Matt Ryan

Yet another "game" that represents everything wrong with the gaming industry currently. Pretty graphics, flashy animations, ten seconds of "follow the marker" gameplay til you hit the next cutscene. If this game was a new ip and not carrying the final fantasy name it would be absolutely slated as generic and soulless. The issues here are many and varied and I'm not sure if square can ever recapture the magic they once had or if they even want to. No party, you play as one dude and that's it, almost zero itemisation which is again indicative of the dumbing down this games received. No sense in simple things like attacking a fire enemy with a fire attack should heal it but not here because the game dosent care. Absolutely zero reason to explore the empty world which is perhaps just as well as there's nothing to find or collect here anyways. Il give it credit where it's due and say the story is good, definitely tells a good tale but if that's all I want then il watch Netflix. Unfortunately the final fantasy series is a shadow of what it used to be and because square seem hell bent on appealing to the zero attention span button masher crowds that make up the majority of gamers today I doubt it ever will be again.

Yet again the indie developers showing the so called "AAA" developers how it should be done. This game is absolutely amazing, I'm a huge fan of the classic jrpgs of the snes and psx era and chained echoes is every bit as good as the very best of them. Beautiful graphics, a sublime soundtrack, an epic story and fantastic gameplay. If your into turn based rpgs at all then just buy this game.

Alright. Going to start this by saying I'm an older gamer who plays pretty much only rpgs and has done for over 30 years, my opinion here is just that an opinion. I've been trying to get into the xenoblade series for a long time and while I enjoyed 2 it was still not really what I wanted, the first game did nothing for me either. Il give my reasons as to why I'm not enjoying 3 and you make your own mind up. The story and characters are at best ok. Generic but serviceable. The "huge open world" is filled with barely anything to actually explore or find other than containers, husks and rare monsters, now this in itself would be fine but these containers only have nopon coins which you use to either buy (sort of) useful accessories from a trader and sometimes they also contain accessories too. The husks are literally only in the game to raise affinity with colonies which unlocks side quests and some perks like moving faster in the world or letting you pick up items from a greater range. There is no real equipment system in the game other than these accessories so in my opinion it is a missed opportunity to put powerful maybe class specific weapons and armour around the world to make exploring more worthwhile. The actual combat is just..bloated. Systems on top of systems and honestly half of it could be lost and it would make little difference. The new class system seems good on first impressions but again it's not been implemented well here, you learn only certain moves and skills from each class and half of them are barely even worth using especially if you say level up a healer class then switch to a fighter, the fighter can't heal so why would I bother equipping a skill that makes healing better?. I just found myself wishing this system was more like a final fantasy job system instead of what they chose here. Options galore but you can't really function without an appropriate mix of healer, tank and dps classes so your very limited in reality. The ridiculous amount of collectables in the world are barely useful at all except for npc collectapedia quests which award another useless accessory or colony affinity. I'm actually disappointed because this game has so much potential but just dosent deliver, if only more was given to the actual world itself and to make it worth exploring and take some of the bloat from the combat systems it would be worth playing.

Easily one of the best games on the switch. If you enjoy pokemon you will enjoy this one too and if you like the monster hunter universe but want a turn based jrpg style instead of the action based gameplay of mainline monster hunter games then this is for you. There is so much to this game that goes way beyond what you may think, the end of the story is really just the beginning of the game with heaps of monsters to collect and raise and things to do. I've played most every rpg on the switch and monster hunter stories 2 is easily in the top 3/4 games. For whatever reason this game didn't really get a great deal of attention on launch so if your reading this then please don't hesitate to pick it up it's absolutely fantastic.

Fantastic game. Reminds me very much of the older final fantasy games especially 5 with the job system being almost identical. Performance on the switch isn't amazing with a little lag here and there but it's a turn based rpg so it really dosent matter. The game is pretty difficult too which I appreciate, you really need to grind in this one and think carefully about your jobs, abilities and equipment. Overall I'm really enjoying this game and although I feel octopath traveler is the better game bravely default 2 should be played by any rpg fan.