7/10
The good:
- World design and fast travel options.
- Story and characters are interesting. Characters have meaningful interaction with each other and as a team.
- There are a total of 8 companions in addition to the hero, and you can select which 4 are active at any given time (barring times when they are not present, of course).
- Combat is well handled. You can make things as simple or as complicated as you want.
- After the final boss, you can either continue to explore and wrap up loose ends, or start a New Game +.
OK:
- Inventory and crafting, often a weak point in RPG's, is OK, but could be improved with more inventory sorting options.
- Cartoon-style graphics are fine. Expressions are lifeline and entertaining.
The bad:
- Side quests! There are a lot of these, which is not by itself a problem, but they are atrociously handled:
- It's not always clear when they start, and there is no indication of any kind in the UI while they are active, apart from the actual events as they happen. The lack of map markers is a design choice, and some players prefer the challenge of operating without them. However, you can't even see what has been said about them after the conversation is over. Either you have to have a very good memory, or you have to stop and write down the details at the time at the time the dialogs appear, which is ridiculously tedious.
- You can often not make this easier by suspending everything else and just focusing on the side quest to completion, because of a complicated and completely hidden and nonsensical set of triggers that allow it to advance.
- Most of them are not actually interesting: they add little to the story, and the rewards usually have no relevance to game play. However, there are exceptions, and if you just ignore all of the side quests, you can miss some good stuff.
- Finally, many of them expire or fail to start, depending on triggers that are silent and unpredictable.
(Of course, you can always use a walkthrough, but where's the fun in that?)
The bottom line: I don't regret the time spent playing it, but I'm a bit frustrated at the lost opportunity of more enjoyment that could have been had with minimal development effort.
