This time, I'm done for good! And with hindsight, I might as well have
abstained from going all the way to the final boss. Sure, crawling the last
labyrinth was oddles of fun, especially after I snatched those SP and HP
replenishing skills I mentioned in my last
post; however, the
final showdown was a major pain in the arse that left me with a sour taste in
the mouth. Being forced to polish off a preliminary boss rush before I could
even engage the final boss was already galling enough; but that was nothing
compared to the final boss itself, which was such a massive overpowered HP bag
it was not even funny. With the Safety setting firmly in place, that ultimate
fight was a mere battle of attrition as far as I was concerned; but being able
to rise from the dead after my whole party was slaughtered — which happened twice
during the fight — didn't make the whole thing less unpleasant. That fight
was a bore and a chore, with battle animations lasting forever and no
strategic challenge apart from trying to wrap up the fight in less than one
hour. Not that I would have wanted to change the difficulty setting to make
things more challenging, mind you: that boss is so utterly OP that I cannot
even begin to fathom how to beat it on regular difficulty — nor do I ever
want to try. But let's see the positive side of things: I now have a Clear
Game save that will grant me New Game + benefits if I play PQ2 again!
And before I part with that game, let's go for a good ol' Pros&Cons list,
shall we?
The Good:
- The fighting system — or, to be more precise, the Boost and All-out Attack features. So deliciously OP, so ridiculously satisfying! Being able to wrap up fights in a single turn with a glorious animation as the finishing touch is just the stuff dazzling RPG combat dreams are made of. Fun fact: it took me several hours of play to notice that All-out Attacks were linked to Boost — but you can bet your arse that once I noticed it, I indulged in triggering All-outs like it was going out of fashion. Heck, I didn't even bother fighting and simply ran away when All-outing was not possible — that's how hooked on the whole thing I was.
- The Persona 5 cast: I though I could not love them more, but that was before learning that Joker's design was inspired by a black panther. Seriously? Now you're really tugging at my heartstrings, Atlus. Long story short: I adore that crew, I want to handle them again, and I already made arrangements to borrow my brother-in-law's PS3 to play the original Persona 5. Oh, and I'm sure as heck buying the upcoming Persona 5 remake-slash-reinterpretation for my future Switch.
The Bad:
- Labyrinths were frigging hideous. They didn't even have the barren charm of old-fashioned budget FPDCs à la The Lost Child; you could feel that the developers put some effort into trying to make them look good yet failed entirely. The fourth labyrinth was a particularly low point, with its garish colours and ugly contraptions — I swear I nearly gave up to spare my poor retinas. Seriously, the labyrinths from the first Etrian Odyssey were prettier, lusher and more evocative, and that was twelve years and one console generation ago. Granted, the fifth labyrinth was much more palatable; but alas, it was pretty much a case of 'too little, too late' at that point.
- Too much Persona megaverse-ish fan service. I know that's the entire point of the Persona Q series, but still... The whole thing could have been handled better, methinks. There were too many cutscenes that existed for the sole purpose of making cast members from different entries bond or butt heads, and the game tried way too hard to draw parallels between said cast members. The last thing I need to have planted in my head before I dive in the canon Persona series is the notion that each entry shamelessly recycles the same character tropes, thank you very much.
The Ugly:
- The fifth labyrinth and final showdown are entirely pointless. Not only do they feel like some sort of bastardized postgame butting in before its time, but they also somewhat undermine the impact of the preceding epopee. (Spoilers!) Helping Hikari overcome her psychological hurdles was deeply satisfying, and Doe would have been a perfect final boss to wrap up the game. Having to beat HP bag Nagi to rescue a whole posse of faceless lost souls I didn't even get to interact with was complete overkill: there was no more mystery to uncover, and no attachment whatsoever to these people I was supposedly fighting for. (End of spoilers) If I ever replay PQ2, I'll definitely stop at the end of the fourth labyrinth like I initially planned.
All in all, it was a darn good game. It made me want to play both the
canon Persona series and some genuine FPDC — the kind that leaves
you alone with (and in) the dungeons, with no interruption, handholding or
cutscenes whatsoever. Should I play one of the two right now? My gaming
instinct will run the show, as always!
Well, if you're
gonna pick up a persona game, I recommend P3P a lot. I'm personally waiting for
P5 Royal to drop to like 20 bucks before I dive in to Persona 5 (other than
persona 5 dancing, which had no story, so whatever). I'm glad I listened to my
instinct and choose to wait on P5; I'd be so mad if I had dropped good money
only to get a more 'complete' version of it barely 3 years later.
Also, the persona game on switch will not have anything to do at all with the
main P5, it will be an original story. Or so Atlus says anyways. They're lazy
now, so I can see them rehashing the same story.
Other than that, Strange Journey. Either the original on the DS, or the remake
on the 3DS. There's several story elements on the 3DS that I haaaate, and
several things I like (including a new path where your faithful male computer
AI actually survives and the two of you live completely alone on the moon...it
makes sense in context), so it's a mixed bag. If you don't play the original,
you won't pick up on what the remake tramples on, so if veeeery slightly
improved gameplay and voice acting at the cost of way harder fights in order to
get the new endings sounds good to you, go for it. It has the same problems of
dugeons looking very samey and being confusing later on, so be warned.
Isleif10 October 2019 at 12:01
I really don't
mind the Persona 5 Switch remake/reinterpretation/whatever floats Atlus' boat
not having the same story as the original, because a) I discovered the cast
through PQ2's story anyway, and b) I'm in entirely for their looks and
personalities. As long as those get to shine, I'm good! Which will certainly
not prevent me from playing the original Persona 5 as soon as I can.
As for Strange Journey: you probably won't be surprised at all to hear that I
own both the original and the remake. ^^ I somehow get the feeling that this
remake was mostly a work of passion for Atlus: the original game flew under the
radar, and they may have wanted to bring it to a new audience — kinda like
Okami got remade a bunch of times in the hope of making it the smash hit it
should always have been. So I'm really curious to play both versions of SJ,
spot the differences and interpret them in light of the evolution of the gaming
industry. That will
certainly be most interesting.
Kumiko15 October 2019 at 19:30
I'm torn on
Strange Journey Redux being a labour of love or not. On one hand, there's so
much good work put into the original game that it's impossible to mess it up
(fitting, since Strange Journey was meant to be SMTIV before the higher ups had
a panic attack that the game wasn't set in Tokyo, THE SHAME), and some story
aspects are improved. On the other hand, it follows the same path their new
re-releases set out, and some story parts feel like it's trampling over the
message of the original, while forcing the philosophy the new games have down
your throat. Something a lot of people, me included, really dislike.
Like, the endings being so over top and beating you with their morality was the
worst part of SMTV Apocalypse. Great game, right until you get slapped with an
ending. The older games were very, very bitter, but not enraging like this.
It's something borrowed from, you guessed it, Persona! Only it makes sense in
those games, since they have a completely different feel to them. For the main
series and its close spin offs? Out of place.
Anyways, back to my point, a huge part of me thinks Redux was just something
they put together to hold over the mainline fans while they wait two billion
years for SMTV while they milk persona. But they do get somethings right, so
it’s hard to hate it….
Lucifer has a great role in this one, while he barely was there in the
original. Best role since megami tensei 2 in fact. So there's that.
No comments:
Post a Comment