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It's definitely admirable that Ubisoft are trying to create a serious COD competitor in XDefiant and I hope they keep at it, but between the general "discount COD" feel, constant jitter on my system (regardless of if DX11 or DX12 is enabled) & the lacking movement compared to Modern Warfare III, I just can't play this game any longer when I can just play MWIII instead. Again, I hope Ubisoft San Francisco can keep up the solid community engagement & responsiveness they've shown thus far and make this an even better COD alternative. Competition is always good for the consumer and COD having a strong, great competitor in XDefiant will only make COD better. But (for me at least), MWIII is the better multiplayer game & I can't imagine that Black Ops 6 will be worse either. Maybe if this had managed to enter full release before MWIII came out, I'd be more willing to overlook more of XDefiant's shortcomings out of sheer desperation for an alternative to MWII, but... that's not the case. Ratings: Creative score (story, gameplay, voice acting, art direction): 6/10 Technical score (graphics, audio, performance)): 4/10 Business Practices score: 7/10 (about as respectable as can be expected of a F2P game) Overall score (my thoughts on a game’s overall quality, does not consider the business practices unless they are detrimental to the experience): 5/10

My time with Final Fantasy VII Rebirth was one filled with peaks and valleys. At its best, Rebirth rivals FFXIV & FFXVI for some of the best moments of any FF I’ve played so far, with difficulty that makes use of its stellar combat system & incredible music. At its worst, Rebirth was just an utter slog infested with mini-games that are mostly tedious to play through, even when focusing on the main story. The open world was… fine, but didn’t do much that hasn’t been done in games like FFXV, Horizon: Zero Dawn & the Ubisoft Open World games aside from littering the world & main story with a **** of mini-games… more of which were misses than hits. I enjoyed Rebirth on the whole, but I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t less excited for Part 3 now than I was for Rebirth after finishing Remake. Or that I didn’t prefer FFXVI or even Lightning Returns to an extent over Rebirth. Ratings: Creative score (story, gameplay, voice acting, art direction): 7.5/10 Technical score (graphics, audio, performance)): 8.5/10 Business Practices score: 8.5/10 (a time exclusivity deal for PS5 detracts from some great consumer-friendly decisions like shipping Rebirth on two discs to ensure it’s playable entirely without an internet connection, something that feels increasingly rare in this era of Day 1 patches & games like COD & Starfield shipping either incomplete on disc or with a disc that’s basically a license to download the game) Overall score (my thoughts on a game’s overall quality, does not consider the business practices unless they are detrimental to the experience): 8/10

Modern Warfare III rings in the 20th anniversary of Call of Duty with a whimper rather than a bang. Sure, the multiplayer feels good to play, is some of the most fun I’ve had with COD MP in years, and Sledgehammer has been proactive in responding to community feedback... But it’s hard to argue that MWIII is as different from MWII as MWII was from MW19. The campaign feels like DLC for MWII and very much deserves the negative publicity it’s been getting, and Zombies just feels like Treyarch took DMZ and made some changes to make it a Zombies mode. So, while I don’t regret getting this game for the MP, I can’t argue that this is one of the better COD games in recent memory if the whole package is considered… Hopefully, Treyarch’s game next year is a banger. Ratings: Creative score (story, gameplay, voice acting, art direction, etc.): Campaign: 6.5 out of 10Multiplayer: 8 out of 10Zombies: 6 out of 10Whole Package: 7 out of 10Technical score (graphics, audio, performance)): Campaign: 7/10Multiplayer: 7.5/10Zombies: 7/10Whole Package: 7/10Business Practices score: 3/10 (All the business practice issues MWII had plus the fact that Activision took something intended to be an expansion for MWII, turned it into a sequel and forced Sledgehammer to rush it out the door to release in November 2023) Overall score (my thoughts on a game’s overall quality, does not consider the business practices unless they are detrimental to the experience): Campaign: 5.5/10 Multiplayer: 7/10 Zombies: 6/10 Whole Package: 6/10

When Quantum Break was announced a decade ago, Remedy promised that it would be “the ultimate Remedy experience”. While that game fell short of that lofty claim, Alan Wake II very much is the ultimate Remedy experience, their magnum opus so to speak. The story is probably their best, most idiosyncratic, meta & strange narrative to date. The characters are all layered and complex. The mix of gameplay, real-time cutscenes & live-action video feels just right. The survival-horror genre manages to fit Remedy’s sensibilities like a glove (even if the upgrade system feels as though it’s more present due to obligation to the genre than anything else). The graphics & technology are some of the best in the industry and (along with certain chapters of the story) feel like Remedy is truly pushing video games as an industry & art form forward. This is my Game of the Year for 2023 & it’s hard to see anything else topping it, not even fellow GOTY frontrunners Baldur’s Gate III & The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom. It is truly incredible that Epic Games let Remedy truly go wild with this game & if this is representative of how they plan to get people to use the Epic Games Store going forward, I’m on board (as long as they also realize that they need to improve the user experience & feature set of the Epic Games Launcher too if this strategy is going to work). Especially since Valve seems content to profit off literal gambling with Counter-Strike 2, which is disgusting to me for reasons I went into in my review of that game…Ratings: Creative score (story, gameplay, voice acting, art direction): 10/10Technical score (graphics, audio, performance)): 9.5/10 (assuming the bugs eventually get fixed) 8/10 (as of now) Business Practices score: 7/10 (Not much to complain about. Even the Epic Games Store exclusivity is much of an issue this time considering Epic both published this game & funded its development. The lack of a physical release (even on console) blows though) Overall score (my thoughts on a game’s overall quality, does not consider the business practices unless they are detrimental to the experience): 9/10 (as of now) 10/10 (assuming the bugs are eventually fixed)

EDIT: Whoops! Meant to post this as a PC review, but Metacritic won't let me delete this. So... Here you go. When Quantum Break was announced a decade ago, Remedy promised that it would be “the ultimate Remedy experience”. While that game fell short of that lofty claim, Alan Wake II very much is the ultimate Remedy experience, their magnum opus so to speak. The story is probably their best, most idiosyncratic, meta & strange narrative to date. The characters are all layered and complex. The mix of gameplay, real-time cutscenes & live-action video feels just right. The survival-horror genre manages to fit Remedy’s sensibilities like a glove (even if the upgrade system feels as though it’s more present due to obligation to the genre than anything else). The graphics & technology are some of the best in the industry and (along with certain chapters of the story) feel like Remedy is truly pushing video games as an industry & art form forward. This is my Game of the Year for 2023 & it’s hard to see anything else topping it, not even fellow GOTY frontrunners Baldur’s Gate III & The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom. It is truly incredible that Epic Games let Remedy truly go wild with this game & if this is representative of how they plan to get people to use the Epic Games Store going forward, I’m on board (as long as they also realize that they need to improve the user experience & feature set of the Epic Games Launcher too if this strategy is going to work). Especially since Valve seems content to profit off literal gambling with Counter-Strike 2, which is disgusting to me for reasons I went into in my review of that game…Ratings: Creative score (story, gameplay, voice acting, art direction): 10/10Technical score (graphics, audio, performance)): 9.5/10 (assuming the bugs eventually get fixed) 8/10 (as of now) Business Practices score: 7/10 (Not much to complain about. Even the Epic Games Store exclusivity is much of an issue this time considering Epic both published this game & funded its development. The lack of a physical release (even on console) blows though) Overall score (my thoughts on a game’s overall quality, does not consider the business practices unless they are detrimental to the experience): 9/10 (as of now) 10/10 (assuming the bugs are eventually fixed)

A bare minimum "sequel" to CSGO that pulls an Overwatch 2 in replacing the original for no good reason.I personally found CSGO to be too hardcore & esports focused for my tastes and CS2 didn't change my ****, and I hate the gambling mechanics in this game. It's somehow worse & more blatantly gambling than any Gacha game. Which is saying something. It legit makes me kinda hate Valve for being so happy to profit off this ****! Especially since Epic are publishing & funding high-quality experiences like Alan Wake II to get me to use their launcher. If you enjoy Counter-Strike, you keep doing you & enjoy it. It's just not my thing... Ratings: Creative score (story, gameplay, voice acting, art direction): 6/10 Technical score (graphics, audio, performance)): 7/10 (fine for what it is & does what it sets out to do, but not pushing boundaries) Business Practices score: 2/10 (literal gambling, overwriting its predecessor for no good reason & CSGO & TF2's marketplaces were what NFTs were trying to imitate and that's still here) Overall score (my thoughts on a game’s overall quality, does not consider the business practices unless they are detrimental to the experience): 4/10

Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII - Reunion is a pretty solid remaster of an overall decent game. The story is good & makes the whole experience worthwhile, even if the combat outside of boss fights gets old rather quickly & the myriad of side missions reminds you this was originally intended as a handheld game. I’d recommend playing it if you like Final Fantasy VII and/or Final Fantasy VII Remake and want to learn more about the game’s story and world, but if you aren’t a fan of Final Fantasy VII… I’d suggest starting with the original or Remake first and then circling back to Crisis Core later. Ratings: Creative score (story, gameplay, voice acting, art direction): 7.5/10 Technical score (graphics, audio, performance)): 7.5/10 Business Practices score: 6/10 (nothing downright offensive, but nothing special either) Overall score (my thoughts on a game’s overall quality, does not consider the business practices unless they are detrimental to the experience): 7.5/10

NOTE: Review originally posted on HowLongtoBeat on April 3, 2022 The gameplay is fun, the visuals are stunning (with damn good implementation of Ray Tracing & DLSS), and the rating system does provide some replayability. It is pretty short though.

Vanguard isn’t the worst COD game ever. But if you aren’t into COD already and a BIG fan of World War II shooters willing to swallow some out-of-place weapon variants and cosmetics, I’d suggest just buying a different COD like Black Ops: Cold War, MWII or the upcoming MWIII instead of playing Vanguard at this point for multiplayer. And stay away from Vanguard Zombies, it's a dumpster fire! The campaign is pretty fun though, but still one of the weaker COD campaigns.

Final Fantasy XV has a great core cast, excellent OST, & a good story that are held back by half-baked & simplistic feeling combat, a rushed pre-launch production cycle that had a fixed endpoint, a lengthy stint in development hell before that & an open world that feels empty & not worth exploring after a while. Definitely my second least favourite FF out of the ones I’ve finished (only beating out XIII-2), but VII Remake & especially XIV and XVI have set the bar very high (didn’t finish XIII to be honest, just watched the story on YouTube so I could move on to XIII-2) & XV is still a decent or even good game underneath all of its shortcomings.

While it sure isn’t for everyone, Bonelab is definitely an experience unlike (almost) anything else you can play in VR at the moment. It takes advantage of the added immersion & motion controls of modern VR headsets to create a gameplay loop that just feels natural once you have overcome the learning curve.

Final Fantasy XVI is an excellent character action-RPG with unforgettable boss fights, a tight & fluid action-combat system & an amazing story that quickly proves itself to be more than just Game of Thrones-lite & brings its own distinct feel separate from anything that came before it in the Final Fantasy franchise while still feeling like a Final Fantasy game (especially if you got into the franchise with XIV like I did). A true testament to the flexibility & ever-changing nature of the Final Fantasy franchise. Shame about the lacking difficulty & bad early-game side quests though… Ratings Creative score (story, gameplay, voice acting, art direction): 9.5/10 Technical score (graphics, audio, performance)): 8.5/10 Business Practices score: 6/10 (points mainly detracted for the whole PS5 timed exclusive thing) Overall score (my thoughts on a game’s overall quality, does not consider the business practices unless they are detrimental to the experience): 9.5 out of 10

Lightning Returns is an overambitious, experimental & emotional finale to the Final Fantasy XIII trilogy/Lightning Saga. The combat is pretty fun with a surprising amount of depth for a team that had never really done action-combat before, with it's DNA being pretty visible in Final Fantasy VII Remake. The story, while undeniably a mess that was made messier by the localization, is a pretty decent one that adds a lot of depth and nuance to Lightning as a character. The time limit is an interesting attempt to impose the pressure Lightning faces in her final mission onto the player, but is balanced in such a way that players will either be turned off by it's inclusion or find it too generous to pose much of a concern. Decent PC port though. Up to 4K resolution with 60 FPS & improved lighting, Depth of Field & texture filtering (although the visuals are generally pretty poor compared to other late 7th gen games like The Last of Us & GTA V and there still are some performance issues due to the Crystal Tools engine being pushed way beyond it's comfort zone). This PC port is also much more stable than XIII & especially XIII-2's ports. Ratings Creative score (story, gameplay, voice acting, art direction): 8/10 Technical score (graphics, audio, performance)): 6/10 Business Practices score: 6/10 (fine, but there was a **** of costume DLC, all of which have stat boosts due to the Schemata System & consumer outcry over XIII-2’s costumes lacking any (that feels weird to say given the push back against any form of Pay to Win these days), although these costumes are included in the PC port with some exceptions that can be re-added via mods) Overall score (my thoughts on a game’s overall quality, doesn’t consider the business practices unless they are detrimental to the experience): 8/10 An extended version of this review can be read here: ****/user/NN010/reviews/3211423/

The story is actually pretty good. The characters get a decent amount of development & their dynamic is interesting for a JRPG. Villain is a bit lacklustre though. He ain't no Emet-Selch, Sephiroth or Ardyn. Too bad the gameplay is terrible and ruined by a combat system that feels like it's trying to please turn-based purists & people who mostly play action games & utterly fails in the process. The inability to control the party leader's movement in combat proved particularly frustrating for me to the point where I gave up and watched the rest of the story on YouTube instead. Paradigms have some potential, but feel utterly wasted in this disaster of a battle system. In short: My recommendation is to enjoy the story, but skip the game itself. By far the worst Final Fantasy I've played so far (although I've only finished XIV + all its expansions, XV + all its DLC & VII Remake). Damn shame that this was the one I tried first all those years ago on the 360 (even though I had a PS3 and could have easily just bought the X/X-2 HD Remaster or downloaded a trial for XIV instead). Here's a mini-series edit I can personally recommend: ****/playlist?list=PLlMscAdJiuKqJxQ98OSU-GpVR0zVneVOe Ratings: Story: 7.5/10 Gameplay: 2/10 Overall Score: 5/10

It's better than XIII! With a somehow more straightforward story and an emotional core about the value of life & determining your own destiny XIII-2's highs are much higher than XIII's. Combine that with the game giving you access to XIII's combat system's full potential from the get-go & great as always music, XIII-2 is worth playing if you managed to get through XIII. Hell, skipping XIII & jumping straight to XIII-2 wouldn't be the worst idea given the story does sideline most of the first game's main cast & focuses on new characters (and Serah, but she was a crystal for most of XIII anyway). Now I'll have to see if Lightning Returns keeps up this momentum! Especially given that cliffhanger. As for the issues with the PC port, just install FF13Fix & a Large Address Aware patch, and you'll be fine. Ratings: Creative score (story, gameplay, voice acting, art direction): 7.5/10 Technical score (graphics, audio, performance)): 6/10 (pretty good graphics for its day, but the PC port is terrible) Business Practices score: 6.5/10 (not terrible, but there was a lot of DLC for this game, including some bizarre Assassin’s Creed & Mass Effect crossover costumes) Overall score (my thoughts on a game’s overall quality, doesn’t consider the business practices unless they are detrimental to the experience): 7/10

Campaign is pretty good. Not the best COD campaign & not all of it's changes to the COD formula work (looking at you armoured enemies & tank boss fight), but it's a good time and tells an engaging enough story. Multiplayer is fun if you liked Modern Warfare (2019), but it's still in a somewhat rough state & could be better (plus it seems like the issues of Vanguard's post-launch support are rearing their ugly head again). Haven't played much of Spec Ops, but it's 100% much better than MW19. Overall, I recommend Modern Warfare II, but not at $70 USD/$90 CAD. Wait for a sale. Ratings: Creative score (story, gameplay, voice acting, art direction): 8.5/10 Technical score (graphics, audio, optimization): 8/10 Business Practices score: 5/10 (Not terrible, but exclusive content on PlayStation, microtransactions & a FOMO-inducing Battle Pass do knock this game down a few notches (without even getting into the terrible practices of Activision as a company) Overall score (my thoughts on a game’s overall quality, doesn’t consider the business practices unless they are detrimental to the experience): 8/10

Endwalker is an outstanding finale to the Hydaelyn/Zodiark saga that began in A Realm Reborn that has some of the most creative gameplay segments of this entire game, a story that not only lives up to the bar set by Shadowbringers, but actually surpasses it with an even more emotional, heartwarming, & gut-wrenching story about life, its meaning, suffering, despair, & joy, and great pacing for a story that actually was the result of two expansions combined into one. Endwalker has become my new gold standard for how to end a long-running story arc. Believe the hype around this game's story. It is well deserved!

Final Fantasy XIV: Stormblood has some great gameplay segments & encounter design, but it's held back from surpassing Heavensward by a story that felt like two expansions smushed into one (still better than A Realm Reborn's story though). Far from a bad expansion, but still the weakest link due to just how great Heavensward, Shadowbringers, & Endwalker are.

Final Fantasy XIV: Heavensward is a solid expansion & a huge step up over A Realm Reborn in terms of story, but it does still have some pacing issues and you can still see some growing pains in some respects.

Warzone 2.0 feels like a case of "One step forward, one step back" right now, but Raven are doing the work to get it back up to the level the final months of Warzone 1 were at. DMZ is a cool addition, but I'll admit to mostly sticking to Battle Royale (please add a solo mode to DMZ Raven, it would make it a better experience for lone wolves like me). There are also a ton of technical problems. So many crashes, bugs & general technical issues. It just feels like yet another game that got rushed out the door to meet a release date. Honestly, while I'm enjoying Warzone 2.0, I also am a heavily entrenched Warzone vet who's stuck with it through thick & thin. DMZ is worth trying (if only bc it's the most accessible way to try out the Extraction Shooter genre that seems set to be the next big thing), but Battle Royale is in a rough spot right now & Infinity Ward did make quite a few bad design choices when making this game. Hopefully Raven will continue refining this game into what it should have always been & that Infinity Ward is never given so much control over Warzone's direction ever again. They may have conceived this mode, but Raven has proven to be better at shaping Warzone into a fun & enjoyable game that its fans can play for weeks or even months on end… Creative score (story, gameplay, voice acting, art direction): 5/10 Technical score (graphics, audio, optimization): 7/10 (While the graphics & audio in this game are phenomenal, I have to dock points for Engagement Optimized Matchmaking, the instability, glitches & crashing issues)) Business Practices score: 4/10 (Not terrible, but exclusive content on PlayStation, microtransactions & a FOMO-inducing Battle Pass do knock this game down a few notches (without even getting into the terrible practices of Activision as a company) Overall score (my thoughts on a game’s overall quality, doesn’t consider the business practices unless they are detrimental to the experience): 6/10

Final Fantasy XIV: Shadowbringers is a masterpiece of an RPG that manages to tell an emotional & heartfelt story and has some great gameplay & encounter design along the way. It still bears a few of FFXIV's pacing problems, but it's still come a long way since A Realm Reborn. The music of this expansion is also superb! 10/10. “Remember… Remember us… Remember that we once lived.”

First off, the gameplay. The combat is a middle ground between traditional turn-based JRPGs & strategy RPGs like Fire Emblem. Like Fire Emblem, Trails in the Sky uses a grid system which controls where your characters can move. But like a traditional turn-based JRPG, you have an overworld and are teleported to a separate dimension for battles (at least that’s how it feels). I will say that, as someone who hasn’t played many turn-based JRPGs & didn’t enjoy a more traditional one like Dragon Quest XI, I actually did enjoy this battle system at times. I say at times because random encounters with standard monsters got old after a while. The story on the other hand is pretty good & has plenty of charm. It starts out as a pretty low-stakes affair, with Estelle & Joshua travelling from one city to another, being contracted to deal with whatever local crisis the citizens are dealing with and getting the assistance of a colourful cast of characters along the way. But as they get closer & closer to their goal of becoming senior Bracers, the stakes get higher & higher, building towards a heart-breaking cliffhanger ending that will leave you eager to start Second Chapter (the game’s direct sequel) but nevertheless wraps up most of the game’s overarching plotlines. The amazing thing is that, even though this game & Second Chapter were supposed to be a single game, but got split into two games to make its targeted release date, it feels like this story was always meant to be a two-parter! Either that’s a testament to how good of an idea the two-parter angle was or Falcom did an excellent job making the split work. Either way, multi-game arcs are seemingly the standard going forward, so it’ll be interesting to see if I feel the same way about the Crossbell & Cold Steel arcs. It’s definitely a very JRPG trope-heavy plot, but that’s not a bad thing so long as the plot itself is engaging, which this one is. As for the technical aspects, the visuals hold up pretty well for an almost 20-year-old game (perhaps this is due to the 2D sprite art used for the characters just inherently aging better than 3D rendering), although the environments (which do seem to be rendered in 3D) haven’t aged as gracefully, but still fare better than most games from this time period that aimed for a more realistic art-style. And the music! Oh, boy is the music great! Created in-house by Falcom’s Sound Team jdk, the OST of Trails in the Sky is full of bangers & I’ve already added quite a few of them to my liked songs on Spotify! Conclusion Despite it’s age, Trails in the Sky is a pretty good RPG with a fun & captivating story that balances telling a self-contained story & kicking off the ongoing narrative that defines the Trails series to this day, paired with gameplay that, while far from perfect, estabilshes a decent foundation to build on in future games. I just hope that the rest of the saga can at least live up to the standard this opening chapter has set in my mind… Ratings Creative score (story, gameplay, voice acting, art direction): 8/10 Technical score (graphics, audio, performance)): 7.5/10 Business Practices score: 8/10 (Nothing egregiously bad, but Falcom’s hesitation regarding releasing the PC version in the West when it was clear that the PSP’s struggles here were a key contributor to the initial release failing commercially does knock off a few points, but I’ll save the details of that for when I finish & review Second Chapter) Overall score (my thoughts on a game’s overall quality, does not consider the business practices unless they are detrimental to the experience): 8.5/10

Before I get into the story, I would like to discuss this game’s biggest strength: the gameplay. Whilst I haven’t played the Nioh games, it is clear that Team Ninja did take a lot of cues from what they’d done in that series when designing this game. Subsequently, while Dark Souls & Elden Ring comparisons are inevitable, Stranger of Paradise is pretty different & much faster paced than those games. Instead of mostly dodging until you can attack enemies from behind, Stranger of Paradise mostly encourages you to either block attacks or use the game’s Soul Shield ability to parry them and gain additional MP slots for using abilities (with the occasional attack you have to dodge, but those are signposted clearly). Stranger of Paradise also emphasizes running down an enemy’s stagger gauge to perform instant takedown moves. The default controls are reminiscent of other Souls-Likes, but you can switch to a more Nioh/Devil May Cry-esque control scheme in the options menu. My biggest issue with the combat really is just that the game is so generous with weapons & armour that in the late-game you have to dismantle a bunch of old gear every couple of missions. It’s a time consuming process & in my experience the auto-dismantle feature Team Ninja added in a post-release patch doesn’t work. Overall, unless you’re looking for a pure Souls-like experience, Stranger of Paradise offers a dynamic & fast-paced combat system that nevertheless takes inspiration from Dark Souls. And if you aren’t into the high difficulty of Souls-Likes (or are just here for the story and/or memes), the game does have lower difficulty settings to make the game more enjoyable for you. As for the story (co-written by Final Fantasy VII, FFVIII & Kingdom Hearts 2 writer Kazuhige Nojima), it is an… interesting experience. At first, it feels like so bad, it’s good edgy throwback to the 2000s wherein the protagonist seemingly drops more curse words than every character in the rest of the Final Fantasy series combined. But as you get closer to the end the story starts to become actually good. The edgy exterior starts to give way to an unexpectedly emotional story about the folly of anger & the importance of memory. Similarly, the dialogue also goes from meme-worthy to good as the game goes on (ex: the **** scene takes place in the first couple of hours). On a related note, the music (mainly composed by FFXIII-2 co-composer Naoshi Mizuta) is pretty good and calls back to previous Final Fantasy games in subtle, but appreciated ways. Speaking of references to previous Final Fantasy games, Stranger of Paradise, being the game released to mark the 35th anniversary of the Final Fantasy franchise, has numerous references & call backs to previous FF games. Most of them take the form of dungeons being inspired by (and implied in-universe to pulled from the worlds of) previous Final Fantasy games (ex: The Crystal Tower from FFIII (also a prominant location in FFXIV), Sunleth Waterscape from FFXIII, Sastasha from FFXIV & the Citadel from FFXV), but outside of that, there are plenty of classic Final Fantasy elements included (ex: Chaos, Warriors of Light & a Job system reminiscent of FFV & FFXIV). These references aren’t so all-consuming that they detract from the story being told, though. Moving on to the technical & visual aspects, Stranger of Paradise is a mixed bag. On one hand, the art direction is as good as should be expected from a Square Enix game. Sure Jack looks like a generic video game protagonist from the late 2000s-early 2010s, but that feels intentional given the direction the story goes in & the rest of characters do have designs that fit their characters. The only one I can really question is Neon wearing a school-girl outfit. Is it meant to signify how she’s younger than the rest of the cast? Maybe, but she’s supposed to be 18 according to the Final Fantasy Wiki (or at least her physical appearance is). Most likely explanation is that someone at Team Ninja and/or Square Enix wanted one of the characters to wear a school girl outfit and didn’t care how little sense it made. As for the technical side of things, this game is a mess. It’s been patched to improve performance, but the game’s visuals still aren’t up to par for a PS5 game. The anti-aliasing solution Team Ninja are using can’t keep up with this game’s environment design & causes the game to look like a shimmery, blurry mess at times (and this is with the game set to resolution mode!). And it’s not a case of Team Ninja not putting much effort into the PS5 version. The PS4, Xbox One & Series S versions are even worse in this regard & people found at launch that the PC version’s framerate tanks whenever there is fur or hair on s

The first thing you should know about Persona 5 Royal is that it isn't a sequel or spin-off of Persona 5. It is, in fact, more of an expanded re-release of the original game with quality-of-life improvements, new mechanics & various additions to the story. So Royal does supersede the original game both in canon and as the superior version of the game. As for thoughts on the game itself, the story is solid. The opening arc does a great job of easing newcomers into the mechanics & world of this game while also getting them invested in the plot & characters fairly quickly. The rest of the story is consistently pretty engaging, with the new Royal content being pretty seamlessly integrated with the original Persona 5’s story (until it isn’t, but at that point, it’s clearly supposed to be jarring for story reasons I won’t get into here) & building off of the original’s themes, at least to someone like me who didn’t play much of the original/vanilla Persona 5. The villains, while generally hate sinks with little nuance, are enough to keep you invested in the narrative & there are a couple of more nuanced antagonists later on. The game even manages to have quite a few tear-jerking moments. There are some dry stretches though, with the section right before the Okumura arc being the worst part of the story, filled with Idiot Ball/Conflict Ball moments & generally less interesting events outside of maybe the Hawaii trip. The Confidants, essentially a series of side-stories where Joker helps either his fellow Phantom Thieves or an eclectic set of his peers & down on their luck adults with their problems, are a mixed bag. Some have both an engaging arc & great gameplay benefits, some have one but not the other & then you have the ones that are completely useless and **** (LOOKING AT YOU OHYA). But this part of the game is definitely appreciated overall. The combat is also a highly polished and smooth experience for a turn-based RPG. There is a certain flow & rhythm to the combat that makes even standard encounters engaging, something I can’t say about most turn-based RPGs. Although I will say that Mementos (a large, randomly-generated dungeon that you can access at almost any time) can get a little stale toward the end of the original game’s arc, but the new third semester added in Royal adds a new floor to Mementos that makes things a little more interesting again. Palaces on the other hand don’t get stale as there’s a lot more variety in what you’ll do in any given Palace & none of them outstay their welcome. My only real issue is that after the introductory Palace, none of the remaining ones (except maybe parts of the Okumura & Cruise Ship Palaces) really have much of a challenge when playing on Normal difficulty if you’re levelling certain Confidants (including ones you have to max out to advance to the third semester). Outside of Palaces & Mementos, the life-sim gameplay sections are fun & interesting at first, but later on as you max out your social skills & Confidants, there really isn’t much to do. So that’s disappointing. Before that though it is a solid gameplay loop & I can see how it can become addictive. As for the visuals, they really are as striking and distinctive as they are made out to be. It definitely has a sense of style & flashyness that sets it apart from other RPGs. And the music is also SO GOOD. Lots of bangers on this game’s soundtrack. Conclusion Overall, Persona 5 Royal is a great JRPG that is an excellent entry point into the genre for newcomers & may go down in history as this generation’s Final Fantasy VII. But it’s not a perfect game. There are some balancing issues & a lack of things to do outside of dungeon crawling toward the end and the story has a couple rough patches, but this doesn’t stop it from being a phenomenal game that’s worth playing, especially now that it’s more accessible than ever. Ratings Creative score (story, gameplay, voice acting, art direction): 9/10 Technical score (graphics, audio, performance)): 7/10 Business Practices score: 6/10 (Not the worst I’ve ever seen, but Atlus really do love milking Persona with lots of DLC costumes & Personas as well as spin-offs & crossover appearances in other games like Super Smash Bros. Ultimate & Nier Reincarnation) Overall score (my thoughts on a game’s overall quality, does not consider the business practices unless they are detrimental to the experience): 9.5/10