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03/01 - Need for Speed: Most Wanted (2005)
08/01 - Need for Speed: Carbon
12/01 - Devil May Cry (Normal)
15/01 - Devil May Cry 2 (Normal/Dante)
26/01 - Monster Hunter World: Iceborne
08/02 - Dishonored
18/02 - Deus Ex: The Fall
23/02 - Devil May Cry 3: Special Edition (Normal/Dante/Free Style)
26/02 - Devil May Cry 3: Special Edition (Normal/Vergil)
28/02 - Horizon Chase Turbo
28/02 - EQQO
02/03 - Yakuza 3 Remastered
03/03 - Devil May Cry 3: Special Edition (Hard/Dante/Free Style)
10/03 - Devil May Cry 3: Special Edition (Very Hard/Dante/Free Style)
13/03 - Mirror's Edge Catalyst
19/03 - A Short Hike
01/04 - Doom Eternal
02/04 - Lucah: Born of a Dream (NG+, Bad Ending)
14/04 - Yakuza 4 Remastered
17/04 - Fable Anniversary
21/04 - Transistor
01/05 - The Last Guardian
11/05 - Mafia III
15/05 - Mini Ninjas
17/05 - Burnout Paradise Remastered (Elite License)
20/05 - The Gardens Between
25/05 - The Wonderful 101 Remastered (Normal)
Unfortunately I simply don't like this one, despite being a big fan of Platinum generally. Even after giving it the best possible chance of playing the whole thing, on a version that should be best possible, my feelings on it are pretty much the same as my first impressions of it from years ago playing the Wii U demo.
I do not like the isometric camera perspective at all. It creates a bunch of huge problems that just never go away through the whole experience. Simultaneously zoomed too close in, and too far out. Too close to be able to get a decent view of things, making it hard to get an understanding of your surroundings and what enemies are doing; yet too far to be able to see your tiny character and what enemies that are on-screen are up to as well. Always stuck in a middle ground of being insufficient at both ends. The perspective makes platforming a nightmare too, making it really hard to judge depth and where you are in relation to other things. That can sometimes be an issue in combat as well, but platforming is where it's most felt.
The game is also really bad at visual telegraphing in general, even regardless of the camera issues. Plenty of enemy attacks don't have a good telegraph at all, especially ones introduced later on. They have little to no wind-up, and their hurtboxes come out way sooner than they feel like they should. The game is extremely colourful and very chaotic, to the point of it being overwhelming. So what telegraphing there is often gets lost in the noise and you can't pick it out among the unimportant details. And these are not issues I tend to have with other similar games. I can parse the likes of Bayonetta, DMC, or Astral Chain fine. But here it's too much to take in, and I don't feel like the game is being anywhere near clear enough as it should. It resulted in me feeling like 90% of the damage I was taking was stuff I basically couldn't have done anything about.
It's also rather fond of pushing you in to scripted sequences that are obtuse and sometimes quite punishing. Not necessarily QTEs, as those tend to be pretty clearly communicated, but instead parts where you are still given control, except you are required to pull of some highly specific thing that it will frequently introduce a completely new control scheme for. It feels gimmicky and arbitrary, and most of the time just not fun, with a few exceptions.
Not much positive I can say to be honest. The Unite Morph system is inventive, but in in light of everything else, that's little consolation. The kinaesthetics are good, as it usually the case with Platinum. The framing and presentation of the Super Sentai-style hero thing is cute at first, but it gets old. It results in a lot of very dragged out and grating dialogue. I guess Platinum Robo is pretty cool, and there were some fun moments in the finale. Soundtrack isn't bad either.
At least it's under my belt now. And I'm looking forward to Bayonetta 3 and Babylon's Fall. Hopefully they will be better. Although looking back at the Platinum back catalogue, I've still yet to give God Hand a proper go...
