volnestacks
It's Pokemon Yellow, honestly it still holds up with all the jank which adds a whole level of charm and nostalgia to it but also I can fully understand why someone who hadn't played this before might be put off by the lack of indication for several mechanics and how absolutely busted the stat layout of Gen 1 is. I'll always love the first game that was truly mine that got for my 6th birthday. Thanks for ruining my life Pokemon Yellow.
This review contains spoilers
I'll start by saying that I was uncertain to mark this as abandoned or simply played because 66 hours in multiple pace halting game design decisions, or minigames, made me rage quit and decide to watch the rest of the story in a compilation on Youtube. So for all intents and purposes I both played, finished and abandoned Rebirth which I think is a good description of what this game feels like narratively and conceptually.
Rebirth is a reminder that a well made game can still be a bad game. Or more specifically, a well made game can be put into a blender and pureed into children's food. Rebirth continues the trend of broad assumptions that yes, you the player did in fact play FF7 or you're at least familiar with it's story because it goes to great lengths to change things in ways that seem interesting but only if you know what was changed in the first place. These changes set up interesting questions and genuine intrigue into progression of the game. Why is Zack here? Why are Avalanche being helicoptered out of the rubble of Midgar? Why are Aerith and Cloud in a coma? These questions are all asked within the introduction of Rebirth, before you're thrust in to Cloud's tale of his derring-dos with Sephiroth back in the day, in the Kalm inn. This is all great. It's well paced, has good character writing. There are some weird changes like why is Nibelheim a bustling town with a similar population to a Midgar city sector? But whatever, I'm sure it's just a small change to make the world feel more alive. Then you arrive in the Shinra Manor, or what was the Shinra Manor. The place was completely gutted and instead of being a creep filled atmosphere of degradation it boils down to one room with a literal elevator in plain sight down to Hojo's lab. Okay, whatever, let's get the fun of Sephiroth's mental break and mass murder out of the way. Sephiroth's monologue to Cloud leads a lot to be desired but sometime it's understandable they might remove some of the PS1 weirdness like him literally flying out of the building, but at the very least he could have thrown the materia at Cloud. I'm getting a bit uncertain now. We go back to the inn and then the burning of Nibelheim starts. What follows is one of the slowest "video game walks" imaginable. Cloud gets crushed under the town sign and has to limp his way through a burning village, emphasis on limping. While this is happening entire citizens who were trapped in burning buildings get to run past him at full sprint. We come up on Sephiroth, being approached by Nibleheim citizens with guns and as Sephiroth deflects their shots and kills them Cloud must crawl forward, by the way of the player pressing two large L2 R2 prompts that are on the screen. This is a microcosm of all the problems that are to come in Rebirth. Important scenes having all tone and pacing removed from them, arbitrary QTE's included in pivotal moments of the game up to and including That Scene. YES, That Scene. A scene that was so perfectly crafted in 1997 that it's baffling to me that any developer would look at such a thing and think "yes, adding QTE prompts where you must fight the haptic feedback triggers is truly what this emotional climax of a game needs!"
If it wasn't clear, one problem leads to an example of another problem. FF7 Rebirth feels like a tech demo for the PS5. The overabundance of minigames with new tutorials every 5 hours of a 100+ hour game, multiple minigames having automatic controller motion controls active, sections of the game where you pilot Cid's airplane with limited control on where you actually go to because the open world isn't really an open world anymore, but it has motion controls! Look at how the plane moves when you move the controller! An entire chapter is dedicated to one single boss fight and an entire minigame just to show you "hey, look! Check out our new cardgame!" and yeah! Queensblood is really good! It's a shame you're forcing me to play it in the middle of the story. And right after this big, important Jenova boss fight on the ship that only lasted a couple minutes even on dynamic difficulty you arrive! In Costa del Sol! The biggest pacing crash in the game. Which is what I'd call it if there wasn't several of them. The characters explicitly remark that you're on an urgent mission but Tifa and Aerith beg you to take a rest on the beach because Sephiroth can wait I guess. But you're quickly introduced to the gimmick of the area, you can't progress until you get a swimsuit for Cloud. You literally can't go to the beach without a swimsuit. Why you may ask? Don't worry about it. You have to do minigames to get Cloud's swimsuit. After going through these hurdles control is shifted to a scene with story implications where Aerith talks to Red about the white materia she has. This doesn't last long and quickly you're whisked away with Tifa for their "date". The two are immediately approached by the same NPC that told Cloud he had to get a swimsuit so now, again, you have to get swimsuits for both Aerith and Tifa. So once again, you're charged with doing minigames! Lot's of minigames!
At this point the game was starting to great on me but I decided to persevere! I was so looking forward to Rebirth and the potential implications of the promised batshit reveals and changes to the story we can expect! And after all these minigames we finally get it, a scene I didn't ask for and I don't think anyone who doesn't still maintain a high school crush on two fictional women asked for. We're subjected to a notification of whether or not Cloud has similair taste in swimsuits to the girls, and we get to see the two girls bounce around in their bikinis from Clouds pov which feels... not great as the player who is clearly not the target audience for stuff like this. But then, Hojo arrives! And is allowed onto the beach in his labcoat which begs the question why you had to waste time doing multiple different full fleshed out minigames. You then get a boss fight because honestly, it's been awhile. Unlike the PS1 game where Hojo just vibes on the beach he summons his robot to come kidnap Cloud, the gang and a bunch of robed men. After some fuckery the gang gets free because of course they do and Hojo just... leaves. And then Costa del Sol becomes an open zone for side quests and more minigames! One of which you're gated from finishing until you've made it past the Gold Saucer of all things.
At this point you get the gist but what really matters is the point in which I stopped. Corel Prison, what once was an absolute dumpster of a location is now a vibrant wall market knock off with it's own eccentric Like a Dragon style gangsters that want Cloud to do chocobo racing! Which is a given, it's a requirement in the original game but there's a twist! And you guessed it! You're required to do at minimum 3 minigames out of 6 or all of them to get extra rewards before you can even consider doing the whole other chocobo racing minigame to progress the story. I tapped out. CBU1 made a big deal about how Final Fantasy 7 is so big it can't be contained to one, or even two games. It HAD to be a trilogy. But out of 60 hours of gameplay, only 10 hours of that was story related and the other 50 was entirely devoted to minigames and maybe 6 was devoted to my stubbornness to beat the summon VR fiights on the hardest difficulty. This review does not even unpack my broader problems with the main story of Rebirth, like it's absolute cowardice to do anything interesting with major story beats, the fact that the developers have already explained the endgame of remake to tie it into Advent Children which means all the big mysteries are solved if you have any knowledge of On a Way to a Smile, the refusal to let this game go above a T rating meaning that any horror or visceral story beats that happened in the original are completely gutted, and the tone of important scenes are ruined. Such as Dyne and Barret's story where in the original Dyne threatens to kill his own daughter after fiinding out she's alive and then throws himself off a cliff, where in Rebirth it's replaced by Dyne comitting suicide by cop and then having a man in a speedo and a cape drive into scene in the buggy and do poses over Dyne's dead body while Barret is visibly in the background crying. Which is ALSO immediately followed by another boss fight against Palmer of all people.
Idk dude, some other people have reviewed this well and expressed my other grievances. What I want to understand is why people think this is game of the year and I mean genuinely. This is not a dismissive question, I actually want to know deep down what made them consider this game as a whole is such a great piece of art to them. A game with so many minigames distracting from an already spread thing plot, a game that has you press Call of Duty QTEs during the Aerith dying scene, a game that is so convoluted just to say nothing in the end. What do people see in this? I need to know. And i need to play the original FF7 again to wash my mouth out.
Rebirth is a reminder that a well made game can still be a bad game. Or more specifically, a well made game can be put into a blender and pureed into children's food. Rebirth continues the trend of broad assumptions that yes, you the player did in fact play FF7 or you're at least familiar with it's story because it goes to great lengths to change things in ways that seem interesting but only if you know what was changed in the first place. These changes set up interesting questions and genuine intrigue into progression of the game. Why is Zack here? Why are Avalanche being helicoptered out of the rubble of Midgar? Why are Aerith and Cloud in a coma? These questions are all asked within the introduction of Rebirth, before you're thrust in to Cloud's tale of his derring-dos with Sephiroth back in the day, in the Kalm inn. This is all great. It's well paced, has good character writing. There are some weird changes like why is Nibelheim a bustling town with a similar population to a Midgar city sector? But whatever, I'm sure it's just a small change to make the world feel more alive. Then you arrive in the Shinra Manor, or what was the Shinra Manor. The place was completely gutted and instead of being a creep filled atmosphere of degradation it boils down to one room with a literal elevator in plain sight down to Hojo's lab. Okay, whatever, let's get the fun of Sephiroth's mental break and mass murder out of the way. Sephiroth's monologue to Cloud leads a lot to be desired but sometime it's understandable they might remove some of the PS1 weirdness like him literally flying out of the building, but at the very least he could have thrown the materia at Cloud. I'm getting a bit uncertain now. We go back to the inn and then the burning of Nibelheim starts. What follows is one of the slowest "video game walks" imaginable. Cloud gets crushed under the town sign and has to limp his way through a burning village, emphasis on limping. While this is happening entire citizens who were trapped in burning buildings get to run past him at full sprint. We come up on Sephiroth, being approached by Nibleheim citizens with guns and as Sephiroth deflects their shots and kills them Cloud must crawl forward, by the way of the player pressing two large L2 R2 prompts that are on the screen. This is a microcosm of all the problems that are to come in Rebirth. Important scenes having all tone and pacing removed from them, arbitrary QTE's included in pivotal moments of the game up to and including That Scene. YES, That Scene. A scene that was so perfectly crafted in 1997 that it's baffling to me that any developer would look at such a thing and think "yes, adding QTE prompts where you must fight the haptic feedback triggers is truly what this emotional climax of a game needs!"
If it wasn't clear, one problem leads to an example of another problem. FF7 Rebirth feels like a tech demo for the PS5. The overabundance of minigames with new tutorials every 5 hours of a 100+ hour game, multiple minigames having automatic controller motion controls active, sections of the game where you pilot Cid's airplane with limited control on where you actually go to because the open world isn't really an open world anymore, but it has motion controls! Look at how the plane moves when you move the controller! An entire chapter is dedicated to one single boss fight and an entire minigame just to show you "hey, look! Check out our new cardgame!" and yeah! Queensblood is really good! It's a shame you're forcing me to play it in the middle of the story. And right after this big, important Jenova boss fight on the ship that only lasted a couple minutes even on dynamic difficulty you arrive! In Costa del Sol! The biggest pacing crash in the game. Which is what I'd call it if there wasn't several of them. The characters explicitly remark that you're on an urgent mission but Tifa and Aerith beg you to take a rest on the beach because Sephiroth can wait I guess. But you're quickly introduced to the gimmick of the area, you can't progress until you get a swimsuit for Cloud. You literally can't go to the beach without a swimsuit. Why you may ask? Don't worry about it. You have to do minigames to get Cloud's swimsuit. After going through these hurdles control is shifted to a scene with story implications where Aerith talks to Red about the white materia she has. This doesn't last long and quickly you're whisked away with Tifa for their "date". The two are immediately approached by the same NPC that told Cloud he had to get a swimsuit so now, again, you have to get swimsuits for both Aerith and Tifa. So once again, you're charged with doing minigames! Lot's of minigames!
At this point the game was starting to great on me but I decided to persevere! I was so looking forward to Rebirth and the potential implications of the promised batshit reveals and changes to the story we can expect! And after all these minigames we finally get it, a scene I didn't ask for and I don't think anyone who doesn't still maintain a high school crush on two fictional women asked for. We're subjected to a notification of whether or not Cloud has similair taste in swimsuits to the girls, and we get to see the two girls bounce around in their bikinis from Clouds pov which feels... not great as the player who is clearly not the target audience for stuff like this. But then, Hojo arrives! And is allowed onto the beach in his labcoat which begs the question why you had to waste time doing multiple different full fleshed out minigames. You then get a boss fight because honestly, it's been awhile. Unlike the PS1 game where Hojo just vibes on the beach he summons his robot to come kidnap Cloud, the gang and a bunch of robed men. After some fuckery the gang gets free because of course they do and Hojo just... leaves. And then Costa del Sol becomes an open zone for side quests and more minigames! One of which you're gated from finishing until you've made it past the Gold Saucer of all things.
At this point you get the gist but what really matters is the point in which I stopped. Corel Prison, what once was an absolute dumpster of a location is now a vibrant wall market knock off with it's own eccentric Like a Dragon style gangsters that want Cloud to do chocobo racing! Which is a given, it's a requirement in the original game but there's a twist! And you guessed it! You're required to do at minimum 3 minigames out of 6 or all of them to get extra rewards before you can even consider doing the whole other chocobo racing minigame to progress the story. I tapped out. CBU1 made a big deal about how Final Fantasy 7 is so big it can't be contained to one, or even two games. It HAD to be a trilogy. But out of 60 hours of gameplay, only 10 hours of that was story related and the other 50 was entirely devoted to minigames and maybe 6 was devoted to my stubbornness to beat the summon VR fiights on the hardest difficulty. This review does not even unpack my broader problems with the main story of Rebirth, like it's absolute cowardice to do anything interesting with major story beats, the fact that the developers have already explained the endgame of remake to tie it into Advent Children which means all the big mysteries are solved if you have any knowledge of On a Way to a Smile, the refusal to let this game go above a T rating meaning that any horror or visceral story beats that happened in the original are completely gutted, and the tone of important scenes are ruined. Such as Dyne and Barret's story where in the original Dyne threatens to kill his own daughter after fiinding out she's alive and then throws himself off a cliff, where in Rebirth it's replaced by Dyne comitting suicide by cop and then having a man in a speedo and a cape drive into scene in the buggy and do poses over Dyne's dead body while Barret is visibly in the background crying. Which is ALSO immediately followed by another boss fight against Palmer of all people.
Idk dude, some other people have reviewed this well and expressed my other grievances. What I want to understand is why people think this is game of the year and I mean genuinely. This is not a dismissive question, I actually want to know deep down what made them consider this game as a whole is such a great piece of art to them. A game with so many minigames distracting from an already spread thing plot, a game that has you press Call of Duty QTEs during the Aerith dying scene, a game that is so convoluted just to say nothing in the end. What do people see in this? I need to know. And i need to play the original FF7 again to wash my mouth out.
The Like a Dragon franchise is known for having many hits and misses. No RGG game has ever truly been bad that that doesn't mean some games feel weaker than others. Gaiden, a game made to bridge the gap between a game that released in 2018 and one that released in 2020. This gap has always felt almost inconsequential, as the appearance of Kiryu in Yakuza 7 is easy to believe after the controversial ending of 6 and the story of this game as a whole pretty much reflects this. Many characters feel created just to justify the events of a game whose conclusion is already known if you played 7, and if Gaiden is your first time jumping into the series it really will just remind you that you're getting a lesser experience. The peaks of Gaiden rely so heavily on the attachment to Kiryu's seven game spanning story and the weaker parts of the game are literally just montage recaps of events present in Yakuza 7 that are already known, and are presented in such a jarring way before having characters recap those same plot beats to you naturally anyway.
Ultimately, the finale of Gaiden truly is amazing and if you're an RRG fan I can recommend the experience of that alone to play this game. But the overall price point, the two chapters of padding to justify the existence of this story as a whole game and not a prologue bundled into Infinite Wealth and some very bland and frustrating fights with less than a handful of boss fights (that are admittedly very fun on the hardest difficulty) means I can't recommend straight out purchasing this. Grab it on sale or play it via Gamepass. It's something worth experiencing but not at the price it's being sold.
Also yes, I did absolutely bawl my eyes out at the end and it made me incredibly excited to see where Infinite Wealth heads with the narrative.
Ultimately, the finale of Gaiden truly is amazing and if you're an RRG fan I can recommend the experience of that alone to play this game. But the overall price point, the two chapters of padding to justify the existence of this story as a whole game and not a prologue bundled into Infinite Wealth and some very bland and frustrating fights with less than a handful of boss fights (that are admittedly very fun on the hardest difficulty) means I can't recommend straight out purchasing this. Grab it on sale or play it via Gamepass. It's something worth experiencing but not at the price it's being sold.
Also yes, I did absolutely bawl my eyes out at the end and it made me incredibly excited to see where Infinite Wealth heads with the narrative.
2023
A stunningly harrowing game that explores the horrors of female objectification, stalking, isolation and accepting oneself and ones trauma. Using relatively simple game play mechanics that are incorporated in multiple ways, the narrative and vibe is clearly a higher priority than any sort of difficulty or oppressing game play. Comfortable enough to leave those things to it's writing and use of visual and audio art to explore such stress inducing ideas in such beautiful ways.
For the price, length and narrative I personally find criticisms of Decarnation being gameplay light incredibly odd. It strikes all the right notes of a horror puzzle game and that's all it needs. If you need something emotionally driving that you can simultaneously relax and experience anxiety through I can't recommend Decarnation enough.
For the price, length and narrative I personally find criticisms of Decarnation being gameplay light incredibly odd. It strikes all the right notes of a horror puzzle game and that's all it needs. If you need something emotionally driving that you can simultaneously relax and experience anxiety through I can't recommend Decarnation enough.
2018
If your game has sexual assault for shockvalue in the cringiest way possible using RPGMaker sprites, people will herald it as the pinnacle of horror and atmosphere for some insane reason. This game is needlessly edgy with some of the most player unfriendly mechanics possible. This is truly not worth the time, especially given that it's not even offensive that the subject matter is so badly handled, it's just embarrassing. It's hard to find anything actually horrific and enjoyable about a game that has you crawling along the floor with periodic fart sound effects and the text "your anus is bleeding" after being raped. It's not subtext, it's all badly written text with the tact of a 13 year old
Apparently Fear & Hunger 2 is a lot better in regards to not only it's content, but it's ability to actually be an enjoyable and engaging horror game which I wish people made clearer when discussing the games. As such I'll be given that a shot and return to this review with an update on whether or not this truly is just a failed first attempt.
Apparently Fear & Hunger 2 is a lot better in regards to not only it's content, but it's ability to actually be an enjoyable and engaging horror game which I wish people made clearer when discussing the games. As such I'll be given that a shot and return to this review with an update on whether or not this truly is just a failed first attempt.
This review contains spoilers
The nature of this DLC two parter truly feels like the "definitive third game" that the new DLC style serves to replace in the current generations. At the time many people complained about the short nature of part 1 but ultimately Teal Mask was 1/3rd to Indigo Disk's 2/3rds of story and content. An introduction to what's to come in this indulgent and enjoyable post game story.
I have not finished ALL the post game content of these two DLC yet but have finished the core content and been playing it extensively with a joy I haven't felt since Sun & Moon.
Story wise these DLC introduce several new characters, some of which have ties to characters from past games. The Blueberry Elite Four is such an enjoyable array of characters with fun personalities and small details that really make the world of Pokemon and it's relation to genration 5 come alive. My personal favourite is fairy trainer Lacey, the daughter of Driftveil gym leader Clay, whose most notable pokemon is an Excadrill like her father that she tera's into fairy type. The story itself isn't any deeper than other pokemon games but it feels much more indulgent in the small things to tell a story, such as Kieran's change in style, the BB Elite Four's pokeball choices and throwing styles, and what their team strategies are.
Speaking of team strategies, while Teal Mask's difficutly curve was relatively stable, the jump to Blueberry Academy truly feels like an endgame/post game. The Blueberry Elite Four all use some interesting strategies and teams. Crispin's Sunny Day team leads with Rotom Heat and Talonflame, and includes Harvest Exeggutor holding a sitrus berry. Dratyon, the dragon type, utilises a Sceptile with the new move Dragon Cheer to buff his dragon Pokemon. And personal favourite, Kieran has replaced much of his of favourite pokemon with a competitive set of Dragonite, Politoad and goddamn Incineroar. Obviously the difficulty of these fights is ultimately up to your play style. I personally caught and EV trained a mostly new time for the DLC but even utlising my competitive Trick Room team I was often left with one pokemon surviving in the victory.
BBQ's are another new, fun gameplay idea that are best utilised while playing with others. You fulfill basic tasks, gain BP and use those BP to upgrade the club room or print items at the new item printer. As someone who actively plays with their partner the BBQ's have been relatively enjoyable but I can see the potential that they'll be incredibly frustrating if you're a solo copy or someone without two copies and two switches to utilise the full group missions.
All I can really say is that I love this DLC. I love Scarlet and Violet as a whole and consider them up there as some of my favourite Pokemon games. This is certainly not to say they're without flaws. Many people have criticised the technical issues with the games which are entirely real and valid complaints. Personally however, the completed Scarlet and Violet with the Hidden Treasures DLC is exactly what I want out of a Pokemon game and have dreamed of since I was a kid. If you didn't like the base game, this DLC probably won't change your mind. But if you even somewhat enjoyed what you experienced, the DLC is truly worth it and adds a large amount of content of fun content. I'm looking forward to playing ranked again with the new Pokedex additions!
I have not finished ALL the post game content of these two DLC yet but have finished the core content and been playing it extensively with a joy I haven't felt since Sun & Moon.
Story wise these DLC introduce several new characters, some of which have ties to characters from past games. The Blueberry Elite Four is such an enjoyable array of characters with fun personalities and small details that really make the world of Pokemon and it's relation to genration 5 come alive. My personal favourite is fairy trainer Lacey, the daughter of Driftveil gym leader Clay, whose most notable pokemon is an Excadrill like her father that she tera's into fairy type. The story itself isn't any deeper than other pokemon games but it feels much more indulgent in the small things to tell a story, such as Kieran's change in style, the BB Elite Four's pokeball choices and throwing styles, and what their team strategies are.
Speaking of team strategies, while Teal Mask's difficutly curve was relatively stable, the jump to Blueberry Academy truly feels like an endgame/post game. The Blueberry Elite Four all use some interesting strategies and teams. Crispin's Sunny Day team leads with Rotom Heat and Talonflame, and includes Harvest Exeggutor holding a sitrus berry. Dratyon, the dragon type, utilises a Sceptile with the new move Dragon Cheer to buff his dragon Pokemon. And personal favourite, Kieran has replaced much of his of favourite pokemon with a competitive set of Dragonite, Politoad and goddamn Incineroar. Obviously the difficulty of these fights is ultimately up to your play style. I personally caught and EV trained a mostly new time for the DLC but even utlising my competitive Trick Room team I was often left with one pokemon surviving in the victory.
BBQ's are another new, fun gameplay idea that are best utilised while playing with others. You fulfill basic tasks, gain BP and use those BP to upgrade the club room or print items at the new item printer. As someone who actively plays with their partner the BBQ's have been relatively enjoyable but I can see the potential that they'll be incredibly frustrating if you're a solo copy or someone without two copies and two switches to utilise the full group missions.
All I can really say is that I love this DLC. I love Scarlet and Violet as a whole and consider them up there as some of my favourite Pokemon games. This is certainly not to say they're without flaws. Many people have criticised the technical issues with the games which are entirely real and valid complaints. Personally however, the completed Scarlet and Violet with the Hidden Treasures DLC is exactly what I want out of a Pokemon game and have dreamed of since I was a kid. If you didn't like the base game, this DLC probably won't change your mind. But if you even somewhat enjoyed what you experienced, the DLC is truly worth it and adds a large amount of content of fun content. I'm looking forward to playing ranked again with the new Pokedex additions!
The copy I was given was a reproduced one so while the game itself was all but legit it's meant I can't make use of item duplication meaning my opinion of the post game is on a long hold. That aside though, Emerald is still one of the best and most groundbreaking Pokemon games. Taking all the new improvements and features of generation 3 and adding just that bit more to them to make it a truly enjoyable experience that still holds up today. Most of the flaws of Emerald and gen 3 as a whole are the result of new features not fully being fleshed out yet. For a first try at Abilities they're implemented incredibly well but the reduced text space means often the descriptions of what the abilities actually do can be confusing. This can sometimes be an issue as well when it comes to the more esoteric uses for abilities such as lightning rods ability to increase the frequency of phone calls, intimidates ability to lower encounter rate, etc. Obviously these are less of an a problem in the age of the internet and two decades of documentation for a game boy advance game but it's still worth noting.
Narratively, Emerald is still one of the best Pokemon games especially due to the series' first ever inclusion of a two team plot with themes of environmental preservation. These have all been talked about before for years, but if your only experience with generation 3 was Ruby and Sapphire, or their respective remakes ORAS, it is truly worth going back and experiencing Pokemon Emerald for one of the best and most enjoyable stories up there with the likes of BW/B2W2 and Sun and Moon.
The biggest problem with Emerald, and all old Pokemon games, is resale culture. I cannot in good concious encourage people to spend $300AUD on a Gameboy Advance game. Which is disappointing because as the end of Nintendo's online support for Pokemon Bank looms in the distance it's nigh impossible to do a Ribbon Master challenge from Emerald and the Pokemon NGC games unless you have unrealistic amounts of money to spend on price gougers. Simply put, Emerald is worth playing in whatever means is available to you, regardless of your familiarity with Pokemon as whole. If it's your first time playing any old Pokemon game, coming from the newer ones, Emerald is truly a great place to start.
Narratively, Emerald is still one of the best Pokemon games especially due to the series' first ever inclusion of a two team plot with themes of environmental preservation. These have all been talked about before for years, but if your only experience with generation 3 was Ruby and Sapphire, or their respective remakes ORAS, it is truly worth going back and experiencing Pokemon Emerald for one of the best and most enjoyable stories up there with the likes of BW/B2W2 and Sun and Moon.
The biggest problem with Emerald, and all old Pokemon games, is resale culture. I cannot in good concious encourage people to spend $300AUD on a Gameboy Advance game. Which is disappointing because as the end of Nintendo's online support for Pokemon Bank looms in the distance it's nigh impossible to do a Ribbon Master challenge from Emerald and the Pokemon NGC games unless you have unrealistic amounts of money to spend on price gougers. Simply put, Emerald is worth playing in whatever means is available to you, regardless of your familiarity with Pokemon as whole. If it's your first time playing any old Pokemon game, coming from the newer ones, Emerald is truly a great place to start.
2023
[thoughts based on a NG playthrough]
The best parts of Lies of P shine through when the game set itself apart from it's blatant From Software inspirations and tried to be something truly unique for itself for the first half of the game with a compelling visual and thematic identity influencing gameplay that abruptly falls to the wayside as the developers start to try more and more to be like the FromSoft tropes that we're all tired of. Lies of P manages to throw out it's unique ideas for the restrictive trappings of two health bar boss fights, arbitrarily removing the ability to summon NPC help 70% through the game for a handful of boss fights, one of the worst status ailments I have ever seen (literally who has ever played a FromSoftware game and thought "I love toxic and weapon durability decay so much I wish there was a status ailment that did BOTH in the last 7 boss fights!"?) and the bizarre decision to switch gears in multiple boss fights with the way the player is expected to engage with the tools given to them up until a certain point. I do hope the developers continue trying to make unique games in this style I'm just begging them to learn from the multiple discussions people have had and realise the truly great bits are the bits that weren't afraid to shy away from being a FromSoftware clone. I love this game in theory but in practice I'd rather just play any FromSoftware game that inspired this again.
The best parts of Lies of P shine through when the game set itself apart from it's blatant From Software inspirations and tried to be something truly unique for itself for the first half of the game with a compelling visual and thematic identity influencing gameplay that abruptly falls to the wayside as the developers start to try more and more to be like the FromSoft tropes that we're all tired of. Lies of P manages to throw out it's unique ideas for the restrictive trappings of two health bar boss fights, arbitrarily removing the ability to summon NPC help 70% through the game for a handful of boss fights, one of the worst status ailments I have ever seen (literally who has ever played a FromSoftware game and thought "I love toxic and weapon durability decay so much I wish there was a status ailment that did BOTH in the last 7 boss fights!"?) and the bizarre decision to switch gears in multiple boss fights with the way the player is expected to engage with the tools given to them up until a certain point. I do hope the developers continue trying to make unique games in this style I'm just begging them to learn from the multiple discussions people have had and realise the truly great bits are the bits that weren't afraid to shy away from being a FromSoftware clone. I love this game in theory but in practice I'd rather just play any FromSoftware game that inspired this again.
2022
A relatively enjoyable sci-fi survival horror game. Blatantly inspired by the likes of Resident Evil, for better or worse, it excels at oppressive and stunning music, beautiful and ominous imagery and an interesting story about relationships and identity. Where it falls flat is the abysmally designed inventory system, ripped straight from classic Resi with none of the nuances that make Resi's limited inventory actually work. An unecessary amount of weapons with incredibly limited quantity of holdable ammunition bogs the game down and makes an otherwise cool and notable boss fight a complete mess that requires a free inventory slot and with unpredictable item pickups so preparing your invetory beforehand is actually incredibly frustrating. Another gripe with the inventory is the mandatory flashlight that takes up an entire inventory space and due to it's requirement to open doors in dark rooms, something that you'll almost always need it for, it becomes a frustrating waste of an entire slot instead of simply being an upgrade to the player as a whole.
The last thing is that some puzzles are incredibly well thought out and enjoyable to figure out blind but a handful are unnecessarily frustrating. This particularly comes to a head closer to the end of the game.
All this aside though, despite my rating and gripes Signalis might be one of my favourite survival horror games hands down. Something that's definitely worth a play if you enjoy this genre of game or horror games in general but go in with lower expectations than the lofty "best survival horror game" some have called it. Overall: enjoyable experience that may or may not end up highly regarded in your personal opinion but an experience definitely worth a try. At a typical horror game run time and a reasonable price give it a try!
The last thing is that some puzzles are incredibly well thought out and enjoyable to figure out blind but a handful are unnecessarily frustrating. This particularly comes to a head closer to the end of the game.
All this aside though, despite my rating and gripes Signalis might be one of my favourite survival horror games hands down. Something that's definitely worth a play if you enjoy this genre of game or horror games in general but go in with lower expectations than the lofty "best survival horror game" some have called it. Overall: enjoyable experience that may or may not end up highly regarded in your personal opinion but an experience definitely worth a try. At a typical horror game run time and a reasonable price give it a try!
A general improvement on Insomniac's Spider-Man formula. Most of my personal cons are simply gameplay preferences I prefered from the first game (such as a broad selection of suit powers no longer being the case and a stripping down of optional crimes to focus on core side missions while leaving tech found around the city in crates) though there were several points that the game bugged out or got softlocked. These were mostly remedied by the incredibly generous auto save feature. I'm interested to see if Insomniac can improve the game from here in any future sequels. If you like Spider-Man, you'll like this so definitely worth the buy.
2020
tl;dr: wait for Larian's inevitable Definitive Edition. I was enamored with the first 2 acts of this game but as things progressed and Larian pushed out patches that somehow made things functionally worse I've just become so disappointed. The entire finale of the game became a buggy mess with broken textures, bugged quests and poor performance compared to the first. Up until Act 3 performance was pretty stable but at this point I can't actually talk about the state of the first two acts because of the changes post launch patches have made. This doesn't even address the multiple lackluster writing decisions that very visibly weren't thought out or were stitched together based on poor decisions during development. At the end of the day I cannot recommend this game to people in it's current state, especially given the years of Early Access before being released Early in such a janky and unpolished state. This game may as well still be in Early Access as long as Larian has to keep updating the game until we get the most likely DOS2 style Definitive Edition.
2023
Edit: I might update this with a full properly written review later to include other glaring problems but I feel so emotionally frustrated with this game I just want to give a "brief" summary to hopefully help others that care about these things dodge a bullet.
I don't even know where to begin with this other than that I was INCREDIBLY hopeful for this game. Final Fantasy changing is nothing new and the idea of a character action Final Fantasy game with the politics of FFXII had me excited, especially after the demo, which I hugely regret.
Eikon fights are flashy and cool for the first 10 minutes but they drag on significantly too long. Especially considering most of them are so visually over the top it becomes increasingly hard to discern what's happening on the screen. You could cut out an entire phase of each eikon fight and they'd still be incredibly fun and amazing to look at and you'd have had additional development time for other lackluster fights (or completely missing plothole fights).
Another thing is the overuse of similarities to FFXIV is such a detriment to this game. Fight's often don't feel unique enough because they're sometimes just massive callbacks to FFXIV. The mmo fight endings taking excitement away from killing an enemy, the overabundance of side quests and awful pacing after major plot events leading to an extreme disconnect in the importance of the plot. And the excessive amount of information delegated to text logs in a way that subtracts from story in a bizarre way. Which also ties into...
The abysmal treatment of women. I can't stress enough how badly this game treats its female characters. Total story important female characters are Three of them. Two die because you can't be redeemed unless you're a male character and the other barely gets to interact with her own plot or the story of the game outside of being an emotional support unit for Clive while also constantly not having much to say while all the men talk. She doesn't even get to come to the end of the game instead being replaced by a male character whose importance wasn't even relevant until 3/4ths through the story. Shiva has so much wasted potential.
I wish I could go into this more but I don't have the energy after venting about it in other places. Other people have levied similair criticisms for all these aspects Just know that if you're somebody easily put off by the treatment of female characters, unecessary reuse of exhausting tropes, horrible pacing, shallow 10 - 15 minute combat sections where you fight the same enemy types for 70 hours or you hated the Game of Thrones TV show (the tv show specifically because the GoT influence was clearly not the books) you'll dodge a bullet avoiding this one. Don't be like me, don't waste $100aud because you're a Final Fantasy fan and a character action fan. It's 70 hours of two games that could have been incredibly good on their own but made absolutely mediocre together with one of the most needlessly depressing stories a Final Fantasy game's told with one of the worst slavery plots known to man.
I don't even know where to begin with this other than that I was INCREDIBLY hopeful for this game. Final Fantasy changing is nothing new and the idea of a character action Final Fantasy game with the politics of FFXII had me excited, especially after the demo, which I hugely regret.
Eikon fights are flashy and cool for the first 10 minutes but they drag on significantly too long. Especially considering most of them are so visually over the top it becomes increasingly hard to discern what's happening on the screen. You could cut out an entire phase of each eikon fight and they'd still be incredibly fun and amazing to look at and you'd have had additional development time for other lackluster fights (or completely missing plothole fights).
Another thing is the overuse of similarities to FFXIV is such a detriment to this game. Fight's often don't feel unique enough because they're sometimes just massive callbacks to FFXIV. The mmo fight endings taking excitement away from killing an enemy, the overabundance of side quests and awful pacing after major plot events leading to an extreme disconnect in the importance of the plot. And the excessive amount of information delegated to text logs in a way that subtracts from story in a bizarre way. Which also ties into...
The abysmal treatment of women. I can't stress enough how badly this game treats its female characters. Total story important female characters are Three of them. Two die because you can't be redeemed unless you're a male character and the other barely gets to interact with her own plot or the story of the game outside of being an emotional support unit for Clive while also constantly not having much to say while all the men talk. She doesn't even get to come to the end of the game instead being replaced by a male character whose importance wasn't even relevant until 3/4ths through the story. Shiva has so much wasted potential.
I wish I could go into this more but I don't have the energy after venting about it in other places. Other people have levied similair criticisms for all these aspects Just know that if you're somebody easily put off by the treatment of female characters, unecessary reuse of exhausting tropes, horrible pacing, shallow 10 - 15 minute combat sections where you fight the same enemy types for 70 hours or you hated the Game of Thrones TV show (the tv show specifically because the GoT influence was clearly not the books) you'll dodge a bullet avoiding this one. Don't be like me, don't waste $100aud because you're a Final Fantasy fan and a character action fan. It's 70 hours of two games that could have been incredibly good on their own but made absolutely mediocre together with one of the most needlessly depressing stories a Final Fantasy game's told with one of the worst slavery plots known to man.
There's nothing I can say about this game that hasn't already be said before but damn the final room before the last boss of the game is so awful if you experience any form of motion sickness. This game's amazing but please don't hesitate to get someone to help if you're someone who experiences issues with motion!!
2023
It's Persona 3 Portable.
I bought the game on sale in AUD and have only finished my first New Game Hard playthrough, not having done the optional super bosses. Played this game in handheld and honestly, it's fine??? The sound mixing sounds like they recorded the compressed PSP audio straight out of the PSP but it's not something that particularly bothered me all that much.
The game still has all the improvements of Portable as well as all the weaker points of portable. The visual novel style still works fine and makes the game cozy but it also means several scenes look incredibly bad both because of the bad image upscaling of this port but also because comparatively the still images with character portraits front and center replacing what were once scenes with full character models with animations and direction.
If P3P on modern consoles is the only way you have access to it then for the price it's probably fine? There's been a lot worse new game releases, remasters and ports to come out that cost twice the price and couldn't even be considered fine. If you do have access to a means of playing Persona 3 FES then I would strongly recommend at the very least playing that first before P3P.
The changes P3P made to gameplay truly make it substantially more accessible and the removal of the jealousy system for the MC makes the game genuinely more enjoyable even if the forced romances as the male protag still suck. But what P3P imrpoves as a game with it's additional content and gameplay mechanics it lacks in the charm of FES.
I bought the game on sale in AUD and have only finished my first New Game Hard playthrough, not having done the optional super bosses. Played this game in handheld and honestly, it's fine??? The sound mixing sounds like they recorded the compressed PSP audio straight out of the PSP but it's not something that particularly bothered me all that much.
The game still has all the improvements of Portable as well as all the weaker points of portable. The visual novel style still works fine and makes the game cozy but it also means several scenes look incredibly bad both because of the bad image upscaling of this port but also because comparatively the still images with character portraits front and center replacing what were once scenes with full character models with animations and direction.
If P3P on modern consoles is the only way you have access to it then for the price it's probably fine? There's been a lot worse new game releases, remasters and ports to come out that cost twice the price and couldn't even be considered fine. If you do have access to a means of playing Persona 3 FES then I would strongly recommend at the very least playing that first before P3P.
The changes P3P made to gameplay truly make it substantially more accessible and the removal of the jealousy system for the MC makes the game genuinely more enjoyable even if the forced romances as the male protag still suck. But what P3P imrpoves as a game with it's additional content and gameplay mechanics it lacks in the charm of FES.
This is hands down the best Metal Gear game and I thank God someone who wasn't Kojima got to handle Raiden because this is the best iteration of him outside of MGS2.