Recent reviews by Erdrick

Number go up make good brain chemical.

Make sure it wins every award just to humiliate the AAA games industry. For the memes, friends. For the MEMES.

I've never had so much fun:
1) Being terrified by random noises
2) Running for my life
3) Dying over and over

Game is jank, and there's a lot of work yet to be done. But it nails the vibe, and it's damn fun. Nothing else matters to me.

The definitive example of what a remaster should be: giving a game that never got a chance to truly shine a second chance at success, while also keeping intact all the things that made the original players love it in the first place. And even after all this time, the emotional beats of the story still land.

Highly recommended.

It's like if Overwatch was good. Plus it's free to play. Try it.

The greatest and still the best idle game (and the only one I play lol). You can technically just play the web version for free, but c'mon ... Orteil deserves a little something for all the work he's put into this nonsense. Cough it up and click some cookies!

Let's be clear: this is probably better described as an HD port than a full remaster. Many of the video cutscenes from the original are still rendered in SD resolution with letterboxing which frankly looks terrible on a modern screen, for some baffling reason Atlus reused the old compressed sample rate music instead of the easily-obtainable uncompressed versions, and the lack of in-depth graphical options (such as 4k/8k display options or FPS above 30) will probably make "PC master race" types scream.

But honestly? None of that matters much to me.

This is, hands-down, one of the (if not THE) greatest JRPGs of the PS2 generation, and it's one that a lot of people have not played. Even for those of us that have, this is the definitive version. The game looks better than ever, and some QoL additions (such as being able to choose skills during fusion instead of re-rolling them endlessly) make it play better as well. The voice acting is fantastic, and adds a lot of character and gravitas to the much-underappreciated story. If you are the sort who is tired of the "traditional" JRPG group of happy-go-lucky adventurers fighting to sAvE tHe WoRlD, or who wants something more tactically-dense than "press Attack over and over until everything is dead", or if you're just someone who appreciates a game that doesn't insult your intelligence, this is the game you've been missing out on.

My only true criticism (aside from the compressed audio, which is pretty unforgivable) is that, admittedly, the price of this game may be asking too much for some. I'm a longtime fan, so I don't balk at it, but for anyone else that's not sure, I'd say wait for a sale. $30-$40 is probably a more fair price ($20 would make it an absolute must-buy). That said, snap it up on the cheap (or get someone to buy it for you even) as soon as you can. It's time to see what all the hype is about.

gO pLaY a ReAl ShIn MeGuMi TeNsAy GaMe

It's Slay the Spire but with boobs and penises and sex. Really not too much more to say beyond that.

Okay fine, the models are so-so, kind of bland and stiff, and there's some ragdoll silliness when things die. There are balance issues; some cards are overtuned must-haves, others are clearly trash that you'll never take, even for free. There's some typos here and there, and the story isn't anything noteworthy. But generally-speaking? If you like Slay the Spire and you like watching a succubus get railed in a variety of ways, you could definitely do worse.

It's easy to see why this game was so highly-rated by critics. Picturesque backgrounds, an interesting premise, and decent voice-acting work all contribute to a surface appearance of a quality game experience.

Sadly, the final product is yet another example of an interesting premise ruined by a shoddy delivery.

What could be a potentially-interesting sci-fi/paranormal mystery is hampered by uninteresting and unlikeable characters, and a slipshod plot filled with contrivances and held back from any explorations of the mystery theme to instead indulge in melodramatic teen angst. There's no plot to explore beyond "go to island, spoopy things happen", and none of the side characters are really explored in any depth. Instead everyone is shallow and one-note, a flat cutout for the player to interact with (or ignore, thankfully) that has no real bearing on the overall story beyond the now-prerequisite "Were you nice or mean?" checkboxes needed to decide which of the endings you get. That alone might be worth something if the player were given any reason to actually care about the side characters, but sadly, this just isn't the case. The player is never given a chance to really know any of the other characters in-depth, even if they choose to make the effort. Rather, they exist only in how they relate to the main character, who herself treads some pretty run-of-the-mill territory as far as protagonists go.

On that note, the player has a tiny bit of leeway to influence the main character's development, but even that is bungled since the option to choose numerous dialog options at various points means her personality can end up being completely uneven; you can be horrible jerk to everyone and still be randomly kind for no reason, or vice-versa, and the game can't really anticipate or react to that in any meanfully way beyond "well you were still a jerk 90% of the time, so I guess you get the jerk ending".

The problem, then, is player investment. If you care about teen angst and are willing to get drawn into a YA novella about unlikeable kids arguing with each other, then maybe you'll get something more out of the "plot" experience. But even if that's the case, there's still no real enjoyable game experience to be had. There are no real puzzles to solve beyond "go here, do X, go here, do Y". There are two spots in the game where you're given a "quiz", but failing them has zero effect on the plot so there's no reason to bother even trying. There are collectibles to find, but they all revolve around the player's radio item, which amounts to popping it open and scrolling until you get the right frequency—not a lot of brainpower involved there. All of this is made into even more of a chore given that the main character moves at an agonizingly-slow pace, only running seemingly at random. This is made even worse when you require a follower NPC, as they often have a tendency to lag behind or get stuck in the environment, forcing you to wait for them before you can transition to the next area or use whatever object you're looking at. This only exacerbates the game's already plodding pace into any absolute slog. I've heard tell the game can be finished in roughly 3 hours if you don't bother with collectibles, and I'd hazard a guess that at least 80% of that is just watching Alex slowly shuffle her way across the screen while one of her inane companions yammers on incessantly about nothing of relevance to the plot.

If you're willing to essentially turn off your brain and just let the game's developers pitch their ersatz-Stranger Things screenplay idea at you for a few hours, maybe you'll get something out of the hackneyed plot and shallow characters and faux-80s style. But for me personally, I've seen it all before, and there's just nothing here to grip me or invest me in the game beyond looking at the seams and realizing how easily it all comes apart,

tl;dr: The plot is a mess of annoying characters, and the game itself has no challenge or difficulty or thought to it. There's just not a lot to like here. But I mean, I guess the backgrounds are pretty? And the voice actors really did the best with the material they had? And it's got some of that faux-80s soundtrack going that's all the rage these days thanks to Stranger Things? So I guess that's an B+ right there, 8/10, 4 out of 5 stars, yadda yadda yadda.

It's not a terrible game, but I can't recommend it to anyone that enjoys a remote amount of depth. Go play Night in the Woods instead. It's more charming, the plot has better build-up and payoff, and there's some actual gameplay in there to boot.

This game is a near-perfect, lasciviously-brutal beat-'em-up experience. You could call it Street of Rage painted with a layer of Hotline Miami and liberally smeared with Soviet-era filth, but even that is doing the game a disservice. From the stylistical visuals to the intoxicating soundtrack by Fixions, from the satisfying crunch of smashing a mobster's skull to paste to the blissful crack of fire spewing from the barrel of a bloodstained AK-47, this game is an experience to be savored. The controls are tight and responsive, and the combat is light enough to easily learn while still deep enough to keep you on your toes to the very end. Enemies are varied, not only in appearance but in behavior and preferred manner of attack, forcing you to constantly adapt to changing situations, especially when stage hazards present themselves.

There's nothing else to say. Get this game now, товарищ.

Dark. Gothic. Brutal. Unforgiving.

And above all else? Immensely satisfying. Highly recommended.

UPDATED: Full game is out. Still great. Just be ready to have a bad time.