1st review (10hr review, 3 days worth, about 3 hour sessions each): Honestly I booted it up a bit ago then just stopped. It felt slow and I didn't want to bother. I gave it another try and it started growing on me. The art of the game is absolutely incredible. Think Skullgirls 2.0 but for a beat-em-up...honestly incredible and the slight grainy filter is a perfect touch. Overall very nice to look at. As you play more, interesting story things happen and it seems the world grows and evolves. I love it.

However, there are many holes in combat that desparately need addressing. I will get into it later, but one of the main issues is visual noise. when there's a lot happening on screen it's nearly impossible to play purposefully rather than just hit what you can and try to use intuition rather than the game giving you reliable visual cues. It's HORRIBLE at that. also playing co-op was fun but aggravating at parts it shouldnt be. like getting food. MY DUDE HAD 3X HEALTH AS ME AND KEPT STEALING FOOD. WTF. Additionally the boons, the most important part of the game...are a shared instance meaning if someone likes a skill and gets it before you, you're left to pick whats left. NOT COOL. if people want to double up, let them. But overall much of this system encourages selfishness and not cooperation which is literally the theme of the story...Money as well. there is no shared pool of money. it's separate. There's no system to roll dice for who makes a disputed decision, just emotes. I really hate that. So there needs some fixing as well as more intuitive fluid combat.

Oh and lastly, STOP USING LOBBIES FOR ONLINE!!! IT SEGMENTS PLAYER BASE AND REDUCES ONLINE LONGEVITY OF GAMES!!!! I use caps for a reason. It needs to stop! Please adopt DROP IN & DROP OUT options for the menu. Allow us to play normally, and select an option or talk to an NPC or interact with an item to toggle 'co-op ok'. But if for some reason down the line it takes especially long to connect with someone maybe even just because of the time of day (so far ive gotten decent connect times, but these things often go down the drain because people hate waiting while concurrent (not total/overall) player count decreases. It's horrible design.

With that said though i still want to play and am excited to move forward. However the devs need to address this like yesterday. Like I don't understand some of these no/half-baked decisions. It's just common sense. But still, I enjoy the game a lot...but I think I need to be the UI/UX guy at this point.

I uninstalled after beating the pseudo-secret act 3. I had fun with a lot of the game...there's no denying that. But that's when the game actually adheres to being a game and not trying to be oh so clever and hide content behind incredibly opaque tasks/requirements.

I stumbled upon act 3 by sheer luck and i mean luck 100%. you're supposed to find an npc a number of times and initially you dont even know you're supposed to run into them in this area. there's no hint or assumption. you then need to run into them 2x more after, then for a 3rd time find them out in the larger world. That's only part of the requirement to finish the game.

Idk who complains about difficulty. it's not hard, it's nitpicky & requires less risk than hollow knight.

Completed 106% W/82hrs on record:

Damn...this game took me for all the rides. The true ending I needed a bit of help realizing the clue of, but was worth it so I could know what to expect and know stories from for silksong

For the dev team: Current Review:

This is a really fun game in terms of exploration. And what the story has to offer. In terms of gameplay it's standard at best. Thankfully there's nothing super aggregious...but the skills are NOT fun at all. They act so stingy, doing anything remotely cool in game. you gotta spend more mana for more upgrades as well. The most vauluable upgrades change certain things about spells like 5-15% max in a nutshell. It's honestly a waste and between all classes, it's similar things, just different colours/effects.

Finishing the game, I wanted to do NG+ but ill be honest, finishing the game took a long time. I usually am slower than most but even 1/3 of my playtime is too much for how limited the game is for so long. Without no actual additions I could see I said I'm done. I enjoy getting the game & think i got it on sale for 30 cad but spend no more.

dialogue routes dont have any point and for some reason it's only reasonable and i woke up on the wrong side of the bed. it's 2025 like leave it out or make it matter. Would be nice if perhaps certain races responded to kindness/rudeness differently (like witches appreciate kindess more) and get rewards based off learning how various races often react. But no.

Many many doors were never unlocked and didnt seem like there were outer routes to maybe unlock more doors in the area. It literally doesnt make sense. wtf are these remaining doors.

Additionally the caravan you gain you dont even get to know till near the end of the game. I wish more quests/etc involved them and the cook as well. food means almost nothing in this game, like it'd be different if they were 30min buffs that actually were good. people would use food more often.

Idk...overall this is one of the most beautiful games to explore but almost everything around that feels undeveloped. The witch tree (the tree itself) isnt delved into hardly at all or the idea of what you're a vessel for and why or how you got to that point. It'd be different if you could goto different witches and train under certain ones to unlock your elements rather than just tossing a skill point. it'd be more meaningful as well as make more lore sense. The voice in your head as well couldve been much much more of an interesting mechanic. imagine speccing into your magic stat or whatever and more you do, more it reveals a high number of secrets about a long time locked door or something else. Or maybe very very very rarely, possesing a boss to help fight for you for a future boss, just anything making you smile. For such a beautiful story & effects, they have something special...I suggest getting the game, but only under sale and purely for the exploration which really is what metroidvanias are about. combat is serviceable. Please make it more fun/dynamic. Make skills FUN & gamechangers. Make the whispers a real part of the game. I was always so happy to hear them talk but you never get that more than a handful of times. so sad for such an interesting namesake. I plan on making a video eventually or making leaving a post but it's so damn much to type although i think the game is worth fighting for more interesting gameplay. The hardest thing these days is style and story. gameplay just requires some experimentation.

Please read every word dev team

1st review:

A very very beautiful game and some of the boss fights tho simple (only 26hrs in) are fun & i enjoyed them. However, as shiny and polished as the game appears...it has a lot of issues explaining things. Either forcing you to look in a glossary instead of helpful pop-up tool tips, from telling you how to use the grapple hook when you get it (you gotta look in controller settings...? tf why is a metroidvania giving an item and NOT telling how to use it, that's the whole point). Additionally, there's some other things like your hub not being very alive (at least this far into it) and it gets old trying to see if theres any new subjects to talk about. Additionally the map marking is not the best. while it is MUCH more helpful than not having it, it's cumbersome and overall wish there was the ability to take a picture and save that. i hear PoP implemented it and people been loving it. On top of that, there's a LOT of locked doors you come across and no rhyme or reason as to when/why they open after beating something. There's a lot of other annoying nitpicky problems im going to leave personal feedback on as i think they're that important...but when it comes to exploration, main point of metroidvanias, this game is incredible. Just wish theyd make some of the skills more interesting when it comes to upgrades. theyre kinda boring. Besides that, i do intend to try to finish the game, it's absolutely beautiful to look at and that never gets old.

wasnt into it at all at first...i never really bothered with the other OG megaman games since i was a kid and me & my dad died over and over at them, then finally played megaman x. i gave this a new try on a whim just messing around with friends online, and it was annoying af at first. seemed very mundane and kind of boring/flavourless...but then i started getting into it.

The gameplay feels quite smooth and tho subtle, the effects are nice. i do kinda wish it had more flavour via the might no 9 concept art...but apart from that it's been fun so far. there's a lot of 'trap spots' that you gotta watch out for but soon you learn. absolutely a game youll have to die a few times at but that's cool.

on rails experience with some moderately clever sections enough to see if youre paying attention. Not sure how I feel about it, but it was interesting

i dont think it was worth near 17/20 at all. more like 10 but i get it. The 'puzzles' often made no sense & were more annoying than anything. there's no option to rebind the run button somewhere else on controller. for some reason it's 'X' and you're not able to toggle or use right analogue well with it either.

Idk....i like it, but to be completely real, seems like most of it would be better as a youtube short but an interactive thing is cool i get it. idk if i can recommend tbph. Not because it's 'bad' but because it's not nearly as deep or groundbreaking as all these reviews say.

hands down the best stage in strive. they need more like this. coolest part its kinda jackos stage

really excited for the remake, but please bring Jet set radio future to steam!

THIS is the reason we play games...

Last time i played poker was texas hold'em at a cabin on a trip with my hs best friend & his crew who I've long lost touch with. It was one of the most fun times I had and I've traditionally hated poker. I think it's because the social element just wasnt there.

Balatro doesn't have multiplayer (*yet??*), but this has singlehandedly been one of the funnest game's I've played when I've not played solitaire or poker in enough years to create a small family. I was an hour late to a birthday party and i havent been to bday parties in forever...late to getting fresh air and a million other things. Lemme just say I've wanted to share this game with my mom so much but I'm scared she'll stop being healthy & play it all day.

Perfect game without a timer to play while watching or listening to something or taking a minute to just mess around. You feel like a genius & when you get those 1 in a million hands -- REPEATEDLY...you feel like a GAWD.

I dont care what you're into...cards is the penultimate human game. You owe it to yourself if you love design or games to not only play this but get others addicted too so we can get more updates in the future (which are coming!). I will not spoil anything...but this is amazing. Get it.

I wanted to play Gran blue for the longest time. When rising was announced it was really exciting and after get such a nice cast. This is one of the few arcsys 2d games with light-medium amount of cosmetics. But the main issue is battle pass & the quest system. At first it admittedly was kinda cool to play quests no matter how mundane and get an entire new skin. Again, that's completely new to arcsys who barely puts in decent colour palettes. But after the novelty wore off the first couple months, it's gotten nothing but resentment& no one cares to grind ♥♥♥♥ out just for a skin. No matter how cool.

Gran Bruise was a wonderful idea & having something to do outside of matches is something much needed. But I think the main issue is there isn't a motivation to play it after a couple times. Nothing really changes & worst of all you dont get interesting progression unlocks or anything like that. In this way, youd be better off turning off GB & just booting up another game. The issue with fgs from beginning of time has been motivation & devs either make online only with bad single player or throw in whatever modes and complain when people dont bother with them.

Being fun is cool...trust me. I actually love the visuals and effects in this game 10x more than strive, but strive's combat is so satisfying and bombastic. Here, even jumping is a yawn. It's supposed to be more like SF so I can get that, but I'm over it. They took away the cool rpg mode and put it into single play no one cares about

it's a good game, dont get me wrong as you should be able to find people online despite low player count (has crossplay), but there's something off & I think ultimately it's the movement. This game had the numbers. But after a while there was no real point in playing. I recommend it, but ill be honest, i only recommend if you have strive first.