Final Fantasy XVI

I really liked the beginning of this - the production value is top of the line. The music, the spectacle - it's all really great. It is just WAY too long for its own good. It seems to run out of ideas after a while and just became a slog to finish. The story was so gripping at the beginning but it progressed way too slowly toward the end. The gameplay was okay, nothing amazing - you're fighting the same enemies over and over again. The highlight is the boss fights by far.

When the main quest isn't stupid fetch quests this is really thrilling and emotional with a great story. I love how it wraps up. I enjoyed the characters more than I thought... not that they are the best we've seen in FF. Combat is fluid and deep. Sure, there's not a ton of RPG in this, but I was okay with it. It was all about narrative and combat. The side quests are mostly whack. The dog is awesome. Soundtrack is absolutely fantastic. Eikon battles are also fantastic.

As torn as I’ve ever been on a game! It looks and sounds fantastic as you’d hope, the battle system is fun (if more hack ‘n slash than RPG) and the plot & world will intrigue and satisfy fans of epic/dark/high medieval fantasy. It also has very monotonous gameplay with zero minigames, a billion fetchy side quests that become near torture and utterly ruin the pacing, and if you’re OCD about watching all the cutscenes like me then strap yourself in for literally like 25 hours of them, dear god.

mid tier combat and a bunch of fetch quests, that coat of paint sure is shiny though