I learned one of my favorite JRPGs, Trails in the Sky, has an especially long script and runtime; in large part because it writes dialog to actually make sense of things rather than let them be said out of context for mysteriousness.
The series ends up being praised for its worldbuilding but can definitely feel boring at times. It’s a little more stomachable if you have a fast reading speed, since it has no voice acting.
And then you have zero/azure and cold steel which DO have voice acting…
What makes the series a marathon is after every minor event, every character everywhere has new text to read… which can get exhausting if you’re ocd. Plus there are missable quests and items that can trigger fomo.
But still love the world building and there were times that certain reveals elicited audible gasps and I even squealed like a little girl when one of my favorite playable characters from sky returned in the later games.
Knowing the series is officially ending is disappointing but understandable. There just hasn’t been any other rpg that has retained the same cast, setting, and well… world as any other that I can recall. And that’s a shame.
I think my favourite MGS video is the one where Dunkey reads the plot exactly as it’s written.
No additional comedy required.
No shade on the game, but the way people look at the barely conprehensible bloated MESS and think “it is hard to understand therefore it is smart and clever and deep wow” frequently pisses me off. Probably because we have the same tendency in software development.
I have dug in and understood some parts, and so far it’s a spaghetti bowl of retcon, made-up-on-the-spot stuff, very shallow metaphors, seemed-like-a-good-idea-at-the-time and more ill-fitting retcon duct tape.
It’s just bloated by growing too long with no strong direction.
And it’s fine! The game is super and fun. It obviously doesn’t need good plot so we shouldn’t have to pretend that it has either. :)
I love Kingdom Hearts dearly (beloved) and will be the first to tell you that it makes no god damned sense. I love the characters and many of the themes so much that it hurts to see them get so misused.
On the contrary, MGS lore is so easy to understand, even a drunk guy can explain it!
