God of War Sons of Sparta is 30 bucks over there in the USA?

Yeah, not getting it today, at all.

Got everything mostly right lol, Tokon only had 3 new chars and was not the first game tho 

Yup. 

Statements like these make me wonder if some people just don't live in the same objective reality as me. I mean, you're allowed to like one game more than another (one of my best friends growing up hated 9 but loved 10), but 13 is one of those games so bafflingly bad from virtually every angle I'm genuinely confused how anyone likes it. Subjective interest in the music and visual design? Sure, I can accept that they're just not for me. Liking the storytelling method is certainly a 'choice' but you're allowed.

But to say 13's battle system is good is just...it's not. It's just not. I could write a 10,000 word essay breaking down every little way it doesn't work right, isn't rewarding, and doesn't compliment skill or growth but I don't REALLY see the point. The short version is, the entire battle system is comprised of picking from one of 24 possible paradigms and shifting at the more or less right time. That's it. The battles go too fast for you to chose your abilities, making you rely WAY too heavily on paradigm shfiting (A problem XII solved by just..pausing the fucking game when you were in a menu if you wanted it to). If your main character dies it's game over (JUST USE A PHUCKING FOENIX DOWN YOU DAFT MORON). And the progression system is functionally linear per job class, and since 99% of the time everything jsut happens automatically instead of having you meticulously strategize due to them wanting SO BADLY To make it an action game and not turn based, None of the skills mean jack shit. They're just...there. You don't get to experiment with this new skill, it just sorta happens. 

Oh, and the battle system has area based effects and tries to be like 'oh, just walk out of the way of the attack that's coming up' styled attempts,b ut the battle system itself doesn't actually facilitate this at all. Your placement on the field matters but you have so little control over it. To be fair 12 did this too but it wasn't as frustrating because the rest of the battle system in that game worked as intended and was incredibly complex and rewarding. This one is so autopilot. Seriously, the eNTIRE combat system boils down to knowing when to paradigm shift to one of 24 potential paradigms at the right time. That is it. That is the extent of the agency in this game. IT is NOT a good combat system and anyone who says it is, is just plain factually wrong. There's no subjectivity here, it's bad. It doesn't work right. It's not friendly to the player, it doesn't reward skill or planning, it just happens.

And since 95% of the game is practically FF on rails there's almost no room to practice or explore or test your might.

In Clair Obscur, a game made in a cave by a small team who loved Final Fantasy, you can explore and fight midgame and endgame bosses early on. And if you know what you're doing, you can beat them (Good luck with that). In FFX you can beat the whole game without using the sphere grid. You cannot do anything like that in 13. Because everything happens automatically. you have so little agency in battles because square NEEDED To keep it technically turn based but WANTED To make it action and fucked it up from both sides, making a system that was technically turn based but went too fast to do anything other than select the auto attack button. 

Game is garbage trash. The only redeeming quality is that, as I said, the music has grown on me. Playign Theatrythm Final Curtain call made me re-evaluate that aspect of the game and while it's still the WEAKEST of the soundtracks, it's still pretty good. Everything else is trash. And while most of that is subjective, the battle system is irredeemable. ESPECIALLY when a better, more rewarding, more complex battle system was RIGHT THERE with 12. same idea but you actually had agency, could actually control the battles, could actually use strategy, and weren't punished if OOPS the character you were controlling died. It was such a baffling step back and it only existed as it did becuase they wanted so badly to trend-chase and make Final Fantasy an action game that they went with style over substance. 15 only just barely made the action combat fun and 16 nailed it, but 13? Nah, that was traaaaaash. 

**Edit** Also, not liking Blitzball and all the side quests and minigames in 8 or 10? I get it. I personally love Blitzball and play it a bunch, same with triple Triad, but I get not liking it. But hey, tell me...what does 13 have that compares? NOTHING! IT HAS NOTHING! Where are the minigames? where's the side quest content? Where are the cute little asides? Where's the SOUL? where's the heart? Where's the fun! Whether something like Blitzball is something you like or not, the presence of it shows that the developers of 10 were at least TRYING To do something fun and add some fun to their game. 13. Has. NOTHING! It's JUST a poorly told story on rails broken up by scripted encounters that give you almost zero agency. 

Sony might've got me with that God of War: Sons of Sparta shadow drop lol.

Housemarque is slowly convincing me to give Saros a shot with every trailer they release.

It does help out that Saros is seemingly more approachable and accessible than Returnal was. I'm still stunned with how much of a graphical step up it is from Returnal. 

Yeah, it's $30 for the new GoW metroidvania.
It looks like a GBA/Mobile game, somewhat even as Betrayal, and they are asking $30 for it...

Sony is so stupid sometimes it physically hurts.
$10 would be ideal, $15 acceptable, $30 they are releasing a dead game.

How long is it even? Maybe if it was a nice hand drawn game, meaty in content, releasing it for even $40 physically would be cool, but boy, wtf is happening there.

That Crimson Moon game looks really cool. Just looks like good mindless fun.

Haven't had a chance to watch everything but there looks to be some really good stuff in this SoP. Definitely one of the best ones sony has put out in a while.

BEST SoP in a long time