Rannch

I LOVEEEEEEEEEEEEEE **** VALLEY, this ain't just a game, it's a lifestyle.

Not a fan of rougelite/like but this one is pretty fun, the fast combat is awesome made me play it for 20 something hours but I gave up on beating the game since it got really boring for me not because it became bad but rougelike just not my kinda game.

The combat is fantastic everything else is decent, not a fan of turn based combat but thanks to this game, I've played a bunch of them lately and it opens a lot of possibilities for me to experience. Would actually recommend this for the combat.

It's soo damn BEAUTIFUL. The whole gameplay is very simple and nothing special but the art style just brings so much charm, the vibrant use of colors is stunning, the animation of the character when walking, sliding and turning into some kind of sea creature to traverse the waters are soo flowwy, it's awesome and the music adds a nice touch to it all.

It does a lot of what Symphony of the Night does, but worse. The story, characters, music, atmosphere, combat, and enemy variety are inferior to Symphony of the Night on many levels. However, it did do some things differently and some things better. The boss and balancing are better, and the way you get skills by farming for souls is unique. I appreciate the difference, but I didn't like it that much. They implemented something similar to Zelda games, switching gears (souls) to get to an area, which made it kind of tedious since it wasn't implemented well in the game. The way you use your souls to traverse is so minimalistic that it makes me question the point of it; it didn't add anything that makes your experience better. I know it's unfair to compare it to Symphony of the Night, especially since this is a GBA game and Symphony of the Night is a PS1 game. Hence, I gave it an 8. It's still pretty fun and solid.

The best part is that the art direction is simply fantastic—easily one of the most beautiful games on the PS1. There's so much variety in the enemies; I adore this game for Alucard's slick animation, story, boss designs, and level designs. However, there is one big flaw that makes it hard to give it a perfect score: the balancing is wacky to the point where you can end up butchering all the bosses without even dodging. Some weapons just shred the bosses in seconds, making the boss fights less engaging. Additionally, the second half of the game (the inverted castle) is too much. It’s cool, but it’s basically the same as the first area, with even the enemies being reskins. The big problem here is that it's also as long to complete as the first area, making it very tedious to finish. It was cool for maybe 40 minutes, but after that, it’s kind of "ehhh." Still amazing and would highly recommend.

This is the one that made me love the franchise, I love the difficulty. I love the bosses. I love the linearity but still makes it feel like a metroid game at it's core, it's well structured that made it blend with the story seamlessly. I love the combat. I love the atmosphere. I love the power ups and I ESPECIALLY LOVE SAMUS.