David Brewer

This is one of, if not the, greatest anime of all time. If I'm being honest, I hated it thoroughly throughout the first season. The very end of season 1 is when it starts to move. By the middle of season 2, it has taken shape, and by season 4, it becomes pure poetry in storytelling. It takes a lot of time investment to get through all of it, but it is beyond worth it. Incredibly epic ending, and they tie up all loose ends.

Expedition 33 is quite possibly the greatest story of any role-playing game that I have ever experienced. I have been around since the days of NES console games like Ultima and Final Fantasy I, so I have seen them all. I even vaguely remember Zork from way back when. This story truly touched me, deeply. The gameplay mechanics bring an incredibly fresh take to the classic turn-based combat of the pioneering days of the JRPG. Some battles will test your patience, as they should, but eventually the system becomes second nature and the elite boss battles at the end of the game become that much more meaningful when you complete them. I played this game on an RTX 5080, and the graphics at 4k (around 85 FPS) were gorgeous. There are seldom glitches with hair and other fine details, but it was mostly great. The price-point is that of a "AA" game, but it is definitely a AAA game, so it's wonderful that the publisher made it affordable in an age when nothing is. I played this for free on Game Pass, completed all the extras at the end of the game, and then I purchased it on Steam because I loved it so much that I wanted the game creators to have my money. It is my vote for game of the year, 2025.

I can see why some people wouldn't give this a 5. I suppose for some it should be a 3.5 to 4. For me it is a 5. Here's why: I got dozens of hours of gameplay out of it because I did most of the side quests The exploration is fun but not perfect The zombie smashing action is great The graphics are top notch I didn't have a single game breaking bug at release, which is rare these days (PS5) The main character voice acting is stellar and constantly entertaining, and you have 5 or 6 from which to choose I would have liked a little deeper storyline but it was a carefree kind of game Anyone rating this as a 1 or 2 is just being salty. The game is a true AAA release. Difficulty is not a reason to give a negative rating. Besides, this game is not difficult at all.

I really enjoyed this game when it first came out. I beat it once and then continued on to complete every difficulty setting and achievement to earn the platinum on PS4. I invested roughly 40 hours of gameplay total, so I was pretty surprised to see all of the complaints. I recently played it again on PS5 and enjoyed it again. So, in hopes of understanding why everyone was claiming that the original was better, I decided to break out the original psone version. Here's my verdict: Both versions took me 6 - 8 hours to complete the first run-through. So, even though content was removed, plenty was added, as well. The controls (and I don't mind tank controls) in the original are terrible. The controls in the remake are among the best modern resident evil controls to date. The voice acting in the original is horrendous. The voice acting in the remake is modern and competent. The city section in the original is not nearly as large as people seem to remember, and... it's boring and drawn out. 😴 The graphics in the original definitely pushed the limit in 1999. The graphics in the PS5 remake push the limits of today. Grave digger was removed and people complained. When I replayed recently, grave digger was the dumbest, most boring boss I could remember in an RE game. People complained about how Jill didn't go to the RPD building in the remake. Well, Carlos' trip to the RPD in the remake was far larger in scope than the original. People just want to complain sometimes. Moreover, RE3make came out in the shadow of RE2make, much like the originals, and people weren't impressed because 2 was just better. Guess what? That was true in the 90s too. I was there. If I had reviewed this game directly after I had first played it, I would have given it a 4, but after replaying it, and the original, it gets a 5. They cut the garbage from the game and added in stellar new content. Stop complaining about remakes. A remake is not a remaster.

I liked it. As many have said, most of the acting was excellent. I feel as though this was probably an exceptional book that became a mediocre film. The story, itself, is decent enough but the way that the information is fed to us is subpar. The visuals are great (although, some face portrait shots were a bit off here and there) and the soundscape is on a pro level. The true verdict is that it's good enough to kill some time, but it surely isn't breaking any ground.

The game is great, as the original was great. Visual design, sound design, and gameplay are all great. There are some issues with textures on fidelity mode. Also, fidelity mode has a poor frame rate for PS5. I assume these will get patches, and I will change to a 5 star if they do. My only real complaint is that this game was advertised as a "remake" when in all honesty, it is just a remaster for modern systems. Yes, the graphics are way better than the original but literally everything is the same for 90% of the game. The layouts are the same, the enemy spawning is the same, and gameplay progression is EXACTLY the same. It's 2023. Enemy spawning should have been procedurally generated to give more replay value. Layouts should have been slightly changed to fool people that already played the original. The upgrade system should have been overhauled to be more modern and interesting. And for the love of God, give us a friggin quick turn!!! In the end, this is yet another cash grab from a large games publisher. Fortunately for us, it is a great game and new generations and old deserve to play it on modern hardware, so there will be very few complaints. $70 is a bit high for a simple face-lift though. *Edit* - I hate to have to add this to a review again but it is happening, so... Google is not only hiding negative reviews, but they have removed the results for 1 - 3 star queries. Why? Why can't you just let people give their opinions. I enjoy this game but others should be able to publicly bash it if they want. Are we going to burn books next?

I plan on playing this game just to see who's being honest. I was going to wait until it was discounted but now I just have to see how objective you are all being. I will update my score after I have a few hours in. *Edit* - First couple hours start extremely slow. The voice acting and beginning character plot is beyond juvenile. It seriously seems like it's written for 6 year old children who see the world through a lense of "that's not fair". The gameplay is smoother than the demo and the frame rate in RT mode is way better. The story is incredibly clichéd. They had a very similar story when I was a kid but it was called The Never Ending Story, and I think I liked it better. I'll say more when I get further. If it continues to be cringey, though, I may have to stop. As I get further in, the game shows its many flaws. PS3 level graphics (mostly textures but also character design) in sections where it seems as if the designers just got lazy. Frey is the only consistently well designed graphic art. Speaking of whom, she is so unlikable that it is near painful to root for her. Okay. Final thoughts. At first, I was just confused at how Square Enix could give us a game that is so... lacking... and then it hit me. It is just a AA game sold for a AAA price. They ripped us off. For $30, maybe even $40, this game would be solid but not great. At $70, it's beyond mediocre. I really tried to like it but the lack of care in its design and execution just leave me entirely underwhelmed. This only reminds me of how my last enjoyable Final Fantasy was number 12, almost 20 years ago. Do better Square Enix, or we will watch you become the next Sega. *1 final edit* Why is it that if people don't like this game, it is assumed that they are just joining a "hate hype" train? Not once in my review have I told people to not listen to people that are enjoying the game. You need to learn to accept that others don't have to appreciate what you appreciate. I really wanted this game to be a 10/10. It just isn't! As a AA game, as I said before, it would probably be a 7, and that would be ok. But for $70, this game is unfinished and lacking in polish... not to mention that the core of the game (story) has no heart at all.

Obviously, I've only seen the 1st episode at this point so I can only speak on that. Small spoilers ahead for the movie and the game. So far, I think it's great but not perfect like the source material. There were many instances where they changed dialogue or plot points for what seemed like no reason at all. Most of this didn't bother me, but one change in particular did. The fact that Tess didn't kill Robert in cold blood, purely out of malice, took away from her character. This original scene showed us just what kind of people Joel and Tess were. Other than that, it was pretty solid. One serious gripe though -- Pedro Pascal couldn't trouble himself to learn a thick Texas accent? Tommy sounds like Tommy, Marlene sounds like Marlene (I know this is because it's the same actress), but Joel doesn't sound like Joel. It's not a major deal breaker though.

The story, characters, and setting are all great. The fight choreography is decent. The rough edges, here and there, could use a bit more polish. The cliffhanger ending left a bit too much to the imagination, but I'm sure it will be explained with greater detail in season 2. This is a very deep show that, unfortunately, sometimes comes across more like a puddle than an ocean. The sum of its seldomly imperfect parts comes together to create something fulfilling in the end though. It has great promise and I will stick around to see it grow.

I would go into detail but I feel like the other negative reviews already have it covered, so I will just be brief. This show is just bad. The character development is so shallow that I not only don't care about them, but I now want to see them all die painful deaths. They are just truly unlikable. This doesn't even include the terrible acting. The episode one scene with the monster was so dark that I couldn't even see what was happening. The fight scenes are so poorly choreographed that you can see where they increased the speed of the film. The world building seems extremely forced, as if it was only introduced out of sheer necessity. I don't even care that the show doesn't follow the source material closely but I do care that they replaced the original content with garbage. It just all rings so hollow.