Such a great boss but every boss is so damn good. Try and fight one of those big bosses in the over world, seems impossible but with persistence, it's so much bloody fun. 

9.7 on 4,724 users on MC. I'm starting to feel validated in my insanity levels of hype.

9.7 user score on now 5k reviews. 92% on 20k reviews on Steam. 4.92/5 on PSN on 9k reviews, I've never seen that happen before. It's fair to say people are loving this game and only one quarter of people on PS5 have reached where the game gets extremely, extremely good, addicting and hits so fucking hard which is about one third of the main quest. 

How does this game hold up for someone who has no nostalgia or plays JRPGs?

Outside of the first few gens of Pokemon and both Monster Hunter Stories games (primarily because they were like Pokemon in a lot of ways lol) I never played the inspirations behind Expedition 33.

I’ve seen many comparisons to FF9, but, I can’t identify with that lol. Game looks fun though.

Like someone said, this will be some kids FF7 moment. I got to the Shinra building in FF7 multiple times and always got stuck as a kid. I bought FFX for good graphics and ended up hating random battles. The best I can say about turn based before becoming an adult and finding Xcom, Divinity OS and Persona is I put up with the systems to advance stories and mildly liked it in a Stockholm syndrome kind of way now and then. I have zero nostalgia and this game is easily in my top 10 ever regardless of genre...maybe top 5 we'll see yet, they devs could come and take a shit in my house and I'd still love this game. So to answer your question, forget nostalgia, forget it being a turn based game, forget your bills, forget everything and do yourself the favour of playing this as soon as possible. 

I know there is much debate but I know for a fact this is a JRPG cause I keep turning around and saying to myself fuck, I think I'm going the right way.

Damn! That's quite the stamp of approval. I'll have to give it a go here soon!

If you need people who have skin in the game to have a balanced opinion or think I'm the only one being hyperbolic, Check out some Youtubers. I'm watching Moist Critical right now giving the game a rim job and Luke Stephens was whom sold me on the game, I thought he was being hyperbolic and I'd get a great game, I didn't know I'd be playing a game so good I'm getting up at 4 in the morning to get a decent session in. Honestly, no matter what you love about gaming unless you're a hard-core sim racer or secerely against turn based, you'll love this. 

@ OT I got into a moral conundrum over destroying a sewing machine my last session, took me near five minutes questioning my decision before I moved on. This game at 9.7 may be a little underrated. 

But its not even made by a Japanese studio....

Doesn't matter really - Lunatic Dawn: Passage of the Book is made in Japan, yet it's as CRPG as it gets.