Video Game-Ranting Center

[KABOOM]

nom

[Zunar]

I like how you have the balls to criticize a game as widely praised as Secret of Mana. Reminds me of a certain Sequelitis

Couple of things I want to note about your analysis, Kaboom. Not to argue against you but just little tidbits of info.

Tidbits: show

Small nitpick, but you can get the sprite before the girl. It's not recommended though because it gives you an extra miniboss that can easily wreck you.

It's really funny how you mention Chrono Trigger while talking about this game because it, Secret of Mana, and Final Fantasy 4 are all connected together in a development sense. If you're interested you can read an article about it here.

If you want to experience the game better there's a few romhacks out there, one in particular that tweaks the gameplay mechanics to be less grindy and more technical. I doubt you'd be interested in them but I thought I'd mention them.

If you haven't already, I recommend trying out Sword of Mana. It's a remake of the first game in the series and one of my personal favorite GBA games. Should give you a similar experience without most the stuff you were complaining about (like the grindiness).

[KABOOM]

wah

[Harmless]

Act of Aggression: show

This sounds kinda stupid coming from someone who was really looking forward to the game, but... well, I tried out Act of Aggression for an hour. Thing is, when I first opened up the game, the game's interface was really hard to comprehend. There was a lack of direction to what I should do first, and I spend five minutes looking for a tutorial. No tutorial was present, so I decided, might as well try out the first faction's campaign.

... The tutorial that was present in the first faction's campaign was not only really brief but also really uninformative. It also didn't give me much breathing room to try and figure out the game - Enemies would attack first thing (and I mean immediately after) the tutorial was done telling you how to build a structure for your base. It was kinda poor design tbh. Then on the third mission a glitch happened and none of my units would respond to my command, let alone return fire at enemies who would slowly batter them to death. At that point I just stopped the game.

I feel like if an RTS (or if any game) needs to be successful it REALLY depends heavily on a good UI. Act of Aggression did not have a good UI, needless to say... both for the main menu and during the gameplay. Speaking of gameplay, it was alright. Never really got to experience more than basic infantry and I guess structure building (but it was really hard to tell my base apart from neutral buildings in the area). Also enemies were really hard to make out, for whatever reason...

Oh well. Worst part was I got gifted the game for like $50. I feel really bad for the guy who gifted me it...

[Zunar]

Mercenaries Saga 2: show

First off, let me clarify: I actually like this game. It's almost like budget Fire Emblem, except without supports and the playing field is more in-depth. Honestly I recommend it if you're a fan of Fire Emblem. There's small little details that bug me personally, but that's not what I'm here to talk about.

What I want to rant about is the difficulty balance. So I start off the game just fine, but then Stage 3 (or maybe it was 4) comes along and suddenly I'm getting my ♥♥♥ kicked. Thankfully there's an easy way to grind, so after grinding a bit I made it through. From there it was pretty much smooth sailing until Stage 22. BAM things start one and two-shotting me with no warning. Like WTF man. I would understand if I was playing on Hard but I'm on Normal difficulty. I mean like I said the grinding isn't hard to do, it's just frustrating to be playing good and next thing you know you're getting your face smashed in.

[Harmless]

Mercenaries Saga 2

F*cking WHAT?! DIAMOND MERCENARIES 2 WAS AWESOME! VAULT HUNTER, FIND THAT ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ AND KILL HIM BECAUSE I DISAGREE WITH HIS REVIEW!

lol references

[KABOOM]

wha

[KABOOM]

meh

[Zunar]

Danganronpa 2: show

After having enjoyed the first Danganronpa game, I was pretty excited for this one and was expecting it to be more. And in most departments, it delivered. Overall I like the characters more, the more open setting is really nice, and I love the new trial things like the Logic Dive and the rebuttal thing (don't remember the name off the top of my head). There were also improvements over existing mechanics from DR1, for example the closing arguments.

Where this game bombs for me is the logic. I had to continually consult a walkthrough in the game (probably at least five times) to be able to advance in a trial because the answer was either stupid, crazy, borderline nonsensical, or all of the above. There was one specific Spot Selection that was utter BS because it's cryptic as hell and the walkthroughs I found were not helpful at all. I had to consult a youtube walkthrough to figure it out. (If you're curious, it's when you select the Octagon in Chapter 4. Like seriously, how tf do they expect you to figure that out)

And another thing: the story. When you hit exposition city (aka the last chapter of the game), things just get so effing complicated. It's like one giant ♥♥♥♥ where there were trying to fit together the story from DR1 and the new stuff, and honestly I think it's just a mess. Of course, I did like the cameos from DR1 near the end, and the ending sequences themselves were pretty cool, but it was kinda ruined by the crazy plot and dumb logic.



tl;dr DR2 made a lot of improvements to the mechanics and I like the characters more overall in DR2, but the twisted logic and crazy plot kinda bombs it for me. If I had to pick, I would probably say I like DR1 better.

[Avo]

Dark Souls ruined video games for me.

Never before have I played a series that drew me in from the very start. The combat is fluid and engaging, the story is subtle and gives you the opportunity to unravel the history of an incredible world, and I have never been more frustrated with a game franchise in my entire life.

Usually I would give up playing for a while if I kept dying or losing, but Dark Souls keeps me in my chair until I finally overcome an obstacle, something that could take hours to do. And the feeling of finally defeating a boss after being stuck on it for hours and hours is nothing short of euphoric. The story is incredible but the game still focuses on addictive gameplay, I haven't put this many hours into a game since Pokemon Pearl almost a decade ago.

I bought Dark Souls on a whim, I thought I would give it a try but I wasn't expecting much. But that bloody game took up my whole summer, it was all I would talk about, it became my life. And 2 weeks ago I bought a PS4 solely to play Dark Souls 3.

This is 150% the greatest video game series I have ever played. But unfortunately, I don't feel as much joy playing my other favourite games. I always go back to play Dark Souls, it's like a drug and I need my fix.

No other game can give me that feeling, and I'm afraid I will be stuck forever playing these games, because they have given me an experience that I will never forget.