Finally! CrossCode! Hurray! That game truly deserves all the recognition it can get. Besides, you can never go wrong with playing it on the PC. GOG is the platform to go for!
Ohh yeah, Shantae and the Seven Sirens was pretty awesome, but Shantae and the Pirate's Curse still remains the best in the series, but Seven Sirens is probably second ranking in the series.
As for me... Well... It's an excruciating wait until Trails of Cold Steel IV. It has been a month or so since I had beaten Trails of Cold Steel III which took me about 160 hours for the first run. It's definitely the Game of the Year here. So I am more than excited to see how it all comes to an conclusion in Trails of Cold Steel IV, the grand finale of the series. That is of course... That the sequel to Trails of Cold Steel IV has already been announced and is set to release in August in Japan or so. Just about everyone from the past 8 games is about to return in Trails of Cold Steel IV, more epic than that you can't get. It's probably recognized as The Avengers of the videogames. Cold Steel III was already pretty insane. You will be immensely rewarded if you have knowledge of the earlier games, since cameos and events from past games are constantly brought up, especially from the still unlocalized Crossbell duology.
There were some nice additions and iterations upon the combat system as well. The Break and Brave Orders mechanics add some interesting strategies into the mix, but I would argue that the use of Brave Orders can be pretty overpowered if not playing on the highest difficulty. I mean... 90% damage reduction? Isn't that a bit too much? Thanks to the Break system you will be constantly weighing your options if to go full-out and hope you can defeat the boss before it unleashed all it's strength or you (or hope to survive it) or try prioritize attacks that focus on reducing their Break more quickly so that it's enters a weakened state (hurray for extra turns!). Mech fights have been immensely improved since the previous game as well, since these now actually feel as real battles rather than some rock-paper-scissors experiment. Being able to control three mechs at once helps a lot towards that, rather than just the protagonist all the time.
Speaking about the protagonist. Rean is back for the third time, and older now. In fact, since he is finally an Adult, you can actually witness him drinking a real beer instead of his usual 100% Orange Juice. And since he's older as well, he's now in charge of being a teacher as well. The old cast from the previous two games are back, but their role is not as large as it was before. Not to say their are not important, since they are still of revelations surround the old cast, but the spotlight this time belongs to Rean and his new students. And you will pretty much instantly like them, so you shouldn't need to miss the old Class VII too much.
Structure-Wise Cold Steel III is more like the first Cold Steel rather than it's sequel. Cold Steel IV probably will follow the structure used in Cold Steel II once again. Just like the first Cold Steel, you be limited to the areas you are assigned it. Divided into chapters you visit new areas on field studies. Some mechanics from Cold Steel II were also lost such as Overdrive and Lost Arts, through they could make a comeback again in Cold Steel IV.
Ohh, and I didn't mention the OST yet, which is just superb, as expected from Falcom. The only thing I could complain about the OST is that some of the outstanding tracks from the previous Cold Steel games don't make their return here. You can't get much better soundtracks than with Falcom. And graphic-wise seen, while it's still not the best looking game out there, it's many times more pleasing to look at than anything Falcom attempted before. No longer do we Falcom games need to be satisfied with graphics just being "good enough for a Falcom" game. Graphics are now just good enough as you might expect in general. Especially facial animations have improved a lot. Just like with the previous ports made to the PC, Cold Steel III is once more close to perfectly ported to the PC. It can always be better of course and there are a few weird glitches occasionally, but I really haven't seen native console games getting ported to the PC with this level of consistency of quality before. The PC is run it with!
All in all, it was the best game for the year for game. You can't get grander than this. Ohh... And that cliffhanger? That really leaves you wanting for more next year. Let's just leave it at that. So yeah, I rather look more forward to the next sequel than any other AAA-game that is in the works. Final Fantasy can get lost for all I care.
Ohh yeah, Shantae and the Seven Sirens was pretty awesome, but Shantae and the Pirate's Curse still remains the best in the series, but Seven Sirens is probably second ranking in the series.
As for me... Well... It's an excruciating wait until Trails of Cold Steel IV. It has been a month or so since I had beaten Trails of Cold Steel III which took me about 160 hours for the first run. It's definitely the Game of the Year here. So I am more than excited to see how it all comes to an conclusion in Trails of Cold Steel IV, the grand finale of the series. That is of course... That the sequel to Trails of Cold Steel IV has already been announced and is set to release in August in Japan or so. Just about everyone from the past 8 games is about to return in Trails of Cold Steel IV, more epic than that you can't get. It's probably recognized as The Avengers of the videogames. Cold Steel III was already pretty insane. You will be immensely rewarded if you have knowledge of the earlier games, since cameos and events from past games are constantly brought up, especially from the still unlocalized Crossbell duology.
There were some nice additions and iterations upon the combat system as well. The Break and Brave Orders mechanics add some interesting strategies into the mix, but I would argue that the use of Brave Orders can be pretty overpowered if not playing on the highest difficulty. I mean... 90% damage reduction? Isn't that a bit too much? Thanks to the Break system you will be constantly weighing your options if to go full-out and hope you can defeat the boss before it unleashed all it's strength or you (or hope to survive it) or try prioritize attacks that focus on reducing their Break more quickly so that it's enters a weakened state (hurray for extra turns!). Mech fights have been immensely improved since the previous game as well, since these now actually feel as real battles rather than some rock-paper-scissors experiment. Being able to control three mechs at once helps a lot towards that, rather than just the protagonist all the time.
Speaking about the protagonist. Rean is back for the third time, and older now. In fact, since he is finally an Adult, you can actually witness him drinking a real beer instead of his usual 100% Orange Juice. And since he's older as well, he's now in charge of being a teacher as well. The old cast from the previous two games are back, but their role is not as large as it was before. Not to say their are not important, since they are still of revelations surround the old cast, but the spotlight this time belongs to Rean and his new students. And you will pretty much instantly like them, so you shouldn't need to miss the old Class VII too much.
Structure-Wise Cold Steel III is more like the first Cold Steel rather than it's sequel. Cold Steel IV probably will follow the structure used in Cold Steel II once again. Just like the first Cold Steel, you be limited to the areas you are assigned it. Divided into chapters you visit new areas on field studies. Some mechanics from Cold Steel II were also lost such as Overdrive and Lost Arts, through they could make a comeback again in Cold Steel IV.
Ohh, and I didn't mention the OST yet, which is just superb, as expected from Falcom. The only thing I could complain about the OST is that some of the outstanding tracks from the previous Cold Steel games don't make their return here. You can't get much better soundtracks than with Falcom. And graphic-wise seen, while it's still not the best looking game out there, it's many times more pleasing to look at than anything Falcom attempted before. No longer do we Falcom games need to be satisfied with graphics just being "good enough for a Falcom" game. Graphics are now just good enough as you might expect in general. Especially facial animations have improved a lot. Just like with the previous ports made to the PC, Cold Steel III is once more close to perfectly ported to the PC. It can always be better of course and there are a few weird glitches occasionally, but I really haven't seen native console games getting ported to the PC with this level of consistency of quality before. The PC is run it with!
All in all, it was the best game for the year for game. You can't get grander than this. Ohh... And that cliffhanger? That really leaves you wanting for more next year. Let's just leave it at that. So yeah, I rather look more forward to the next sequel than any other AAA-game that is in the works. Final Fantasy can get lost for all I care.