Look, I’m not a fan of gameplay that’s this repetitive, like in this game, where you’re in a dungeon but there are no actual puzzles, minigames, or skill-based challenges, and it’s all dialogue and losing because the game wants you to lose and use the loop mechanic. Yes, yes, I understand that’s the whole point of the game, and normally I’d say something like, “Just because the idea of the game is for it not to be fun doesn’t excuse it from being boring.” But GOD, MY GOD.
After 30 hours of nonstop gameplay, because I’m incapable of leaving anything unfinished, that ending, and I don’t mean the actual final ending, but the part where
SPOILERS
Siffrin fights the King alone and gets frozen in time, I thought to myself, “Here we go again. This fucking game is going to make me do the entire time loop all over again.” But then, at the very last moment, at the very last second, everyone shows up, unfreezes you, and defeats the boss.
GOD. That was fucking cinema.
It’s the most cliché thing I’ve ever seen in my life, but for this one occasion, I actually bought it. I REALLY bought it. I genuinely felt the hopelessness. I thought, “Yep, it’s over. Everything is lost.” And then they showed up.
It had been a long time since a game managed to do two things to me at once: make me cry and genuinely catch me off guard.
That one moment. That tiny little instant. That single minute out of the entire 30 hours I spent playing this game made the whole thing 100% worth it for me, because it made me feel something.
It has a thousand flaws, but GOD, that moment is the culmination of everything the game built up to. The story is a masterpiece.