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Drainus - Review

I'm very excited to review this, this is the third game of Team Ladybug, a developer team I am quite fond of, they made 2 of the best Metroidvanias out there and it might seem weird that their next game following 2 Metroidvanias was a shoot em up, but if you take a look at their 2 previous games, it does make sense.

Touhou Luna Nights is basically a fangame of the Touhou games, a bullet hell series, and Deedlit in Wonder Labyrinth had elements that were heavily inspired by shoot 'em ups, specifically, the element change system, which is similar to how Ikaruga works.

So them making a shoot 'em up seems very logical to me.

Another interesting fact is that this is their first completely original game, both of their previous games were based on an already existing franchise, so that makes this game even more special.

I'll start with a brief summary of the plot.

You follow Irina, a young woman who fights to destroy the evil galactic empire that has control over countless planets, she counts with the help of the incredibly handsome Gehnie, an artificial lifeform sent from the future.

He manages to steal the empire's secret weapon, the Drainus, and contacts Irina so she helps him free the universe from the empire.

The plot is fairly straightforward, but the inclusion of obtainable disks scattered through the levels, that contain conversations between characters on both sides of the conflict, help flesh out the world.

Now, moving out of the plot, because I don't want to spoil too much, let's get into the gameplay.

When you boil it down, it's a very classic shoot 'em up, but it has some features that make it stand out a lot, for starters, the whole draining mechanic.

When you enter draining mode, you drain all energy-based projectiles you come in contact with, and when you exit draining mode or run out of meter, all of the stored energy auto-targets the enemies.

It's very reminiscent of Ikaruga, like how the upgrade system is reminiscent of Gradius, but they add their own, very unique spin to the system.

You start with a basic weapon, and each upgrade item will unlock the next equipment you have equipped, it can be a different laser weapon, a fleet of mini ships with different properties, missiles, or even a stat boost.

You can unlock them with special points you get after defeating enemies, and after purchasing them you can equip them wherever you want.

The equipment level you are currently into is displayed in the top middle by the power-up meter, once you get all of your equipment unlocked, any new upgrade items will charge your bombs.

You can also buy hard upgrades for your Drainus, like unlocking more equipment slots, increasing the draining gauge, and increasing the number of bombs.

The upgrades also work like your life meter, when you get hit you lose your highest upgrade, and if you get hit while you have none at all, you lose a life, which I think is quite friendly for players who aren't that good at shoot 'em ups, like me.

But if you want a greater challenge, there is the option to enable 1-hit kills, making the game way harder.

You can also change the speed of your ship whenever you like, making maneuvering in tight spaces easier.

The actual levels are very dynamic, there's a wide selection of enemies, environments, and transitions that keep the level fresh and fun the whole time.

And as a cherry on top, the bosses are extremely cool.

Most of them have more than one bar of HP, and when it depletes they morph into a completely different machine, the music also aids these encounters greatly.

The whole OST is incredible, really.

These are all the first boss!

The artwork is also incredible, it's in my opinion the best artwork in any of their games to date, it's something to admire.

So in a few words, this game has very tight controls, gameplay, upgrade system, and difficulty customizations, while also counting with an incredible OST and artwork.

So if you like shoot 'em ups, it's a must-play, and even if you don't play a lot of shoot 'em ups, it's a game anybody can enjoy due to its difficulty options, it's just that good.

I can see myself getting lost in doing challenge runs on this game, like I have been doing in Touhou Luna Nights and Deedlit in Wonder Labyrinth, except on this game it's way easier to determine the rules because of the levels of customization.

I really mean it when I say: Go play this game.

[ladyirisreviews]

Deedlit in Wonder Labyrinth - Review

This is the second Team Ladybug game on Steam, it came after Touhou Luna Nights, which I reviewed.

Despite being interested in it only because it was a Team Ladybug Metroidvania, it did a great job of making me interested in the source material, which I will be reading into very soon.

To explain the plot of the game, first I need to give some context.

The setting is based on a series of light novels called Record of Lodoss War, they date back to the 80s, and another novel was released not too long ago, 12 years after the last one, and this game serves kind of like an introduction to this new series of novels in a way.

The game does give you some backstory, enough to establish its own, coherent narrative, and even without reading the novels, I feel this game can be enjoyed, along with its themes.

Though I would imagine reading the novels and then playing this game would be nice for the fans since you would know all the characters and their backstories.

The plot of the game is pretty simple, you are told there was once a group of heroes who brought peace to the land of Lodoss, and that the only girl in the group, Deedlit the elf, fell in love with a human.

She wakes up in an unknown place, with her memories feeling hazy, she must travel the labyrinth she finds herself into and discover what she is truly doing there.

As I mentioned, you will find several characters from the original series, from protagonists to major antagonists, but despite the game not explaining each character, you can see a theme in Deedlit's journey, and it's one of sorrow and loss.

The game doesn't have that much dialogue, but in the little it has it's able to convey those emotions at the end of the game, there is not much else to talk about in terms of plot, so it's time to talk about the gameplay.

The gameplay is just a bit similar to Castlevania Symphony of the Night, but there are big differences, for one, you can aim in 8 directions for your attack, and you also have a bow you can freely aim.

Magic works similarly as it does in Touhou Luna Nights, but there is one more mechanic that mixes things up, very early on in the game, you get wind and fire spirits, and you can switch between which one is active.

This changes the element of your attacks, and when you have any of them active, you can level up the other one by defeating enemies, by reaching the max level, you automatically regain health while having that spirit active, getting hit removes a whole level though.

Another property the spirits have is that you completely absorb the damage of the same element, which replenishes your MP, which reminds me of Ikaruga in a way.

I like this system very much, at the start I thought it would make things too easy, but you die pretty fast if you are not careful, and the HP recovery rate is not that high to feel like it removes danger completely.

I especially like this system in bosses that use both of the elements, it's very satisfying for me to learn their patterns to optimally defeat them.

The level design is also alright, it's the typical "unlocking an ability or key to progress" kind of design, but it also takes the spirit changing into account, including obstacles that need it to be surpassed.

While the level design isn't as great as in Touhou Luna Nights, it's still pretty good.

Enemies are also pretty standard, what stands out are the bosses, as I mentioned before, they put the spirit changing to the test, and they all have at least one tricky attack that might need some figuring out.

The boss rush has the same issue it had on Touhou Luna Nights though, they have the original health, making it so the first few die in just a couple of hits.

The game has some extra features though, after you complete the game once you can pick a number of modifiers to the game, like always staying on level 1, 1 HP, spirit levels being always 1, or retaining all of your learned spells.

For me, that increases replayability quite a lot, I kind of wish these types of settings were retroactively added into Touhou Luna Nights, these challenge runs in Metroidvanias are very fun to try, and giving you the choice to pick exactly what you want makes me more willing to try one.

And that is pretty much all there is to the gameplay, it's pretty solid overall.

The only stuff left to mention is the graphics and music, and they are both fantastic.

Team Ladybug did a great job yet again, the sprite work is incredible, just like with Touhou Luna Nights, visually the game is eye-candy, though the afterimage of the Deedlit can be bothersome sometimes, you can turn it off if you want.

And that's pretty much it, I heavily recommend this game, even if you never heard of Record of Lodoss war or haven't read the novels yet, I think this game holds up on its own, And if you are a fan of the series already, it will be a very cool experience.

[ladyirisreviews]

Criminal Girls - Review

I didn't have any plans to review this game, but after experiencing all of what this game had to offer, I just had to review it.

This game was a huge disappointment, not because it didn't deliver on what I expected, it was more or less on point to my expectations, but it was because of all of the wasted potential I saw while playing the game.

The original Criminal Girls was released on the PSP in 2010 only in Japan.

In 2015 it was ported to the PS Vita as Criminal Girls Invite Only, which replaced some minigames with new ones that featured Live 2D models, instead of static images.

Later in 2017, it was finally ported onto PC, being basically a direct port from the PS Vita version, and at least in my experience, the port has some issues.

For example, there are times when a sound effect will be like 10 times louder than normal to the point even when all the volume in the game is turned off, it will still be heard, it's very weird.

Another thing is that, while there is not a run button, if you are using the mouse for movement, there is a pixel-perfect position where you will move like twice as fast.

I guess they did plan for a run button but got scrapped for some god-forsaken reason, and the only remains are 4 pixel-perfect positions in each cardinal direction.

Also, you are not able to customize the mouse controls, I wanted to map the middle mouse button to the menu, but you are just not able to, if you are playing only with a mouse you need to stand without doing anything for a bit and click on the inventory icon, it's kind of unnecessary.

And I know mice with way more buttons exist, you would be very much capable of completely playing the game without problems with just a mouse if not for that.

And yet another problem has to do with the minigames.

You can't play them with your keyboard, only with your mouse, hence why I mention that mapping more things to the mouse would be helpful.

But also, there is a tutorial screen that appears the first time you try a minigame with every character, and you can't get past it with just a mouse, which is confusing to me.

There are also a couple of minigames that won't work properly, like you will do the right thing but it won't register, it's a pretty bizarre port that failed to take a lot of things into consideration.

But now that we got past the small stuff, let's start with the plot.

You find yourself in a prison, where a girl named Miu, as your instructor, tells you that you will be in charge of reforming girls who were on the path to becoming criminals, but died before turning into one.

Miu calls them delinquents, and the reformation program lets these delinquents redeem themselves by climbing the Hell's Spire, where they will be challenged in multiple ways.

After convincing the girls to follow you, you go into the spire to receive some training, but there seems to be something going wrong, monsters called convicts, who were delinquents but failed to reform, seem to be running amok on the lower floors of the spire, where they are not supposed to be.

Miu tells you to stay put, and that she will scout ahead to see what's going on, but after some time of her not returning, you decide to follow her anyway, starting your actual climb of the spire.

With a plot like this, they had a lot of opportunities for cool stuff, they had the chance to:

-Explore each character and why they ended up there. -Show how their sin relates to their character. -How that affects how they interact with each other. -A progression from the start of the game of the characters learning from their mistakes and effectively reforming. -Told us how the characters died earlier because of their sin.

But they went with the laziest approach possible, the characters feel like they have one dirty secret instead of having deep character flaws, like they suggest is the case.

The sources of conflict throughout the plot are completely separated from how they are as characters, and it's instead because external reasons.

Their sin only gets explored in the late game, and in a lazy way, they pretty much explain it to you, you fight a boss and now the characters learn from their mistake.

It's just very disappointing.

Also as an extra, the way they approach all the roadblocks in the game is very lame, but I'll talk more about it when I talk about the dungeons.

So, because of all the missed chances, the characters themselves end up being not very interesting and quite stereotypical.

But also the world is very flat as well.

Towards the end of the game, it ends up being demystified, and it only makes the world seem sillier

At the start, you are told that these girls, who didn't live long enough to become criminals, but were on their way to becoming one, end up there to redeem themselves instead of going to hell.

No explanation given for the specifics, and it really didn't need that, it's alright.

Then towards the end of the game you are told that a "committee" created the program a couple of years ago and the system is kind of glitching out.

But they don't elaborate on how the whole system was created and who this committee is at all, and it only damages the game in my opinion.

Yet another thing I feel is very lackluster is the main character, it's a blank slate with no personality, only there so the player inserts in them, which is quite a shame, a character with actual personality would have been a good decision to interact with these characters.

But no.

A blank protagonist the players could project into while motivating the girls or when they show any sign of affection towards them would be better, obviously.

That only makes the game even more disappointing.

Moving over to the gameplay though, despite everything, it's kind of interesting.

I want to get the dungeon design out of the way before the combat.

It's very very simplistic, there are no puzzles at all, all fork roads lead into a chest, or to nothing, and there's really not a lot of exploration to be made.

It's all divided into floors, and each floor is pretty much self-contained, once you explore all of it there's nothing left to do there, besides going up.

So yeah, it's kind of monotonous, which makes not being able to run even worse, but at least you can unlock skills that help in exploration, like sending you to the last save point, disabling random encounters, or instantly starting a fight.

As for the roadblocks you encounter, they will always be going from point A to point B without any challenge in between other than the occasional battle.

I really wish exploration was more involved.

now actually getting into the combat.

Instead of selecting the move for every character, each character will recommend you an approach, and you need to select which one you want.

At the start of the game, for example, the recommendations will be stuff like a single character attacking, despite having a party of 4.

After you unlock special moves they will also recommend them.

Early on you unlock a guard command, which is exclusive to a single character, so you need to have it in your party to be able to guard, this does apply to all the party though.

And all of these options pop up in specific situations, like, say you are fighting against enemies weak to fire, if you have a fire skill it's more likely a fire skill will be recommended.

Or say the enemy will do a very strong attack, the guard option will always pop up.

You also don't have to always pick the same option in each situation, when you unlock buffs you can choose to block the big attack or buff the whole party for example.

But as interesting as the system might be, as you can expect, it has some problems that make it not that enjoyable.

The options that you get, in most situations, are not the most optimal you could get.

You could have a skill that defeats all of the enemies in one move, but if the game doesn't feel like it you will waste several turns fighting the enemies.

Also on the harder fights, not being able to decide on a specific skill that might help you out can make the battle very tedious.

Or on the REALLY hard fights, not getting the right skill might make you lose, making it very luck-based.

It is until near the end of the game that you get some items that guarantee the activation of some moves, but these are very limited in quantity.

in my opinion, it would have been way better if these items got introduced around mid-game, and made available for purchase at an affordable price, you could save hours of tedious gameplay with that little change.

And talking about tedious, the pace of the combat is very slow.

The speed at which turns go by is very slow, and sometimes the text is so slow the game needs to wait for several seconds until all the text lines are displayed.

It's another example of how the game was not optimized for the re-release, letting the game stay like that makes it a slog in some of the encounters.

And that's really it for the combat.

As I mentioned before, there's a mechanic in the game called motivation.

Motivation consists of some minigames you have to do to unlock all of the skills for a character, even for unlocking normal attack options, so it's pretty much required to go through them a lot, basically, every time you get money to play them.

And I wouldn't be making a whole discussion point on them if that was it, but there's quite a lot I want to mention about them.

First what they actually are.

These minigames consist of the player engaging in BDSM activities with the girl you select, the first one you unlock, for example, is spanking.

The rules for each minigame are different but it's very similar, a pink or blue icon will appear, and by using the left or right mouse button you will get rid of the icons.

At the start, there's quite a lot of pink smoke, but as you progress on the levels of the minigame there will be less and less smoke to the point there's basically none left

Except for specific clouds that cover very sensitive spots on some girls' bodies.

Another difference between the minigames is the girl's clothes, the pose remains the same.

I personally find these minigames very tiring and almost out of place.

If you like lewd stuff in games that's ok, I also enjoy them on some games, but like, on this game specifically it feels very forced in.

There's no other lewd content in the game outside of these minigames and it's very tedious having to go through them each time you need to get skills, you get desensitized to it pretty quickly.

I also don't appreciate how the younger characters also take part in those minigames.

I see all the complaining about the censorship in the reviews of the game's Steam page, and I really don't get it, is not being able to see a little girl's panties that horrific it ruins the game for you?

Did they even play the game before installing a patch that removes the little extra smoke? Because of course a patch exists, and a bunch of people recommend it in the reviews.

I just don't get it, I feel like all the complaining is very exaggerated

If what they appreciate about the game is neither the gameplay nor the plot and only that lewd part, that feels completely separated from everything else, they got really low standards.

There are plenty of actual Hentai games on Steam that offer way more than just the same pose in different clothes.

And like I said, I have nothing against lewd content on games, but with how minimal the censorship is on this game, and with how little actual lewd content there is, I just don't get the complaining.

I honestly think the game would be better without them.

It would be less tedious, it wouldn't put minors in those sexual situations, and it wouldn't take away from the more serious parts of the game, but that's just my opinion I guess.

So in summary, this game has an interesting premise and gameplay, but it doesn't go far with either of them, the plot always goes for the low-hanging fruit, the gameplay lacks smoothness, the level design is lacking and it needed a lot of extra quality of life stuff.

I really wouldn't recommend it, unless you don't mind playing a not very good game and you got nothing else to play.

[ladyirisreviews]

The Desolate Hope - Review

This is a game by the creator of Five Nights at Freddy's, it's available for free and it's pretty bizarre.

The game takes place on a distant planet where 5 AIs were sent by humans to run simulations to find out if colonization of that planet was possible.

The simulations were supposed to last only 5 years, but the station lost contact with Earth, so they kept going for many more years than that.

And we control a coffee machine with arms and legs that was included by accident, but more precisely, we control a program that controls the body of the coffee machine.

The original AI for the coffee machine altered this program to fight a virus that has been attacking the simulations.

By going into the rooms where each AI is located we can enter their simulations, and just before entering the simulations, you can already see the very crazy designs these AIs have, all of the exposed wirings and tubes make them look creepy and weird and I kinda like that, though they also look very goofy.

It's inside their simulations where the actual gameplay takes place, you are still a coffee machine even in the simulations, but in them, you can jump and shoot.

Inside the simulations you will find enemies, honestly most of them are pretty harmless, they also drop egg-like things that fill bars on top, I'll talk about them in a bit.

You can also find friendly robots that sell stuff to you, though what they sell is not very clear at first.

Your goal on the simulations is pretty much to find the AI inside of them, so the coffee IA can locate the actual virus so you can fight it.

But before I get into those fights I want to talk about something else first.

Hidden through the simulations you can also find screens like this, these take you to another layer of simulation, and change the gameplay to a top-down game.

Your goal here is to find a fissure inside of this simulated simulation and fix it by shooting at it, the game is kind enough to tell you about fake walls to look for, as the fissures will more likely than not be hidden behind one of them.

As far as the gameplay for this type of section goes, it's not outstanding, it's pretty slow and it's not challenging at all, you get locked into a fight sometimes when you enter a room, and when you defeat an enemy they drop a bush-like thing that the rabbit following you around eats, and it gives you some money.

However, the rabbit often takes very non-optimal routes that waste even more time.

You can find an NPC inside that lets you upgrade the reach and power of your attack, along with increasing the value of the bushes the rabbit eats, which is by far the fastest way to grind money.

And yes, you do need to grind for money a lot in this game, before you actually fight the virus you need to spend a lot of money upgrading various stats and bonuses so you have a chance to win, as going into a fight without upgrading will lead to a fast defeat.

Completing one of these sections awards you with a conditional, which I'll explain what that is later.

Now it's time to actually talk about the virus fights.

These fights are what all of the game elements build into, the game was trying to go for a kind of calm, creepy atmosphere, and these fights throw all of that out the window.

I liked the concept of them, but the execution is, in my opinion, horrible.

I want to make clear that the part I liked conceptually was the mechanics and not the visuals, they are an attack on the senses, very annoying to look at, and pretty much a hazard for people with epilepsy, so I won't even try to show you how bad they get.

They also completely ruin the mood, from exploring a ruined and decayed place you go into a rave with lasers and music at full blast, but besides that, I really don't like how they flow gameplay-wise.

It's like a final fantasy active-time battle but on steroids, you don't get the mechanics explained to you, so you gotta figure them out for yourself.

I'm gonna try to explain the most important parts.

When your turn comes you get a lot of options depending on how the charge level is, and you can charge on a turn to get more options on a later turn.

You can also see what each skill does by hovering with your mouse, but they don't give very detailed information, I think that all of the buffs and debuffs apply to all of your party and not only to one character at least.

The lower the option is on the list, the more charges it will take.

On a corner, all of your buffs will be displayed, and on top of your characters, the debuffs will be displayed if there are some.

Also, remember the bars on the top of the screen in normal gameplay? They carry over and serve as bonuses, you can also load mini-games with a character once their charges are at their max to get more bonuses.

And yes, they are actual minigames you can play to get the bonuses, but while also paying close attention to the actual fight.

A character has the skill to activate autoplay on the active games so they play by themselves though.

Then on the virus side, you can see the debuffs, and look at the stats of the virus itself.

The energy is just the health, the white bar is when it will act, and the one below is when it will activate a skill that I believe is dangerous to people with epilepsy.

The actual stats are mostly meaningless since you don't know the stats of your characters to compare them or anything.

All you need to know is that they get stronger, and that later when you get the hack ability, there will be a button that will allow you to turn both their strength and defense to 0, but they will still hit like a truck anyway.

The whole thing is a lot, it's gotta be the busiest battle screens I've ever seen, and if not, it's definitely the one I want to see the least because it hurts to look at because of all the flashing lights.

I wish it was like the active battles that paused when it was your turn with any character, you don't get to think properly about the stuff you want to do because everything is going so fast.

And this is especially a problem in the later virus fights, they can KO your entire party in 5 seconds if you don't act quickly enough.

I also wish it didn't hurt to look at.

But that's pretty much what the virus fights are all about.

So all of the game is to prepare you for these fights, after you beat one of them you need to go back to the IA and then find the virus again.

There are 4 in each area, and you can tackle them in any order, though there's clearly an intended order just by looking at stats.

Also, each time you defeat one, the simulation gets a glitched effect that bothers the eyes too.

The way you get stronger is by exploring the simulations, getting money, buying a ton of upgrades, grinding a lot in the simulated simulations, and leveling up.

But this is probably the worst implemented level-up system I've seen ever.

There's no exp or anything, but there is a night and day cycle, during the day you get to explore simulations and fight the virus, but at night you get to explore the desolated planet.

You exit the station and walk in a straight line to the left, sometimes picking up random items, and these items you gift to the AIs to give them one level up.

The catch?

You can only bring 2 at a time, you need to manually walk to each of their rooms to gift the items to them, then go all the way back to keep exploring for more items, and you are limited to 6 items in total per night, there's also some times when it takes forever to find items.

It's just not a good system, it completely halts the gameplay, and you can't skip the nights either, the most you can do is get the 6 items per night, after that, some space invaders clones will appear when you go exploring, and if they hit you time will go faster, it's just a forced slog.

Oh yeah, and because you can't check the character stats, you don't know if leveling up a specific character is preferred or not.

The last thing you can do to better your chances of winning a virus fight is to change something called conditionals.

As you complete the simulated simulations, you unlock more conditionals, they are activated when something specific happens in the fight, and you can select what you want to happen when that condition comes true.

It's a cool mechanic, but with how the fights go, I can't say I ended up appreciating it a lot.

This is one of those games I wish were better because I like a lot of the ideas, but the result ends up being a mess.

The gameplay ideas were interesting, but they weren't executed properly at all, the plot is also interesting, it slowly gives clues as to what is really happening, and it all kinda comes together in the end, but it's still underwhelming.

But even if I think this game wasn't good, I definitely got more out of it than with any FNAF game.

This game is free, but it wasn't always like that, I suppose once FNAF skyrocketed, the creator didn't see any hope in this game picking up in popularity, so it was left alone as a free game.

It was a unique experience for me, but I can't say I recommend it at all, and I kind of regret playing it a bit because of the headaches it caused.

[ladyirisreviews]

Rogue Legacy - Review

If you like playing roguelikes with unique enemies and challenges, a great variety of different rooms, classes with very distinct move-sets, and runs that feel very different from each other.

This game ain't it sadly.

My experience with this game was a frustrating one, but before I go into detail, I do want to say that this is an important game.

Not only because it inspired many games that did better things with the rogue-lite concept, but because I think it was an important step in the studio and their growth.

and you can see this inside of the game itself.

You will find rooms with giant paintings that show some of their past and even future games, and a small reflection on what the development for them was like, and you can notice how they have learned from it.

But all that learning sadly doesn't apply to Rogue Legacy completely.

But let's start from the beginning, Rogue Legacy is, as far as I know, the first game to be referred to as a rogue-lite, at least by the developers.

The genre consists of using the resources you win in a run to upgrade your character or equipment, making each subsequent run have a better chance of winning.

The plot is about a lineage that wants to conquer a cursed castle to vanquish the evil inside, but death is not the end, you will always have a successor who will inherit all of the money you earn.

And you can use said money to upgrade a skill tree, get new armor, or equip runes, and the castle will be different on every run.

But the twist is that in every generation, you will get to pick one of 3 heirs, they can have different classes or even traits that will have different effects on your run.

And in short, that's everything the game is about.

I want to talk about every element of the game, so I'm going to start with the character movement.

You actually got a very nice grip on the main character, you can turn directions even in the air, but in regards to actually attacking, it's kind of awkward.

There's a lag before you attack, kinda like in Castlevania, but you don't get the range you get in Castlevania, there's also a downstabbing move used mostly to activate a specific type of platform, but you can also bounce on enemies with it, but it feels unreliable.

It does very little damage, the hitbox is not directly below you but a bit forward, and it's active for such a short time, it's easy to miss-time it and get hit by the enemy.

Which brings me to the enemies and rooms.

There's not much wrong with the enemies, though there's a very small variety of them, most of them being recolors, even bosses are just bigger versions of normal enemies.

But they are a problem sometimes because of their placement in rooms, the sense of difficulty in this game is kinda unbalanced.

You sometimes will get rooms with barely any enemies in them, and other times you will get rooms with 20 enemies that throw projectiles from the other side of the room making the game feel like a bullet hell sometimes.

But another thing that bothers me about the rooms is that there's not a lot of variety.

You will very quickly notice some rooms repeating over just a few runs, even in different zones, rooms will be the same as an earlier zone but just with a skin of the current zone.

There are also a lot of times when a room will have absolutely no purpose other than wasting your time.

Now i want to talk about how a run usually goes.

You start by spending the money you made in your past run, unlocking every branch is in my opinion the most important thing to do first, Because you will see all the stats you can upgrade so you better know where to put your money on in future runs.

Some of the other stuff you can spend your money on is on the smithy, who will craft better weapons for you as long as you find the blueprints inside the castle.

And equip runes with the enchantress, but you also need to find them inside the castle.

The smithy charges depending on the piece of armor you want to get, and the enchantress charges more money for every rune you unlock.

So right off the bat, you need to not unlock every rune you get because it will get very expensive very fast.

Then you will be able to enter the castle by giving Charon, the guard at the castle gate, all of your money, so no saving money for an expensive upgrade.

And then you finally start the run.

The goal for most of the game is to get the most money out of each run, your ultimate goal is to eventually defeat the bosses in each area, but that can wait, as you will be very squishy at first, just a couple of hits are enough to kill you.

So you collect money, mostly from chests and enemies, find some blueprints for armor, a rune if you are lucky, and you play until you die pretty much.

So if we add that up to what I thought of the room designs you might notice why this is such a problem for me, you often get cheap damage that brings you a lot closer to ending your run.

And unless you are very good, at the end of every run you will only be able to afford just a couple of upgrades, which makes the overall progress feel very slow as you don't get stronger in any way while you explore the castle, something that every other roguelike does.

Runes are mostly locked on a specific challenge you have to beat, something like beat all the enemies or take no damage, but some are literally impossible unless you have the right runes already equipped, like the "don't jump" challenge, where you need to be able to levitate to get it.

You can also lock the castle by giving a character 40% of all of the money you earn in a run, which might sound OK at first, you already know where all of your chests are after all.

But chests remain already looted when you lock the castle, and because you will earn so much less money it feels like a wasted run just for an extra rune you would have been able to get later.

Once you are strong enough to challenge a boss and manage to find the boss room in a room, you can teleport there again if you lock the castle, but the rewards for beating the boss, which is a lot of money, will be greatly reduced, making it feel less worth it for beating the boss, at least in my opinion.

I just don't feel like the gameplay loop is satisfying, if the final objective was different I would have enjoyed the game a lot more, I think.

Instead of beating all of the bosses in infinite runs, why not make the 4 bosses mandatory on every run? You would get more money to spend on upgrades instead of grinding with normal enemies, making the game way less grindy.

And it would make the boss fights feel more engaging, since you have a lot more to lose because you need all of the boss kills to ultimately win.

Otherwise, it just feels like banging your head against a wall until you get the boss kill so you can get to the next zone, this especially applies when you unlock the final boss.

But now that I discussed why I don't like the gameplay loop and the level designs let's get to the classes and traits.

First the traits.

Despite being one of the most advertised features of the game, I feel like it's one of the least impactful mechanics.

Most of them do nothing to affect the gameplay whatsoever, things like your heir being gay, or being bald, color-blind, or dyslexic, it's charming at first, but they don't impact the game at all so they become whatever at a certain point.

Then there are the ones that impact the gameplay and they are mostly annoying, the negative ones can do stuff like removing your map, making the game upside down, making everything far from your character blurry, or the opposite.

And the thing is that you don't have to put up with these annoyances, you can quickly end the run by dying to the first enemy or trap, and get the next character, there's no penalty.

Then the positive ones don't make your overall run much different, Some are nice to have, but they won't make it so you are much less likely to die.

Some traits combine well with some classes, but because it's all randomized, the chance both the classes and traits get together it's very low.

Now as for the classes, there are a couple but they all play the same in most of their aspects, they all get a random spell and they have the same sword attack as every other class.

Each class has a special thing, for example, the knight can block, and the barbarian can shout to erase all of the projectiles on the screen, but this is limited by the magic meter.

These actions take a lot of magic and you don't regain that much through your run, also the amount of health and magic you have in a run is determined by your class.

Blocking and shouting are very useful skills, but because the knight and barbarian have a low magic pool you don't get to use them a lot.

Some classes focus on magic, but to make sure you take advantage of these classes you need to upgrade the skill tree so magic does more damage, which takes a lot of runs to get the money for.

There's 3 classes that I think are both fun and distinct from each other because of their abilities.

The barbarian, which I mentioned has the skill to shout to delete projectiles, but it also has the biggest HP pool of all of the classes, allowing you to explore more and make more mistakes than normal, which makes the game more enjoyable for me.

Then there's the spellsword, who regains magic for every sword hit you land, and can activate powered-up versions of your spell by using more magic than usual, which makes their gameplay kinda fun and safer in some situations.

And then there's the shinobi, who might have lower health and magic, But it's faster and deals a lot of damage, which is perfect for bosses or to clean rooms of enemies easily.

But there's still annoying things about them, you are very limited on your shouting uses with the barbarian, if you make a few mistakes or run into unfair rooms with the shinobi, you will die pretty fast, and if you get a spell you don't like as the spellsword, their ability will feel pretty useless.

But at the end of the day, no matter what class or what traits the character has, the gameplay always feels the same from run to run, and that's probably my biggest problem with the game.

Despite every run being "unique" it always feels the same, if you like doing the same thing for 10 hours, slowly increasing your stats, exploring the same rooms over and over, and fighting the same enemies over and over again, you might like this game.

But no matter how much I tried, I couldn't get that much enjoyment out of the game in my 50 hours of playing it.

There was some enjoyment from time to time when I had a good run, but then the next run would feel sluggish by comparison.

Now, you may think I don't want to know anything about the sequel, but I actually am pretty excited to try it out, the classes actually differ from each other in more ways than one and there's new mechanics.

It absolutely looks like a more enjoyable game for me, just by looking at the trailers.

But as for the original game, I would personally not recommend it, but if you want to see how much of an improvement from the first to the second game, you might get some enjoyment out of that.

[ladyirisreviews]

Metal Walker (GBC) - Review

This game is basically what if billiards were an RPG.

In 1999, Capcom released a very goofy game called Metal Walker.

The plot, in short, is about exploring an island with your robot buddy, searching for your father while collecting special metal cores that allow your buddy to evolve.

But the plot is not really that important, it's funny how bad the dialogue can get, but it's not outstanding, what is interesting though is the gameplay.

When you enter a random fight you get into an arena and your goal is to aim at the enemy, decide the potency of the shot, and ram into them, you will then ricochet out of the enemies and the walls, so I really wasn't lying when I said it's like billiards.

As you collect the cores you will be able to freely morph your robot buddy, giving it better stats and different designs while also allowing you to progress in the game, since the different forms let you get past specific obstacles.

Nothing crazy though, just things like breaking a block or getting past a hole.

The core gameplay is amusing, but in my opinion, the game ruins it with how items work.

Items get thrown out every turn randomly in any place of the arena, there's no rhyme or reason as to where they are going to be thrown out, after every turn, a new one will be thrown out, depending on how they are ordered in the item menu, this deletes the previous item from the arena.

You can also select an item to not be thrown out in a fight if you want, and to actually activate them in battle you need to ram into them. The catch is that enemies can also get those items, and they even throw items of their own.

It sounds cool in concept, but not being able to control the position where an item will be thrown out, or decide the item you want depending on the situation is really annoying.

Other than the wacky battle system and the design of the robots, I really like them I am not gonna lie, the game doesn't have much to talk about.

The plot is not worth talking about in detail, and the music is not outstanding, but it's not terrible either, it's just kind of a bland game, it is fun to check out just for the heck of it, but it's not a really good game.

Check it out if you want though, you might find more enjoyment in it than I did.

[ladyirisreviews]

Breath of Fire 2 - REVIEW

After playing Breath of Fire 1, I was very excited to see what the sequel brought to the table, and honestly, I am glad that I played this, despite not being exactly what I wanted out of it.

I'll skip the prelude to talk about the stuff that happens in the "current time".

The protagonist and his friend, Bow, are both orphans who became rangers when they grew up, but someone framed Bow for a crime he didn't commit, so he is forced to flee the village, and it's up to the protagonist to clear his name, You'll meet several characters along the way and discover something sinister brewing in the land.

In this game, characters are more fleshed out and move along the plot, unlike in the first game where it's only the bad guys showing up and you have to beat them up.

Characters still join you without much reason, but at least most of them get some spotlight, they still don't interact with each other but it is a step forward.

There's also a place where you can directly talk with them, and they will comment about what is going on, which I think is a neat detail even if the dialogue is shallow.

I wish they could have had dialogue for all of your party members every time the plot was progressing, but for the most part, they are as silent as the protagonist, the exceptions being when they are first introduced and when their time in the spotlight comes.

The plot is also a huge step forward, the introduction does a good job at building a specific type of atmosphere and some mystery, as well as having some pretty well-made cutscenes throughout the game.

It's still pretty simple, both the story and the characters, but it is a noticeable upgrade.

I also liked how in very few instances, the game used the battle screen to make a cutscene play, I thought it was pretty cool, and I wish the game used that trick more, it would have made some scenes even more impactful.

As much as I appreciate the work that was done in everything related to the writing, The translation work is kind of terrible.

There are multiple instances where the text will be badly formatted, sentences will have weird wording, pronouns will be wrong, and even options will do the opposite of what they say.

I like everything that the plot tried to do, but the horrible translation does bring it down a bit, thankfully it doesn't make the game unplayable, or make you unable to appreciate some of the stuff that it does.

But man, I wish they released a re-translation for it.

Now going into the combat.

Right off the bat, I think getting rid of the icons was a good choice for the UI, which felt kinda clunky in the first game.

On top of having an attack option and a special option, every character has a special skill unique to them.

The main character, for example, recovers HP depending on how low his HP currently is, the effect being stronger the lower it is.

I felt that overall they didn't influence the battles a lot, the one for the main character is nice but I felt all the others were disposable, but it is still cool that each character has unique stuff.

Also, you can defend and switch formations by pressing L or R.

Formations are kinda neat, it's a step above just making a character be in the front or back row, deciding the risk of a character being attacked in that way was interesting for me, and I found myself changing the formation multiple times during my time playing the game.

As for magic, there are points when it feels underwhelming, especially around the middle of the game, but at the start and the end, magic can pack a punch.

Which is a big upgrade compared to how it was in the first one, where the only worthwhile spells were the healing ones, weaknesses still feel like they are kind of an afterthought, but at least they exist.

I do have to say though that making bosses immune to all the status-inducing spells and debuffs is very lame, I don't mind bosses being immune to things like sleep or poison, but being immune to debuffs as well makes the debuffs feel completely worthless, you won't be needing them on random fights either, since they end very quickly.

Despite this, the combat feels like a huge step forward compared to the original game, bosses will have you managing resources and you will need to watch out for random fights towards the end of the game.

A lot of random encounters are still solved by pressing the auto-battle button though, but if you use it during the last dungeons of the game odds are one of your party members will be KO'd.

There's also another mechanic that impacts combat, and that is the shaman system.

You will encounter shamans along the way that can fuse with your characters to increase their powers, there's a total of 6 shamans in the game and you can unite a max of 2 shamans to any character.

The catch is that characters are only compatible with some of the shamans, some being able to unite with most, and others with only a couple.

Also, if you happen to discover a special combination the character's color will change and the effect of the bonus will be stronger, or even better, their form can completely change and get a bonus in all stats.

I have some problems with the system though, it's lame that you can't fuse the shamans with everyone.

Allowing that extra customization would have been very cool, of course rewarding the secret transformations but still giving a little bonus for a non-special fusion.

Another problem that I have is that the fusions come apart very easily, when a character reaches critical health, or passes out, the fusion comes apart, but it also happens after a lot of cutscenes, which is pretty lame and annoying.

It would be better if you could have access to the fusions everywhere, or even at safe spots, but they are restricted to only 1 city.

So if you lose it in a long dungeon it's either go all the way back or finish the dungeon as is, which makes them feel a little bit worthless.

The overworld abilities make a comeback, but like last time, they feel a little bit like an afterthought, I saw it being used mostly to force a certain character into the party.

It would have been better if some character interactions led to them being forced onto the party, since if they are not with you and you encounter the obstacle you need them for, you need to go all the way back for them, which is the same place the shamans reside after you find them.

This can be kind of annoying.

And the worst is that they were perfectly capable of just forcing them on your party.

There is this section where you need a specific character to be with you to talk to another character, you get transported into a dream world with some save points available where you can change your party, but the character you need can't be removed.

And there is nothing inside the dream world that requires them, they don't even get dialogue inside, it's a bit frustrating.

This is one of the only things I think were better in the first game, you could freely change your party from anywhere, and that type of backtracking didn't exist thanks to this.

And like I mentioned, if they forced characters into your party with some plot in the middle it wouldn't be a problem, it would even flesh out the characters more.

Breath of Fire 2 has a way lower encounter rate than 1, so at least the backtracking isn't as bad.

Moving forward though, there's another new mechanic.

As you advance through the game you get to build a town of your own, and there are a lot of factors that change quite a lot of stuff.

Depending on the carpenter the look of the town will change, and you get to recruit people from around the world to open shops, only 6 though, and once you invite them to your town they will remain forever, so choose carefully.

Some sell pretty good stuff and others are useless, by talking to them when you first find them you will be able to know what purpose they would serve in your city.

And you could just save, recruit them, and then check out what they do, I think it's a very neat feature.

With the main features out of the way, I want to talk about the rest of the details.

Like in the first game, the overworld feels pretty small and looks pretty similar all over the world, at least there's more variety in the locations you get to visit in the dungeons, but also, like in the first game, they are very short and have barely any puzzles, the reduced encounter rate makes them more enjoyable to me though.

I had a nitpick in the first game, in towns, whenever you entered a house, the town theme would fade out and a different song would start playing.

This bothered me very much, and I am happy to say that doesn't happen in this game, but I have a different nitpick related to the music now.

And is that almost every dungeon plays the same song, this also applies to the towns, and they are not even that good in my opinion.

I am very glad the last few dungeons had unique songs, I would have been pretty mad if they didn't, but outside of those 2 songs, I think the game has a pretty good soundtrack.

Not every song is that great, but there's a couple that are very remarkable in my opinion.

I'd say I would definitely recommend this game over Breath of Fire 1, you don't miss on much lore if you skip it, as stuff that you would need to know is explained in the main plot of the game.

Writing this review made me realize how much I appreciate this game, especially when comparing it to the first one, it's such a big improvement.

I wasn't very optimistic about the series after I played the first one, but after looking at all the improvements they made in 2, I am a bit hopeful about Breath of Fire 3, and what improvements they could make.

Like more character development, a tighter combat system, or better dungeons.

Unlike the first game, which I think only people who enjoy very simple RPGs with almost no plot would enjoy, this game feels a bit more accessible, and I think you lose nothing in giving it a try.

The horrible translation could make it difficult to get into it, but once you do it's pretty fun to see through, at least in some parts.

It still has some issues, especially for how optimized RPGs are these days, but I felt it was a genuine attempt at making a better game, even if it still falls short in a lot of things.

There's a lot of plot-lines and concepts that I wish were developed more, characters that had more screen time, and of course, a better translation.

I kind of wish Capcom would remake this game someday with the proper care put into it, I think it would be incredibly good.

They don't need to waste millions in giving it mind-blowing graphics, as long as they get good translators, polish some of the rough edges, add some QoL stuff, and maybe add the Game Boy advance portraits.

It could be a very good quality release, but I know that will never happen, I still can dream though.

[ladyirisreviews]

Pokémon Red - Review

Pokémon has come a long way, even when people are complaining that the most recent games are some of the worst in the series, I came back and played the original Pokémon Red, and let me tell ya, I didn't have a great time.

Not everything about the game is bad, so I at least want to start on the positive stuff.

It wasn't the first game to have monster-catching, but it was the first to have the objective to "catch them all" and letting you keep most of them, as well as being very kid-friendly, both things unlike the Megami Tensei games.

At least to my knowledge, it was also the first game where you could trade creatures and battle with other players in a turn-based game, and all that coupled with being able to play on the go pretty much guaranteed the game's success.

Another factor in its success was that it was such a watered-down RPG experience everyone was able to play it and have no problem finishing it.

And that might be it for the positive things I have to say about it...? except for the gameplay, that will come later.

I really don't want to be mean to such an old game but a lot of the stuff it does other games did it way better, and the stuff that was unique to the game didn't feel that very well done, of course this is me talking from the future, I wasn't looking at games at that period, but I couldn't help but be frustrated at the game while playing it.

So just let me vent a bit.

The game is unbearably slow, both the movement, the text boxes, and the battles, the game is plagued with unnecessary textboxes telling redundant stuff in battles, and where the objects you grab go.

The plot is basically nonexistent, your only objective is to be the Pokémon champion and beat Team Rocket, and there are no actual characters.

You interact with the gym leaders once and never again, they have cool designs but no personality outside of the 1-liners they throw when facing them, which is very little to me.

You might encounter your rival several times, but all there is to it is he telling you he's better than you which gets annoying.

The exploration is also so simplistic, every route is super short, there is not much to explore at all, caves might have like 3 or 4 screens long but they are equally as easy to get through.

There are only 3 places in the game I would call dungeons, where there are more than 3 floors to explore, and the exploration is not just going from A to B.

But again, it's still simple to explore, and once you defeat all the trainers around there is no threat to the exploration, it's a matter of time before you get past them.

Having talked about all that, it's finally time to talk about the gameplay, which is by far the best aspect of this game.

encounters are both random and predetermined, random while you are in bushes or in caves, and determined when there are trainers around, which is kinda cool.

On random encounters, you only fight a singular Pokémon, and trainers can have up to 6.

The way actual fights go is that you fight with one of your Pokémon against another singular Pokémon until one of them faints, it's simple enough.

What I think separates Pokémon from most RPGs in this era are the weaknesses and how similar your Pokémon are from the ones you fight.

The Pokémon you fight are the same as the ones you can control and are equally as strong.

Of course, there is a level difference in some cases, but it's mostly fair fights if you play as intended.

It would be boring if every fight was always perfectly balanced for each Pokémon, and that's where weaknesses come in.

Each pokémon has specific weaknesses depending on its typing and a hit with their weakness pretty much means defeat most of the time.

And that's why Pokémons can only have 4 moves, if they had more they could be busted, so this balance between weaknesses and limited moves is what makes Pokémon feel so different from other RPGs.

But the balance on this specific game is kind of dumb.

You can beat the game with your first Pokémon, which is fairly easy as it will get a lot of levels if you only use them, and I kind of feel it's encouraged.

Training Pokémons takes a long time in this game, and quite a lot of them are borderline unusable when you first get them.

This forces you to either come back to an earlier zone to grind to give them levels, or putting them on the front to change to your strong Pokémon, which gives them half of the EXP.

It is until the very late game that you are able to get an item that shares the EXP you gain in battle to every Pokémon in your party.

But:

A) They get very little EXP, as the way it's shared is by dividing the half of the EXP between the number of benched Pokémon you have.

B) It increases the amount of text you have to go through by a lot, making training even slower.

Though you could bring only 1 other Pokémon so they get half of the EXP and keep text boxes to a minimum, but it could be risky if your main Pokémon faints and you are unable to flee with your weak Pokémon, you risk losing a lot of money.

I like the type of gameplay they came up with, but the snail speed of the game makes it so not fun to play.

There's also a big lack of difficulty, because every route and cave are so short you can easily come back to the last Pokémon center every time one of your Pokémon gets injured instead of wasting money on potions for the way to the next city.

Another thing that bothers me a lot is how little space you have to save your items, you can save the stuff you don't need right away to the pc, but even that runs out of space surprisingly fast.

If you want to collect a lot of move discs for when you want to make a very strong Pokémon odds are you will run out of space by then.

So, to summarize

It's the lack of plot, the simplistic level design, and the general speed of the game that makes the cool gameplay hidden in the game unable to come through, at least for me.

I've played so many RPGs that respect my time that I am not able to enjoy this game, it makes me wish it was at least 3 times faster.

But like I said, there are some cool things about this game and it wasn't a hit for nothing, it worked for people and it isn't terrible if you are able to look past the extremely slow speed.

So, would I recommend it? Not really, Fire Red is right there and it's such a much better and smoother game.

And that's all I had to say, thank you for reading this far if you did get this far, any reblogs would be appreciated, I would love to engage in a conversation with people who love this game to hear their perspectives.

[ladyirisreviews]

Hi I am Iris and I review games

I like reviewing games, but sometimes I don't know what to play, so if there's a game you would want me to recommend please do so, I will very likely review it as soon as I can :) reblogs are very appreciated.

Thank you for your time :)

[ladyirisreviews]

Pizza Tower-Review

To say Pizza Tower was a hit would be an understatement, it's so well-received in fact, that I feel like there's not much point in me reviewing it, but I want to talk about it even if everything I say has already been said.

At least I'll get to flex my P-ranks.

(I try to use the cover art of each game I review, I gotta be thankful Steam has some sort of cover art for games that weren't released physically.)

The plot is extremely simple, our dear Peppino Spaghetti is having a hard time with his restaurant, then Pizzahead goes to him threatening to blow up his place for no real reason, and that's how our mess of an Italian gets into the pizza tower, trying to stop Pizzahead, and that's about it.

The focus of the game lies entirely in its gameplay, and lemme tell you, it is something to admire, it's the most fluid game I played in a while, Peppino has a varied moveset that makes traversing any type of terrain feel like sliding butt-naked covered in oil on a ramp made of butter, yes it felt that fluid for me.

Run-Grab, Mach-Running, Uppercut, Ground-Slam, Twirl, Dive, Wall-Climbing, Roll/Slide, Piledriver, every single move Peppino has I was able to find multiple ways of using, and they link with each other so well that I was able to pull off pretty much everything I could imagine, the only thing that stopped me was how tight the inputs could get in some places, only because I was going for ambitious routes.

(Every frame is a painting)

The levels also flow pretty well, every level has some sort of gimmick, be is a transformation of Peppino that completely changes how he controls, special enemies, types of platforms, or all 3, each stage feels completely unique and are so well made.

The levels might not look that linear at first glance but they are quite linear, which is better for the gameplay, there's a number of secrets on every level and collectibles, they are spread throughout the level very cleverly, if you aim to collect all of them, they end up feeling like an extension of the level instead of going out of the way, and that is because of how the rating and combo systems work.

(What's that eye doing there?)

After defeating an enemy, your combo starts, congratulations, you did it, you are doing a combo, but there's a meter that depletes after a couple of seconds, after which the combo ends, getting hurt also depletes the meter faster, but you can defeat other enemies or get any type of item to make the meter deplete.

So if you want to maintain your combo need to utilize everything that is on your way, enemies and collectibles, sometimes when I was playing I felt like in a frantic daze trying to keep the combo going, which made me realize why the portrayal of Peppino as a nervous wreck is so genius.

And there's one last mechanic I need to talk about, which is the escape sections.

(Just look how much he is freaking out.)

When you reach the end of the level, you get into contact with dear old John, who you sadly have to destroy to keep going, prompting the imminent collapse of the level you are currently playing and a change of music, and your objective is to get out of the level from where you entered, NOW.

Some aspects of the level change and the feeling of anxiety is palpable, getting to the point where the time is almost over and hear the music communicating that exact feeling to you is awesome, but if you manage to escape you are safe and you get a rating.

But what if there was more?

(Does the P mean perfect or pizza?)

You survived the level, but you could conquer it by collecting everything and doing a second lap to the level, which changes the song again and feels more frantic, getting to the point where you start a second lap with everything is such a cathartic feeling, I cannot describe it, the music itself is an award already.

But if you manage to do it all without dropping your combo you get a P-rank, which signifies you absolutely conquered a level, and you can get them for both normal levels and boss fights.

They don't unlock any content and you are not required to even get a good rank to finish the game, I would say that if you didn't even try to keep your combo going the game would be a pretty easy experience, just getting enough collectibles and beating the bosses until you get to the final boss.

(The main purpose of this image is to flex I got all achievements.)

And that's the brilliance of how levels and ranks are designed, the game is as hard as you want it to be, and I simply love that, the game can be a very chill game to go through or an anxiety-inducing race against the clock, it's just so cleverly designed in every way I cannot praise it enough.

SO now that I'm done gushing out about the gameplay, I quickly want to mention that the graphics are top-notch, I almost feel sorry for the devs while looking at how fluid every single animation is, no wonder it took so long to release, you know? love pours out of every orifice of the game.

(I just love this level card.)

And not to mention the music, which gives like half of the personality to every level and boss-fight, it's just incredible, really, how every single aspect of the game I look at is amazingly done, I haven't had this much fun with a platformer since a long time ago, so it goes without saying but I recommend this game to anyone.

If I gave ratings it would be an easy 10, and it's also obviously the game of the year for me so far, and I am gonna be honest, it's gonna be pretty darn hard to surpass, not only because it's so good but because I am kinda broke at the moment to play other current indie hits, but even so, if I wasn't broke it would be pretty darn hard to surpass.

[ladyirisreviews]

Everhood - Review

Everhood is quite an experience and I am very glad I played it, even if I fundamentally disagree with some of its core choices in the plot, but I am getting ahead of myself, this rhythm RPG is quite unique and I recommend playing it without looking up any spoilers.

The plot is a very complicated thing to talk about, and I don't really want to spoil a lot about it, so I will only give you a bare-bones description of it.

You control a wooden puppet everyone calls Red, after a thief steals your arm, you follow them and before long you encounter a frog with a banjo who tests you before you can go on, after you pass his test your objective becomes pretty simple, you need to find the thief and regain your arm, but it's not so simple, also there's stuff beyond that I really don't want to reveal, you will have to experience it for yourself.

Now let's get to the gameplay, it's pretty much "What if you controlled a character dodging the notes of a guitar hero track", of course, it goes beyond that but it was my first thought, you can only move left and right and you also have a jump, and there's pretty much 4 types of notes, normal waves you can jump over, tall ones you need to dodge and black waves, these act the same as normal waves but they are special, which will become apparent why later in the game.

You have an HP bar that regenerates with time, the number of hits you can get in a row and the speed of regeneration varies depending on the difficulty.

This all might sound very simple, but what really makes it special is the visuals of the gameplay, the game warns you at the start about flashing lights, and they really mean it, the visuals can get extremely abstract and psychedelic, the screen can also move back and forth and rotate and various other effects, "crazy" would not cut it to describe how nuts the visuals can get, but also I couldn't begin to describe how genuinely pretty it can look.

This, however, CAN get in the way of the gameplay, on harder difficulties especially, there are visual effects that make it harder to avoid damage, and while I am well aware that was an intentional feature, I just personally don't like when games use visual obstruction as a form of difficulty.

And speaking of difficulty, I would personally recommend playing the game first on the story mode difficulty or changing it when the difficulty spikes up if you decide to play on a harder difficulty, because the spikes are very real and they will make you lose a ton, which could harm the flow for you, I was playing on hard mode and it was fine but there was one fight I just couldn't get past and I decided to change to story mode to not sour the rest of the experience.

But I do have to give props to the game for letting you change difficulties any time you want.

The last thing I want to mention is the music, because dear lord is it good, every single fight in the game has a unique song, and they are all bangers, battles never ever get tiring, and while I might not enjoy all of the songs as much, there definitely are some songs that I especially liked, to the point they became some of my favorite songs in a videogame soundtrack.

So yeah, I'd say this game is pretty much worth playing, and as I said, I really don't want to spoil anything about it, the game is definitely an experience and I want people to go in as blind as possible.

I might disagree with the plot and what it tries to make you feel at some parts of the game, but you might not find those parts frustrating, even after that I a very glad I played it, I was thinking about the ending for several days after I finished the game, so it certainly left an impact on me.

If you play it, please tell me what it made you feel.

[ladyirisreviews]

8-Bit Adventures - Review

8-Bit Adventures is a pretty good RPG maker game, it's on the simple side of the spectrum but it's very faithful to the classic RPG formula from the NES and SNES.

The world suddenly loses its color, and 3 individuals are tasked with regaining the color of the world, a warrior, a thief, and a mage, and the adventure is not even over after you do, there's something that threatens the world and it's up to them to beat it.

And that's pretty much it about the plot, it's fairly simple, and even though there might be some character moments, it also stays on the simple side, and it's not a bad thing, the game is really good at emulating the retro RPG feeling.

The combat is also rather simple, it's a turn-based battle system with a very straightforward weakness chart, everything has a color assigned to it, and another color beats it, red beats green, green beats blue and blue beats red.

The numbers stay low, and it also stays challenging despite being a simple system, the game will have you using your resources, and even though it might get hard at times I didn't feel like grinding was necessary at all.

The visuals and music are also pretty much, again, they emulate the retro RPG feeling perfectly.

And there's not much else to say besides that I really want to play the sequel soon, it looks like a big step up in every aspect, and the battle system being expired by Final Fantasy X really does make me excited.

As for this game, I would happily recommend it, it's a simple yet well-made game with nods to retro RPGs and it's honestly a chill time, I know this review wasn't that long but there's not that much to say about the game other than it's very solid and I am happy I played it, and I hope their new game does well.

[ladyirisreviews]

Koudelka - Review

This game I wanted to play because I was really looking for a horror-themed RPG, and from what I read online this one seemed to be one of the better ones.

From the PS1 era, comes Koudelka, made by Sacnoth (Later renamed to Nautilus) and published by SNK in 1999.

You follow the titular character, Koudelka, trying to infiltrate an isolated monastery, she quickly encounters an injured man named Edward, who warns her about a monster and gives her his gun to fight with it, after the fight is done Koudelka heals him with mysterious powers and reveals he was there looking for treasure, they decide to team up in exploring the monastery.

Later they find and save a religious man named James, who refuses to elaborate on why he is there but follows the party anyways.

While exploring Koudelka gets visions of people dying, an accident on a ship, and someone asking for help, she then reveals she is a medium, and went to the monastery trying to save the soul of someone, but with the monsters roaming everywhere, something else might be going on there.

The way the story gets told is quite interesting, all of the dialogue is completely voiced, and cutscenes that aren't pre-rendered feel almost like a theatre play, with the characters doing a back and forth and even with some physicality in their "performance".

The characters have a weird chemistry between them, but it kinda works, with Koudelka and Edward developing a closer relationship and both poking at James and his devotion to god.

Besides the cutscenes, you will also find documents that explain what is going on in the monastery and even reveal the motivations of central characters in the plot.

I can't talk much more about the plot without spoiling so I'll leave it at that, it's time to get into the gameplay.

First of all, you are in complete control of the character's stats, upon a level up you will be asked to allocate points in the stats you want for each character, so you can build them to fill whichever role you want in your party.

Encounters are random, but they are pretty sparse overall, the actual combat is set on a chess-like grid, you can choose where on your side of the grid your characters will be on the pause menu, battles are turn-based, and it plays like a tactics game more or less, but it does have things that make it unique.

First, enemies can't get past the character that is the further into the grid, and the same applies to your characters, and if the furthermost character faints and an enemy advances, you can't revive that character anymore, these rules also mean enemies can't occupy the same row as your characters.

The way attacking works depends on the type of weapon you use, and broadly there's 3 types of weapons, short-range weapons, like fists, swords, and clubs, these can target the space right in front of the character and the 2 spaces on its side, medium-range weapons like spears, this one can target the space 2 spaces in front of the character and its 2 spaces on its side, but it cannot target the one right in front of the character, it also cannot target an enemy if an ally is right in front of them, and lastly there's long-range weapons like guns, shotguns and crossbows, these can target anywhere on the map as long as an ally is not right in front of the character.

Each type of weapon gives bonus stats on different stats, so they might be more effective with one character but not with another, also, they break with use, so you might want to save the more powerful ones for bosses.

Also, there's no money on the game, besides the stuff that you might find lying around, you get extra items and equipment from enemy drops, which makes the game really feel like an RPG take on resident evil, especially with the notes you find and the general design of the monastery, which does give off resident evil vibes, there's paths you can clear for easier traversal, puzzles that require key items and at points even enemies you have to flee from, in general, it was pretty fun to explore the monastery, and the game really wouldn't be the same if the gameplay took place in different dungeons.

The last thing there is to mention about the gameplay are weapon and spell levels.

The characters are free to equip any piece of equipment and use any spell they want, and each time they use a type of weapon or any spell they build experience for it until they level up, the maximum level being 3.

For weapons, the level up adds a chance to hit 2 times in a row for level 2, and for level 3 it also adds the chance to get 3 hits in a row.

For spells, the effect will greatly increase, but the mp cost will also increase considerably.

The customization level the game gives to the hand of the player is pretty great, and the game quickly punishes you if you don't properly build your characters and your weapon and skill levels, the normal enemies aren't that hard, but some bosses do kick some serious butt, so sometimes a bit of grinding could be necessary, but something nice is that you gain levels pretty quickly, so it's really not a problem.

So all in all, I really enjoyed this game, I was really itching for a horror-themed RPG and Koudelka really delivered, it's not perfect, like many RPGs in 3D from the time, a lot of time is lost at the start of combat showing the scenario, the enemies and the players, and the combat itself might feel slow, but because the encounter rate is very lax it doesn't ever get frustrating.

The plot is pretty interesting and seeing these characters interact with each other feels very different to what every other RPG had done by this time.

So, yeah, I would recommend this game if a horror RPG sounds appealing to you, it's pretty solid for the time, and even for today, nothing really has matched it's vibe so it's still very unique.

I'll definitely check Shadow Hearts, which was made by the same developers, when I can, I really wonder if they build on the mechanics of this game or try a new system altogether, in any case, I'm excited to check it out.

[ladyirisreviews]

Super Lesbian Animal RPG - Review

"women pr-pretty" the game

Super Lesbian Animal RPG is a very charming RPG maker game I had the pleasure to know about as soon as it came out.

The setting is a world where anthropomorphic animals exist with magic and with modern advances in technology, more specifically though, the story is set on the Sapphire islands.

You follow Melody, a young pink fox trans girl, who just joined a guild with her childhood friend and just recently girlfriend, a hyperactive bunny named Allison, alongside 2 other friends, an absolutely shredded tiger named Jodie, and an overly curious cow who dedicates all of her free time to study magic, Claire, who is also trans.

Melody and Allison joined Claire's guild, The Novas, despite not being capable of using magic, but Claire was prepared for that, she made a ritual she found in a book that would let them use magic.

After starting it they are transported into some sort of astral plane, and Melody is told to pick between 3 doors, which will determine what type of healer she wants to be, something she wanted to be to support Allison as much as she could.

After the ritual is done and some days pass, they are ready to start guild duties, but first Melody and Allison need to go through a made-up dungeon Claire prepared for them in Allison's basement (against her will).

Here is where the adventure starts and hijinks immediately ensue.

The plot honestly surprised me at various turns, it deals with numerous subjects in a tasteful way, and honestly, I don't want to say much about it to avoid spoilers, there's some surprises I don't want to ruin.

I do want to mention the characters though, simply put, I love them all.

Their interactions feel very organic and they are genuinely funny, the characterization is very well done, each character is very unique and have their own arc to go through, even the antagonist side gets to have interactions.

I especially like Claire and her honest to god chaotic aura, I just vibe with her.

Also, have I mentioned the vast amounts of lesbian relationships? I just feel so seen, it's so refreshing to see actual queer characters and relationships created by a queer person, it's as good as I hoped it would be, and I hope it's the start of me coming across more queer RPGs.

Now I want to talk about the actual gameplay, I don't want to give too much away about the characters either.

The combat is turn-based, like you would expect from an RPG maker game, but it's got a neat gimmick, every action a character does that aligns with their role will generate star power.

Each characters has unique skills that use up star power which are very useful, the ones I used the most were Claire's magic that hits every enemy and Allison's directional attacks, which is quite interesting, every enemy has a directional weakness besides their elemental ones.

The flow of battle is a blend between building star power and deciding the right moment to use it, while also managing everyone's health because enemies do quite some damage, it's a satisfying combat system despite being relatively simple.

The exploration is also very solid, for starters, there's no random battles, you instead start battle by making contact with enemies on screen, they also don't respawn unless you leave the dungeon, which makes exploring easier.

The dungeons are nice to explore, they have light puzzle elements and are not very long, they are just very well made.

Another thing that makes them work for me is that throughout the dungeons, the party will engage in conversations, making the whole experience more engaging in my opinion.

The game also has a number of optional sidequests that are very worth going through, some rewarding you with some very good equipment.

It's also incredibly pretty and has an amazing soundtrack to go with it, I just can't give enough compliments to the game.

And that's all I can say about this game for now, I can't really go into much detail without entering in spoiler talk or dissecting every part of the game, which I don't want to do, I really want people to enjoy the game as blindly as possible, it's very funny, charming and honestly it will stick me.

I really want to play it again after a while and try a different sub-class for Melody, and also the game is still getting some minor updates, so I am excited to see what the dev thinks of doing.

So in short, game good, woman pretty, be gay and kiss your girlfriend.

[ladyirisreviews]

Front Mission: Gun Hazard

The game I'll be talking about this time is called Front Mission Gun Hazard, a spin-off of the tactics RPG Front Mission, unlike Xenogears, this game is set in a more realistic world, of course, giant robots fighting each other isn't that realistic, but it does take place on earth.

A few decades into the future, the state of the world is in a complicated condition, with the development of a megastructure to distribute solar energy all around the world being stopped, countries lost trust in each other, and wars began being a common thing again.

In the Bergen republic, an attack on the president is being planned, and it's up to our protagonist, Albert, to protect him, but as the story progresses Albert notices that not everything is quite like it seems, like there's someone behind not only the problems in his country, but all around the world.

The plot is not too complicated but it's actually pretty good, thanks in part to the characters, each one has a clear personality, and even if some are blander than others, it's still fun to watch all the interactions throughout the game.

With the plot out of the way, I want to talk about the best part of the front mission gun hazard, the gameplay.

You control Albert and his wanzer in a 2d world, movement is very smooth, especially when you jump around, you can aim your weapon wherever you like by moving around and you can even hold it where it's aiming by pressing a button.

As you defeat enemies you get exp, which increases your health and also unlocks equipment in the shop, the equipment is very interesting and varied.

First is your wanzer, this is the robot Albert controls, it's not like there's a huge variety that offers different benefits, each one is better than the last one, which applies to a lot of equipment, but the design does change with every upgrade.

Then it's the vernier unit, this is a propulsor that lets you float in the air for a short period of time, the better the vernier unit the more you'll be able to float, you start without one but it is required to equip one from a certain point into the game.

Next is the shield unit, you have an assigned shield button to protect yourself from projectiles or other hazards, the better the shield the more area it will cover.

And then it's the dash unit, by double-tapping you are able to dash and advance at an increased speed, the better the dash unit, you'll be able to dash faster and for longer.

Now it's the arm equipment, which is mostly weapons, and there's 3 types, a sort of Gatling gun that recovers ammo over time, a shotgun that deals a huge amount of damage from up close, and a laser that deals damage fast but needs to recharge frequently.

And then there's the special weapons, there's a lot of different weapons to chose from, there's homing missiles, grenade launchers, flamethrowers, these are all pretty distinct, but the difference with the main weapons is that they have a limited amount of ammo.

However, the better your wanzer is, the more special weapons you can equip, including repeated weapons, also there's an item to replenish ammo but it's hard to come by, so it's better to save those for complicated situations, but yeah, the weapons are fun, and it's up to you to pick the ones that suit you best.

And lastly, there's the human equipment, you can leave your wanzer to explore some cramped areas, and without your wanzer your arsenal is not that strong, but there's not much to mention about it, you have a pilot suit, a handgun and a grenade, both with infinite ammo, it's still important if you want to fully explore a map and not instantly die though.

In the equipment menu, by pressing L or R you can also pick a companion for a mission, each one serves a different role so pick the one that suits best your playstyle.

Now, one last thing about the equipment is that, the more you use a piece of equipment, the better it'll become, there's a percentage next to the equipment, it goes up gradually to 100% and then into 120% after using it some more, a fully mastered weapon might deal more damage than the upgraded version without using, but after using it for a while the difference in power becomes apparent, so don't stick with inferior versions of a weapon and upgrade your favorites as soon as you unlock them.

Now with the equipment out of the way, I want to talk about the actual missions.

Most are straightforward, you need to go to point A to point B, with enemies spawning as you progress, though not forever, there's a meter that indicates how many enemies are left to spawn, so if you want to do some grinding that will help you out.

Sometimes there will be a boss waiting for you at the end, but some other stages are a bit special, when a mission takes place in an enemy base for example, there's a lot you can explore, and there's a bunch of hidden items to get, so I would recommend searching all around for them, you can replay almost every stage though, so if you don't want to get everything right away there's the option to get it later.

There's not much else to say about the game without entering on spoiler territory, the music is amazing, doing a very good job at giving the right atmosphere on most of the game, and the graphics are pretty good, it has a very distinct style.

I played the fan translation and it's such a well-done job, it was so good it felt like an authentic release of the game, I really recommend it so you can see the plot if you end up playing this game.

With the remake of front mission 1, I can only hope this also gets a remake, I mean I doubt it will but I can wish, it is such a fun game to play.

[ladyirisreviews]

Pikuniku

This is a bonafide short and sweet game and I'm glad I got to play it, this review will also be short but you probably would prefer that, wouldn't you?

Published by Devolver Digital, Pikuniku is a colorful platformer game, you control Piku, this red little guy, who wakes up after a long sleep and honestly, I can only describe what happens for most of the game as they vibing and helping around.

There IS a proper plot with a villain and everything, however, Mr. Sunshine is picking up junk from the villages of the island and giving everyone free money for it, sounds good to me!

But in reality, he is also stealing the resources from the villages but no one is noticing because of all the free money, Piku decides to help those few that want to stop him, and that's pretty much the plot.

The game is filled with funny interactions, and despite things getting kinda dark with the plans of Mr. Sunshine, it never lets go of the cheerful vibe the game had going on, it's a very enjoyable ride from beginning to end.

The gameplay is fairly simple, Piku can jump, kick stuff, grab on some hooks with their legs, and also put their legs away to roll around, which makes them go a little bit faster.

The game has some puzzle elements here and there that aren't that hard and some fairly easy platforming, it does get tricky at points but with no penalty for failing something other than trying an obstacle again, it's very easy to get through.

Though I was surprised by some optional challenge sections, they can get tricky even with the instant retry, and it was very satisfying to get through those sections, each one with its unique visual style and music.

Oh yeah, the music, it's simply delightful, very cheery and energetic, some songs have this soothing vibe to them too, I could have some tracks on repeat for hours.

If anything, the game is already worth it just for the music alone, but everything else is also very well done, this is an easy game to recommend, especially because of its short duration.

If you focus on finishing the game it's like 3 hours tops, but getting every optional thing might take some extra hours, even then it's not that long, and getting some extra hours on such a good game doesn't sound like a bad deal at all.

So yeah, thank you very much for reading me, if you want to support me, I have both a Kofi and a Patreon, you can just click on the words and they will hopefully take you there.

Any amount of support really helps me, like you wouldn't imagine, I feel kinda bad that there isn't any exclusive content for people who support me but with my type of content and workflow, it's kind of hard to make exclusive content at all.

Again thank you very much for reading me, even if you don't support me monetarily, sharing this helps a lot too!

Well, until the next review!

[ladyirisreviews]

Xenogears - Review

You probably heard of Xenogears before, it is usually mentioned as one of the best RPGs in history, that it was a masterpiece, something better than Final Fantasy 7, and it had super cool giant robots. Though I also heard a couple of angry people online say it was a mistake but I didn't pay much attention to them.

It was years of listening to how great it was that led me to finally try it, that and the fact I like cool giant robots and there aren't that many RPGs about that, and it was everything but what I expected, it wasn't the masterpiece everyone told me it was, but it wasn't the bad game a few people predicated it was, Xenoears was one of the most unique experiences I had with an RPG and there is a lot I want to say about it.

For those who aren’t familiar, Xenogears is an RPG released by Squaresoft for the PS1 in 1998, and it’s considered a cult classic by many, some people say it's the best RPG for the ps1, or even of all time.

You explore a futuristic world and fight in giant robots called Gears, the game explores themes like existentialism and religion, it gets pretty serious at points, and it’s pretty committed to what it has to say.

You can bet that’s one of the reasons people like it that much, one other being that these Gundam-inspired robots are pretty cool.

Xenogears is set in a world where a war between 2 countries has been raging on for a hundred years, warfare has evolved, thanks to the Discovery and development of giant man-controlled robots named Gears, helping only in increasing the scale of the conflict.

It is in a peaceful village at the border between two countries, where we follow the life of Fei, he has been living a peaceful life thanks to the kind people that took care of him after waking up without his memories.

One day while he was taking care of some things, a gear fight broke off in the middle of the village, and while trying to help people to evacuate he found an empty gear, and as if something invited him he entered it, and started fighting off the gears destroying his village.

Eventually, Fei lost consciousness and when he woke up the village was destroyed, and the village blamed him for it, with no other choice he was forced to leave, now he must find his own way in a world he knows nothing about, struggling to know his real purpose and who he really is, but wherever he goes, there's always conflict he rather not get involved into.

I know this is not a very detailed summary of the plot, but I really don't want to spoil much.

Even though Fei is an amnesiac, a very overused trope in RPGs, he is still an interesting character to see grow, what makes him work, to a degree, is that the amnesia is not his main conflict, but how all of his beliefs are challenged throughout the game.

There are various characters, each one with their own conflicts and objectives and most of them don’t follow the main party blindly like some RPGs of the era did, they all have a reason to be together even when they have problems within them, it’s their motivation that drives them and not just a “let’s defeat the bad guy” plot.

In fact, the game doesn't have a clear villain for quite a while, there's a lot of smaller antagonists that have some connection to the main characters, and this helps to develop them, some villains also get development, which was surprising to me, because RPGs around this time had villains that were really simple, it was nice to see that the important antagonists weren't like that.

The world exploration is something I really like about the game, it helps the world-building a lot, you could remove the starting text of the game that describes what is going on in the world, and let NPCs tell you about it instead, which they do anyway.

Every city you visit is full of life, NPCs tell you about their daily life, their worries, and their perspective on the ongoing conflicts, some having small stories that are directly connected to these conflicts, the dialogue also changes when something major happens in the story, and some of these mini-stories progress as well, some reaching pretty far into the game.

I was surprised by the level of detail the game had with the world exploration, all the effort that clearly went into making the world feel alive paid off, it's one of the RPGs with the best NPCs ever, if not the best.

The plot itself is very gripping at various points, having full sequences where I felt fully engaged, this feeling was aided by the great direction the game had on its cutscenes, most with the in-game graphics, which are amazing, and some of the score, or even lack of it, this game can pull off entire sequences with no music at all, only sound effects, and visuals, and be amazing.

Sometimes songs won’t cut off if you enter into a fight, this can give a special flair to these encounters and be much more memorable. The soundtrack is mostly traditional music, it’s very grand and epic, and it fits pretty well with the overall mood of the game.

You can see all the effort and passion in this game everywhere, however, as much as I appreciate everything the game gets right, it’s not perfect.

While the plot is very interesting and ambitious, the pacing can be rough, some parts drag too long, this is amplified by the fact that you can’t speed up text in any way.

Other parts go by very quick, especially on the second disc, which starts with a great summary of quite a lot of events, many important events get skimmed through in a matter of minutes. And you don't get to explore the world until the last bit of the game.

Some of the characters from both the protagonist and antagonist sides don't get developed at all after their introduction, this especially happens to female characters, which the game treats kinda roughly in general.

Not that there are no interesting female characters, but in comparison to the male cast, they don’t get much to do at all, this doesn’t ruin the game, but it’s a shame because there are some characters that would have been great to see more of, but don’t get the deserved spotlight.

A lot of plot points can be very vague, especially at the start of the game, there are quite a lot of things you can’t really figure out what they mean until near the end of the game.

And while there’s the mystery part of it that can make it engaging, you can feel pretty lost in the story on some parts, as if you missed something important, but it's the game actually being very vague.

I think the way the game uses music can feel very repetitive, there are times when you hear one track for like an hour without interruption, and it's not that the songs are bad, but the way they are composed makes it hard to hear many times in a row.

And this sound like a nitpick, but the character portraits can get in the way of the emotions some characters want to express, this is because the portraits rarely change expressions, they are stuck in a neutral face for most of the game, no matter if they are happy, angry or sad.

And it's weird because at the start you can see there were some variations, it may be that they ran out of time for all the other portrait variations, but as they are, they bother me a little.

And a last detail I want to talk about the plot is that there is some symbolism that can be interpreted, they can be easy to miss, but some cutscenes in the game can be taken as symbolism for something, and maybe there's not a lot, but it is nice that they let the player interpret some stuff for themselves.

It's time to talk about everything gameplay related.

Xenogears has a 3d world that you explore with 2d sprites, and a fully rotatable camera in most places, cities are full of details because of this, making them great for exploration, and dungeons are very detailed and convincing, looking like real buildings and not seemingly random corridors like in most RPGs.

They don’t have that many puzzles though, and they can be a little bland to explore, but they do offer some platforming now and then, making them still a little bit fun to explore.

The game has random encounters, there are just a few places when this is not the case, and they can either be tolerable or very annoying, it depends on the zone.

There's this weird pause between the moment you get locked into the encounter and when it actually starts, and you can get them when a cutscene is starting, which can ruin the mood sometimes, this rarely happens though so is not that big of a deal.

When in combat, the game uses the same 2d models as in the overworld, gear combat uses 3d models, though when you get to explore the world with your gears, the game uses 2d sprites of them.

Now let's get into the combat.

Battles can be divided into 2 categories, on-foot combat or gear combat, both follow the same way of turn order, combat starts with a bar filling with time, and when it fills it's the character's turn to act, the faster the character the sooner it'll get its turn, this is a bit similar to final fantasy's ATB system, but time stops when it's your turn.

Now let's start by dissecting the on-foot combat.

Your options are Attack, Defense, Items, Skills (it changes names depending on the character), Flee, Combo, and Call Gear.

Defense, Items, Skills, Flee, and Call Gear do exactly what you expect them to do, but the other ones need some explanation.

There are 3 types of attacks, Weak, Strong and Fierce, each one assigned to one button, Triangle, Square, and X respectively.

Weak attacks have high precision but are weaker than the other ones, Strong attacks deal more damage but are less precise, and lastly, Fierce attacks are the strongest ones but tend to miss.

To attack you need AP points, and you can attack as long as you have AP points left, Weak attacks need 1 point, Strong 2 points, Fierce 3 points.

You can mix them as you like, or even attack only once and have reserve AP, though you won't be able to use it with the attack command, but for something else.

As you progress through the game your max AP and thus your damage output increases, but normal attacks aren't your main source of damage, as you fight and level up you can unlock skills called Deathblows, which activate when you do a specific combination of attacks, the first combination being a Weak attack and a Fierce attack, this activates a special attack animation and deals severe damage to the enemies.

You need 2 things to unlock them, the required level, and the usage of normal attacks, every attack needs a certain number of uses to unlock the next Deathblow, and the different animations of weak and strong attacks when you do them in a row also count, every animation needs a certain number of uses, and when you are close enough, a percentage appears on the menu that indicates how close you are to unlock a Deathblow.

You can then see if it stops increasing when spamming one type of attack, so you need to spam the others instead, each one you unlock is stronger than the last one, so it's a priority to keep unlocking deathblows as you can.

Next is the combo command, which uses reserve AP to instantly use a deathblow you already unlocked, you can even chain multiple if you have enough AP stored, every deathblow keeps getting faster and it can be amusing to watch.

And that's everything there is to on-foot combat, it's a very simple combat system that requires you to do the strongest deathblow you have unlocked, magic is not that useful outside of healing, or some buffs and debuffs if you want to, but I never felt they were required, also the combo command it's entirely pointless, the deathblows don't scale on damage if you use them with the combo command, it's much more efficient to directly use the deathblow whenever you can, if you fail a normal attack, the attack chain won't stop, and you can do the deathblow anyway, there is nothing that stops you of doing it.

If defending gave you AP, and there were more reasons to defend, the on-foot battles would be more interesting, but that is not the case at all. This doesn't mean that these battles can't be fun or entertaining, the great animations and sound design, and all the different characters and its diverse deathblows make it fun enough, though I can't say it doesn't ever get repetitive, especially because on-foot combat has almost no challenging enemies in the entirety of the game.

Gear combat though, it can get very funky in concept, but it's still very similar to on-foot combat.

First of all, there's the fuel, Gears need fuel to operate, and different actions use up different quantities of fuel. If you don't have enough fuel you can't do those actions, and there are ways to regain it if you run out of it.

Items, Skills (now all named Ether Machine) and Flee remain the same, now, attack works different on gears, you can only attack once each turn, Weak attacks cost 10 fuel, Strong 20, and Fierce 30, and they follow the same rules as before, weak attacks are precise, strong are stronger but less precise and fierce are the strongest attacks but tend to fail.

Now, after you attack once, your attack level goes up by 1, that means that, if you know enough Deathblows, you can use them, and the way you access them is that, for example, if your attack level is 1, you need to use a weak attack, then you will see a prompt like in on-foot combat, that activates the deathblow, they cost extra fuel but do severe damage compared to your normal attacks.

To raise the attack level further you need to attack again but make sure you don't activate a deathblow because it causes the level to go back to zero, level 2 corresponds to strong attacks and 3 to fierce attacks, each level has 2 deathblows and an extra one if you have a certain item equipped to your character.

Defense gets replaced by a Charge command, which replenishes a very small quantity of fuel in case you run out of it, the amount will be higher if your attack level increases, but only while you have that attack level, there's also equipable items that make you regain a much higher amount of fuel, though these appear much later in the game.

Booster spices things up, it doubles the speed at which your turn comes but consumes a considerable amount of fuel each turn, this option is the main reason you might run out of fuel, once you don't have enough fuel to sustain it being on, it will turn off automatically, you can also turn it off manually, in the early game this is pretty much the only way to increase the damage output to the maximum, though this remains a valuable option through the entirety of the game.

Being able to act multiple times before the enemy is pretty valuable, it also adds some grade of dept to the combat, you have to evaluate the current situation to see if you should go for the booster or not.

There are sequences that you could mess up if you use it too early or in a situation when it's not needed, you would end up with an underwhelming amount of fuel for a hard fight.

Special options serve multiple purposes, it's mostly for unique attacks each character has, it deals massive damage but uses quite a lot of fuel in one go, the other main purpose it has is using a healing equipable item, this is one of the two ways to heal while fighting on gears, the other one being a skill from a specific character, normal healing spells or items don't work.

While still being simple, gear combat proves to be more engaging than on-foot combat, you need to think about your actions a bit instead of just going all out, you need to keep an eye out for your fuel consumption, boiling it down, it's more about resource management than actually making strategies to the specific enemies you face, some bosses might have some gimmicks that make you think outside the box, but these are few.

While the combat is fuel management while you are in the actual fights, the actual strategy comes before the fights themselves, and is in my opinion what makes the gear combat interesting, equipment in this game is crazy.

Each character can equip 3 things while on foot and another 3 on the gears themselves, and gears have a separate set of parts that act as stat upgrades.

Equipment is mostly things that enhance some given stat, like increasing defense, attack, magic power, the chance to dodge attacks, or immunity to some ailments, the fact that you can equip 3 of anything to any character means that you can buff the hell out of a given stat, and while this wouldn't be so big on on-foot combat, your stats outside of the gear impact your gear stats to some degree.

A specific example I'll give is that there's this rare item that doubles your magic power, but doubles the mp consumption, you can equip this to a character, equip them with even more magic enhancing items, then equip the actual gear with even more magic enhancing items, and well, wreck stuff up, magic might be useless in on-foot combat, but on gear combat, everything is possible, with gears you tackle any challenge any way you want as long as you fully commit to a build.

I feel the equipment system is very gratifying when you realize what you can really do with it, but even without this, very VERY broken and fun approach to equipment, you can get through the whole game without much trouble, there will be some tough fights but the strategy won't change much, you'll just need to be extra careful.

This it's not that hard of a game outside of some specific fights and the combat is not that complex, even when you factor in the crazy equipment possibilities, but the gear combat introduces a very different type of tension that is the running out of fuel scenario.

At the early stages of the game, it forces you to stop you from maximizing your offense, making you take damage you can't heal, and in the late stages, it makes you choose between maximizing your damage output with the booster or the special options, while risking your hp regeneration capabilities since they use the same fuel or taking a slower approach to combat and saving up the fuel for offense.

And that's pretty much what I had to say about the battles.

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You might be able to tell that I like this game and appreciate a lot of the things it does, but it has some shortcomings, most notably the fact that most of the story in disc 2 is told in a visual novel fashion and that it skips a lot of sequences and exploration that could have been great.

The development for this game was kinda rocky, to say the least.

It was first pitched to be Final Fantasy 7, but it was rejected because it was too dark, after some time the pitch got greenlit as its own game, and after switching some ideas around, like instead of using summons in a final fantasy way you used giant robots, the concept transformed into Xenogears.

The game was given a much smaller budget, a less experienced team, and the same time limit as Final Fantasy 7, but that wasn't everything that made the development difficult.

The game director, Tetsuya Takahashi was first assigned to work on Final Fantasy 7 before getting the green light for Xenogears, he didn't want to work on Final Fantasy 7 because of the direction it was taking.

The world had a fixed point of view, and he thought a freely controllable camera would be much better for the world of the game, so he made the world of Xenogears one in which you could move the camera, and at the time, Japanese game developers weren't so used to working with 3d graphics, this made it even more difficult for the inexperienced team to work on the game.

The other reason the second disc was like that, like all that wasn't enough, is that the vision for the game just grew much more to what they had anticipated, the scope got so big that Xenogears ended up being only the fifth part of a 7 part story, they wanted to explore the remaining parts through more games or even different types of media, like manga or anime.

This however never happened, Squaresoft wanted the game to sell at least a million to authorize a sequel, but it sold 900k, even though it was so close and had good reviews.

You can tell that even back then Square wasn't very respectful to their creators or that it cared for quality rather than money, like Square Enix is showing to be in this day and age.

The game thankfully didn't fall into obscurity, to this day people keep talking about the game, it has quite a following still, and for good reason.

I really like this game, I can only imagine how better it would have turned out if Squared cared more or if the team was given more time to develop it, but as it is, it's still a very enjoyable game that is very worth it to see through, one of the reasons I didn't go in detail about all the plot is that I hope that this review makes someone give it a chance.

I also hope my talking about the gameplay in detail helps new people to not feel lost while playing, since there's no tutorial about anything.

If you have a PS3 or a PSVITA you can get it on the PlayStation Store, and it's pretty easy to get it running on a PSP.

One last thing that I want to talk about is that you don't have to feel bad about the people who made the game.

After it got released, and Square made clear a sequel wouldn't be possible, Takahashi and multiple people that worked on the game left Square and created a game studio called Monolith Soft, which went on to create Xenosaga, a spiritual successor of sorts to Xenogears.

They managed to make 3 games, I don't know much about them because I haven't been able to play them, but they seem to be kind of how the first parts of the Xenogears story would have been like, I would love to play them and maybe make a review about them, but for the moment I am not able to play them.

Monolith Software games are always interesting for the very least, now they seem to be doing well with Nintendo, and with the Xenoblade series, I am looking forward to what they will do next.

It's also very nice to hear that Monolith has a very nice culture inside their company, and that, at least from what I hear, female characters in their game are treated way better than they were in Xenogears.

So, give the game a try if you never played it, it might not be the best but it's definitely an experience that will be hard to forget.