Recent reviews by Ol' Dirty

Absolute banger

If you like the genre you will probably love this game. Its a rock-solid tactical RPG with a decent enough story.

For tl;dr scroll to the end.

The english localization is a bit janky at a few points but its not nearly as bad as some people make it seem. Translation issues aside, the english dub is a 10/10 when it comes to the quality of voice acting and the fact that its fully voiced is a huge plus for me personally. The quality of voice acting especially shows when you have your characters perform different roles and plays at the theather. [8/10]

Gameplay is solid. It has engaging turn based combat, a huge and diverse roster of characters to choose from (some are clearly better then others - youre not required to min-max to beat the game tho, so simply choose who you like), a variety of side activities including a cardgame, beyblade-like duels, cookoffs, base building, a theater, endgame dungeon, boat racing and a horse racing like mini game called "eggfoot racing". You might find some of them more engaging then others depending on your personal taste. Theres also the tactical army battles which I found to be lacking in many ways, they're basically glorified cutscenes so don't expect to much from that part. Another minus for some is the sometimes tedious inventory management (really only affects the first few hours of gameplay) and the lack of fast travel from the start of the game (you will unlock it after like 4-5hrs depending on your pace) but it did not really bother me, growing up on janky JRPGs in the 90s. [8/10]

Character design is solid. As mentioned earlier the cast shows a great variety of different backgrounds, races and personalities. Ranging from your stoic, conservative-valued officer over your fiery beast-men to your femboy mage who thinks cuteness beats everything. So no matter what you're into you're gonna find at least some relatable characters. When you have a roster of 120 (71 usable in combat, the rest adding flavor and businesses to your base) characters of course not everyone is gonna be fully fleshed out , but if you are really into that you can always learn more about indivdual characters personalities and backgrounds thru "divination", by letting them perform in your theater, or by having them hang out together in the hot spring. [8/10]

Graphics are timeless and overall enjoyable if you can live with a bit of background blur (which annoyed me for the first 30 minutes of gameplay but then i simply didnt notice it anymore). [9/10]

Soundtrack is solid. Its lacking in quantity but definitly delivers with quality. [8/10]

The story is kinda cliche for JRPGs (friendship, overcoming odds, good vs. evil - you know the drill) and not overwhelming in any sense but still decent with a few twists and turns here and there. Especially from a spiritual successor to Suikoden i expected a lot more on that part - but maybe iam just spoiled by Suikoden II [6/10]

In addition the game only had a few minor bugs on release which feels like a breeze in modern gaming, where most AAA games are basically unplayable for two weeks after release.

tl;dr

The game is a fully dubbed, solid, classic JRPG and even if you never played a Suikoden game before you will find it enjoyable, if you like JRPGs. Its only held back by a somehwat dull story and a few janky mechanics. Even strangers of the genre might find it enjoyable due to variety of characters and side activities. Overall [7.8/10]

Wardens review bombing the game because of skill issue.

Used to be a great game. Unfortunatly it now forces you to create an Epic Games account.