Number of gripes, but I still give it 10/10

[Cruna]

What an amazing game....
It's not like it does something crazy new, but it delivers a wonderful experience.

I do have a few notes, something I thing this game should have.... maybe.

-party of 3 in battles. Numerous JRPG games showed ever since FF9, that a party of 4 is the sweet spot to have a good mix of synergy and battle flow.

-No option to switch out party members during battles? Why not? I mean that's an amazing mechanic which also helps with flow, target enemy sweet spots, mix strategies on the fly. Also would help us use more party members for different effects.

-Some visual clarity issues. Sometimes it's difficult to figure out skills and their impact just by simply looking to descriptions like "medium damage 4 times" or "high damage 1 time". That "medium" changes drastically from one skill to another, so it would be nice to have more clarity when choosing what skills we use.

These are nit-pickings, certainly still makes it a 10/10 game for me because it's refreshing that some dedicated developers finally get most things right.

[Ratsplat]

Party size is a bit funky when you have 3, then 2 come in later. Feels like it was made with 6 in mind, but...

The switching during combat makes sense and fits with existing mechanics. You can bring in a reserve team. But I wouldn't say this is necessarily a flaw.

[Cruna]

Originally posted by Ratsplat:

Party size is a bit funky when you have 3, then 2 come in later. Feels like it was made with 6 in mind, but...

The switching during combat makes sense and fits with existing mechanics. You can bring in a reserve team. But I wouldn't say this is necessarily a flaw.

Agree. But wouldn't be better to also have the option to switch out a party member for the cost of one move at any time, instead of only using the reserve when the main party is wiped?

[Shin Happens]

I won't add my gripes in detail here for spoiler reasons, but gameplay is actually a more minor issue for me.

Act 1 and Act 2 are very, very good 8.5 out of 10 for me, the setting, the art direction, the story are all excellent, but let's be real, the gameplay here is super basic, some extremely basic exploration coupled with turn based combat every other minute or so. Other games offer more here. If I compare this with God of War then the gameplay in that game is lightyears better. I use GoW because it too is a linear story focused game with linear levels (with some backtracking). But gameplay mechanics in GoW are SO much better and more varied.

Act 3 is at best a 2/10 for me. And this has story only reasons.

All in all it's still a game worth playing, but overall, all things considered, I can only give it a 7/10. Act 3 simply tears down almost everything and invalidates almost everything that came before and that you were asked to care about and be invested in.

And then everything is rushed like crazy.

This can't be a 10/10.

I can tell you what IS a 10/10 for me:

voice acting
soundtrack
art direction

it does not get any better than in CO. Truly outstanding.

Gameplay: 5/10 - just very average. I had more fun sneaking as Naoe in AC Shadows even. Generally speaking.

Story: ultimately a 3/10. sorry. But Act 3 is one massive blunder for me. The issue is not WHAT you get in Act 3, the issue is what you DON'T get in Act 3, as in, if the things we get in Act 3 were just one part and not all there is, I would have rated the overall story much, much higher and the endings that ARE in the game would have been fine, IF they were not all there is. But you need to stick the landing for a story to truly work.

[Cruna]

Originally posted by Shin Happens:

I won't add my gripes in detail here for spoiler reasons, but gameplay is actually a more minor issue for me.

Act 1 and Act 2 are very, very good 8.5 out of 10 for me, the setting, the art direction, the story are all excellent, but let's be real, the gameplay here is super basic, some extremely basic exploration coupled with turn based combat every other minute or so. Other games offer more here. If I compare this with God of War then the gameplay in that game is lightyears better. I use GoW because it too is a linear story focused game with linear levels (with some backtracking). But gameplay mechanics in GoW are SO much better and more varied.

Act 3 is at best a 2/10 for me. And this has story only reasons.

All in all it's still a game worth playing, but overall, all things considered, I can only give it a 7/10. Act 3 simply tears down almost everything and invalidates almost everything that came before and that you were asked to care about and be invested in.

And then everything is rushed like crazy.

This can't be a 10/10.

I can tell you what IS a 10/10 for me:

voice acting
soundtrack
art direction

it does not get any better than in CO. Truly outstanding.

Gameplay: 5/10 - just very average. I had more fun sneaking as Naoe in AC Shadows even. Generally speaking.

Story: ultimately a 3/10. sorry. But Act 3 is one massive blunder for me. The issue is not WHAT you get in Act 3, the issue is what you DON'T get in Act 3, as in, if the things we get in Act 3 were just one part and not all there is, I would have rated the overall story much, much higher and the endings that ARE in the game would have been fine, IF they were not all there is. But you need to stick the landing for a story to truly work.

Maybe you are a bit harsh to it, but I respect any opinions.

For me personally when it comes to these:

Story: 8/10 -I like the world building, the setting the way the characters connect and find their place in the story. It's noting revolutionary to be honest, but it's a good story for this type of fantasy setting.

Characters: 6/10 -the characters are good enough. There is mostly absolutely no layers to them, not very interesting by any stretch of imagination, they are tuned to their single track and they stay on it. Probably Monoco is slightly more interesting in that regard than the rest

Writing/Dialogues: 9/10 -well written dialogues, good writing overall. It's great. I personally am not a fan of the constant moaning and sad talks, but it's more of a personal preference of mine, but regardless of my own preference, I still admit that it's great.

[Shin Happens]

Originally posted by Cruna:

Maybe you are a bit harsh to it, but I respect any opinions.

For me personally when it comes to these:

Story: 8/10 -I like the world building, the setting the way the characters connect and find their place in the story. It's noting revolutionary to be honest, but it's a good story for this type of fantasy setting.

Characters: 6/10 -the characters are good enough. There is mostly absolutely no layers to them, not very interesting by any stretch of imagination, they are tuned to their single track and they stay on it. Probably Monoco is slightly more interesting in that regard than the rest

Writing/Dialogues: 9/10 -well written dialogues, good writing overall. It's great. I personally am not a fan of the constant moaning and sad talks, but it's more of a personal preference of mine, but regardless of my own preference, I still admit that it's great.

Do you know that feeling when you feel something or someone has true potential to achieve something outstanding... and AAAAAAALMOST gets there only to fumble at the last second?

You may be harsh then because you care, you can sense that more would have been possible. If say, someone fumbles their way through Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata (all three movements of course) you'd think "ok, he or she tried, it's fine..." and you move on, but when someone plays it more beautifully than anything you ever heard before... only to completely lose it with the last two bars, hitting all the wrong keys... you'd feel very, very disappointed, because you can tell the talent is there.

CO is something like that. So yes, my rating (mostly for the story) may sound harsh, but that is because I am convinced they could do SO much better based on what we get for 90% of the story.

I would rate the characters higher really, they are all memorable to me, even Gustave who leaves early. But the story lets the characters down in the end. I do agree that the characters deserved a more elaborate character arc, their own set of missions, they are not on the same level as, say Judy or Panam in Cyberpunk 2077, who both are much more fleshed out and 3-dimensional. Even Evelyn in CP2077 is more fleshed out and you feel her death. It hits hard.
But the CO characters are all truly memorable despite a lack of content. I think you can see why this is an AA game made by a small studio. CP2077 had a massive team and AAA budget, they could create lots of narrative content for the major NPCs.

If Judy from CP2077 is a 10/10 character then Lune, Gustave, Sciel are maybe 8/10 or at least 7/10. You are invested in them, you will like them, you learn about them, you care about them, the story just never gives them any time to fully develop like CP2077 did. Even Maelle never truly gets the character development she needs in act 3.

[['w']]

when you fight golgra at her place, music is playing over the area music, drives me crazy

Gustave is a clear 10/10 for me

[Cruna]

Originally posted by Shin Happens:

Originally posted by Cruna:

Maybe you are a bit harsh to it, but I respect any opinions.

For me personally when it comes to these:

Story: 8/10 -I like the world building, the setting the way the characters connect and find their place in the story. It's noting revolutionary to be honest, but it's a good story for this type of fantasy setting.

Characters: 6/10 -the characters are good enough. There is mostly absolutely no layers to them, not very interesting by any stretch of imagination, they are tuned to their single track and they stay on it. Probably Monoco is slightly more interesting in that regard than the rest

Writing/Dialogues: 9/10 -well written dialogues, good writing overall. It's great. I personally am not a fan of the constant moaning and sad talks, but it's more of a personal preference of mine, but regardless of my own preference, I still admit that it's great.

Do you know that feeling when you feel something or someone has true potential to achieve something outstanding... and AAAAAAALMOST gets there only to fumble at the last second?

You may be harsh then because you care, you can sense that more would have been possible. If say, someone fumbles their way through Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata (all three movements of course) you'd think "ok, he or she tried, it's fine..." and you move on, but when someone plays it more beautifully than anything you ever heard before... only to completely lose it with the last two bars, hitting all the wrong keys... you'd feel very, very disappointed, because you can tell the talent is there.

CO is something like that. So yes, my rating (mostly for the story) may sound harsh, but that is because I am convinced they could do SO much better based on what we get for 90% of the story.

I would rate the characters higher really, they are all memorable to me, even Gustave who leaves early. But the story lets the characters down in the end. I do agree that the characters deserved a more elaborate character arc, their own set of missions, they are not on the same level as, say Judy or Panam in Cyberpunk 2077, who both are much more fleshed out and 3-dimensional. Even Evelyn in CP2077 is more fleshed out and you feel her death. It hits hard.
But the CO characters are all truly memorable despite a lack of content. I think you can see why this is an AA game made by a small studio. CP2077 had a massive team and AAA budget, they could create lots of narrative content for the major NPCs.

If Judy from CP2077 is a 10/10 character then Lune, Gustave, Sciel are maybe 8/10 or at least 7/10. You are invested in them, you will like them, you learn about them, you care about them, the story just never gives them any time to fully develop like CP2077 did. Even Maelle never truly gets the character development she needs in act 3.

Oh I didn't say "harsh" because I thought, that you are "mean" to it. By all means, yours is simply a healthy criticism.. But I simply think that you rated it lower than it deserves really based on what you said. That's not mean, it's simply how you see it.

About the characters. As a concept, they sure are memorable, and they have a wonderful place and they interact well with eachother. However as far as their personality goes, for me they are simply going on one track. Well written characters should have some dimensions to them, layers, but these characters are more like what you see is what you get. Don't expect any surprises.

And a small team is no excuse for writing a boring character. That's all up to the talent of the writer itself.