Sand Land

There is something really charming about this game, maybe the art style or the whimsy. I'm a big fan of Toriyama's art style, especially when it has this heavy shading like it does here. I also appreciate this being an underrated work of his that lends itself to this open world style of game more readily. That being said, the open world is pretty boring and doesn't really add much to the game. The vehicle gameplay is fine, I love the tank and the armor but some of the other bots lack viability in most cases. There is some on foot combat that is fine but honestly unneeded. The stealth segements are definitely unneeded. I'm assuming these play a part in the manga in some way otherwise I have no idea why they are even here. There is a crafting system that is very gated which makes it kind of a pain to interact with. I also never got a crafter in the hub town so early on I was fast traveling to another place to make everything and then going back to the garage, which wasn't ideal. The fast travel system was good. It's on demand and you can use it just about anytime aside from a few instances where you need to fully travel. The story itself is fine in the first half but then it gets conveluted and sloggy after the fakeout ending. The gameplay stayed good for the most part, some spongy enemies near the end but I felt like I was always more powerful up until the end. The game definitely overstays it's welcome by a few hours because of some heavy padding in last third of the game. Idk what it is with these Japanese open world games and thinking they need to do this before the end of the game but it is not a positive aspect. Overall though it was a fun game and I enjoyed how upbeat and silly it could be. I also love the Metal Slug style tanks.