For me it's short. Still playing Clair Obscure. I have no time at all for anything. But i will finish it in june for sure.

huSo, I just finished Metaphor today. My opinion remaind mostly the same as I already stated last month, I think:

::: spoiler Mild spoiler
It's a great Persona game with some big flaws not found in the previous ones:

• MP regeneration is inherently un-fun. Either waste days, grind overworld mobs or have un-fun encounters where you stun the enemy, steal/regenerate MP each turn and then flee before the enemy can do anything - then stun again.
• Due to MP regen, I believe, they made no effort to thightly design dungeons around MP. In P5R, playing on hard, I always found one of the three MP skull thingies, got booted out of the dungeon or reached the end right when I used up all my MP. In Metaphor, I don't think dungeons like the Skybound Avatar or Dragongod Temple are possible without wasting massive amounts of days or abusing MP regen.
• The class system meant that I only ever used the first three party members. I invested so much into them by the time I got the last charater, using him would nerf my entire party. They basically only existed to generate Hero Leafs. The later members have good classes, but I could always just equip them to the first three.
• Sometimes the game is so slow. Each day, you shower, search the pantry and maybe take a shit. When maxing a character or getting a new one, you unlock a lot of classes at once - all with an unskipable animation and some dialog. Same with Masks and Summons - crafting them is such a hassle, I never used either of the classes.
• Lots of skills are overpowered. Nothing in the game can win against spamming Frozen Fortress Tactic or whatever the skill is called - the ice one that adds a ice weakness to enemies. Even Elegy of the Soul went down long before it casted the one-shot move on hard.

Of course, a lot of things are better too:

• Overworld encounters are great
• Getting a rank up each time you speak with a social link feels so much better
• Actually travelling the world is fun, although the only time you even think about the route is in Brilehaven. Kind of a missed chance.
• The rewind feature came in handy, even though I mostly abused it for stealing in the later game. Press Turn is always so snowball-y that the option is appreciated nonetheless.
• I liked doing everything in a single playthrough. These games are so long, I won't replay them for missing social links and such. I won't for the secret boss either.
• Generating A EXP items with maxed classes is awesome. Usually, I tend to dislike class systems because I feel forced to switch them up and play with un-fun ones just to not waste class exp and get completion bonuses - Xenoblade 3 is one of the biggest offenders. Metaphor completely solved this. However, having to click through that many Hero Leafs is tedious as all hell. Towards the end, you get 3-10 of these with a lot of encounters.

Overall, I'm curious what the Golden Royal Reloaded version does, but I don't think I'll touch it. Everything that makes these games special is just such a drag on a repeated playthrough.
:::

Next up is either Mario RPG, Octopath 2, Xenoblade X or Baten Kaitos. I'll decide on that tomorrow, I think.

I haven't said something last month i guess. Our thoughts about it are not that different.

::: spoiler answer to spoiler

MP regeneration is inherently un-fun.

• yes completly true. But i think that a bit of a problem of a lot atlus games. They limi mp recovery items so much that you always have to manage arround that.

The class system meant that I only ever used the first three party members[...]

• I get you critic, but i have made it different. I just used the chars i like. And the new classes which, summoner or dancer, were kind of interresting. I just used the chars with their class. But sure at some point it was very hard to catch up. Especially for the last char that joined the group.

Sometimes the game is so slow.

• i guess that's true. While Persona has daily activity as part of the core gameplay besides dungeons and fighting. It rather a side activity here. I go with you with that, could been more different that what atlus is use to do.

I have not much to say to your positive points. I agree with all of them.

One negative point from me would be. I really don't like the monster designs. It's unique, sure, but sometimes i like to see a few monster that doesn't look just bad for me.
:::

None completed this month for me. I played a little Shin Megami Tensei V Vengeance and will likely continue to do so this month. I keep trying Atelier Escha & Logy but it's just not grabbing me. Not unusual for me with Atelier but feels worse this time somehow.

Might try Breath of Fire IV. Also have had my eye on Fantasian: Neo Dimension, could pick it up if it's on sale this month.

Funnily enough, while our takeaways about MP are similar, we come from different ends of the spectrum.

I think limiting MP as much as possible is integral to a great dungeon, because now every encounter is something to think about. How much MP do you spend? Is the EXP worth the investment? How much damage should you take - how much healing do you still have? And some more. The answer to the question "How can I survive this encounter with the minimal amount of resources?" will shift with your gear, level and resources. Dungeons are all about resource management.

If they are not, they become boring. Every encounter will be the same, and you just use the same moves, which are usually your strongest ones. The answer to "How can I defeat this encounter as fast as possible?" will be the same each time. Especially with Press Turn as implemented in Persona games. You start every fight with advantage and kill everything in the first turn, nothing short of a boss would ever hit you if you're not forced to use weaker moves or even rely on auto-attacks for some things to preserve MP. Also, without a limiting resource, endless grinding within a dungeon becomes an option, and I don't think it should be.

Sadly, outside some Persona games and Etrian Odyssey, a proper dungeon seems to be a lost art. Older Pokémon games kind of went for that sometimes, but with healing around every corner and before every major fight, there isn't much left there either.

Still playing Xenoblade Chronicles X. No changes on JRPG front.

I did start Marvel's Midnight Suns recently. It's Tactical RPG, and obviously western, so not sure if it counts, but that's the closest to another JRPG I have come yet.

I started playing Persona 5 Royal in January. It's already June and I still haven't finished it lol

I'm towards the end of midnight suns, enjoy the journey!

Might try Breath of Fire IV

I played it last year emulated and loved it. The story is interesting although a bit sad and the game has this melancholic and kind of dream-like atmosphere, the music helps with the vibe too. The graphics are some of the finest spritework from that era IMHO, I quickly fell in love.

I finished Expedition 33 a few days ago, I think it deserves all the praise it is getting.

I was playing Breath of Fire III but had to stop for a couple of days and now I'm struggling to find it interesting again, unfortunately I have this problem quite often.

Thanks. I feel like I am spending too much in abbey, compared to actual fighting, but it hasn't gotten to where I am annoyed by it. Maybe as the game progresses they will start to balance a bit.

There's a ton of dialogue and I've enjoyed most of it. Who knew superheroes had so much drama

Does Vagrant Story count as a JRPG? Or is it just an RPG with Japanese developers?

After dropping Final Fantasy X a while ago (I regrettably played for like 30 hours or something, up until the Seymour wedding part in wherever that was, just wasn't having fun with how grindy it felt and how the choices some characters were making in the cutscenes felt wildly out of character), I decided to pick up Vagrant Story. I know nothing about the game.

The opening cinematic was very impressive considering the time, very clever way of faking rim lighting. The facial animations are also quite good for a sub 200 meg game. I played about 15 minutes and it seems interesting enough, we will see how long I continue to play it. The rotatable perspective seems like it could be easily frustrating for platforming, so I hope that the platforming in this game doesn't get too technical.

My singular complain so far is I think lack of voice acting really hurts this game. It feels like they probably didn't have voice acting in the budget and spent whatever extra on art direction, but if they had been given extra for full voice acting I think the game would have been vastly more captivating.

Heh, yeah, there's already some drama going on, and I guess that will just increase as more and more heroes join the group.

Finished Trails of Cold Steel 4, started Trails into Reverie.

Found that the middle part of Cold Steel 4 dragged, to the point that I stopped playing it and picked it up again. First started it August 2023. Thankfully I remembered enough to continue playing without restarting. I was playing through 3 and 4 on hard, but halfway through the final dungeon I dropped the difficulty to normal. The bosses just felt more like a chore on hard than a fun fight.

Enjoying Reverie so far, though only about 10 hours in or so