Reviews

Let me start by saying that as of writing this, I have not played the other Persona games: 3, 4, their variants, or 5 Royal. That does not mean I am unfamiliar with them; on the contrary, I have a decent understanding of each game. Persona 5 is a very special game. All the Personas are special games. They come around once in a blue moon and leave such an overwhelming impact for the years to come. However, Persona 5 will always hold a very special place in my heart, probably because it was the first game from the series that I experienced. But enough introductory fluff.


[There will be spoilers]


Persona 5 is phenomenal.

The game oozes style. Right off the bat, you’re given a taste of what you’re about to experience from the opening cutscene. Sleek black, white, and red, jazz fusion ala Herbie Hancock. I was sitting on my couch starry-eyed with a big ugly grin on my face when I booted up this game for the first time. And that grin never went away. Throughout the game’s somewhat lengthy introduction, the dialogue, all the way through the first palace, I was starstruck. This game was made specifically to appeal to me.

If there’s one thing Atlas mastered with this game in comparison to the others, it’s AESTHETIC. The menu screens, the fonts, the music—THE MUSIC. It’s vibrant when it wants to be vibrant and mellow when it wants to be mellow—perfectly encapsulating the dynamically contrasting lifestyle in the big city. The city itself is so interesting, each district different from the rest. There are cramped gray alleyways and then there are sprawling neon plazas, each setting full of things to do.

One of the core gameplay mechanics of P5 (as well as the other Personas) is that you, the player, live another life within the game. You’re a student, you have exams and pop questions thrown at you. You can and should study, but that doesn’t mean you have to. Why not get a part-time job instead? or just spend every hour after-school hanging out with your friends? or practice in the batting cages? or partake in oversized burger-consumption challenges? or workout until you collapse on the floor? or….

Just like in reality, you are given the difficult task of juggling your attention, using your time wisely, making the right choices. This might seem stressful and overwhelming, as much as it is in real life. However, the game constantly reminds you to do one thing and one thing only: TAKE YOUR TIME. A misleading phrase, "take your time" means use your time as you see fit, and don't stress it—at least that's my interpretation.

If there's one thing these Persona games stress, it's characters. Characters, characters, characters. And if there's a weak link in P5 (which believe me, there are), it's the characters. The writing does not do them any justice whatsoever (another weak link). A lot of the characters in P5 are very two-dimensional—both the confidants and especially the 'antagonists'. Some confidants are just "I am sad, listen to my problems" and virtually all the antagonists are just "mwahaha I'm a bad person!" The characters that really stood out to me in terms of development and writing were Sojiro Sakura, Munehisa Iwai, Sadayo Kawakami, Sae Niijima, Tae Takemi, and Yusuke Kitagawa. You can see a trend here (minus one character, of course).

On the subject of thematic material, P5 tackles a theme I have yet to see covered in a video game: societal complacency. As you and your ragtag group of corny, vigilante, double-life living superhero friends take down the ‘evil adults’ in a somewhat poorly-developed manner, your rise to fame is quickly lost due to not only information manipulation but also because society simply got bored of you. Their collective attention has shifted to whatever’s trendy next.

The endgame is particularly jarring when the true nature of Mementos is revealed. It’s a giant prison, and the people behind bars are there because they want to be. The game’s final boss, Yabbadabbadoo or whatever his name is, is a god created by the slothful nature of society and the desire to conform. Ultimately, your song and dance routine of “Wake up, get up, get out there” has fallen upon deaf ears.  

In the end, after defeating Yabba-whatever, what really has changed? Sure, at the climax of the fight, the people give you their unwavering support and you channel their power in a way akin to Dragon Ball. But afterwards, everyone has just packed up and gone home, gone back to their routine. Who’s to say another Yabba-whatever won’t come to be again?

That’s why to me, P5 is so bittersweet. After this giant adventure, nothing’s really changed, and there’s nothing you can do for change to occur. “Life Will Change” is nothing but a ruse, a lie you’ve been telling yourself.

In the words of P5 Royal’s song “No More What Ifs”,

                “…I know I won’t change anything because I can only be me.”

Ai the Somnium Files is the best narrative based game I've played since Portal 2. 

To set the stage, this is an Anime based, brand new IP, from the studio that brought you Danganronpa. 
For me, personally, those were each marks against my surface level interest in this game. But somehow I pushed past my predisposition and took the dive on this game. 

It was worth it. A thousand times over it was worth it. 

Why?

The voice acting, emotive, fitting with each characters role, emotion is brought out via inflection that nothing with an anime art style has done, in my somewhat limited knowledge has done, since Cowboy Bebop. Looking up a clip of "The Boss" (played by Allegra Clark) shooting the shit never fails to make me feel like I'm listening to a ""real"" person, with emotions and a purpose. 

The gameplay. This is a noire detective story set in the near future. Where your prosthetic eye has a personality and can help you solve mysteries with the help of a machine that allows you to delve into suspects dreams, aka their "Somnium".  This isn't an action game. This is very much more of a streamlined system akin to LA Noire. Find clues in a setting, with a locked camera. Use those things to build your case. Very well thought out and compelling gameplay on that front, but, there's another degree to this. I mentioned it before but, you enter your suspect's dreams. When you do delve into a Somnium, you're greeted with a completely new gameplay formula. A third person, over the shoulder puzzle game, where time is ticking down, and every choice you make in these "dream-logic" puzzles, ticks time down a little more. Think of the director's previous work on the Zero Escape series, in 3D space, for an example of that. Truly phenomenal. 

The style. I personally love the style, designed by the character designer for No More Heroes. The somniums are a high point too. You'll see. 

The writing. Characters just "work", you learn to LOVE how these people interact. You want to hear each character reacts to something you say. The writing is punchy and funny, sweet and emotional, and depressing and touching. It's a truly human game in an anime shell. Sometimes if you decide you want to press your luck with a certain dialogue option, sometimes the game with reward you with a fantastic little funny sequence. 

The story. Surprisingly touching, surprisingly coherent, surprisingly poignant. Love this game's story. That's pretty much it. You'll feel happy. You'll feel fulfilled.

Half Life: Alyx truly surprised me and surpassed my expectations. 
I went in expecting a decent story with gameplay a la a dumbed down "Boneworks".

I was truly, truly surprised by the characters, Alyx, despite having a different voice actor, talks as much as I'd expect a protagonist too, with enough flavor chatter with the guide/comic relief, Russel, to keep things feeling fresh and alive. 

The gameplay, while not "revolutionary", is incredibly polished. Would I like to be able to put my gun down? Yes. Would I like to be able to HIT the enemies with something like the series mainstay, a crowbar. No melee leads to many situations where you round a corner only to realize that you're a foot from a zombie, with no quick way to dispatch of them, except with your shotgun that, at any given time, you only have 8 or so shells for. The gun design is incredible though. 

A breakthrough in many a genre. Puzzles that engage, in a similar fashion to Resident Evil. A horror section that blends so effortlessly with VR that I doubt anything will match the incredible experience I had until someone like Capcom takes a stab at an ACTUAL VR focused game. I won't spoil it but it's probably the best fear I've felt in a VR game. Ever. 

Leading into my next point, design. Everything is deliberate, everything was clearly labored over. During the "last hours" interview they noted that "in VR players tended to take much longer to clear a room, inspecting each thing manually." and that is DEFINITELY here. Obviously not every section of the game is a visual "showcase". But there's always going to be a place where you'll settle in and realize you are surrounded by assets of which more than half are thought out. 

Before I delve into spoilers, I should note. If you are a Half Life fan. PLEASE. PLEASE. Take the time required to play this game. They say to play HL2:EP2. Do it. You will not regret it. 

----Spoilers----

Okay so this is just me freaking out. 
G-Man speech???? HOLY FUCK!!! I can now quote it word for word. Also, was it a retcon??? sure! Do I care? NO
Epistle 3 baby. Who gives a shit. Life is amazing.

The story takes a different turn than the last Doom. It introduces all these different levels of society with demons and demon slayers that we didn’t see in the last. Much more fantasy and less sci fi. I like the change up, I like that they did something unique, but at first I didn’t like it as much as the simpler demons on mars story in the first. As I kept playing it grew on me. By the end I was really enjoying the fun absurdity of this story. The little bits of the lore here and there are pretty dumb if you read them.

The art style and graphics are very well done. The gory kills are very creative. There are a lot of unique kills that are either funny, gruesome or both. After the intense fights if you take a moment to look at the environments they are well done as well. Lots of cool giant dead demons and other things. The visuals and atmosphere are impressive.

Gameplay is very fast paced, constantly hectic and feels great. Its the most chaotic and difficult shooter I’ve played in awhile, and maybe ever. If you stay still for even a moment you are most likely going to die. I’m playing on the ultra-violence difficulty but it is very difficult. Multiple battles I  have thought “this is impossible“ but then I beat it, and the next one is even harder. The first fight with a marauder was ridiculous. I died so many times and it’s only vs the one marauder. The last one I did I wrecked him. Put him in a blender in the middle of a big battle. That improvement gives this game a strong sense of accomplishment that makes the frustrating times worth it. There are some frustrating times but not too many and they occurred more often at the beginning of the game for me. By the end I was dieting once or twice on tough sections but not 10 times. The platforming and puzzles are pretty fun. I like the addition.

You need to look at your map lots in this one because there are so many hidden areas you need to get to in order to actually do all the fights and find all the items. This took a bit of time for me to get used to because I don’t remember having to search like this in the last game. On a few occasions I couldn’t find areas and had to google it because I was getting frustrated but it didn’t happen too often.

This isn’t a fault of the game but I needed a very specific mood to play doom eternal, and I didn’t play for long sessions. Usually 1-2 hour periods and after that my enjoyment starts to get reminiscing returns. It’s because it is so difficult and demanding. After a long day of work this game is too much. Again, not a criticism of the game because I am really enjoying playing it in these 1-2 hour bursts when I’m in the mood. The exception is the last 4 or so hours that I played in one go. It was some of my favourite parts because by that point I had so many upgrades and all the different guns so I started to die less and less. Doom Eternal was a fantastic shooter that did not reach the same heights as Doom 2016 but was very enjoyable nonetheless and I respect them for making some noticeable changes.

Score: A-