A 5-star game that I'm yoinking one away for late game things that detract from the experience. Technically they're optional, and the game telegraphs that to you, but it still makes the overall experience worse. Late game "kaizo" (intentionally overly hard/trolling) platforming area. Megahard boss rush mode. Extremely long and hard arena fights. Side bosses that require extremely careful precise positioning. Basically if it was added in one of the "free DLCs" it probably wasn't a good thing. Everything before these? Superbly done with rather few major issues (save and respawn benches being the main one). (I do have an over 100% clear rate -- including some of the above -- but not the max.) Avoid the sequel, Silksong, unless you absolutely loved all the stuff I mentioned as the negatives here -- it's basically just that the whole time.
Silksong is a poor sequel to a great game. It didn't learn any lessons from the first game, and it even threw out and regressed away from many of the things Hollow Knight did well. Silksong is an exercise in exhaustion, filled with anti-player design decisions at every turn. You constantly feel the developer's hand (not anagonists; the developers) thwarting your progress through silly artificial barriers. The difficulty is high (worse than all but but a few moments of Hollow Knight), but done in all the bad ways and not the fun ones. The game as a whole doesn't work because the developers despise the players and want you to know it. Upgrades are sparse and not meaningful making exploration mostly about completion and story since you don't get more powerful from it. Grinding for resources is frequent and required. The list goes on quite long... The part that sucks the most? The game could very easily be made better to at least tie its predecessor, but the developers thus far have shown zero interest in doing so. The story/art/music/core game play/etc are all amazing. Everyone I know online and in person quit the game, finding that its frustrating, irritating bits greatly outnumbered the fun and thrilling ones.
The developers have confirmed publicly in multiple places that development has ceased and the game will never be finished. It should be delisted.
Playing through this game was great. I enjoyed the whole experience. Great graphics, sound, story, and gameplay. Few "pain in the ass" or frustrating moments. The game doesn't need a "guide" to get pretty much everything. (A couple of the recruitable characters had odd triggers; and see bugs below.) The core of each combat works well. There's auto if you want it (works well once you're overleveled). Crafting your characters is fun. A few of the characters (and there are over a hundred, truly) are clearly more powerful than others; it's intended. A lot of the dungeons work by attrition -- MP can exhaust quickly and consumable slots are limited. Make sure you save enough resources defeat the boss! The minigames (there are a few) are largely skippable, easily solved, or repeatable. The main one that isn't is fun itself -- mass combat battles that are a gridded turn-based sequence. These are hard to lose and mostly an expression of story, though there are mechanics to make them easier/harder. (You're going to want an auto-fire controller for the chef's challenges. And the boat racing is irksome, but, fortunately, each try is short.) The game isn't bug-filled as some other reviewers indicate, but there do, if the guides are accurate, appear to be a couple of odd trigger conditions to recruit someone if you go someplace too soon/late. I didn't encounter any bugs during my play. A few downsides: * Because of there being so many characters, most will be ignored and never used, while the few "mains" will be used a lot. * There are points where you'll be very poor and encouraged to grind for money or resources (especially if you try to keep more than one main squad at max power). * The in-battle call-outs get repetitive, especially for specific characters or battles. (Sadly this is true of every JRPG I've seen lately, including the big AAA ones.) * There are some RNG issues if you want high completion, like getting certain things to spawn in a few stores. * In some sequences, there's a lot of walking and your movement speed can feel painfully slow when the maps are bigger. Some people report the story is a rehash/mash-up of Suikoden games. I never played any so it was fresh to me. But it was really well executed. (Also, ignore the "anti-woke" ragers ranting against the localization -- there are no localization issues unless you think that everyone in an RPG should always speak in some sort of period English.)
Some of the content is missing from the game if you are not playing online and connected to SEGA's servers. This is content in the single-player game gated behind online activity. Search for "The Superbug Initiative" to find out more. Some important items for hospital design, like "Ectovat" (to clean up ghosts for benefit) are gated behind this system and are unavailable if you are attempting to play offline.
As stated in the game card, this requires online connectivity to get the full experience, even for single-player -- it has tons of content, including single-player content, gated by online connectivity. Attempting to play this game in an offline, disconnected method will result in numerous missing features and content. At the time of writing: "The game features online components introduced in updates (SYNTHESIS, BYTEBEAT, LIVING SHIP, EXO MECH, CROSSPLAY, DESOLATION and ORIGINS) that require Internet connection." This game fails to meet any sensible definition of a game that is free of online restrictions or digital restrictions management. It's effectively been redesigned to operate almost as an online-only title.
I enjoyed True Fear. (It wasn't the best, but it was fun, thoughtful, etc). True Fear 2, in contrast, is not very good. There is a grand total of 1 hidden object scene in the game. And it's tiny and brief. Otherwise, it's a not-very-good point and click game with high levels of pixel search and "read the developers minds". The environments, mostly asylum interiors, are drab and repetitive. The puzzles are bad. Most games like this I never get tempted to use the 'skip' button. In this one, I used it multiple times. And then there's the story. The first game had a good setup. This one tread water and even regressed... nothing happened except some jump scares and what seems to be time travel. "Mysterious for its own sake". It also then far overstays its welcome. Just on and on with backtracking.
This game is a light "Metroidvania" combat platformer. You have to explore the map and learn how to use your traversal skills (which are mostly unlocked by skill points from leveling; most things strewn about the map are plot). The game doesn't hand-hold you, and it's very much "choose your path, you can progress with whichever skills you accumulate". Once you get enough mobility, you can move on to the next phase of the game that really makes you backtrack and fill in the holes in every corner of the map. Combat is fun. Challenging but not punishing. Resources are plentiful enough that you're never grinding for them, but are rare enough that you might pause to try to optimize use. There are LOTS of different directions you can take to level up your caveman + dinosaur pair. (If playing co-op, I do recommend making sure to power up the dino's combat.) XP comes rapidly enough there's always a trickle of skill points. But you do have to save up for some of the big upgrades. Contrary to what some bits indicate, this game isn't a "crafter" game or a "survival" game. There are around a dozen things you can make, and they're all consumables used in exploration and combat (weapons, traps, healing, etc). Your health only goes down when you take damage. Make sure to camp when you can! Dying resets you to the last save, which is either the last time you camped, or the last time you changed zones. Some big foes can dish out and take a lot of damage and you don't want to have to re-explore the zone again because you forgot to camp out before a big fight. The story is peak pulp: Do you want to be a caveman with his dinosaur companion riding a dolphin in an underwater alien space ship shooting a laser beam? Then this is the game for you! When my spouse and I finished the game, we both immediately expressed having loved the experience and wanting more.
