous but the crux of the game, its story and characters, are empty, disconnected and messy as all hell. I want to try the first game to see if it has the same issues and I hope they make a third to fix some of these flaws and improve on a game premise that has such shining potential to be incredible.

Please use this elevator. Hold up, push this slow ass cart to vacuum up all the mako before you can access it. Exit this cave. Hold up, move this slow ass cart that's blocking the exit. Reach this ledge. Hold up, the ladder is broken, so you'll have to push this slow ass cart all the way there to use as a platform. Hold up, the path is blocked, so have Barret shoot at this boulder for several seconds so that you can continue pushing your slow ass cart. Great job, now it's time run across an empty field to go activate your 6th Ubisoft tower.

Remains one of my favorites of all time so many years later. I'm sure it helps that this was one of the first games I ever owned, but there's still such a zen-like quality to running and jumping around the most beautiful PS1 pastels and polygons while Copeland's perfect score accompanies every moment. Full completion is a breeze and rarely frustrating (Tree Tops aside of course), so much so that you could probably knock out this entire game in a weekend if you wanted.

I'll keep coming back to Spyro until the day I die, you can count on that.