Recent reviews by Wilq

One of the best jRPG I have ever played.

I had mixed feelings after finishing Tales of Zestiria so I did not know what to think about Berseria at first. When I heard that suppose to be a prequel to ToZ I was a little bit skeptical. Unnecessarily. This is one of the jRPG that put genre back on right track in last year (together with Persona 5).

This game contains the most bizarre party I ever seed in any jRPG. Velvet, protagonist, woman filled with rage and hatred towards her brother-in-law Artorius. Eizen, the pirate, looking for his captain, Rokurou a demon trying to slay his brother, Magilou an unpredictable witch, Eleanor the exorcist and Malak named Laphicet.

Story is interesting and takes about 40-50h to complete.

Combat system was improved from ToZ, it is much more dynamic. You can choose either of characters that suits you during combat and you can swap them immediately when needed. Personally, at most of time, I was using Eleanor but I had no trouble to adapt with any other character. When you progress the story you are going to notice that battles become too easy (no problems with enemies 10 or more levels than your party) and only way to challenge yourself a little is to set difficulty a little higher.

• Interesting story and characters,
  
• Good combat system,
  
• Solid soundtracks,
  
• Mystic artes,
  
• Enhancing system,
  
• Lots of content including fair amount of side quests,
  
• Eleanor is better than Alisha.

• Not challenging battles later in the game,
  
• Battles may become a little mashy later in the game

In overall this is highly recommended position for any jRPG fan.

It’s only natural to support your favorites.[aphorisms.kazamatsuri.org]

That’s my first thought when think about LB! When I waited for other Key great title to be on sale, Clannad, there was no hesitation to buy this game for full price. It is definitely worth it!!

LB! Was actually fourth VN title I read (after Katawa Shoujo, Ever17 and Rewrite) and during that playthrough I never expected that this one will become my favorite VN ever. On first sight it looks like average school life Visual Novel with sometimes clichéd routes but what it makes great is last route Refrain which wraps story perfectly. I remember reading that route until 5AM then I was ready to call in sick and go to sleep.

Story itself is about Riki and his childhood friends(Kyousuke, Masato, Kengo and Rin), Little Busters, forming a baseball team to preserve their youth. Riki invites 5 other heroines to join them in this team and together with Rin it makes 6 heroines routes which player has to read to reach the conclusion of the story. It’s important to start new game after finishing every route because it is part of the game. With every route completed player should notice some changes on the way. During that gameplay there is couple minigames such as baseball practice or ranked battle system (which you can switch off if you don’t like them).

As expected from Key visually (CG, sprites, background) looks fantastic for VN first released 10 years ago and music matches it perfectly.

The time has come

Pros:

• Refrain,
  
• Too many to count,

What is a Visual Novel? People like me see them as interactive books or something closer to interactive theater rather than a video game. This genre is popular in Japan and slowly getting popularity from western audience. What it might be surprising for some people is pricing of games like this. Pricing of top VN might be close to AAA titles what could surprise players unfamiliar with this genre. If you never played/read VN before I can assure you that this title is a good place to start. Just make sure that you start playing Root After first. Root Before answers some of the questions in Root After at the very beginning and you want to avoid that.

Root Double - Before Crime * After Days is the VN title that surprised me in the most positive way. In my humble opinion, this VN is underrated even among fans of this genre.

When you start the game you are waking up into world in year 2030 at LABO, a giant scientific research facility built by a lake on the outskirts of Rokumei City where an incident occurs. In result, you are trapped inside this facility and You will be facing lots of dangers. You will be playing as Watase Kasagi an amnesiac rescue captain and you have to survive during lockdown. After clearing this route you will play as Natsuhiko Tenkawa as he goes through incidents as well as his life the week before we get to know more about this future world and why certain things are happening inside the LABO.

The story itself is well-written, there are interesting twists, character development, lots of endings - 39 (bad, normal, good) with impressively executed final route. This VN could read even someone who is not interested in that kind of games. I think that RD makes a great first VN.

At the beginning I explained more or less how VN looks like and what is unique in Root Double that there is no “answers” which players select. Instead, you will be using Senses Sympathy System (SSS). During the gameplay you will have to make a choice how much you trust each character and this choice will affect the direction of the game.

The visual production value of Root Double is top-quality. Sprites, CGs and backgrounds, all look great and visual effects are put to good use frequently. Music is also good quality, but it lacks some memorable tracks.

Very few productions feature the number of intriguing mysteries and revelations hidden within its depths and it takes the time to get them all but I found that time definitely worth it

Pros:

• Great story for anybody,
  
• Interesting characters that develop during the game,
  
• Well-designed art (Sprites, CGs and background),
  
• Multiple endings with great executed final route,

Cons:

• SSS is unique but may confuse players.

Final Fantasy XIII-2 is sequel to Final Fantasy XIII (obviously) and is another underrated game in the franchise. Luckily for me, I didn’t have a single problem during the gameplay of this port so I could easily enjoy the game.

Good side:

• Less linear than prequel,
  
• Interesting story and characters (solid villain),
  
• Battle system was improved,
  
• Solid music,
  
• Multiple endings,
  
• Bowsword,
  
• QTE

Bad side:

• Monsters as team members – poor substitution of 3rd party member,
  
• Ending I think ending was made this way to open a possibility for the sequel

One of the best VN available on steam.

Pros: Story, characters.

Cons: Price ( I recommend to wait for sale and buy it for 50% of the price)

In my opinion - the most underrated Final Fantasy game in the series. Most of the Final Fantasy and/or JRPG fans expect all of the games in the franchise to be like FFVII or FFIX which is impossible. Thanks to that distorted image they don’t see that FFXIII is at least decent game worth playing.

When you start the game you are thrown into completely independent series within Final Fantasy – Fabula Nova Crystallis which may be a little difficult to understand at first. You will be introduced to new terms in FF like L’Cie or fal’Cie. After impressive cutscene You will take control of Lightning (second female protagonist in the main series after Terra from VI, not counting Yuna from X-2) and introduced to battle system of the game. Battle system is much more dynamic from older game in the franchise (which in most cases was basically turn-based). In this series during battles player chooses Paradigm Shift – formation of group. Each member of the party will be assigned to offensive, defensive or healing role. Player has to adapt the Paradigm Shift during the flow of the battle and execute moves from leading character. This system is not difficult to grasp and some people might that it’s not enough challenging for the player. In my case I found it enjoyable and unique but there was one thing I didn’t like - If Leader of the party dies it is game over even if rest of the party have full HP and can revive him/her.

The next thing I will talk about is story of the game. At the beginning I mentioned about completely new independent series of FF and FFXIII is first of them. Unfortunately when player starts the game he might fell confused when characters starts to use some unknown terms like L’Cie, fal’Cie or Focus. Luckily with time the story is easy to understand and Flashbacks put the player on the same tracks as the game goes. Lots of players complain about linearity of the story and I have to mention it as well. First part of game might look like endless corridor that player has to pass through to progress with the story. During this part of the game we have a chance to get to know all of the protagonists and their background. It might not be the most enjoyable part of the game but remember what I mentioned earlier. This is the first game of new series and introduced lots of new terms and other things. This could confuse players and SE decided that leading players by the hand in the first part could be the best idea.

Other thing worth mentioning is very good music. It might not be a memorable as it was in the previous games of the franchise but saying it is bad would be a lie. Voice acting is also impressive.

Graphics looks amazing for a game released in 2009. It’s not perfect but is at least impressive.

As for me, a Final Fantasy fan (finished 3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,12,13,13-2,LR:13,FFT and Type-0) and with over 200 hours of the gameplay, I can recommend Final Fantasy XIII not only to Final Fantasy Fans and people playing JRPG. I can also recommend it for other people that would like to play game with good (and linear) story and enjoy it.

Pros:

• Good, interesting characters,
  
• Interesting Battle system,
  
• Cutscenes,
  
• Interesting story,
  
• Music,

Cons:

• Battle system (Death of the leader means it’s game over),
  
• Linearity of the story (Corridors in the first part of the game)