Topic: Games You Recently Beat?

Beat Mario Tennis Aces Adventure mode.

Pluses.
The opening cutscene where Wario and waluigi are digging.
The story while it's a maguffin hunt with a couple of familar beats, it takes advantage of that narrative limitation by polishing what little story it has to a shine making it a fun adventure. Simple narratives don't have to be boring if you take the time to make it fun.
Fun scenarios like taking out train hiking shy guys via a snowball fight.
The before/after battle script courtesy of the island opponents you meet and ya boy Toad grant a bit of charm and few points of self-awareness on the game. That'll have you at least crack a smile.
The bosses are very fun; Final boss especially.

Plus or minus.
You can clear this with a bit in a couple of hours (probably an afternoon) but I think it works for what it was without feeling bloated. Maybe they can take the template of what's been done in Adventure mode and improve upon it whenever theres a Mario tennis Switch 2.
No Strategic advantage for getting a new racket. A new racket is only stronger than the last one. But it does count for additional lives.

Minuses.
Mario's jump is delayed by a couple of frames so you gotta jump a couple of frames early if you want to have an easier time with the bosses.
This is basically a one and done affair. Especially with what little post game it has.

So its a one and done and it has a simple gameplay loop but you gotta give it to them to make this a fun one. This is worth a play-through.
7.5/10.

Just finished Super Neptunia RPG. My thoughts on the game are kinda a mixed bag. There are some things about it that I really enjoyed, it has all the 4th wall breaking humor, references to other games and gaming culture and anime girls that I would have expected from a Neptunia game and I enjoyed that part quite a bit. From Pokemon parodies to a literal Mario Bros section, it does all of that very well. And it always feels good at the end of an RPG when your characters are totally crazy strong.

In terms of game play however it's not as positive - for a game with a focus on it's 2D nature, it baffles me why we cannot use the D-pad to move in the platforming sections. I can't think of a good reason for this. Also, the break gauge mechanic is utterly broken and non-functional. I beat the entire game without ever having a battle where I even triggered it once - aside from the tutorial. The break gauge is increased by hitting enemies, but everything, even bosses die way before you get even the lowest tier charged. Unless you deliberately use attacks the enemy resists - however doing that makes everything painfully slow because you get an action point penalty for doing that. And this is another issue, because of the way this game handles damage, it is possible to find yourself totally locked out against an enemy if you don't have a type they aren't immune to. Thankfully this is rare - but this just shouldn't be a concern.

Moving on, another issue is a general lack of polish in the game. For starters, on the main menu, selecting load game doesn't have a sound when you press the button, and takes a moment before going to the save game list - and on that list it does not default to your most recent file, simply starting at game 1. Selecting the game has the same problem, you press A and wait a very noticeable 3-4 seconds before the game responds. Once you are in the game, things generally run smoothly - unless you use the speed up button - which can cause the game to soft lock at the end of the battle and happened to me enough that I stopped using it almost entirely for fear of triggering the glitch.

Another issue I didn't like was the use of foreground decoration to hide pits, enemies and items, and enemies being right in your face when you get to a new screen with no time to react. All very annoying.

My final issue was the cut scenes. I am perfectly okay with cut scenes, I even like visual novels which are basically nothing but cut scene... But that content needs to have a purpose, character development, humor, world building, plot, something. I'd estimate at least 40 minutes of the game was spent listening to Neptune talk about eating pudding. We get it. Anyone who plays the Neptunia games knows she loves pudding - you don't need to repeat that joke in every single scene several times! Further, if you're going to have so many cut scenes, animate your characters better! GBA titles had sprites with more animation than these characters did, aside from Neptune I think everyone only had like 4 different animations. And one character consistently started moving before her walk cycle actually began! She just weirdly floated for a moment then moved her legs - repeatedly!

All in all, I had fun playing the game, but I seriously doubt I'll revisit it ever. It just lacks the polish and the creativity to warrant that. If you are a big fan of the Neptunia series, this game is worth a play through, once. It's got the humor and the characters you already know you like. But for anyone else, it's probably not worth going out of your way for. I'd give it a 5 out of 10.

SteamWorld Dig (Wii U)
I played this as part of the physical SteamWorld Collection. This wasn't my first time with the game since I've also played it on the 3DS.

Positives

• The gameplay is equal parts intuitive, relaxing, and addicting for me. It doesn't take long at all to learn the controls and almost never seems unfair. Just a bit more ore, then I'll quit....Just a bit more....
• This game's assets are quite stunning in HD. A lot of care clearly went into the art.
• The residents of Tumbleton, on the whole, are quite interesting to talk to. However, they aren't the meat of the experience.
• I quite like the exploration in this game as you continually mine to deeper depths in search of ore and secrets. To avoid some enemies, hazards, or damaging falls, you have to plan your route to an extent.
• All of the upgrades are useful or fun in their own way, plus they can all be obtained with patience (and if you don't need repaired too often).
• While nothing from the track stuck out too much, it's still an enjoyable sound experience overall. The music definitely fits the Western vibe. I think I like the main theme best.
• It's so, SO satisfying when you use the game's physics to do away with some enemies.
• I enjoyed the secret cave area that served as a clear nod to the Mario franchise. I'm not sure if I missed this when I played the 3DS version, or if it was added later.

Neutral

• I've seen some compare the HD version on various platforms to the 3DS version. In my opinion, both are decent in their own right: One has a nice coat of HD paint, while the other has wonderfully rendered 3D layers that also add to the experience.

Negatives (Mostly small nitpicks)

• I wish some of the Tumbleton residents had been expanded on more personality-wise. While they imparted some useful information, some of them didn't really feel relatable.
• Most of the enemies, on the whole, are fairly easy to deal with or avoid.
• You won't hear this from me often, but I wish the game had been a little longer.
• I feel as though there should have been more boss fights with this game. The end boss fight itself is pretty easy once you know what's up.

I haven't played SteamWorld Dig 2 yet, so it's very possible that some of the above has been addressed there. I had as much fun with this game as on the 3DS, perhaps even more so this time around. It's definitely a fun Metroidvania, though it's a little on the easy and short sides. It's an excellent game to unwind with.

On to SteamWorld Heist!

Yoshi's Crafted World

School Girl Zombie Hunter (PS4) - A mission based TPS that sees a group of 5 high school girls fighting for their survival once zombies overrun their high school.

Pros:

• While a bit janky (it's a budget title), the gameplay is generally fun, with the guns being fun to shoot, especially since you can dismember the zombies.
• Ally AI is actually pretty good considering the budget. They generally stay near you, so no wandering off by themselves to get killed, and shoot anything that moves. The only downside to this are base defense missions with a collectable off the beaten path, as they will follow you away from the base leaving it defenseless when you go for the collectable. This only happens once or twice though.
• There are a decent amount of unlockables, such as outfits that can be hidden in a level, or Charons (bird zombies) strewn about that unlock hair & underwear colors, and the most powerful rocket launchers, if you kill enough of them. Then there are the numerous varieties of the six weapon types regularly dropped by enemies (though I tended to pick options I liked relatively early on and didn't mix it up).
• I really mostly really enjoyed the schlocly B-Movie vibe it had going on (including the cheesy rock theme song), even if it could have used some more environmental variety.

Neutral:

• Although the weapons all feel good to use, ultimately things tend to get so busy that I tended to only use shotguns, and ocassionally a rocket launcher to get me out of a pinch (other than the sniping specific sub-missions).
• Each of the 5 girls has a special ability, and while Akiha's (who can indefinitely revive fallen allies, at half health, using no items) and Mayaya's (who reveals the locations of all a level's key & hidden items) are really useful, the various combat buffs the other girls' abilities involve aren't nearly as useful, IMO.
• Being a budget title, the characters are a bit wooden, but generally all have a character arc that shows how they've grown.
• It's a fanservice game, so take that how you will. It's not as over the top as something like Senran Kagura (especially in terms of design), but you can dress the girls up in outfits like swimsuits & nurse uniforms, clothes take damage as you get hit, and as a last resort move you can strip down to your underwear to temporarily distract the zombies.

Negative:

• Difficulty is all over the place. Sub-missions not withstanding, there is a huge difficulty spike around the end of chapter two/the start of chapter three (missions are suddenly filled with very aggressive, infinitely spawning zombies that make routine point A-B missions and card key missions highly annoying, especially considering you're on the clock & they spawn as fast, if not faster, than you can kill them), it was almost enough to make me quit the game outright, however that huge spike is gone as fast as it came, and later missions become much more manageable once again (the only time infinitely spawning enemies appear in the main story again are in survival & base defense missions, which are much more manageable since you can stand your ground & fight). Not only this, but boss missions (first introduced in Chapter 3), with the exception of the final boss, are much EASIER than anything else in the game.
• It does drop frames ocassionally, I think once or twice into single digits. Not often or long enough to hugely impact the game, but it is a noticeable mar.
• From a story perspective there's no "how", or even "who" or "why". Relatively early on it's revealed that an intelligent zombie named Ren is causing the infestation using a science facility below the school, but other than stopping him, the story doesn't go any deeper (no explaination as to who Ren is for example). A deep story is probably not the biggest equation that goes into a game about high school girls fighting zombies, but a weak link it is.

Overall a pretty average experience, but there's just something that draws me to these B grade experiences from time to time.

@Ralizah, sorry for aping your write-up format. It just seems so useful.

Unravel (multiplatform, played on Xbox), one of the best indie games ever made in my opinion. It's fun to play but also for the beautiful visuals, classic folk soundtrack and ecological and love message it conveys. The character is ugly before you play and cute and lovely once you start playing. The whole game including mechanics and progression is organic. I loved it!

Negatives. Some puzzles are a bit twisted and some action bits can be frustrating until you repeat and realise what's going on and what options you have.

Dragon Quest Builders 2...well at least until the DLC comes out. But I got end credits so I'm satisfied. Going to head back to okami now. I should be playing FE3H (I am pecking on it slowly) but I don't want to get sucked in when I have other games to beat.

@Tyranexx if you enjoyed the first Steamworld Dig I’m sure you’ll love the second. I almost 100%’d it a few days ago (there’s a tough as nails postgame challenge I couldn’t handle)

There are a lot of quality of life fixes and more enjoyable upgrades. Characters are a little more fleshed out but the main focus is definitely still the digging. There are more boss fights than the first but only a handful. The length for me was about 12 hours if I remember correctly (just main story and general exploring before going back and nabbing collectibles)

@Glitchling78 Thanks for the feedback! I'm glad to know that a lot of my issues (which I'd consider minor) were addressed. I'll definitely be picking up SteamWorld Dig 2 before too long.

I'm an exploration nut, so I'll probably tack on 2-3 more hours of that time.

Two games this time, since I don't have too much to say about either of them.

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Mutant Mudds

Platform: Nintendo Switch

Completion Status: 100%. All levels completed normally, including the moon and ghost levels. All hidden retro levels completed, both of the normal variety and the more hidden ones only reachable with the overpowered "Grannie" character. All hidden character skins found. Only took a little over five hours to do all of this.

Description: A comet falls from the sky and mud monsters take over... or something. Aside from a cutscene near the beginning that's less than 30 seconds long, there's no story here. You play a kid with a hoverpack and a gun that shoots bullets of water. Otherwise, it plays like a normal platformer: you shoot enemies, navigate across the stages, collect gems or something and try to get to the goal at the end of the level. Hidden levels are themed after older systems such as the Game Boy and Virtual Boy, which render levels in grey or red and black, respectively.

This was originally released in 2012 on the 3DS, where I originally played it, but it was soon ported to every other imaginable platform. Now that includes the Switch.

Likes:

• Simple, mildly challenging gameplay that's reflexively enjoyable for me.
• Vibrant color scheme.
• Controls are tight.
• Pretty much the definition of a "pick up and play" experience. You can mix and match sessions of this with almost anything else without getting your cognitive wires crossed (kind of the opposite of playing two complex RPGs at once, I would say).
• I like the twist on traditional gameplay in the ghost levels. Unlike normal, you can't just kill enemies and then progress through stages in a carefree manner. Enemies are immune to your attacks and, with only a few exceptions, you never get the right ammunition to kill them, so you're attempting to platform while also avoiding enemies. When you do get ammo that can hurt them, it'd often only enough to kill baddies that are unavoidable in certain sections and, even then, they respawn a few seconds after killing them.

Dislikes:

• It's the video game equivalent of junk food. You gobble it down, often too fast, and enjoy the activity enough while you're in the midst of it, but, afterward, there's little to remember. It's hard to even remember anything about this game. There's no real story, the music is forgettable, everything is just sort of designed to be mildly pleasant and passable and absolutely nothing more.
• There's very little variation in-between different worlds or characters.
• The game was originally released on Nintendo 3DS, and you can tell, because a lot of the levels have you navigating between various layers of the screen. On the 3DS, each layer had its own visual depth, allowing you to tell which enemies were on which layer of the screen even when they overlapped, but here, without the aid of the stereoscopic 3D effect, screens often become cluttered and confused and it's difficult to tell which layer of the level enemies are operating on.

Conclusion: Decent, but mostly forgettable little game. It does very little wrong, but, at the same time, its lack of ambition or ingenuity makes it difficult to recommend to people unless there's a deep sale (which is actually the reason I repurchased this).

Verdict 6/10

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BoxBoy!

Platform: Nintendo 3DS

Completion Status: Finished the main story levels and most of the optional score attack and timed levels. Didn't quite complete all of the optional post-game worlds, though. Spent 11 hours playing it.

Description: You're a boy who is also a box. You're eventually followed by other silent box people. You complete levels by manipulating the main character's abilities to spawn more boxes out of his body.

Likes:

• Despite the limited number of mechanics and simplistic controls, there's a surprising amount of stuff you can actually do with them. When the game eventually becomes challenging in the post-game, it can be interesting to experiment and see just how wild your solutions need to be to complete a level while collecting all of the crowns (the currency in this game).
• You can use the optional crowns you collect in each level unlock outfits, music tracks, and optional challenge levels, which is nice, I guess.
• There seems to be a decent amount of content in the game. Despite the levels themselves being short, they eventually feel longer just because of the sheer brainwork that goes into figuring out what to do in them.

Mixed:

• Most of the game feels like an extended tutorial, because each of the story worlds introduces you to a new mechanic (or a new twist on a previously introduced mechanic), and, as such, the level design primarily revolves around learning to manipulate these mechanics.

Dislikes:

• I have no issue with visual minimalism, but this game is... too basic. The game's color scheme is monochrome. There's no texturing or detail to any of the characters or levels. It's pretty much just a step above ASCII art. While it's very clean looking, it's also pretty bland.
• No stereoscopic 3D. I hate this. It's not like the developers needed to disable the 3D because the game needed to use as much of the system's resources as possible.
• The minimalism extends to the use of sound and music as well. I can't even remember any of the aural components of this game. They're apparently purely functional and nothing else.
• There's no story, or context for anything that happens, which makes it difficult to care about completing the game.
• The game gives you nothing for completing optional challenges, which makes them feel kind of pointless.
• There's a mechanic where you can extend boxes away from yourself and then contract your character to the point where your line of boxes extends. There's also a mechanic where you can 'break away' your extended box body and use the shape it makes to help you when you're platforming. But, oftentimes, it would break off instead of allowing me to contract, and I feel like the game never clearly explained the rules governing this behavior.

Conclusion: The puzzle aspect of this puzzle game is solid, I guess, but everything around it is so plain that it's hard to maintain interest.

Verdict 5.5/10

@Ralizah I don't know why mutant mudds gets so much love. I stopped played after 2 hours from shear boredom. There's games that I don't mind and still finish because they're decent enough to play. This is a game i don't mind but could not spend the time to finish. It's pretty 1 dimensional. Good for you spending the time with it til the end. You're a better person than me ☺.

Marvel Ultimate Alliance 3

It was so much better than i expected it to be and enjoyed every minute of it. I almost never experienced any performance issues. The graphics were maybe a little "mobile like" but not enough to really complain about. The voice acting was solid in my opinion. It had that marvel flare you'd expect with cut scenes. The amount of characters available were all top notch. It was like the smash ultimate of action rpgs, everyone was there. The action in the game was fun and fluid. Pretty cool special attacks and there's so much replayability. I'll definitely be going back to do more runs with new characters. I stuck to only a few characters so there's many more I want to try. Considering I didn't get into the first 2 games in the series, I was taken by surprise..

9/10

@NintendoByNature I agree with you. I tried the demo on the 3DS when it became available. While it's by no means a terrible game, there just wasn't enough there to make me want to purchase the game.

The layering effect was nice though.

@Tyranexx yea the layering even on switch looks nice. But it's just....a bland game. There wasn't even boss battles that I recall. The puzzle game in the collection that was Dr Mario esque was the only thing that saved the collection for me. Atooi who made the game, actually did a nice job on xeodrifter though. That's worth someone's time for a few bucks at least

@NintendoByNature I like Mutant Mudds a good deal. Like I said, I played it on 3DS at launch as well, and I rarely replay games I've fully completed. The 3D effect was actually really cool on the 3DS, so I'd rate that version slightly higher for that reason alone. It's clearly a game made with stereoscopic 3D in mind.

With that said, it's objectively pretty basic and borders on mediocrity, so I have to acknowledge that.

I'll definitely be playing the sequel and the spinoff included in the Switch collection as well.

Recently beat the Wolfenstein Double Pack (The New Order& Old Blood). They still hold up especially Old Blood, biggest gripes with both games are the A.I, they're terrible. Like terrible, they can't put up a fight, except in the final mission in the New Order is when they do give you a challenge, somewhat.

The New Order: Story is great in the beginning and end(except in the middle), A.I sucks(like I said before), the gunplay feels mediocre I feel like sometimes I'm shooting pea shooters half the time. Those forced fetch quests almost ruined this game, there were boring and unnecessary. But I can still recommend this, it isn't perfect by any means but you'll get some enjoyment out of the New Order.

Old Blood: Man I love this title, it started decently but when you get to the old town and s*** hits the fan, it's god damn fantastic! The atmosphere, environment, and sounds make this game come out on top! Gunplay feels great, the guns feel meaty(especially the rifle), A.I still sucks. The biggest gripe with Old Blood is that's too short, they didn't spend enough time in the old town like they should've. The best part of the entire game and you're barely in it.

I highly recommend Old Blood, best Wolfenstein to date, I'll rather play this again than the New Colossus and YoungBlood. Off-topic, but I have no hope for Doom Eternal or any other Bethesda game coming out. With Bethesda track record as of late, Eternal will be mediocre garbage just like Rage 2, New Colossus,76 and Youngblood.

Game: Lapis x Labyrinth
Platform: Switch
Completion: End Credits (79% total)
Time: 18 hours

This was the strangest game I’ve played in a while and I could see it polarising people. It’s a hyperactive 2D hack n slash dungeon crawler with overwhelming visuals and audio.

By overwhelming, I mean that for 80% of the game you will be showered with bright colours, flashing lights, characters screaming stuff in Japanese and combat sound effects. If you’re epileptic or have a headache this is one to avoid, but if you love fast paced action it’s worth looking into.

Combat is great, at least to start with. It’s really fast and the moves your characters can do have weight. You’ll often be fighting hordes of enemies like a musou but if you’re not paying attention you can get seriously injured. It keeps you on your toes but aside from different enemies, nothing really changes throughout the entire game. You don’t unlock new moves and the majority of the abilities you learn are stat buffs. Whilst it’s fun, the sheer amount of repetition can grind you down.

The game showers you with loot, which feels incredibly rewarding. You do get a lot of duplicates despite the huge variety of weapons but these still come in useful as you can dismantle them to create items. That said, the sheer amount of stuff you’ll amass makes navigating weapon and armour menus difficult, even with sorting options.

There’s about 80 missions in the campaign, ranging from 1-3 levels each plus a boss battle. A mission generally takes between 3-10 minutes. Whilst a lot of levels are original, there’s a noticeable amount of copy paste in terms of layouts. There are 10 level types but to be honest, they all kind of blend together by the end. That said, it was always fun trying to navigate your way to the exit in time.

If this sounds interesting, definitely look up videos before purchasing. As much as I liked the flashy and noisy presentation I could see it being grating to some.

Marvel Ultimate Alliance 3: the Black Order (Switch).

Pros:

• The core beat 'em up gameplay is easy to pick up and grasp, but it can be satisfyingly challenging at points. Even against groups of regular enemies there are more powerful variants than can pack a punch if you're not careful so you can't just mindlessly punch around, and the numerous boss fights demand your attention & on more than one occasion I had to abandon the story for a bit to grind up in the Infinity Trials when I was stuck on a boss.
• Between fights with large groups of enemies, platforming/chase segments, light puzzle elements, and the numerous boss encounters (many of which have a special gimmick, such as an early encounter where you have to solidify Sandman with rounds from a turret before you can hurt him), objectives are varied enough to keep the action from getting stale.
• From levelling up individual characters, as well as their abilities, the party wide skill tree, and ISO-8 equipping (stat altering stones), there are lots of ways to power up your heroes. These elements are introduced one at a time though, so they're easy to take in. Good thing too, as you'll need to be conscious of all of them in the later game.
• If there were any performance issues, I didn't notice them. Seemed to run great from my perspective.
• I haven't explored these too deeply, but you have the quickfire challenge based missions of the Infinity Trials if you're really up for a challenge. They're usually remixed boss fights, though there are missions where you have to fight through waves of enemies with special rules in place as well.
• It has an extensive concept art gallery, and I love features like that.

Neutral:

• There are tons of characters to play as (and many do have their own feel), however you're essentially stuck with a core group during a single playthrough as it's impossible to stay reasonably levelled otherwise.
• I like the story well enough, and it has a neat twist at the end, but there are so many characters on offer that not many get much to say. There are even some (like lets say Ghost Rider) that I don't think get any airtime after the mission they're introduced in.
• While I do like the cell shaded style that I think works well with the source material & think it has a good amount of environmental variety, it's definitely not one of Switch's prettier titles. I'd even say that Hyrule Warriors: DE & Fire Emblem Warriors (all developed by the same company, with lots of enemies on screen) look better.
• It probably would be better playing it with others. I didn't have a particularly tough time playing it solo & enjoyed it (and I played on Mighty, so I didn't go the easiest route), but the ally AI tended to bum rush all the bosses, even the ones with a gimmick for you to exploit, which isn't ideal.

Negative:

• For whatever reason, whenever you're moving towards the camera your character stops running and only walks. Naturally, this is a bit unavoidable as you're often trying to run around combat arenas, so it's a bit annoying. Luckily you still jump, swing, and fly at full speed when moving towards the camera, so it quickly becomes second nature to do so if you need to move quickly in that direction.
• The only alternate costumes to unlock are pallet swaps, and even then I think it's just one per character. Of course, I'm not expecting it to be on par with the bounty of options available in PS4's Spider-Man (which only has to focus on one character), but it would have been nice to have at least one or two real options per character.

Overall it's a pretty solid effort. It's not going to win any awards, and it's noticeably not even one of Nintendo's top tier efforts on the system, but if you enjoy beat 'em ups or the Marvel universe it's definitely worth a look.

Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga

Platform: Playstation 2

Level of Completion: Fully beat the story, and have seen a decent amount of side-content. 55 hours total if you include the lost time from my corrupted save file.

What is it? An SMT spinoff developed for the PS2. Features the press-turn combat and demon encounters of mainline SMT, but the game itself is designed more like a linear, story-focused JRPG ala Final Fantasy.

In the apocalyptic world of The Junkyard, various tribes vie for dominion over eachother so that they can be granted access to Nirvana by the mysterious intelligence communicating from the Karma Temple at the center of The Junkyard. The tribes are cursed with a virus that transforms them into demons and trives to cannibalize one-another. The main tribe the player follows, The Embryon, eventually takes in a mysterious young woman named Sera, who possesses the mysterious ability to quell their demonic rage.

What I Liked:

Press-turn combat. The brilliant, strategic, Pokemon-esque combat system Atlus created for SMT: Nocturne returns almost unchanged for this spinoff, and it works as well as it ever has.
Fascinating themes and symbolism relating to Hinduism. While it's probably mostly window-dressing, ideas surrounding reincarnation, karmic imbalance, etc. weave their way into this narrative and add an interesting flavor to the proceedings.
Evocative setting. The world of The Junkyard is very cool: equal parts Silent Hill and what you might expect a big city to look like after a nuclear war, the setting does a great job of conveying a sense of despair that helps to explain why these characters want so desperately to leave this place. In many ways, it's reminiscent of depictions of Purgatory I've seen in popular fiction.
Elaborate dungeon design. Many of the dungeons in this game are particularly well-designed, with puzzles, secrets, complex designs with non-linear progression cycles that take the player out of their comfort zones and force them to explore and often engage in light mental gymnastics in order to proceed. They're also nicely varied, and you explore everything from the blasted remains of a seemingly ancient ruined cruise ship to labyrinthine waterways and illusory mansions.
Well-paced story. While the game is a bit on the short side for my liking, one thing I can't dock it for is the pacing of the story itself. This is one of the few JRPGs I've played that ticked along with a ruthless, mechanical potency from beginning to end. There are certainly spots where you can slow down and deviate a little bit from the main plot, especially right near the end, but the game never forces the player to slow down, and you're always doing something different.
Loads of side-content. While the majority of the game is strictly structured, a ton of side content opens up near the end, primarily taking the form of challenging optional bosses who you have to beat to obtain various items that unlock new mantras and/or improve your selection of equipment or available macca in the sequel. To be honest, if you include grinding to level up enough to beat all of these enemies, you could probably spend as much time doing this as you would completing the actual story content of the game.
Great voice acting for the PS2 era. While the voice acting is mainly found in cutscenes, the quality of the acting itself is surprisingly high, considering the generation this game released in (consider Tidus and his terrifying crow-like "laughing" scarred the minds of a generation of youths just three years prior).

What I Didn't Like/Was Disappointed By:

Humor and ethnic stereotypes conflict with the vibe of the game. The game has a prominent funny streak throughout, which I'm usually a big fan of, but I feel like one series that usually does better to stick with a straight face is Shin Megami Tensei. In this case, it's a spinoff, but it still has a similarly uncompromising vibe. Now, don't get me wrong: Atlus games are never humorless, and the mainline SMT entries are filled with a lot of wry and black humor, but the comic relief here strays uncomfortably close to what I'd term "slapstick." On that note, I'm not sure how I feel about Cielo, the sole Jamaican-coded character, being the primary source of bumbling comic relief in this game. If Atlus wanted to make this game more light-hearted, I wouldn't mind terribly, the aesthetics have to match up. The goofy anime antics in SMT IV: Apocalypse were fine because all of the characters involved looked like young people you might find in a Persona game. Not true here, and the subject matter is a bit too grisly for it to jive well with the vibe.
The way you're depicted consuming your enemies is a bit of a cop-out. Now, look, I get it: no game that doesn't want to immediately be horrifying and alienating is going to feature anything close to an actual realistic depiction of someone eating another person. But... there is supposed to be a carnal and grisly element to the cannibalism element here, and turning enemies into balls of light that you absorb just doesn't do it for me. I will say, though, it is very creepy and very cool that the best way to prime your enemies for consumption is to terrify them first.
Lack of demon negotiation and fusion hurts the game, and the Mantra Grid isn't a great replacement. The conversations and bargaining with demons, fusions, gradual learning of new skills via careful combinations of demons, etc. are a huge part of SMT games, and, just as PS2-era Persona games suffered from a lack of these elements, so do these games. The replacement of these various complex systems with a skill grid where you grind and buy all of your skills with macca isn't nearly as satisfying or engaging.
Human form, and guns, are mostly pointless. Aside from having to take a turn to transform when enemies get the jump on you or de-transitioning to hunt Omoikane (more on that in a sec), there's almost no point to becoming human, and, as such, no reason to invest in bullets either. It's pointless. You ALWAYS want to fight in demon form. It's just needless fluff.
Omoikane. These enemies are needlessly annoying. They're sort of like the Wealth Hands from Persona 4, but INFINITELY more annoying because of how quickly they flee and how absurdly difficult it is to find a way to damage them before they do have a chance to flee. Until you get to the point, late, late game where you might actually stand a chance of killing one (if it doesn't IMMEDIATELY run off, which it usually does), they're just an obnoxious waste of time whenever you happen to encounter them.
Field Hunts. So, I made these way worse for myself than they needed to be, because I didn't realize until near the end of the game that they would reset automatically if you failed them, so I kept restarting my PS2 to try them over again (more on that in a moment). Even putting aside my own idiocy, though, these mini-games just suck. You're given a super strict time limit to run around a series of rooms and... slash at orbs with your arms. You almost never succeed at these the first time because you have almost no room for error, and the orbs appear in specific patterns every time. At the end of these, if you're fast enough, you can fight enemies that, when consumed, give you a time of macca and experience with which to level up your currently equipped mantra (the set of skills you're learning at a given time). But the activity itself is mind-numbing. There's no skill to it, it's just pure tedium.
Lack of a soft reset function/the ability to quit to the title screen. So, I obviously blame myself for making the field hunts worse than they needed to be, but, even if I hadn't done that, it was still annoying that, if I did something and wanted to quickly reset the game, I'd have to restart the console because Atlus didn't see fit to add something as basic and helpful as a "back to title screen" option to the menu in this game. What a weird oversight, and one that probably added up to me losing hours of my life waiting for the stupid PS2 to reboot back to the point where I could pick back up from my last save.
Side-content is unnecessarily hidden. While I dig all the optional content near the end of the game, I don't like how hard it is to even know it exists in the first place. I hope you like randomly trawling large dungeons you've already visited in the past for minor changes that'll lead you to new bosses, because that's the only way you're ever going to learn about their existence without just looking up the info online.
Towns are very streamlined. Without any real equipment or quests to speak of (outside of the forementioned endgame content), there's just not a lot to do in most of the game's towns and hub areas.
Aside from optional bosses, the game is excessively easy. Like, really, really easy. So easy, in fact, that Persona 5 on hard mode gave me a good deal more trouble than all but the hardest optional bosses in this game. Pretty much the only times I died was when the RNG of random battles decided I needed to be kicked in the stomach and a bunch of rando demons spammed Mudoon before I had a chance to react. Some of this might be down to how streamlined skill acquisition is in this game, combined with the ease of obtaining stat boosting items. But the bosses in these games just aren't ferocious at all.
Bland music. I do sort of like the random battle theme in this game (although not enough to keep listening to it when I'm grinding; I'll just mute the game and put on good music instead), but the majority of the music in this game is really bland guitar-based alternative rock. It's weird, because I usually love Meguro's soundtracks for these games.
Unnecessarily ambiguous ending. I have NO idea what happened at the end of the game. Some random evil lady shows up as the final boss. I easily defeat her. And suddenly The Junkyard is blowing up, and everyone is comically floating around. At the end, we see the main character trudge into what looks to be the wasteland of a city. Is that the Junkyard, or did DDS1 take place in something like The Matrix? The latter is my guess, because there's a lot of computery jargon thrown around in this game. The Junkyard is probably a digital world of some sort, and the visions characters keep having, and references to previous lives, are actually memories they're having of when they were living in the real world. So I'm guessing defeating the last boss crashes The Matrix and wakes up our intrepid heroes This is all pure stabbing at the darkness, because the game doesn't care to explain what's happening at the very end.

Conclusion: Wow, that's a lot of complaining! I did quite enjoy this game, though. If it seems like there was a lot more criticism than praise, it's because a lot of the praise-worthy stuff... there's just not a lot to say about it. And, as usual with me, most of the complaints are more nit-picky than stuff that actually ruins the experience. Digital Devil Saga is, ultimately, a compelling and very fun experience. One I'd gladly play again at some point in the future. I'll absolutely be playing the sequel sooner than later, as I want to find out what happened at the end of the game.

Verdict: 7.5/10

Misc: The world of DDS is apparently quite deep, and extends to various forms of media. Not only is there a direct continuation of the story in the form of a sequel, but there was also a five-novel series adaptation of the mythology, translated into English as "Quantum Devil Saga." These were written by author Yu Godai, who originally created the concept and story for these games but eventually withdrew from the role for health reasons and was replaced by someone else. She chose to adapt her original vision for the story into these novels instead. Only the first two novels have been published in English so far. I'm INCREDIBLY tempted to pick these up once I finish the sequel.

@Ralizah I'm glad you liked the dungeon designs in DDS, because boy...it's gonna get a lot worse midway through the sequel, IIRC. Probably won't have to worry about it being too easy, though. They really turned it up a notch....or maybe they just turned up the encounter rate. Either way, it tends to be a game that tries people's patience, from what I've seen.

I just finished my first play through of Fire Emblem Three Houses. Fire Emblem is a series I have loved since I was a child and care dearly about. When it was announced for Switch it instantly jumped right to the top of the list for my most anticipated games on the console and in general. Despite common sense telling me not to let my hopes get too high, I expected good things for this title.

And I can comfortably say that it met and exceeded my expectations! FE3H is a superb entry to the series that draws from the best the series has to offer, as well as exploring new territory that, I admit, I wasn't entirely sold on when I saw the preview videos. While the school setting does get a little repetitive after a while, they did an excellent job of making everything meaningful. None of the side features are just fluff. The game also gives you a nearly unprecedented level of freedom in choosing how to play. Never before have you had so much control over your characters skills and abilities and that alone would provide tremendous replay value.

But add to the fact that there is not one but four complete stories in the game, right out of the box?! Almost any other studio would have treated them as DLC or expansions on their own, but here you get them right away. To be fair there is likely a lot of overlap in these runs, but with a single play through being 60-80 hours depending on how you play, you're getting an incredible value even if you only play it once.

Value certainly isn't everything, the quality of the game play is top tier Fire Emblem. The difficulty varies wildly between "normal casual" and "hard classic" and there are harder modes on the way as free updates. But personally I found "normal classic" to be just right, especially in the latter half of the game. The story is very solid. Lots of moral grey areas and things to make you question if you are fighting for the right cause. A very big improvement over past titles where you were obvious, unquestioned good guys fighting obvious unquestioned bad guys.

The only negative I have with the game are the some performance issues. While the battles themselves run buttery smooth most of the time, walking around the monastery something that, in my opinion, should have been the least demanding part of the game, has noticeable chugging almost any time you fast travel and often you visibly see NPCs and your characters popping in, even in docked mode. Also there are a few areas in the game with extremely basic looking textures that seem out of place. Most notably the merchant stands with fruit baskets that look more like it's a rocks with fruit painted badly on them.

None of these issues however ever effect the game play or detract from the story, so they are forgivable but keep me from giving the game a perfect score. I can easily say this game is my second favorite title on the Nintendo Switch and an easy 9/10.

I've happily dropped 85 hours into this game, and likely will drop another 200 before I am finished. Maybe more, depending on what the DLC contains.