Recent reviews by LThesaurus

The awkward and strange weapons and relatively limited movements of Melinoe compared to Zagreus took time for me to get used to, but, the way the weapons and the combat works feels very witchy. You've got to be somewhat clever, using every advantage you can get, in order to prevail.
Note, I haven't played all that much, but, I love the Cast, the weapons are strange and lead to wonderful and weird little movements, and using Magick wisely is a delight thus far.
If you've not played it yet, you can expect a very different playstyle to the original game, but still a good, fun experience.

Other than that, the story feels less strong in a strange way. The Greek God dialog has a different tone, compared to the family drama that was the prior game. But, it's by no means bad-- it's just not clicking for me like it used to.

I like grindy games, but, I like grindy games with projects to work on, grindy games with agency, grindy games with a mild sense of occasional adventure or discovery. I didn't get that here.

I like the concept of Runescape, but, what always put me off was the monetization, the death penalty, and.. well, really, that's about it. I'm exactly the type of player who crafts her own axe, I gather all my own materials, I build my whole kit, because I love that. It's like my own side project in a meaningless little digital world. It's grindy, yeah, but it's fun. It's a journey that takes me all across the world, and culminates in a lovely trophy armor set, or a much easier combat encounter.

Brighter Shores doesn't have any of that. Your tools require you to spend gold. Food you cook is solely meant to generate income. I found out from a youtube video that there are even MORE gold sinks that, rightfully, should require me to work on grinding projects elsewhere, instead of requiring me to generically just grind gold. But, that's not the worst part. The worst part, to me, was how incredibly joyless it was to become more capable in combat. The only way to do that is to grind mobs, and find random high-rarity equipment drops. And, these don't come from specific mobs. Any one will do.

...So... Essentially, this is a game about grinding for generically available currencies in generic locations in order to hopefully become stronger. The exp requirements are ludicrous, the primary materials used to become stronger are generic, and the combat-enhancing loot is random, giving you no agency in how you become stronger. I've seen some people love it, and I value their opinions. I don't understand them, but, don't let me take away the joy that they find in this game. If it sounds like there's nothing wrong with anything I described, then give it a shot.

But, as a lover of grindy games, I find it hard to name a game that I hated more than this one... Because, it's reasonably well-constructed and polished. In theory, I like the enemy and resource variants. I love the aesthetic-- It feels like a board game!
But, there's nothing to work on, I felt there was nothing to work towards, and my experience was utterly joyless, as there was no particular projects to pursue.

Finished the whole game, including the postgame and all DLCs, without using Extra Mode, out of sheer defiance of most guides on the game I've ever read.

This game is an incredibly fun time, but, can be roughly divided into two theatres. You have to play the action game part pretty competently, or you'll just die. But, if you don't play the RPG part competently, then you'll do so little damage, and take so much damage, that your fights become hopeless. So, to thrive in this game, you must play both sides equally well...
...And, unlike most open-ended RPGs like this, I actually did really well, I think. Once it started to click, I came up with my own build, pivoting when I needed to, and prevailed over most every boss. And, well, much like Nioh 2, another game that I love, the bosses are fantastic, and there's a ton of depth to engaging each boss with each playstyle. The action side of the game tests everything, positioning, timing, judgment, and I found a valid use for every move I was given.

But, there are a few caveats... First of all, most guides I've found online will point you towards avoiding playing the game-- Use Extra Mode, or any number of invincibility or infinite MP builds. This isn't necessarily a BAD thing, I think it's great that this game has exploits. But, it could give you the wrong impression if you play the game and follow a guide. You can certainly find your way without one, and I was able to cover my weaknesses every time. And... The other Caveat is, if you don't like postgame content, you should avoid the DLC. The DLC extends the postgame, and that's its primary purpose. There are some lovely references to other popular FF games, but the main story's ending is conclusive enough. You don't really need the DLC, if you're just here for the story.

So basically:
- I think this game's gameplay is astoundingly well designed, with exceptional combat and fairly intuitive RPG elements.
- The postgame was great fun. The best decision I made was playing it without using a guide or extra mode to cheese the game.
- The story's pretty cool actually (I didn't say this in the review proper, but, it's true)
- Ignore the DLC until you get access to the postgame. If you really like the postgame, buy the DLC. It's a whooole lot more of the same! And, I personally loved it.

It's pretty chill. Basically you just wrap yarn around pegs, and it can feel pretty satisfying when I make smooth motions from peg to peg. There's no loss condition, no pressure, it's just about following their instructions to make these cute little yarn things. After you complete a puzzle, you can restart it in order to gain the ability to change how the yarn and background looks, although it requires 5 completions to unlock all the options for just that one puzzle. I found it pretty fun to mess with color changes anyway, though. It's a nice, super low pressure way to do something a little artistic.

That said, outside of any relaxation/artistic merits the game has, it's not going to be challenging or intense by any stretch. There aren't really puzzles or anything. The most you can do, if you happen to be feeling competitive, is optimize yarn movement or something. Basically, don't go into it expecting a challenge-- you play the game to set your own goals, or just to unwind.

This is one of the most overly complicated RPGs I've ever played, to the point I found it exceptionally stressful to play for a long time... But, once it clicked, it actually got really fun, and I started making good use of all the mechanics. But, if you want a simple RPG, or a simple action game, this ain't it. It's got some serious pacing issues as well, with long stretches of the midgame where the story just doesn't really go anywhere at all. but, when the story peaks, it's VERY strong.

All-in-all, it's something of a mixed bag, but overall it's been a very positive experience. If you think you can handle it.

Of course I recommend Final Fantasy IX, why would I not

I would love to recommend the game, it is fundamentally really good in every way... except, the current version of it just kicked me back to the title screen and reset my mission progress because "I lost connection", even though I didn't.

So, they added always-on DRM that does not work reliably. This is a hard pass. Do not buy this game.

I Hope You Like Coins.

This is a pretty cute platformer, I get pretty strong speedrun vibes to it, but I got pretty stuck on basic progression playing through the first time, and practically accidentally got 100% completion while trying to figure out where to go. You do need to absolutely collect every normal-sized coin in the game. You'll probably need to backtrack and wander a lot. You will almost certainly get lost. If those don't sound good, then, well, it's a no.
Unless, you like speedrunning, in which case, you might start having a lot of fun with the game once you already know where to go. I did a second run for achievements, and it was actually pretty fun to route through the map once I knew what I needed to do ahead of time.

I mostly just want to chat about the story because it drives me nuts hearing other people talk about it.

Story's basically nonexistent until you get to Heavensward (first expansion), and then it starts feeling a bit more like a traditional JRPG-- not the deepest in the world, but it's alright. If you're here for story hype, expect it to start incredibly slow. As in, 100 hours before anything super exciting happens, that slow. But, once you get to Heavensward, it's alright, and once you get to Shadowbringers, it actually gets pretty great.

But, a little bit of extra stuff about mechanics: No customization whatsoever, but you can change classes whenever you want (though you must level each class separately, and leveling is very slow outside of daily random dungeon runs). The open world combat is very shallow, but bosses range from decent to among the best in the genre. If there's a boss in any piece of content, do it. It'll probably be a good time unless it's Binding Coil.

Tenuous recommend: The caveat is what I outlined before. It's very slow to get going properly.

I don't have an explanation for why this game's so good, It just is. It's good. It's pretty hard, but very learnable. Play it. Love it.