Recent reviews by TheColdOne

The team behind the Persona series keeps one-upping themselves with every entry. This might be their best game yet, though I know that is very subjective.

Obviously they have the very strong points of story and characters, with just pitch-perfect writing and voice-acting, the emotional points hit hard and I grew to really enjoy each of the characters.

Even after it was over and I played through the epilogue, I wished so much that there was more game and I could spend more time in this world.

The gameplay hybridized a bit between Persona and a traditional SMT (Digital Devil Saga) where they ditch the demon recruitment and ease up on requirements for social rank upgrades (no need to spend extra time with them, just unlock the next rank when you have the opportunity).

I've actually recommended this game to a few friends who have trouble getting into the Persona games because of the lightening on the social requirements and whatnot, as well as the change of scenery to being high fantasy.

But yeah, this game isn't perfect, but it's pretty damn close. Any issues I had are incredibly minor and I got over pretty quickly. I didn't go into the launch of this game expecting much or to play it at launch, but that demo put me over the edge and I do not regret getting into it right away.

I only paid a few dollars for it, but... man, this game is really rough.

I think my main problem is that it is VERY basic. The controls are good enough, but it's just "going through the motions". Maybe if they explained the mechanics better. It was weird that they OVER explained the combos in the beginning, but then didn't provide any explanation for the little tokens you can apply with energy levels and other gear/items.

Then I just go through basic/plain platforms and enemies, mashing the same basic combo and dashing as-needed. I couldn't even get through the whole first area/zone (after the tutorial and village).

This is a soft recommendation. Like, 6.5/10. The 3rd dungeon was a chore, I will just say that now. The combat isn't fun enough to carry through the entirety of the game and loses it's charm moderately quick. With the emphasis on status affects and applying it to enemies with combos, etc, I don't think they really did a good job supplying much opportunity with the characters and their core demons. Even recruiting demons for extra abilities doesn't offer tons of variety.

But it was fun enough and the art was fantastic. The story was good, not great. It's a really good "first try" kind of thing and I don't mind having supported it at launch. I do also look forward to this developer's future titles as they continue to refine their design skills.

Oh, and I guess the social aspects were mostly good (also not great). The writing was hit-and-miss (more hit than miss). Some social stuff was obscure and I never took part, like the music clubs or the book club. Some entirely missed side quests, I think, that were too out of the way or not obviously interactive when walking by. You also end up with so much money halfway through the game that growing crops becomes completely pointless. That and I had the best great before the end of the second dungeon.

Really strong indie entry. The overall experience feels satisfying and within a reasonable amount of play time. I didn't 100% it, but I didn't feel I needed to anyways (I didn't care about some of the optional objectives, but I did complete most tracked sidequests).

Not sure how I feel about the ending, but I'd play the sequel if it happened.

Not sure if this is my new favorite Of Mana game, but it's definitely close.

My only downsides are:
- Too many side quests (I felt pressured to do as many as possible but many were just boring busywork)
- Not enough detail in facial animations for key characters
- Maybe too easy when you find out a broken build (Morley with Moon Vessel and Crit % + Crit Damage buffs)

But overall I thought the story, characters and world were really enjoyable. It was also a little longer than I expected, but at least it didn't try to be a 60-80 hour RPG.

Easily the best combat in any Mana game so far too. I was really impressed with both how traversal felt as well as how well-built the combat mechanics/controls were.

A soft recommendation. The story is fun, the cutscenes/animation/visuals overall are pleasing, and (best of all) it works well on Steam Deck! Well, except for the snowy mountain level where the performance drops were frequent. But everything else ran mostly smoothly.

The gameplay gets HARD though. Halfway through the game I had to drop it to Easy and even then I barely made it through some of the fights (including the final boss).

It was a nice little story with some good gameplay. Though sometimes traveling longer distances with just skimming along the water felt like a bit of a chore in-between the "acrobatic" launchers and ramps. The combat could have been a little more involved as well with something like a lock-on and a block/counter.

The shorter runtime was also welcome and it felt like an appropriate amount of time to spend with this game/story.

it doesn't quite hit the highs of the best Suikoden games, but it is still really good for anyone looking forward to a spiritual successor.

And that epilogue text went way too fast for reading at a comfortable speed (and it is a lot of info at that speed since I got all characters).

I wish it was little longer, but it was fun and told a good story with quality characters.

It's very "ok", but in the way that it gets boring pretty quick. The character range from fine to annoying, the humor is very hit-or-miss, and the gameplay itself doesn't feel good enough to carry through the entire game. I wanted to keep giving it a chance since the time to complete isn't long, but I just couldn't after a couple more levels.