Classics 3

Story Positives:

1. Music Direction: The music isn’t really… directed in the traditional sense, but absolutely adds to the feel, vibe, tone. As such, this gets a Story Music positive
2. Intro: The Intro does a great job of quickly and efficiently establishing place, setting, main plot, initial characters, and scope… plus Patrick Stewart is awesome. All of this works whether you’re familiar with the setting or not, too. In all honesty I hold this up as one of the better Intros in gaming…
3. Intro: …and have no hesitation giving it…
4. Intro: …three positives
5. Storytelling Mechanic: Books are extensive and very interesting and fun to read, and there are so, so many of them (148!) so this easily earns…
6. Storytelling Mechanic: …a full…
7. Storytelling Mechanic: …three positives for the usage of in-universe lore storytelling
8. Architecture: I’ve used Oblivion as one of my favorite examples of what good architecture design is for years. Each of these towns is SHOCKINGLY small, being able to cross the entirety of several of them in literal seconds, but they use a lot of tricks to make them seem much larger than they are and to add to that all important immersion. Lots of interior spaces (indeed almost every single building has an interior cell), lots of sight blocking lines, plenty of visible terrain outside…
9. Architecture: …consider this textbook good Architecture design
10. MSQ: The Kvatch intro is just awesome. The slow walk up the path, the NPCs freaking out, the sky turning red, the first Oblivion gate blaring in the background, and the first charge into Oblivion
11. World Building: Regions, species, sub cultures based on areas. There’s quite a bit of it here…
12. World Building: …easily deserving…
13. World Building: …three positives
14. NPC Set Dressing: The scheduling and mundane routine of NPCs isn’t as good as it could or should be, but still does add to the feel of people rather than NPCs. And, like it or not, this is as good as this has ever gotten in these games…
15. NPC Set Dressing: …earning itself…
16. NPC Set Dressing: …three positives
17. Character: Martin is a good character; He has an arc, characterization, he’s engaging, he’s a good leader, and generally enjoyable to work with
18. MSQ: Manker Cameron’s Paradise is wonderfully, horribly messed up in so many ways
19. Outro: The Outro of the main quest, the lead up and finale of Martin’s sacrifice, the final confrontation, great stuff
20. Prime Opt: Fighter’s Guild is an engaging chain and Oreyn himself is one of the better side characters of the work…
21. Prime Opt: …and the quests around Water’s Edge, helping the poor woman… and then killing her unknowingly…
22. Prime Opt: …culminating in a status quo change for the guild across the region. Love it
23. Prime Opt: The Mage’s Guild is an awesome arc which feels nicely varied and fun…
24. Prime Opt: …and ties itself in neatly as things progress towards the Mannimarco showdown, and the whole arc feels satisfying and fun
25. Prime Opt: Whodunit has surprisingly well written (and a lot!) of dialogue that changes depending on how exactly you do it and in what order. This is one of the best quests in the game…
26. Prime Opt: …and deserves its own recognition
27. Prime Opt: The Dark Brotherhood is, as usual, satisfying and well constructed and has a nice twist, though it falls apart a bit at the end, it’s still the second best chain in the game…
28. Prime Opt: …deserving its own…
29. Prime Opt: …triple positive
30. Prime Opt: The Thieves Guild quest is the best chain in the game. It falters here and there, but does good connections and continuity within themselves and with other quests, have a couple of cool characters (Amusei!), and has a nice little finale…
31. Prime Opt: …easily earning…
32. Prime Opt: …three positives
33. Prime Opt: Special mention must be made of the inclusion of the Elder Scroll and its significance to the Thieves Guild…
34. Prime Opt: …and a showcasing of the retroactive continuity in action, in lore
35. Secondary: Cheydinhal quests (Cheydinhal Painter, Cheydinhal Mage, Cheydinhal high justice
36. Secondary: Chorrol Defend The Farm, Daedric quests, Bloated Float
37. Secondary: Bruma Fake Vampire, Bruma Pale Pass, Hackdirt, Mazoga
38. Secondary: Bravil Rat quest, Chorral painting quest
39. Secondary: Through A Nightmare Darkly, Caught In the Hunt
40. Secondary; Bruma Two Sides of the Same Coin, Imperial City grave robbing, Order of the Virtuous Blood, Noble’s Daughter (forsooth!)
41. Intro: Shivering Isles: The intro to the Shivering Isles is poetry, with Haskill, the Mania/Dementia metronome, the butterflies, and the initial peek into the various madnesses within as we interact with the characters in Passwall and make our way past the Gatekeeper…
42. Intro: …for two positives
43. Dialogue: Shivering Isles: Shivering Isles dialogue is the only dialogue in the game actually well written, with lots of variety to the various mental illnesses suffered by those within
44. Character: Shivering Isles: Sheogorath is as awesome as he always is, well voice acted, interesting, and fun
45. Secondary: Shivering Isles: Side quests in Shivering Isles aren’t the best, but there’s a decent amount of them and they’re enjoyable
46. MSQ: Shivering Isles: The main plot-line of Shivering Isles is great, culminating in a huge sea-change for the setting (even though it never matters again)
47. Atmosphere: Generally great Atmosphere and Tone of the medieval countryside
48. Internal Continuity: While each quest arc ignores the others, each arc has good Internal Continuity within itself
49. Outro: After some thought, a second positive for the Outro managing to be one of the better, more investing sequences in the entire game
50. Visual Storytelling: Some fantastic Visual Storytelling in the towns and cities
51. Doodads: Doodads within New Sheoth…
52. Doodads: …for two positives
53. Doodads: Doodads in Anvil…
54. Doodads: …for two positives
55. Doodads: Doodads in Skingrad…
56. Doodads: …for two positives
57. Doodads: Chorrol doodads…
58. Doodads: …for two positives
59. Doodads: Bruma doodads…
60. Doodads: …for two positives
61. Doodads: Cheydinhal doodadorinos…
62. Doodads: …for two positives
63. Doodads: Bravil doodads
64. Doodads: Leyawiin doodads
65. Brickwork: Rolling green hills…
66. Brickwork: …for two positives
67. Brickwork: The Imperial City, and Aylied ruins in general
68. Brickwork: Bruma, the layers, the snow, the hills, the styles…
69. Brickwork: …for two positives
70. Brickwork: Cheydinhal and its nice river and residentials
71. Brickwork: Bravil and Leyawiin
72. Brickwork: Anvil, the layout, the walls, the docks…
73. Brickwork: …for two positives
74. Brickwork: Skingrad is a bit too narrow and too cloistered
75. Brickwork: Chorrol, the poor district, the rich area, the market, the tree, the statue…
76. Brickwork: …for two positives
77. Visual Storytelling: Visual Storytelling is all over the place. It’s hard to narrow down individual examples, but there’s lots and lots of usage of items, visuals, and areas to say what isn’t told
78. External Continuity: Yes, really. The game follows through on the story threads of the previous games in several ways and, ultimately, ends the era and arc of the Elder Scrolls
79. Humor: Yeah I know, but honestly, between the bugs, the dialogue, and the wild dynamic stuff… yeah
80. Character: Generally memorable, interesting support cast

Story Negatives:

1. Voice Acting: Voice acting for everyone who isn’t one of the big 4 is just… repetitive and lacking and actively ruins several scenes…
2. Voice Acting: …earning itself a double negative
3. Secondary: Either the voice acting actively saps nuance and subtlety from quest stories, or the quest stories are too simple for the complexity they should have
4. Banter: We really should mention how… actively bad the Banter is, both with friendly NPCs and in combat. Sure, it’s memeable, but that doesn’t make it good…
5. Banter: …for double negative
6. Doodads: Or the lack thereof within dungeons and the like. For how amazingly well fleshed out the towns are, the dungeons are barren…
7. Doodads: …for double negative
8. Spritework: I’ll be honest, it’s damned rare for Spritework to actually detract from a story, but here we are. The infamous potato faces are… not great, and that’s at best…
9. Spritework: …earning itself…
10. Spritework: …a full three negatives

Gameplay Positives:

1. Mod Tools: Full mod encouragement and resources and tools…
2. Mod Tools: …earning…
3. Mod Tools: …three positives
4. Mod Depth: Depth of modding…
5. Mod Depth: …for a full…
6. Mod Depth: …three positives
7. Core Combat: Archery is intuitive, fun, and awesome to use. The arrow you use matters, the bow you use matters, your perks matter, how long you hold the bow matters, and no matter your skill whether you hit or not is all on you. I say without hyperbole that I’ve never seen better archery in a game…
8. Core Combat: …earning itself an easy…
9. Core Combat: …triple positive
10. Alternate Leveling: The perks that are good are great and offer mutators and new abilities instead of simply being stat modifiers. The only thing that prevents this from being multiple positives is that not every perk is particularly well designed
11. Core Mechanic: Stealth is enjoyable, if substantially flawed
12. Starting Options: The class build system and design is actually excellent (disregarding levels), which tracks what you do to give suggestions, there’s prefab templates for new players, and you can customize your class. There’s plenty of options and thus it earns
13. Intro: The Intro is fantastic, with only a few minor complaints and a lot of things done right (tracking abilities, access to all methods of playstyles, good pacing and progression of events to guide player into playstyles, etc.). It’s also probably the best gameplay intro in a BRPG ever…
14. Intro: …earning itself…
15. Intro: …three positives
16. Music: Jeremy Soule’s music is just phenomenal
17. Music: A second positive for just some fantastic overworld and atmospheric dungeon music
18. Music: And a third, screw it
19. Fast Travel: Good fast travel system (discover points of interest, warp to any point from anywhere as long as out of combat). As an aside, this might be the best or near best version of fast travel I’ve ever seen, not just because of the basic ‘find and warp’ concept but the spread of warp points, how it approaches fast travel inside cities, and the smoothness and ease of the travel itself…
20. Fast Travel: …earning itself…
21. Fast Travel: …three positives
22. Map: The overworld map is actually quite well designed; It’s pretty, visually indicative of areas to interact with via roads and labels, and neatly tracks all the interactable spots to warp to. I’ve used this as a prime example of how to have a stylized map that’s still useful for years…
23. Map: …and I stand by that to this day…
24. Map: …for triple positives
25. Builds: Build variety and kit possibility (there are an absolutely huge number of possible builds you can do that are viable in this game)
26. Builds: …for two positives
27. All Roads Lead To Rome: Quest branching and multiple outcomes in most quests. I’ve seen better since then, but there’s still a decent amount of options in this one…
28. All Roads Lead To Rome: …for two positives
29. Crafting: Alchemy is fun to do, fun to combine, very useful, and modular to a high degree (rather than making a specific item you just add variables to potions)…
30. Crafting: …for two positives
31. Kit: Magic crafting and making your own spells is awesome and there’s a huge variety of what you can do with it, both mundane and broken
32. Kit: Magic crafting is sufficiently awesome in its structure and availability of what you can do with it
33. Kit: …for three positives
34. Crafting: Enchanting is just as awesome as crafting and just as fun
35. Crafting: …for a full…
36. Crafting: …three positives
37. Kit: Vampirism. It’s a great little side thing with some fun bonuses (and detriments) and can add some nice ‘find some blood’ gameplay
38. Difficulty Mutator: Dark Brotherhood and bonus objectives in assassinations
39. Prime Opt: Whodunit is easily the best crafted quest in the game, with no less than six possible methods of progression and incredibly non-linear approach
40. Prime Opt: …for two positives
41. Secondary: Cheydinhal painter, Cheydinhal Mage, Cheydinhal high justice, Bloated Float, Bruma Pale Pass, Chorrol painting quest, Through A Nightmare Darkly, Caught In the Hunt
42. Level: Knights of the Nine: Actual and fun dungeons and puzzles in the KoTN chain. This is especially noteworthy as dungeon design is NOT Oblivion’s strongsuit
43. Secondary: Shivering Isles: Ghosts of Vitharn, A Better Mousetrap, generally more polished quest design and a recurring ‘two choices’ theme
44. Starting Options: Character appearance options
45. Minimap: The compass is pretty good, giving an idea of what’s nearby, where the quest objective is, and is unobtrusive but still easily visible
46. Cheats: The built in console…
47. Cheats: …which could be better, but is still a great feature
48. Overworld: And consequently, the game does a lot to Encourage Exploration, especially in the overworld. Indeed, I would say that this is one of the better BRPGs in terms of having stuff to do on the overworld (random side dungeons, quests, interactions) and so…
49. Overworld: …earns itself two positives
50. Itemization: Good thought and effort put into Itemization across the game, both from drops, stuff that’s just out in the world, and quest rewards
51. Overworld: Mentioned earlier, but the Overworld design is great. There’s a clear range of what you can see from where you are that helps inform where you could or should go, and there’s clear ‘paths’ that you’re guided towards but don’t have to follow
52. Replayability: There’s so much to do and it’s so much fun that this game has great Replay value
53. Save: We have good, quick ease of saving and loading…
54. Save: …good quicksave and quickload…
55. Save: …and good autosave feature
56. Tutorialization: Bonus points for Tutorialization in the Intro, but also…
57. Tutorialization: …several quests throughout the game continue to help Tutorialize on newer concepts and ideas
58. Prime Opt: Dark Brotherhood’s quest design is some of the better stuff in the game, with the unique methods you can use throughout…
59. Prime Opt: …for two positives
60. Prime Opt: General variety and quality of the Fighter’s Guild quests
61. Prime Opt: General fun and puzzle design of the Mage’s Guild quests
62. Prime Opt: The actual Thief’s Guild quests can be very creative and fun, and overall are probably some of the better gameplay quests in the game (especially the big heist at the end)…
63. Prime Opt: …for a full…
64. Prime Opt: …three positives

Gameplay Negatives:

1. Difficulty Options: Boring, lazy difficulty (damage, health)
2. Difficulty Options: The difficulty design is flat awful, even worse than the norm because all it does is apply a linear and lazy damage taken/dealt modifier to the player only. This is, and I mean this, the worst difficulty design I’ve ever seen in a game…
3. Difficulty Options: …and it earns a full three negatives
4. Padding: Durability is lazy and boring, as it serves as a minor irritant that doesn’t really add anything to gameplay other than wasting your time
5. Level Scaling: First, the level scaling itself is quite linear and boring in its design, affecting both enemies and quest rewards, punishing the player for doing quests before leveling…
6. Level Scaling: …and second, it actively punishes the player for not optimizing their build, as enemies gain both equipment and stat boosts dependant solely on your level (and not your power output capacity). I should mention that this is probably the worst level scaling I’ve seen in gaming…
7. Level Scaling: …for a full three negatives
8. Level: Dungeon design is not interesting, engaging, or fun
9. Level: Dungeons are practically copy pasted (thanks to their design limitations) with samey layouts and samey visuals
10. Level: The Oblivion dungeons get particular notice for having all the problems of regular dungeons but add new ones; Irritating to navigate, especially bad lighting, and semi mandatory
11. Power Progression Curve: The leveling system is not great. You generally get weaker as you level, it’s astonishingly unnecessary, it feels counter-intuitive, and you can easily build yourself into a corner. Beating the game at level 4 is not uncommon, and in many cases is actually recommended…
12. Power Progression Curve: …leading to a full…
13. Power Progression Curve: …three negatives
14. Lighting: Lighting issues that basically mandate a torch and/or Light spell which barely helps
15. Core Mechanics: Another negative for general jank of connecting gameplay systems (level scaling makes leveling worse, leveling makes combat worse, combat makes dungeoning worse, dungeon design makes questing worse, etc.)
16. Interface: While not a huge issue, certain aspects of the menu are minor irritants and you have to deal with them all the time (selling, moving on the map, an ever-increasing inventory size)
17. Level: The dungeon design not only continues to be bad in Shivering Isles, but actually gets worse with the long, twisted, samey, hard-to-see, bad-mapped ‘roots’ style dungeons
18. Pathfinding: Pathfinding is not the worst, but it’s actively bad to the point of causing issues with quests, including escort quests
19. Outro: An additional negative for the ‘final dungeon’ of Shivering Isles being another long, boring, irritating roots dungeon with only one minor gimmick to it, which is escorting NPCs slowly to a destination
20. Alternate Leveling: Bloated and unnecessary perks
21. Core Combat: Melee combat combines with…
22. Core Combat: Entirely too easy to hit allies which can then aggro them (and yes I know about the yield thing)
23. Bug: Occasional bugs which limit or hinder progress
24. Backtracking: The lack of recall or teleport spells means a lot of weirdly irritating Backtracking through dungeons
25. Interface: While you can get used to the Interface, it’s just… not good
26. Visual Distinction: There’s several large sections (almost all in dungeons) where it’s legitimately hard to see what is where, making for bad Visual Distinction
27. Walkthroughitis: If I’m honest, this game is best played with a Walkthrough, as there’s just so much that it’s so easy to miss, even when just counting basic things like quests
28. Controls: You can get used to it… but you the game does not control well at all
29. MTX: Horse Armor
30. Traversal: You either run or, worse, use a horse

Story Positives:

1. Localization: Some of the best localization of the era, shaming games for over a decade to come. Nuance, dialect, jokes, and of course some great programming…
2. Localization: …easy double
3. Architecture: Not a surprise for a SNES RPG but there’s solid Architecture design throughout. Places like Twoson, Fourside, Summers, all feel larger than they really are
4. Architecture: Special mention for Onett which actually feels like the largest and best designed town in the entire game (go figure)
5. Storytelling Mechanic: The way they use text stylization in order to convey things. Tone, pauses, emphasis, variant fonts…
6. Storytelling Mechanic: …great stuff. Boing!
7. Storytelling Mechanic: Fun usage of guest characters periodically to help convey personality. Picky is helpful, the dog tries, Pokey is completely useless, and there are later examples I shan’t spoil here which count too
8. Tone: So unique a tone it spawned a few dozen successor games across the thirty years hence. Quirky but serious, silly but scary, it’s a unique flavor…
9. Tone: …and it manages it…
10. Tone: …brilliantly
11. Background Lore: The newspapers. Seriously, if you haven’t stayed at the hotels just for the newspapers at various plot points I highly recommend it
12. Dialogue: Some of this is down to the aforementioned excellent localization…
13. Dialogue: …but I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention the smart, snappy, varied dialogue
14. Humor: While most of the game’s strength is in its tone, the game still makes me laugh more than a bit…
15. Humor: …even to this day
16. Doodads: Not the best, but there’s still enough to warrant a positive (especially in the town and city areas)
17. Spritework: Some really good stuff, mostly in the enemy designs (both in battle and out)
18. Intro: Intro establishes everything right off the bat, bam. A meteor hits, the local cops are crazy, Pokey is useless, there’s an evil alien invasion in the future and we’ve got to stop it, let’s go. And then it starts the pattern we’ll be seeing for a while (help with a local problem, go up against a major dungeon, find out how it’s connected to the main plot while we go)
19. Character: Good time to mention the supporting cast of Onett. Lots of memorable characters here, like Franky, Mayor B. H. Pirkle, the mayor’s aide, the people in the library, the helpful people at the bakery, the cops, the kids in the clubhouse, Pokey’s family…
20. Character: …lots of good stuff
21. Brickwork: So I’m giving this to Onett and Twoson equally but these are probably some of the nicer looking areas in the entire game. Lots of little details, really sells the small town Eagleland vibes
22. MSQ: Everything about Happy Happy Village. The creepy music, the off color paint, the people preaching, it’s awful. I love it
23. Foreshadowing: This is as good of a time as any to mention the Mani Mani Statue and its relevance across the game. We actually first see it WAY back in Onett, right after the Intro, but it obviously makes another appearance here with Mr. Carpainter
24. Atmosphere: Welcome to Threed. I absolutely adore the vibe and tone of this town your first visit. Everybody in town talks about how bad things are, and how worse they’ve been getting. We also get…
25. Character: …some more great supporting cast in Threed. The dude who’s eyeballing the zombie traitor lady, the guy who abandoned his family, the weird delivery pizza man, et cetera
26. Princess Peach Segment: So, hey! Let’s take a break and follow Jeff and Tony for a bit up in Winters. This is a fun little divergence (with some significant plot relevance down the road, considering Andonuts alone, nevermind Dungeon Man)
27. MSQ: Jeff showing up to rescue us (thank goodness he had that Bad Key Machine!), using Zombie Paper to save Threed, and everything to do with Mr. Saturn
28. Moment: I don’t talk about this type of thing very often, but the return to Threed after we rescued everyone is actually really nice. Everyone is happier, we see the conclusion of all their little stories, and it’s just a good vibes sequence
29. Brickwork: I rather like how they present Fourside. The sharper angles and higher buildings really convey the urban aesthetic
30. Character: This is a good time to mention the supporting cast of Fourside. There’s a ton of NPCs here, from the thugs to the lady worried about her hips to the singer to the guy worried about his socks… great stuff
31. Dialogue: I’ve been holding off on this, but the dialogue in this game is really smart. You can almost immediately tell who’s talking purely based on their patterns of speech, and it’s part of why the game is so memorable decades later…
32. Dialogue: …gwaargh. Gwaaargh!!
33. MSQ: Everything to do with Moonside. While it has some gameplay issues listed later, Moonside is a gold mine narratively. The creepy visuals, the slightly surreal dialogue (just off enough while still sounding normal), the confrontation with Mani Mani…
34. MSQ: …great sequence
35. Plot: Believe it or not this is a great plot sequence, at the terminus of Fourside (which is also the end of the first major swath of the game). Onett to Fourside is one connected thread (literally connected even, you can walk on foot from Onett to Fourside if you want), and while we’ve known about Giygas since the beginning, now that we’ve taken out the Mani Mani statue it’s time for something else to step in. And this is when Pokey starts to make his presence known more… this also leads to some increase in the stakes, before we head off to…
36. Pacing: …Summers. I love this entire sequence, and it serves as a great downswing in tension as we get a breather before we escalate again
37. Character: Special mention to the characters who really help flesh Summers out. The ritzy restaurant, the beach goers, the museum, the people who love the smell of their own farts, the old timey fisherman’s wharf… great stuff
38. MSQ: This is functionally an aggregate, but I do like the Dalaam section. Similar to Jeff and Winters, this serves as another reset in events to get another party member to join us. We learn a bit about Poo himself, Mu training (which I totally failed my first time playing, lawl), and honestly that’s it but man that Mu training is just horrifying in all the right ways
39. MSQ: The entire trip from Summers to Scaraba is just full of little humor and flavor. I love the sailor, and the pseudo tourist nature of Scaraba itself
40. MSQ: So there’s an entire village of shy people, meaning you need to cure their shyness, which leads to tons of amusing discussion when you do. This is great in its own right but also in between this quest…
41. Atmosphere: …we go to the Stonehenge Base. As an anecdote, as a child this base scared the piss out of me. Even as an adult this is very well designed. Sharp angles, harsh pulsating colors, intimidating music, lots of alien and robot enemies, and our friends and allies stuck in jars begging for help…
42. MSQ: …this entire sequence is fantastic, and really emphasizes the Giygas threat in a very zoomed in fashion
43. MSQ: I love the Underworld sequence. The zoomed out camera, the slower move speed, the visuals, the old timey music, the Tendas and their, uh, cage. The whole thing is a great vibe and does a good job of conveying how ancient, old, and lost this entire area is. This is truly in the depths of the earth at this point, which makes sense for the last Your Sanctuary (and over on the side, the Cave To The Past)
44. MSQ: For everything I hate about the gameplay of it, Magicant is a delight narratively. The shifting color palette to follow your mood, the insight into Ness’ personality and his perceptions of others, the visual storytelling everywhere, all culminating in a fight against his own fear
45. Moment: One bonus thing to mention. In Ness’ inner thoughts he sees a Pokey who just wants to be his friend again. Ouch
46. MSQ: The revisit to Onett is fantastic. Most of the doors are sealed, it’s wreathed in perpetual night, the enemies here are brutal and high level (second hardest enemies in the game actually), the sounds and music are horrifying. Your own house is one of the only places left which doesn’t keep their door perpetually locked. This also serves as a great bookend before we hit the final dungeon
47. Visual Storytelling: This is an aggregate for several tidbits, but my personal favorite parts are the ‘path’ Pokey leaves as we follow him down into the depths of the underworld
48. Outro: Atmosphere: Good lord, the Cave Of The Past. This is gloomy, empty, and alien. It doesn’t even feel like something on Earth, and that’s before you get into the swarms of monsters and robots. And all of this is in service of…
49. Outro: Tone: …the slow descent. Most final dungeons and Outros in RPGs build upwards, escalating into a crescendo of epicness. Earthbound does the total opposite, descending into more and more of a quiet tension, like a single note just hanging in the air. There’s no bombastic music, no flashy visuals, there’s not even an epic final boss really. There’s just the eldritch horror
50. Outro: And then we see Giygas… or what’s left of him, trapped inside a machine designed to prevent his out of control PSI power from destroying everything. It’s a horrible, organic looking monstrosity and there’s no music playing, just this awful pulsing. And who do we meet there…
51. Outro: Character: …but Pokey. I haven’t talked much about Pokey, though he’s been with us from the beginning. He is such a unique villain. He’s kind of like a Krennic, but one who’s bosses keep failing above him, leaving him to stumble blindly upwards until he’s the right hand man of Giygas himself… and honestly given what’s left of Giygas, that just leaves Pokey in charge. And he’s… a child. Shoved to the top so fast he never matured or developed. And so we have a petulant brat who is primarily motivated by general misanthropy as well as a deep-seated frustration over how no one likes him. And this leads to a great moment of his…
52. Outro: Moment: …when he deactivates that horrible machine, and lets Giygas loose. And so Giygas just spills out like a fog
53. Outro: But, of course, Giygas always had trouble understanding one thing; Love. The prayers of the party reach out to the characters we’ve met across the game…
54. Outro: …the world itself…
55. Outro: …and the friggin’ player in order to stop Giygas by deleting what’s left of him from existence entirely
56. Outro: Moment: I need to give that its own moment. The player, the PLAYER, defeats Giygas… by praying with all our heart. Goddamn
57. Outro: Integration: So then we have the playable Outro. You can actually just kind of go… wherever, and do whatever, and that’s awesome in its own right…
58. Outro: …but there’s also a TON of updated text to acknowledge the changes (my personal favorite little detail? The uppity faux intellectual place becomes a trucker’s stop)
59. Outro: And finally the actual ending. Great credits, great pictures (depending on how many camera spots you got across the game!)

Story Negatives:

1. Story Sequencing: So… there’s a pretty weird section around Fourside that seems open ended but is super railroaded, but everything happens in such a generally illogical sequence it feels out of order. We go to Fourside, IMMEDIATELY turn around to hit the gold mine, then go back and get paid enough money to free the Runaway Five (for reasons that won’t happen for quite some time), then this opens up the department store, which leads to us losing Paula, then it’s off to Moonside, etc. It’s just a bunch of ‘and then’s

Gameplay Positives:

1. QoL: Plenty. L button, equip in store, sell after equip, smart usage of shortcuts…
2. QoL: …not at the level of FFVI or VII, but solid
3. Controls: For a SNES RPG this game controls really solidly. I already mentioned the L button but the way they shortcut stuff makes the whole experience quite smooth
4. Kit: Poo is the only character without good variety and kit design. We have Ness and his good spread of moves, mostly support…
5. Kit: …we have Paula, the offensive mage who can nuke groups or single target (or random!)…
6. Kit: …and we have Jeff and his incredibly varied and useful arsenal of gadgets
7. Itemization: I’ve seen better, but this is still pretty solid stuff. You will rarely want for money as long as you’re fighting normally, and the spread of useful items is pretty well done throughout dungeons and the overworld
8. Enemy Design: There’s plenty of design in the enemies in this game. While we don’t approach most of them very differently, there’s still enough stuff here to make things interesting…
9. Enemy Variety: …and to keep combat relatively fresh
10. Tutorialization: It’s here and there but the game does at least a decent job of conveying most of the basics of gameplay to the player. Sometimes through the moles, sometimes through NPCs, sometimes just within the design itself
11. Intro: The intro isn’t the best, but it’s still good. We start off weak (and alone!) but get a carry character to help us out with our first few fights, giving us a safety net and some free exp (first the dog, then Buzz Buzz). Shortly after this we get thrown into the deep end, but we’ll discuss that more in the negatives, because the structure after that is still solid; Local trouble, local dungeon, major boss
12. Level: The first dungeon isn’t the best, but what it does well is gives us enemies we can fight en masse who give good exp (the thing the Sharks failed to do earlier). This is a nice power boost before we hit the Titanic Ant, who’s main gimmick is he drains your mana and summons adds, but is followed immediately by…
13. Leveling: …enemies in Your Sanctuaries flee from you after you beat the local boss. This can be a GREAT time to level in any point in the game where this applies, since back attacks have a higher chance of instant win (the exact calculation has to do with your Speed stat, believe it or not) as well as just getting an ambush round in
14. Guidance: While I mention this in the negatives as well, there ARE a lot of different signposts to help you figure out what to do next that a new player is likely to stumble into (like resting at the inn, or roaming the bazaar)
15. MSQ: So the game does something really smart when Paula finally joins the party. First, she levels VERY fast to catch up (remember, these experience curves are manually designed). Second, she learns a lot of her basic kit at a very low level, meaning she’s useful almost immediately. Third, the enemies in the very next dungeon are pretty lucrative. And finally, she comes with a Teddy Bear which takes hits for her while she plays catch up. This is brilliant and a great way to ease her into usefulness. Did I mention the boss (Mondo Mole) is turbo weak to paralysis?
16. Kit:This is as good of a time as any to mention the useful variety of items in the game. It’s rare I give ITEMS a Kit positive but here we are. We have buffs, debuffs, heals, mana restores, stuff that specifically augments other things, stat ups, line attacks, full AOE attacks, single target nukes, all kinds of crazy stuff. I mention this here especially because in addition to the generally great stuff…
17. Kit: …there’s the really unique stuff, like the aforementioned Teddy Bear, which is phenomenal for several segments of the game (as tutorialized by the free one we get for Paula)
18. Princess Peach Segment: So I have to mention the Winters segment. This is brilliant, honestly. You start as another character who’s level 1, but unlike so (so!) many RPGs the game is designed AROUND you being level 1. You’re reset back to zero and the stakes go down with you, but you’re also playing a whole new character with their own kit (and those tools are fantastic, even early on). This entire section is weirdly well designed, from Brick Road to the Your Sanctuary to how the Bubble Monkey helps, and even down to how the segment is itemized…
19. MSQ: …so take that double
20. Hub: Weirdly, the Saturn Village is the best gameplay hub in the game. Everything is neatly and clearly laid out, readily accessible, and serves as the best (gameplay) hub for the entire rest of the game
21. Level: It’s a little late, but I have to give credit to the Belch Factory for being just a gigantic pile of experience if you want to level or catch up Jeff and/or Paula. Butterfly rooms, mass respawning enemies who all stand in a line and are weak to everything, it’s great
22. Level: So hey, a good level! The Monkey Cave feels like a weird choice but I’m totally with it. So here’s the deal, everyone in here requires an item to progress. All of those items (except the very first) can be found inside the dungeon itself if done in the right order and with thorough exploration, but also you can just bring most of these in from outside the dungeon if you please. Further there’s some REALLY good loot here if you bother to explore fully
23. Fast Travel: Yep! We get the Teleport spell at this point, and while it takes some skill to use in some areas it’s still incredibly useful and allows us to hit a lot of things in whatever order. This is as good of a time as any to mention that you can do a lot of the Your Sanctuary locations in whatever order you want (seriously, areas that look mandatory at the time totally aren’t)
24. Itemization: Small but interesting tidbit; Poo uses items differently than everyone else, so he gets different benefits (mostly better). He’s ALSO given a bunch of said items in his solo sequence to help him get up to speed quickly
25. Guidance: Almost the whole game has small but irritating walkthroughitis problems, but the next two major dungeons (which as per usual can be done basically whenever) are pretty solidly guided. The Museum in Summers leads you to learning about the major threat and how we have to go to Scaraba (that’s our MSQ lead), as we’re leaving we get a phone call from the guy in Fourside who leads us to one dungeon, and during this whole sequence we also get the key to unlocking the other dungeon over in Dalaam
26. MSQ: This is a pretty zoomed out aggregate but there’s at least enough decent design in the aforementioned dungeons to qualify. Decent item placement, enemy placement, enemy variety, general difficulty, as well as boss design. Pro tip; Bring the Franklin Badge to the all lightning dungeon
27. Difficulty Curve: So the game has a wonky curve multiple times but when the full party of 4 are together and have access to their full kit (basically Deep Darkness and onwards) the game starts to really come into its own
28. Level: Speaking fo which, the Lumine Hall is another experience fountain. And that’s good, because after this is the Underworld (which is mean) and the Fire Springs (which is meaner), followed by Magicant (where grinding is less feasible). So be sure and stock up on exp while yer here. (Also a general positive for generally decent boss designs in this sequence)
29. Outro: Level: The Cave Of The Past is a fascinating dungeon. There’s no save points throughout, BUT one right at the entrance which also serves as a full restore. Enemies here give tons of everything to help you get caught up. And there’s plenty of nice goodies along the way for the curious
30. Outro: Boss: The final boss sequence is mostly a Victory Lap if you know what you’re doing (see gameplay negatives for a bit more about this), and that’s so appropriate at this point in the game. Plus the fact that you, the player, are what deals the final blow? Amazing
31. Outro: Integration: The playable postgame where you can navigate basically everywhere and revisit everything

Gameplay Negatives:

1. Unskippable Cutscenes: Ironically made worse by the wonderful text rendering code
2. Inventory: I’ve seen worse… barely. It’s a colossal hassle to swap items around, you have tremendously limited space…
3. Inventory: …and don’t forget that both key items and equipment take up space. This gets worse…
4. Inventory: …when you remember that there are several points in the game where you’re penalized if you didn’t bring the right item to a given dungeon or area, probably because you banked it, because your inventory is so small
5. MSQ: So we hit our first bullcrap wall right out of the gate with the Sharks. They are mean, can summon adds (infinitely, if your luck is bad), and aren’t as rewarding as they need to be for what this should be (a wake up call as well as a way to boost your power output). This basically mandates luck, bringing a ton of healing items, and/or grinding to get past this little hiccup and it’s RIGHT out of the gate, arguably still in the Intro. It’s also followed by…
6. Boss: …two bosses back to back. The first one is ‘merely’ an RNG fest (he can absolutely destroy you with a lucky strike), but the second one is a nice big stat wall and is essentially designed to force you to grind. Not a great start
7. Boss: Not a fan of the cop gauntlet. First it’s a gauntlet with no pause to recover so… that sucks. Second these guys hit REALLY hard for this level. Third we’re still in ‘one character’ land so our action economy is really hurting. This is actually a good time to mention this since we deal with this in the Twoson area too but…
8. Early Game Hell: …we spend entirely too much of the game with just Ness. It smooths over the instant we pick up Paula, but that’s still two towns, two overworld segments, and a major dungeon (plus four bosses) with just Ness in a game clearly not designed around being solo
9. Info In Game: So there’s a lot of status effects in this game. Some don’t show up normally (hello, homesickness), some can only be cured by extremely specific means. Good luck figuring out any of that without a guide
10. Walkthroughitis: Speaking of which. Twoson is… weirdly obtuse in how to proceed. The game is actually smart about having multiple ways to figure out what to do next in GENERAL but the specifics can be a bit weird (invest in Apple Kid, rest, get his invention, use it on the pencil, go to the Happy Happy Village, oh and fight Everdred before all of this)
11. Walkthroughitis: We’ve had a few hiccups (especially in Twoson) but they all kind of start to add up. I’m specifically codifying this negative here because of how you progress in Threed, which requires you to go to a totally unrelated graveyard (nothing indicates this by the way) and approach two zombies, which then serves as the specific trigger. At least there’s a few hints you should follow the obvious trap with obviously trap lady
12. Level: It’s rare I speak out against levels in a game with so little level design but I have to call out the Threed to Saturn Valley tunnel as being absolutely terrible. Very narrow corridors, very irritating enemies with tons of status effects, and a long unpleasant trip to the nearest recovery spot. From a personal perspective every single time I replay this game I dread this segment because of this nonsense. I should also mention the enemies in Saturn Valley itself are actually pretty mean
13. Walkthroughitis: …okay but for real, memes aside, standing stock still for three minutes is not good game design. We all agree right? Even the hint for it is more vague than it really should be AND is required for even accessing it
14. Level: I swear I like this game, but the Desert Gold Mine can go to hell. We have weak enemies who are worthless, but also powerful as hell enemies which are a bit beyond us, also plenty of status effects, and also the place is an irritating and samey maze, and ALSO we need to take out five completely identical bosses in order to progress. Thank God there’s an indicator when you’re done (the music)
15. MSQ: Level:: So we just lost Paula. First, hope you knew that was coming and were prepared, cuz if you weren’t sucks to be you! Losing our primary DPS mage sucks, but losing a party member in general REALLY sucks. This is a problem all three Mother games share; They’re balanced around a full party, and have trouble when there isn’t (with the notable exception of the Winters excursion earlier). And lemme tell you, this isn’t as bad as Breath of Fire 2’s, but this is still a Sten Segment
16. Gotcha: By the way you’re trapped in the Department Store until you beat the boss. This is even WORSE because in addition to losing a party member (which nothing indicates is going to happen) you’re not told you’re about to do a (fairly mean) dungeon minus said party member. If you are under-leveled, under-geared, or under-supplied, sucks to be you, graveyard zerg it until you succeed
17. MSQ: Let’s get this out of the way; Moonside is great. Narratively. It kinda friggin’ sucks gameplay wise. The terrain is super indistinct (there’s no real visual indicator at times of what’s navigable terrain and what’s an invisible wall), the enemies like to do weird circles and teleport around periodically (and tend to suck to fight), the actual route through the place (which is aggressively linear) is the kind of thing you can’t intuitively find, and as per usual you’re stuck here until you succeed
18. Level: Screw the Pyramid. Extremely narrow corridors with enemies that absolutely love to debuff you and hit pretty hard, as well as a stat wall boss towards the end, on top of being somehow easy to get turned around in and aggressively linear
19. Level: I was going to give this one a pass but honestly screw the Fire Springs. So first of all everything here is insanely mean encounter wise and, thanks to the tiny movable area, are almost impossible to dodge or out maneuver
20. Level: Encounter Rate: Second of all this dungeon has a LOT of door transitions. Why is this relevant? Enemies respawn at door transitions in this game. This means that there is a much higher average encounter rate here than usual, which combined with the aforementioned problem makes for a giant face punch of a dungeon, but there’s one last problem…
21. Walkthroughitis: …there’s a very high chance this is your last Your Sanctuary spot (as mentioned earlier you can actually do these semi out of order). That means you’re probably going to go STRAIGHT from here to Magicant, no pause or chance to rejigger anything. And nothing warns you of this. So if your inventory isn’t sorted or you have the wrong items equipped or basically anything is wrong, sucks to be you. Go back to your last save (which was a while ago) or live with it. Because…
22. Gotcha: …Magicant is bullcrap. Again, nothing tells you you’re alone here, and the game (which is so well balanced around four party members) is TERRIBLY balanced for a single party member. The upcoming sections are a narrow hallway where it’s hard to avoid enemies and a slow sea section where the enemies can catch you easily respectively. And you have to deal with this solo. The Flying Men were a good idea, but badly executed, because they barely help, and they die easy and early. It is not infeasible to get ‘stuck’ here functionally softlocked, or having to crawl your way through a terrible and slow grind to escape…
23. Difficulty Curve: …screw…
24. Level: …Magicant
25. Outro: Okay so, yes, I love the final boss… buuut… there’s an issue here. For those unaware you have to use the Pray command (several times) to progress. There is a VERY vague hint by Pokey at this but otherwise good luck figuring this out, as there’s very little feedback that everything else is the wrong choice. To further this, Paula’s had access to Pray since we recruited her back in Peaceful Rest… and it has ALWAYS been trash. A curious player may have used it a few times just to be thorough and found (accurately) that it’s total junk. So by the END of the game it’s unlikely a player will even consider it as an option when debating what to do

Story Positives:

1. Camera: Excellent usage for cutscenes
2. Lighting: It’s subtle, but it’s used well
3. Cutscenes: Direction in general, it’s a little crazy how well they’re constructed
4. Banter: The combat banter and chatter (which is optional!) adds to the flavor and tone of combat and scenes…
5. Banter: …for a full…
6. Banter: …three positives
7. Atmosphere: The tension, alone, is insane in this game. It’s right up there with Metroid games…
8. Atmosphere: …for a full…
9. Atmosphere: …three positives
10. Moment: The initial infection. Good lord, the initial infection. “Cut us loose!”…
11. Moment: …for two positives
12. Voice Acting: The voice acting is just great in general, as per usual for Homeworld games, but in this one they have the unique flavor of sounding more ‘normal’ like the miners they are and in over their heads…
13. Voice Acting: …for two positives
14. Voice Acting: I need to give a bonus to Fleet Command
15. Character: Fleet Command. There’s several good characters, but Fleet Command takes the cake
16. Music Direction: The music is used to great effect to enhance the mood
17. Pacing: Story pacing is just fantastic, keeping highs and lows and fluidly moving through story beats…
18. Pacing: …for two positives
19. Character: Everything about the Beast is just wonderfully horrifying. This is one of the most messed up space monsters I’ve ever encountered…
20. Character: …for a full…
21. Character: …three positives
22. MSQ: Mission 15 is just phenomenal. The characterization, the world building hooks, the Bentusi, the voice acting, the dialogue, it’s just so good
23. MSQ: The final mission, Mission 17, is awesome. The big fight against the bosses is neat and all but the way the Beast interacts with us and the Taiidan, the terrified Bentusi aiding us
24. Atmosphere: In addition to the tension is just the nightmare horror that pervades the entire work…
25. Atmosphere: …earning another positive
26. Plot: It’s not often I get to give a positive for what is effectively escalation, but here we are. The arc of the miner kiith being forced to deal with an existential threat right on the chin and have to crawl up from nothing to deal with it…
27. Plot: …for two positives
28. Dialogue: Fantastic dialogue
29. External Continuity: Best External Continuity of the original trio, connecting neatly to and from Homeworld 1 (mostly in how it follows logically in the ‘now what’ story in the wake of the happily ever after of 1)
30. Internal Continuity: Aaand great Internal Continuity as well, keeping track of and following events throughout
31. Outro: Special praise for the entire Outro, narratively
32. Story Sequencing: The Story Sequencing is extremely logical and well constructed
33. Intro: The Intro does everything it should. It doesn’t just set the stage, it really establishes how pathetic and worthless you’re perceived to be; the nobodies mining on the sidelines for no profit or gain but to continue existing…
34. Intro: …for two positives
35. Moment: “You’re killing us. You’re killing us!”
36. Moment: “You are what all life is to us; Food”
37. Moment: “This is the Kiith Somtaaw warship Kuun-Lan.”
38. Theme: The core theme of sacrifice, true heroism, ‘now what’, and the strength of the un-regarded nobodies is awesome…
39. Theme: …earning itself a second positive
40. Storytelling Mechanic: This is a fun one. There’s this sound that plays as the black bars close in, and the player very quickly becomes aware of what that sound means, and that bad things follow. The game then USES this as a tool, and it’s honestly kind of awesome…
41. Storytelling Mechanic: …for two positives
42. Spritework: As with many space games, the sprites are the thing. The unique styles and designs of the raiders, the Taiidan, the Somtaaw, and the Beast ships are all excellent…
43. Spritework: …easily leading to double positives

Story Negatives:

Gameplay Positives:

1. Interface: Proper interface to allow for a 3D RTS
2. Controls: Surprisingly well controlled, given the complexity involved…
3. Controls: …for two positives
4. HUD: Proper HUD to allow for a good 3D RTS and helping you to immediately be aware of what’s going on…
5. HUD: …for two positives
6. Tutorialization: The (entirely optional) tutorial is very good at getting a player to know everything they need to know and how to play a relatively complex interface…
7. Tutorialization: …for two positives
8. Options: Good and decent amount of options with regards to interface, audio, etc.
9. Intro: First missions tutorialization. Mostly fighter and corvette class enemies, your base gets regularly hit, there’s a nice resource node a ways off to encourage you to learn how to move your HQ, and finally a peak at how enemy capital ships operate
10. Core Mechanic: Persistent fleets is a great idea to begin with, but it also works great with the veterency system (since you’re actually encouraged to keep and endure your best ships), and it adds what is effectively a strategic layer to the tactical gameplay…
11. Core Mechanic: …easily earning itself two positives
12. Power Progression Curve: The game goes out of its way to properly scale up what you have access to and when in line with mission structure
13. Pacing: Gameplay pacing is fantastic, with ups and downs in intensity and difficulty before the ambush, followed by a nonstop escalating of intensity thereafter
14. Level: Mission variety is good, fighting against any boredom or similarity familiarity that might bog the game down
15. Level: Mission design continues to be good, with lots to do and varied objectives that help keep things fresh
16. Level: Mission 15 is a great intensity point and vary point; having us fight something way above our pay grade, showcasing what the Bentusi can really do, unique and fun mission objectives, and continuing the escalation to the finale
17. Level: The final mission, Mission 17, is actually quite well designed. Two very unique bosses back to back with ways to side-step their abilities and multiple possible strategies with tons of resources (or mines if you prefer) to help, and of course the Super Acolytes
18. Core Combat: Core Combat of the space RTS is quite fun
19. Save: Generally easy and smooth saving and loading
20. Sound: Great Sound Design
21. Unit Design: Most of the Super Capital Ships are quite good and useful from basically the moment you get them until the end of the game

Gameplay Negatives:

1. Level: The nebula escort stealth mission can go to hell. It commits almost all of the typical sins of gaming design while simultaneously being not as polished as most other missions and lacking the variety they tend to have. It involves escorting a ship that won’t move unless two separate conditions are met, while keeping a fast and mobile force always ready to defend against scouts, which doesn’t matter because eventually the enemy attacks anyways with overwhelming force, and gathering resources is effectively not happening thanks to the constant movement and the mines and enemy attacks, but finally and worst of all the dialogue spam is at its worst the entire mission…
2. Level: …for a full…
3. Level: …triple negative
4. Pacing: Long stretches of empty nothing which can be pretty boring
5. Visual Distinction: A huge problem with visibility (it’s relatively easy to have enough ships to literally not see an entire battle at once) because the render radius is so small
6. Unit Design: Exceptionally limited ship variety, for a huge swath of time (effectively using just one type of ship for almost a dozen missions). More than anything else this limits tactical options, which you do not want to do in a strategy game over an extended period of time. A lot of the new units you get are also… not useful. Just Marines is fine… for the first two missions. This is easily one of the worst elements of Cataclysm’s gameplay…
7. Unit Design: …for a full…
8. Unit Design: …triple negative
9. Sound: Sound balancing is off in many scenes, to the point where voice acting either is inaudible or the music is
10. Bug: Bugs on almost every playthrough which can cause serious issues, including soft-locking
11. Difficulty Curve: As much as I love this game, the Difficulty Curve yo yos up and down massively throughout the missions

Story Positives:

1. Plot: The premise of the game’s initial few chapters is actually quite cool, running around and restoring cycles of life and working your way up to Humans
2. Character: Fyda, Perel, Meilin, and Elle (princess Elle) aren’t great characters by themselves but have cool moments and are generally enjoyable supporting cast
3. Background Lore: There’s some good flavor throughout the whole game, mostly tiny little things (buying an apartment or a croissant, freeing a bird, etc.) that helps make it feel more fleshed out than it otherwise would be
4. Prime Opt: The ‘economic sidequest’ is surprisingly engaging, as you run around helping the big three towns develop and grow
5. Plot: The twist that you’ve been a pawn of Dark Gaia for almost the entire game is handled pretty well, including the fact that your Yomi was Dark Yomi, and that this has all been a move to take control of this cycle
6. Cutscene: The Prince Liem tidbit was actually pretty cool, and probably one of the better scenes in the early game
7. Story Sequencing: There are periods of the game which have good Story Sequencing
8. Brickwork: While a bit weird at times, the game has good Brickwork…
9. Spritework: …and good Spritework as well
10. Animations: Animations are quite excellent, especially for the main character

Story Negatives:

1. Localization: The way the text is displayed is not good, and the translation has multiple issues that just slowly get worse as the game goes on
2. Cutscenes: There’s several cutscenes where what, exactly, is going on is just not clearly presented and it can get actively confusing
3. Outro: The ending is just kind of nonsense, a bit too preachy, and doesn’t even seem to understand its own point while simultaneously being massively unsatisfying
4. Story Sequencing: And there are areas which just have actively bad Story Sequencing

Gameplay Positives:

1. MSQ: The entire Liem escort, assistance, and off-screen boss fight
2. Bosses: Shadowkeeper, Parasite, Stormkeeper
3. Level: The Zelda-lite approach to dungeon design is a nice approach and the variety of puzzles is generally fun and interesting
4. Penalty For Failure: Return-to-save penalty for failure is a good system and still penalizes you but not too hard, hitting a nice balance point between ease and frustration
5. Outro: The final dungeon of Beruga’s tower and airship are actually really cool, having the companions you’ve encountered up until now helping you along the way and actively participating, and there being actual objectives (the bombs) instead of just progression
6. Tutorialization: Tutorializing via action, especially in the Intro
7. Intro: Health regen weapon in Intro
8. Mid Mission Checkpoints: Boss fight ‘checkpoints’ per phases
9. Music: The music, when it’s good, is great…
10. Core Combat: The combat isn’t super complex, but it is fun and works well with… // …the varying types of attacks and how they do different damage to a few enemies here and there

Gameplay Negatives:

1. Unskippable Cutscenes: The usual JRPG plague
2. Walkthroughitis: Most notably in how the game doesn’t tell you some things you can do, or what certain enemy types are weak/strong to, or whom to talk to in order to progress, improperly labeled map aspects such as the river or desert, having to get certain items in the right order to progress, etc.
3. Walkthroughitis: The walkthroughitis is actively bad, especially in late game, to the point of getting in the way of just playing the game
4. Power Progression Curve: The experience curve is just enough off that it interacts with the power progression curve such that you have to effectively stop and level periodically so that you are where you need to be
5. Music: Music has too short of a loop often and gets irritating, and the songs that are bad are the majority of the music you hear in the game (especially dungeon songs)
6. Outro: The final boss is, honestly, awful. It commits most of the sins of boss design; long invuln phases, unclear directions, too much health, disinteresting song, too long, and too boring…
7. Outro: …for two negatives
8. Graphics: Nauseating inderworld
9. Boss: Dark Twins boss fight
10. Interface: The shop menu is not good and is actively hard to see
11. Kit: Magic isn’t actively bad, but it’s not well designed at all and is only really useful a very small number of times
12. Backtracking: Some pretty bad sections of Backtracking, especially if you don’t know where you’re going

Story Positives:

1. Tone: The tone remains light and surprisingly enjoyable throughout, despite a relative lack of other elements of story
2. Brickwork: I never thought I’d say this, but after actual deep analysis the Brickwork of this game isn’t bad at all, and adds to the enjoyability of the experience. You’ll note it still only gets one positive… for the ENTIRE game… but still. Secret of the Stars has opened my eyes
3. Humor: I really shouldn’t admit it but I do still laugh at this game here and there
4. Outro: The ending is a very NES ending but it’s still solid for what it is. A tour of the places we’ve been, and each major NPC we’ve interacted with, and of course the ship sailing off into the horizon

Story Negatives:

Gameplay Positives:

1. Save: Save design (can save anywhere, can save quickly and efficiently, multiple save slots)…
2. Save: …for two positives
3. QoL: X to save or Start to menu (shortcuts), hold down A, enemy ‘health bars’, percentage healing, DQ cheating AI…
4. QoL: …surprisingly good Quality of Life features considering
5. Core Mechanic: Overworld interactions and minor jumping puzzles
6. Core Combat: The balancing of the mana system is interesting; similar to FFI’s overall system but more balanced
7. Penalty For Failure: Restarting encounters option on death. Do note this is restarting to the state you were in at the start of battle so it’s not a complete freebie
8. Music: Music is some great stuff overall (even detractors of this game praise its music)…
9. Music: …for two positives
10. Visual Distinction: As with most FF’s, the Visual Distinction is quite good
11. Enemy Variety: Surprisingly good Enemy Variety in how many there are and how they attack, as well as their weaknesses. In fact…
12. Enemy Design: …the ‘weakness’ design is arguably one of the strongest elements of the game as a whole. Each enemy is weak to at least one thing and they are SUPER weak to it, which then informs most of the decisions in combat (facing 3 mobs weak to bombs? One bomb might not kill them all, but if you single target one down first a bomb will kill the other 2)
13. Power Progression Curve: Every new spell, piece of equipment, and level is a substantial increase in overall power, making for some great staircase leveling. Very Dragon Questy. There’s just one asterisk to this mentioned down in the negatives
14. Intro: So the extended Intro is actually pretty solid (aside from maybe dying to the Behemoth thanks to pure RNG). We get our first town, which contains a party member and the Cure spell. We get our first dungeon, the Level Forest, which is a singular route until you gain access to the axe at which point you can explore more and get a few additional things. It contains our first exposure to Battlefields (which give us an accessory and experience). And then we have the Bone Dungeon, which you can reach inside of 15 minutes of play time on a normal playthrough so yes it counts as Intro still, which adds bombs and a few additional puzzle layers
15. Intro: Boss: The Flamarus Rex is a weirdly well designed fight considering. He hits reasonably hard but not too hard, doesn’t do any irritating status effects (just an occasional poison which essentially just wastes a turn), and doesn’t have that much health. He’s also turbo weak to Quake (which you just got) and you have a baked in healer with Tristam (or yourself, since you’ll have Cure). Solid end to the Intro
16. Song: Boss. Talk about a headbanger out of nowhere
17. Level: The Focus Tower, in its entirety, is weirdly well designed. There’s multiple routes that dovetail into each other that slowly unlock as you gain access to more coins (read; keys) and open up new areas on the overworld map. And, of course, give you access to more lucrative chests (big and small… this is my go-to spot for refilling bombs for the entire game, for example)
18. Hub: Foresta, Aquaria, Fireburg, and Windia all serve as surprisingly decent recovery spots gameplay wise. Each sells their own stuff (Fireburg selling seeds is the best of course), each has free recovery rooms and random smatterings of resources, and each has their own little side things to get additional treasure
19. Level: Falls Basin is a surprisingly well designed dungeon; Low enemy encounter rate, one room size, good puzzle looping, and multiple potential solutions
20. Level: The Ice Pyramid is another one of those simple but solid dungeons. Drops, switches, side treasures (you can literally skip the mirror by the way, hah), and solid enemy design pretty much custom tailored for your team
21. Level: For what it’s worth the Lava Dome actually has some neat things. Side areas with mostly optional encounters to get treasure, several jumping and looping puzzles, and even a switch or two
22. Song: Gale. I dunno, this song just rocks what do you want from me
23. Level: Mount Gale isn’t terrible either. Nice routing around itself (in fact this might be the most Peeking dungeon in the game), and not too many encounters (which is a nice breather after the friggin’ Tree)
24. Level: Pazuzu’s Tower, despite the encounter issues, is a well designed and interesting Zelda style dungeon. Multiple routes through, switches to lock off the elevator, some really good equipment (Excalibur and Flare), and generally solid stuff. If not for Mac’s Ship after this this’d be the beginning of the game really coming into its own…
25. Level: …but as is it’s still a solid double dungeon
26. Boss: Pazuzu is another fight that’s solid for what it is. A defined counter / vuln phase rotation, severe weaknesses you are designed to exploit, no status effect bullcrap, and not too much health
27. Outro: Level: The final dungeon is actually surprisingly well designed given the rest of the game. Ignoring the obvious banger of a song (more on that in a moment), the first floor does some cool stuff with the sand and grapple, as well as actually NOT having a billion enemies oh my gosh. The second floor is all about switches and pits. The third is jumps over laval. And the final is more pits and looping paths. And at the very end is a turbo refill for the final boss. Overall…
28. Outro: Level: …a shockingly good final dungeon
29. Outro: Boss: The improved final bosses are nice developments of their previous forms (and thanks to the updated gear, no more bullcrap status effects!) The final final boss is… fine, even if you don’t use the underflow glitch
30. Song: Castle Beyond Time. There’s a reason I pause every single time I reach the first point in the game where this song plays, and just listen to it for a loop or two. This song is one of my favorite songs of all time and serves as a wonderful reward for finishing the game…
31. Song: …earning a solid…
32. Song: …triple positive

Gameplay Negatives:

1. Difficulty: It really does need to be mentioned that it’s possible to lose to the very first fight in the game through absolutely no fault of your own. This is how the RNG goes in this game and will continue to be a problem until basically the final dungeon
2. Difficulty: RNG is something else in this game, as mentioned with the Intro sequence. How bad it gets seems directly tied to how many status effects enemies have access to, which means the absolutely worst part of this is the Fire region (lots of status effects, and you’re not immune yet)
3. Encounter Rate: So by the time we hit the frozen area (most noticeably in the Wintry Cave) we’ve already started to hit what is probably the single biggest problem in the entire game; the Encounter Rate. Yes most SNES RPGs had too high of an encounter rate but in FFMQ it’s kind of crazy how rapid fire these get. It’d be even worse if the encounters lasted longer than 20 seconds, but it’s still not great
4. Boss: Both the Ice Golem and Dualhead Hydra are ALMOST positives… except the Golem sleeps and heals himself, and the Hydra likes to friggin’ petrify!
5. Difficulty: The game’s fake difficulty really ramps up right about the fire quadrant, with lots of enemies who have the ability to instantly kill/paralyse/status effect you to death and effectively nothing you can do about it (status effects in general also suck, as most of them just force you to waste a turn). A not uncommon event to happen is you start a battle, die in a few turns, hit restart, and then sweep them because they used different attacks
6. Encounter Rate: And yes, the encounter rate is still a problem. The Mine isn’t that bad, really, the Volcano is a bit big but otherwise fine, but the Lava Dome is just a gigantic chonker from hell. In fact I do believe this is the second longest dungeon in the game in terms of time spent
7. Level: And then there’s the Giant Tree. This is the single worst dungeon in the entire game. And let’s be clear, there’s two big reasons why. First, it lacks all the cool puzzles or dungeon design of the previous dungeons…
8. Level: Encounter Rate: …and second is the awful, AWFUL encounter rate. It’s never been good the entire game, but I swear this dungeon in particular is the worst of the slog. Maybe it’s a bit because it’s just dragging by this point because, and I can’t believe I’m saying this…
9. Padding: …but this 8 hour RPG is just too damned long for what it is. In fact I’ve put specific thought into this. If you axed the Wintry Cave, the Volcano, the Giant Tree, and Mac’s Ship I think the game would instantly become much better. But no, instead these segments just pad the entire game out
10. Encounter Rate: Pazuzu’s Tower is one of the more frustrating dungeons in the game because in addition to enemies that absolutely spam blind, this place is just GLUTTED with enemies. This is THE longest dungeon in the game, and part of that is due to the good dungeon design, and most of it is because of the dozens upon dozens of encounters everywhere. Just to name a particular example, just to be able to navigate without the elevator you need to fight 3 enemies per staircase, and there are 5 staircases. 15 encounters just to traverse between floors…
11. Encounter Rate: …this is terrible
12. Encounter Rate: And then there’s Mac’s Ship. Honest to God every time I play this game I forget this dungeon even exists. It’s such a bump on the road in between Pazuzu’s Tower and Doom Castle, and it’s not good or bad it’s just a giant pile of enemies

Story Positives:

1. Voice Acting: Voice acting is surprisingly good on the briefing guys
2. Plot: General plot and theme (the everyday combat of being in the empire while not being puppy eaters)
3. Plot: The entire Sepan Civil War is probably my favorite arc in the game, with fun missions, interesting concepts, and a great premise
4. Background Lore: Background implications and lore (Lack of oversight on Zaarin’s missions, Harkov being higher rank than Thrawn, the slow build-up of plot elements like the rebellion and the new Starfighter programs, seeing the underbelly of Imperial corruption, right after uncovering Harkov’s treachery you’re reassigned to the middle of no where with Thrawn and Zaarin, etc.)
5. Character: Zaarin himself is a uniquely well crafted villain for this game. He’s an Imperial who’s got a lot of personal power through the military who was in charge of starfighter research in a starfighter game so he has the best fighters and uses them predominantly in his strategy, and since he knows so much about Imperial starfighter research he can unique cause issues for and damage to the Imperial starfighter infrastructure
6. Cutscene: Interesting and pretty cool in-gameplay cutscenes
7. MSQ: The entire ninth (I think) Tour was pretty awesome, with a nice feeling of being screwed and having dwindling resources but in a way that made perfect sense and added to the enjoyment
8. External Continuity: The game does a pretty good job with internal and external continuity, connecting Hoth to Endor, explaining Thrawn’s activities during the third movie and the lead-in to the Thrawn Trilogy, explaining why the TIE/A (and I, D, and MIS) were not really widespread during and after Endor, etc.
9. External Continuity: A second positive for good External Continuity to the rest of Star Wars EU
10. Intro: The entire Intro works really well at establishing everything it needs to, putting you right in the wake of Hoth as well as how the overall campaign will flow
11. Atmosphere: The general military vibe
12. Brickwork: All in the cockpits and hangers, but it’s there
13. Storytelling Mechanic: Everything to do with the Emperor’s Hand and the secret side objectives
14. Visual Storytelling: Subtle, but there’s a lot of stuff going on in missions that tells their own stories
15. World Building: This game does more for the setting and the Empire than most books do
16. Spritework: Honestly the ships and fighters themselves are a huge part of the draw, well modeled and hugely varied…
17. Spritework: …for a full…
18. Spritework: …three positives

Story Negatives:

1. MSQ: Suddenly Zaarin has captured the Emperor! And you’re flying with Darth Vader! And you’ve saved the Empire! Yay!
2. Writing: The excessive elbow nudging and writing for the player rather than the character of the Endor missions got legitimately irritating after a bit
3. Story Sequencing: Especially in the expansion missions, there’s some legitimately bad Story Sequencing as events just kind of… happen

Gameplay Positives:

1. HUD: HUD design (quick and easy to see, double radar, weapon indicators, shield and hull indicators, etc.)
2. Core Mechanic: Energy management system
3. Cheat: Built in cheats which can be toggled on and off at will in flight
4. Tutorialization: Good training VR missions
5. Difficulty Mutator: Secondary and bonus objectives as a form of optional content and increased difficulty
6. Level: Lots of good mission design and varied objectives as well as gameplay / story integration in the main campaign
7. NG+: Ability to replay missions
8. Difficulty Option: Achievements with medals and rank which is completely cosmetic
9. Controls: The game Controls very well and very intuitively across the many inputs you need
10. Enemy Variety: Really good Enemy Variety in types of ships and how they fly and need to be dealt with
11. Intro: That Intro in the wake of Hoth is a lot of fun, and very enjoyable to play through
12. Pacing: Aside from the expansion missions, the game has really great Pacing in its campaign design
13. Replayability: Game is very Replayable, especially in the secondary and bonus objectives
14. Yoshi Drums: Lovely dynamic music as events happen and depending on current status
15. Core Combat: The entire hardpoint system and how it can be used
16. Core Mechanic: Energy shunting and the usefulness thereof
17. Encounter Design: Generally really well thought out
18. Enemy Design: Many ships and capital ships, with lots of good layout, weaknesses, and hardpoints
19. Hyperbeam Moment: There’s technically two; the first time you get the TIE Defender, and the first time you get the Missile Boat
20. Music: Dynamic and interesting, Star Wars style without being from the movies
21. Kit: General loadout and kit positive
22. Kit: TIE/I and the increased energy reserve and weapon spread
23. Kit: TIE/A and the incredible maneuverability and energy spread and general fun
24. Kit: Missile Boat, hope you like literally dozens of missiles and a ton of energy to use them
25. Kit: TIE/D and the overpowered monster fighter of doom
26. Kit: The other ships and their various issues and benefits

Gameplay Negatives:

1. Core Combat: Core combat has issues which cause problems in some missions more than others (squadron AI is not super useful, ‘dogfighting’ consists of jousting, lack of speed/shields/hull in some combination thereof, etc.)
2. Level: The capture Harkov mission (Chase after three ships, one of which is substantially faster than you, scan and disable them, also they’re in a minefield defended by TIE/A’s, also one of them will slam into the other upon takeoff unless you trick the AI first, auto failing the mission)
3. Level: The expansion missions just do not feel as designed as the main campaign ones, with less thought into specifics of encounters, your ship, enemy composition, and objectives being a bit too pat. There’s also a lot of unpolished, or not QA tested, missions
4. Pacing: Long periods of nothing where you’re just waiting
5. Mid Mission Checkpoints: Total lack of mid-mission checkpoints
6. Difficulty: Start with half shields for no reason
7. Party AI: The ‘party’ AI is absolutely awful, barely useful as anything other than fodder
8. Difficulty Curve: All over the place, especially by the expansion

Story Positives:

1. Voice Acting: Voice acting
2. Writing: Good exposition and cutscene usage early on
3. Intro: The Intro does a great job of taking its time, pacing itself with stories big and small, and never really straying from the core themes of personal connections and political intrigue
4. Character: Good supporting cast for the Intro: Marina, Belcoot, Lym, Ferid, Arshtat
5. Cutscene: The culmination of the Roy story arc was amusing and the big scene with Euram and the… ‘acting’ was hysterical
6. Plot: Political intrigue is the series’ hallmark and the first four chapters are ripe with it
7. Pacing: Pacing through much of the first half of the game is great stuff
8. Story Sequencing: There’s a natural progression and escalation of events
9. Consequence Storytelling: Consequence storytelling is well on display, with lots of smart plot construction
10. Background Lore: Comment box is a great source of flavor lore as usual
11. Plot: Usage of True Runes as a main vector for the plot and a great examination thereof
12. World Building: Horror of the Nether Gate. They are described in full and they are not pretty
13. Foreshadowing: Proper build up and foreshadowing with Georg and Sialeeds
14. Character: Georg is kinda awesome throughout
15. Character: Supporting cast. There’s too many to list but they are pretty awesome and have a lot of little tidbits
16. Humor: The game still gets a chuckle out of me
17. Outro: The epilogue slides for each recruited character remain a good way to showcase what happens after the game ends
18. Character: Mathias // Miakis // Viki
19. Character: Lucretia // Lyon // Boz
20. Internal Continuity: Quite tight
21. Brickwork: Honestly kind of bland, very early PS2
22. Spritework: But the Spritework is much better, honestly some of the better stuff on the PS2 in general…
23. Spritework: …for an easy…
24. Spritework: …triple positive

Story Negatives:

1. Writing: Occasional dialogue issues and ‘as you know’, with some bad exposition
2. Character: Sialeeds’ arc. You can see what they wanted to do with it, but the execution was severely lacking and honestly it just felt like way too much unnecessary conflict and drama between allies
3. Sound: Audio balancing issues abound in the cutscenes
4. Fake Drama: Several instances of artificial drama and ‘noble heroes working for literal genocidal maniacs’

Gameplay Positives:

1. Leveling: The leveling system is the same, good one from Suikoden 2, and it is very anti grind…
2. Leveling: …for two positives
3. Build: Lots of party members and 6 sized party, which allows for a decent amount of ‘bring your favorites’ and a lot of possible combinations
4. Strategic Layer: Keep mechanics are, as usual, fun and interesting with some nice side stuff and rewarding filling out the Keep
5. Fast Travel: The Viki / Mirror option makes getting around so much better and serves as a functional hearthstone / waypoint system
6. Kit: Kit is not too shabby, between Training, Runes, equipment, and the four slots system
7. Strategic Layer: Setup for Major Battles has some surprisingly good complexity and customization
8. Minigame: Duels are actually pretty decent in this one, with timing and voice clips and some juking
9. Kit: Unite system is pretty cool, with some cool combos both for attacks and spells
10. Party AI: Auto battle returns
11. Encounter Rate: Release, and the availability of just skipping some encounters
12. Enemy Variety: Decent throughout
13. Difficulty Curve: Some bumps here and there, but overall good
14. Itemization: Good spread of items and gear
15. Relayability: General, but replayable, especially with its (limited) NG+ system
16. Alternate Leveling: Upgrading

Gameplay Negatives:

1. Unskippable Cutscenes: Some of the worst in the series, honestly…
2. Unskippable Cutscenes: …earning two negatives
3. Walkthroughitis: Pretty bad walkthroughitis (lots of permanently missable content and esoteric methods of recruitment)
4. Walkthroughitis: The trigger design of the game is actually pretty bad, harkening unto much older RPG design of ‘find the exact person/spot/thing to go to to progress’
5. Mid Mission Checkpoints: Repeated instances of lack of checkpoints/saves in between difficult and/or lengthy battles (often crossing Major Battles, Bosses, and Duels)
6. Walkthroughitis: The combination of walkthroughitis and ‘need to know what you’re doing’ means the game can be pretty grindy if you don’t know what you’re doing or have a walkthrough
7. Seconds In Minutes: A combination of everything just taking too long (animations, distances) and lengthy segments of walking across long stretches of town/dungeon/overworld just kills the gameplay pacing
8. Outro: The Outro really is not good. The final boss isn’t bad, per say, but it’s pretty generic. The lack of save points and anything interesting in the final dungeon hurts it quite a bit too, combined with a lack of good final music (in dungeon or boss)
9. Interface: Interface design is just… kind of lacking
10. Overworld: Generally bad overworld design…
11. Map: …combined with actively bad map design
12. Level: Dungeon design, never a hallmark of the Suikoden series
13. Music: Music restarting upon reload problem
14. Strategic Layer: Strategy side kind of sucks, most notably in the interface and controls but also the ease with which you can be stunlocked, and the animations drag it out far too long
15. Encounter Rate: Encounter rate isn’t the worst but on top of…
16. Pacing: …the battle transition speed, it slows things to a crawl
17. Save: Really irritating, slow Save System