Game Playability Reviews

I was diagnosed with carpal tunnel syndrome in 1992, when I was 40 years old and working as a systems analyst. Physical therapy and a switch to using an ergonomic keyboard and a trackball let me work again. Three decades later, with arthritis added to the picture, my hands are not in the best of condition for console gaming.

This is my attempt to quantify what makes games easy or difficult for me to play and to record what I find enjoyable, or not. What causes me the most trouble is repetitive use of my thumbs, or of any finger if it's extreme (like hitting the X-button quickly during battles). So my focus is on ways around such use of my hands.

I play games for fun, to make the evenings less lonely. Though I enjoy a bit of challenge, I'm not trying to 'beat the game,' but to participate in an interesting story with characters I come to care about. My general tactic to make gameplay easier on my hands is to level up and equip my characters so the battles are fairly easy to win. Using multi-button closely-timed combos to let lower level characters win battles is not something of which I am physically capable.

These are all games that I own, and have at least played long enough to have some useful information. (Games I tried to play but gave up on are the titles that are not emboldened.) In September 2013 I codified a set of factors to use in describing my gaming experience that are explained in detail here. Additional information I include is to jog my memory when I play a game. I try to avoid outright spoilers without warning. Updated: October 2019.

Index of games with completed (or abandoned) play-throughs and full notes.

Playstation Portable
Vita TV
Playstation and Playstation 2
- Dragon Quest VIII
- Final Fantasy VIII (also PS4)
- Final Fantasy XII
- Mana Khemia: Alchemists of Al-Revis
- Parasite Eve, 2
- Rogue Galaxy (also PS4)
- Tales of the Abyss
- Tales of Legendia
- Valkyrie Profile
- Xenogears
- Xenosaga
- Xenosaga II
- Xenosaga III
Playstation 3
Playstation 4

Sony PSP

A big advantage to the PSP is that a game can be paused at any time, so there's never the need to play too long just to reach a save point. Controls are rarely a problem (unless the game has been ported from another system without redesign, in which case there can be awkward combinations of button presses required). So factor III is usually moot. PSP games are on a UMD (miniature DVD; only two games were ever made that require two UMDs) or downloaded from PSN (PlayStation Network) either directly via the PSP's built-in WiFi, or from a linked PS3. I now usually use the PSP on a table, plugged into a large display and stereo sound system. (See the PSP section on my controllers page for details.)

Brave Story: New Traveler: I. XSEED, 2007. RPG. ESRB: Everyone. Abandoned.; II. Party/combat: 6/3. The 'hero' (named Tatsuya by default) cannot be removed from the party, and his icon is always used on the map. Party turn-based. Frequent random encounters on world map and in dungeons; enemies not visible. No retrying.; III. Controls are very simple. No camera movement. Save only at Inns and restore/save points.; IV. It's always clear what is supposed to be done, but exploration is possible. Following boss battles, you generally find yourself back outside, so if the dungeon wasn't fully explored, you have to return and start at the beginning.; Physical difficulty increases fairly quickly because of the combination of random encounters, sparse save points and the lack of any way to revive characters during a battle. An early dungeon has monsters that, when enraged, can inflict massive damage, and the dungeon ends with a three-part boss battle with no time for healing between the parts. On top of that, trying to escape even normal battles is not guaranteed to succeed, and the entire party looses its turn if the attempt fails. If the reason you're trying to escape is that you don't think you can survive, that's a pretty big gamble. So the need to continually heal your still relatively weak characters up to full HP makes exploring this dungeon a bit of a slog.; With the following dungeon (emmet warren, chapter 6, at 10-12 hours into the game) when your characters are up to around level 20 and more than one of them can heal, escaping battles to avoid doing essentially the same battle over and over and over again is less risky but no less annoying.; V. Loosely adapted from Miyuki Miyabe's novel, Brave Story. Tatsuya's backstory is much shorter and seemingly not as dark as Wataru's, but you do quickly end up in Vision under similar circumstances. (You do meet Wataru, Meena and Kee-Kima and others in-game; in fact you have them in your party at times.) This is one of those games in which the hero is basically mute. The mixed-race girl Yuno, who joins him almost immediately, does the talking. The usual stereotypes. Some sexism and light fan service. (Yuno is a cute but feisty cat girl archer / white mage with a skimpy costume.); The game often forcibly reconfigures your party. Guest characters enter with similar levels and are fully equipped, and you are prevented from changing their equipment or accessories. Having a continuing character sidelined for an entire dungeon or boss fight makes it difficult to keep everyone leveled up with Tatsuya, who is always in the battle lineup. As characters receive a little extra EXP for dealing the final blow, it can be done, but it's annoying.; One finds diagrams that show how to craft materials into accessories. Accessories can later be sold, or broken back down into materials. Some found or dropped items can only be sold.; There are quests that can be carried out to earn money or items. There are optional dungeons to be found on the world map, if you want to endure the random encounters while looking for them. There is an in-game game of bird (goalfinch) catching and fighting, which I ignored.; VI. Animation mostly is anime style, but there's an attempt to render some of the more human faces realistically. The world map is pretty bland, and dungeons and scenery within each dungeon is very repetitive. English or Japanese battle voices, but the occasional other use of voices is English only. Music is inoffensive.; VII. I gave up trying to play this game after Gasara, when two of the party of six (including Tatsuya, who can not be swapped out) were K.O.'d in the first three random encounters. This game is simply too painful for me to want to play.; It is very difficult to avoid comparing this game to Ni no Kuni, which was of course created with vastly more resources for a much more capable platform, and is much kinder to its player.; VIII. No English language strategy guide. Never looked online.
Gurumin: A Monstrous Adventure: I. MASTiFF/Falcom, 2007. Adventure, puzzles. ESRB: Everyone. PSP, Vita TV.; II. Party/combat: 1/1, though occasionally friends help. No random encounters, but the non-random ones and boss battles can be quite tricky!; Initially you may select Beginner or Normal level. The Beginner level makes things quite a bit easier, and you begin again after game over with full HP. On Normal things are less easy and you begin again with half your HP. More levels of difficulty can be unlocked, but you carry over accessories, items and some loot, so your character becomes more capable.; III. Controls are okay, but complex actions in battles require multiple buttons and timing. Camera needs to be moved to find things; the default is okay while fighting. Cannot save in dungeons, but you may exit a dungeon at any time and return to the world map. There are heal points and check points in dungeons.; IV. Not too hard to make it through the basic game the first time, especially on Beginner level. But, there are puzzles, jumping, fighting (on ice and around lava, water and poison gas) and timed trials, some of which I am unable to do. The score with which one completes a dungeon depends on the percentage of battles won and treasure found. (You can go through a dungeon again to try to improve your score.); V. Player character is Parin, 12 y/o human girl, equipped with a mining drill. Fiends and frenemies are monsters, as you'd expect from the title. There's a decent story, and the characters have surprising depth at times.; No unusual stereotyping and no overt sexism or fan service. (But one can unlock some pretty ridiculous costumes for Parin, some of which change her voice in rather creepy ways.); VI. Animation is anime style. Music is good. Voice acting in cut-scenes and battle.; VII. I bought this game when it came out, and despite the difficulty I loved it and played it through multiple times, reaching levels of difficulty I probably can no longer tolerate.; VIII. No strategy guide. Online walkthroughs and FAQs available. There's a lot of hidden or difficult to find / figure out stuff in this game!; There once was a really cool website for the game but, alas, it is no more.
Harvest Moon: Back to Nature for Girl: Natsume, 2007. Farming/relationship simulation. ESRB: Everyone; Player character: Fate, young woman.; Difficulty: Generally easy on the hands, if a little repetitive in places.; Comments: No same-gender courtship in this one, unfortunately.
Jeanne D'Arc: Sony/LEVEL 5, 2007. Tactics. ESRB: Teen. PSP, Vita TV.; Player characters: Jeanne, age 17, plus a variety of other characters.; Difficulty: No problem; this is a tactics game.; Comments: This is rated Teen rather than Everyone for good reasons. Also, read a biography first!
Sweet Fuse: At Your Side: AKSYS, 2013. Otome visual novel. ESRB: Teen; Player character: Saki Inafune, teenage girl.; Difficulty: None.; Comments: Japanese voice acting is a plus!
Tales of the World: Radiant Mythology: I. Namco Bandai, 2006. RPG. ESRB: Teen.; II. Create your own character. Choose gender, face, hair color, skin color, battle voice, initial job and name!; V. Not a mainline Tales game, but has all the usual Tales characteristics, including being able to play on full auto.
Trails in the Sky, First Chapter: I. XSEED/Falcom, 2004, 2011. RPG. ESRB: Teen. PC, PSP, PS3 (Japan only), Vita, Vita TV.; II. Party/combat: 8/4, but at times only 2 or 3 characters are in the party. Turn-based battles with a tactical component. Enemies always visible and usually avoidable except for booby-trapped chests (which can be wicked). Boss battles are manageable, the final battle is doable. Any lost battle may be retried, and the game may be configured to make retried battles easier. (But it's better to reload, which is fast, unless you're in pain.); III. Simple controls. On the Vita, one can configure the right stick to be used for one of a number of other button combinations, as the PSP has only one stick. I mapped L/R to the right stick, as that's more convenient usually than the L1/R1 buttons on the SRWC. Save anywhere! Both HP and EP are fully replenished when a character levels up, which is very handy early on.; IV. There is one fight that can go on a long time and is difficult to win (the game continues if you loose this fight), and a number of treasure chests trigger monster battles that are a good deal harder than the surrounding encounters. The Bracer Handbook keeps track of up to what one is supposed to be, and has good help about important things. Until the end-game, one is largely free to do what one wants, but there can be consequences, which is okay. Overall physical difficulty is on the easy side.; V. The viewpoint character is Estelle Bright, a spirited teenager, and one of my most favorite game characters. Though the characters available at any one time are constrained, they can be arranged as one wishes. (Estelle and Joshua are required to be in the combat lineup for the end-game.) I love the story. Typical JRPG stereotypes, no overt fan service, and if you're being sexist Estelle will punch your lights out.; There are two kinds of item creation. Monsters drop sepith and ingredients for cooking. Sepith can be sold, or used to create quartz, which in turn changes character stats and skills. Cooking can be done to make restorative items that can be used in combat or sold. Sit-down meals can be cooked outside of battle that have immediate effect. The only way to directly earn money is to carry out missions that have sometimes relatively short expiration times. (The primary consequence of spending too much time wandering around or doing things out of sequence is finding that missions have expired, which is a bad thing, as accruing BP and mira is very important.); VI. Anime style animation with chibi figures on the map. Great music. BGM an FX volumes adjustable. Only voice-acting is battle voices.; VII. Playing time depends greatly on how much effort is put into completing quests and acquiring sepith to make quartz. Can easily take 75 hours to play. The ending is an incredible cliff-hanger for the second game, which is a direct continuation. Have played twice on PSP, third time on Vita TV using HORI SRW controller. Playing with a clear save allows one to carry over many things, and choose level of difficulty (which affects monster strength).; VIII. No English language strategy guide, but very good online walkthroughs exist. Tons of Japanese material. I love my Estelle and Tita Nendroids!; XSEED web page for the games.; Second Chapter: 2006, 2015. NA download-only for PSP, Vita, Vita TV. Originally one of only two two-UMD PSP games ever made, it downloads as two separate files.; SC is a direct sequel to FC in terms of story (it picks up on the next day), with almost exactly the same mechanics. One may now set run or walk as the default, and do the other by holding down the 'X' button. It is also possible to 'chain' crafts among multiple members of the battle party, which is more powerful than a single character using a craft, but not as powerful as using an S-break. Player level (35-40) carries over, and characters retain all their crafts and S-breaks from FC. Orbment changes, with an additional slot, and slots may now be upgraded to hold more powerful quartz. Depending on Estelle's final Bracer rank and total BP, up to two bonus accessories, an item and a quartz are awarded early in SC. (All four only with rank 1 and all 368 possible BP.); I encountered about half-a-dozen glitches with subtitle colors, and a couple of instances of missing sound effects for various things. I've only played this on the Vita TV, so I don't know if that has anything to do with it. Considering the massive amount of text and number of options in the script for this game, I can only give the localization a rousing three cheers.; My rather obsessive first play-through of SC took about 133 hours over the course of three months, with my main characters reaching level 94. I also spent probably that much time translating from my Japanese PSP-Edition Official Conquest Guide Book, which covers FC and SC in 168 pages, and Japanese Sora no Kiseki Second Chapter Scenario Book (which is essentially a script for the game).
Valkyrie Profile: Lenneth: Square Enix, 2006. RPG. ESRB: Teen; Player characters: various, and Lenneth, of course.; Difficulty: Generally no problem, but there is much jumping and use of crystals, which can be very hard on the hands.; I never finished the PSP version. See my notes on the original Playstation version.

Sony Playstation TV / Vita TV

The PS TV died a sad and lonely death, without realizing its full potential. I do have several games yet to play on mine, but the Vita was never popular in North America, and few NA Vita games were certified for use on the TV. (See my notes on using wired controllers with the PS TV.)

Tales of Hearts R: I. Bandai Namco, 2013. JRPG. ESRB: Teen. Vita chip.; Hearts R is a remake of Hearts, which was developed for the Nintendo DS and released in 2008. So originally it fell between Vesperia and Graces, but the R version was released following Xillia 2.; II. Eight player characters, four in battle party. Full-auto works for all characters in battle, and you can choose which character is displayed. The AI is okay, but going from Berseria to this game shows how much AI has improved. However, the AI configuration is similar to that in Xillia, including gambit-like per-player instructions (which you have to purchase) that also include attacking, defending and use of skills, so you can really fine-tune the AI behavior. Invisible random ncounters. Boss battles usually not much worse than mob attacks and boss battles usually have a preceding save point and may be retried. Playing on normal difficulty to begin with and I'm leveling up quickly.; III. The controls are late Playstation-style; no L2/L3 and R2/R3, movement with either L stick or directional buttons. Camera movable using R stick only on world map. Buttons configurable, battle-camera focus configurable. Save (sometimes also heal) at save points; save anywhere on the world map. Pause only using the PS button. (Or Analog button, as I am using the HORI SRW Controller with my Vita TV.); IV. Surprisingly little tutorial handholding, compared to later games in the series. A few puzzles that would be very vexing if I didn't have the guide book. (Though random encounters do make some puzzle areas quite annoying; one cannot control the camera in dungeons, so the only way to look at things is to move the character, which triggers encounters. And, yes, there are holy bottles to reduce encounters, but that's a pain.) A few dungeons seem unreasonably long without a chance to save. Reasonable freedom to run around on the world map.; V. There is cooking, of course. TotA-style discovery points. Namcoins to collect for prizes (like mini-medals in Dragon Quest). Relatively simple skill system. There is a clear-save extra dungeon. I used only the free 1,000 gald DLC. (When I played in 2018, the NA store did not have any of the item packs.) The story is interesting and the characters are varied in the usual way for JRPGs of this era, backstories are filled in, but the characters don't really develop (except for Kohaku, of course, but that's different). Boob jokes and relationship humor have not aged well.; VI. Japanese voice acting only; subtitles are as usual not very accurate. BGM, SFX, Voice, Movie (cutscene) volumes separately adjustable. Music is underwhelming. Cutscenes tend to be short. Very good anime-style graphics.; VII. I played the main game through in 60 hours. Did not do any post clear-save playing. There is an extra dungeon, and there is the usual grade shop for new game+. Ending wraps things up nicely, but characters still feel like cardboard cutouts. The huge amount of inane dialogue and skits serves as a damper on thoughts of replaying this game.; VIII. I have the Japanese Complete Guide.
Ys Seven: I. Xseed/Falcom, 2010. JRPG. ESRB: Teen. PSN Vita TV download. Abandoned.; II. Ys Seven, Ys: Memories of Celceta and Ys: Lacrimosa of Dana all have very similar mechanics, so I am only noting the differences from Ys: Celceta, which is the one I played first. (Though the order of events in the Ys universe is Celceta, Dana, Seven.); Battle party is three, from a total of seven available at various times. Difficulty level may not be changed during the game. (I was playing on normal.) Retrying boss battles does not reduce the difficulty.; III. This is a PSP game, so no use is made of the Vita touch panel, no auto-upload of saves and no DLC. Camera may be set to automatic or zoomed in or out. Minimal AI settings: same target, weakest target, different target.; IV. Very brief tutorials and little handholding; maybe too little. Map completion is not a thing in this game.; V. The boss battles are much more difficult than other battles. The very limited number of healing items the party may carry and lack of any healing skills make these very difficult for me, as the general flow of a boss battle is: whack it repeatedly while staying alive until a vulnerable spot is revealed, then whack that spot as hard as possible; repeat four or five times. This is not fun for me when characters cannot guard, the party has only 3 - 5 of each healing item, and I have to retry half-a-dozen times to get it just right. After the second boss battle, my hands were aching. At the third boss battle, I gave up.; Simple item creation from found and dropped material. Some quests from interaction with NPCs.; VI. Adol's battle voice may be turned off, sliders for BGM and SFX.; VII. I was 8 hours in, level 13-14, when I gave up. At some time when my hands are hurting less I may give it another go, on easy difficulty. Compared to Memories of Celceta and Lacrimosa of Dana, I found this game to be extremely disappointing.; VIII. Online walkthroughs are available. I have the PSP release, with booklet.
Ys: Memories of Celceta: I. Xseed/Falcom, 2012. JRPG. ESRB: Teen. Vita chip on Vita TV.; II. Six playable characters, not all available at any one time for a while. Battle party of up to three, though at times it is one or two. Battle party members can be swapped out during battle if there are more than three player characters available, and changing the controlled character is a one-button thing. (As characters have different attack types—slash, strike, pierce— and enemies have vulnerabilities and defenses to these types, this is very useful.) Adol does not have to be in the battle party, and the character you control is the one shown on the map outside of battle, also. There is little AI configuration (and I see no sane way to make use of that on the Vita TV with the HORI SRW controller, as it uses the rear touchpad of an actual Vita for two-finger gestures).; Enemies are visible, though not always avoidable, and battle just happens where you are. You don't 'enter' battle, so there is no 'escape' from battle; you can freely run around (or even out of) the battle area to choose targets or draw single enemies away from a pack. You occasionally encounter a large enemy that you can't handle, so being able to easily run away is a life-saving ability in some places. Battles may be retried. Game-over otherwise lets you resume at the nearest monument (these are heal/warp points), camp or town, or you may reload a save.; Somewhat unusual is that one must choose easy, normal, hard or nightmare difficulty at the beginning of the game, and thereafter you may only decrease the difficulty. I began on normal and was okay, but ended up with a rather over-powered party by half-way through. In other games, I would have gone up in difficulty.; III. Controls are simple, and one may reassign the six buttons used. No camera control, but the world map (Select button) is unusually detailed and useful. Save anywhere. There are heal points that also serve as warp points to leave dungeons and to travel around the world map, though any particular warp point connects only to a subset of warp points. (Later you gain the ability to go to any warp point from anywhere.) Party heals slowly while standing without moving in the field, and quickly in camps and towns, which means healing potions need only be used in battle and there are no stays in inns for healing. (Characters have no healing skills, either.) Pause with PS/Analog button.; IV. There is no player AI, and though the battle system is simple, with a battle party of only two or three this is definitely an X-button masher, which is quite painful for me at this point in my life. There are a few puzzles and tricky situations, but nothing too bad. The world map is much larger than any town or dungeon, and usually you are free to return to areas you've already explored. The shops have different capabilities in different towns, and every town has unique quests, so a good deal of traveling around is expected. Map completion is a thing, with a reward is available for each 10% completed.; V. Weapon and armor stats and some accessories can be enhanced, healing items synthesized and accessories crafted, using material from drops and a variety of resource points which renew after a time. Few treasure chests. No DLC. Interesting story. Typical Ys characters. They each have a backstory that is revealed, but past that they do not develop. Adol, as usual, is just Adol and remains oblivious of everyone else's feelings.; There are points (first is the final door in Ancient Burrow) where it is impossible to proceed without using the Vita touchpad. This is possible using the virtual touchpad of the Vita TV, but is a bit finicky.; There appear to be no story extras post game.; VI. The upscaled animation looks pretty fuzzy on my monitor, no matter how I adjust settings. (Dialogue pop-ups, menus and cut-scenes are fine.) Sound is good, with BGM, SFX and voice being separately adjustable. No text speed control. Adol of course is mute and other voice acting is minimal. Music is decent.; VII. Sixty hours at the final warp point. (There are no true save points in this game, but after a certain boss battle, when saving you are advised to not overwrite your previous save if you wish to go back.) Everyone is level 56 to 58 (four are 57) with best equipment fairly well enhanced. We're clearly over-powered; the character I control takes damage only because I do such a poor job of guarding; the AI-controlled characters are fine. Ending is rather minimal; no glimpses of what happens with the various characters afterwards. Very enjoyable game with plenty to do, and some equipment decisions that can be different on replay.; VIII. I have the Silver Anniversary Edition, which includes a cloth map, some other goodies and "Adol's Travel Journal," a small book that is somewhere between a manual and a strategy guide. The Journal only has about half the map (the cloth map is complete) and only hints at some of the later areas, towns and quests.
Tales of Berseria: I. Bandai Namco, 2016. JRPG. ESRB: Teen. PS4.; II. Six player characters, battle team of four. AI settings similar to Zestiria, but AI seems to be smarter. No random encounters. Full-auto works in battles, and one has the ability to see enemy stats, trigger Velvet's Therian state and to switch out characters while in full-auto.; After a while, fighting many battles in an area may cause a sub-boss to spawn in the next battle. Wandering enemies or dire foe, these are difficult but rewarding fights, and unlike normal sub-boss and boss battles, they may be escaped from if one is caught out in poor shape for the fight.; III. Usual Tales controls and settings, which can be changed at any time. Save at save points and a single quick save from the pause screen. Pause almost anywhere (anywhere, actually, using the PS button on the controller). Using the HORIPAD FPS Plus wired controller, but I don't hold it.; IV. Less hand-holding than Zestiria at the beginning, but later there are a few areas that are pretty closely scripted. Mercifully when tutorials force you into semi-auto you usually are returned to full-auto once you clear the tutorial. Am playing on moderate difficulty with full-auto battles for more gald and better drops.; There are Katz and Turtlez. The Katz chests hold fashion accessories, so strictly speaking are optional. (Opening enough chests grants access to the usual kind of Katz area.) Turtlez merchants, as usual, show up in out of the way places so you still have access to shop services if the story blocks you from returning to a town. The Katz run a series of mini-games, which do contain puzzles and feats. These games reward Tales coins that can be traded for fashion items and some useful items, though the latter are very expensive. (Tales coins are occasionally found in the random sparkly objects, also.) There are several other mini-games, including a card game that features characters from all the main Tales games. Many sub-events, often with multiple steps spread all over the map.; V. Velvet is a welcome change from the usual Tales protagonist. All the characters have significant backstories and development. This is a party drawn together by need, trickery and devious motives. Trust no one! Item creation has returned to sanity after Zestiria. You have some control over cooking, which uses items you collect.; Equipment enhancement uses special items, some of which come most easily from dismantling enhanced equipment. Skills are learned from mastering equipment. Equipment also adds temporary skills, as do titles. In-game help is pretty weak in general, and totally lacking about cooking, enhancing, dismantling, skills and so on.; DLC is mostly costumes, and I'm ignoring it. There is a large (nine area) and complex (treasure determined by floor and number of souls given to a Katz) extra dungeon (after clear save) that ends with a 128-level boss.; Berseria is set in Zestiria's distant past. For those intimately familiar with the various Tales storylines, Berseria (and Hexen Isle in Zestiria) make it clear that the worlds of the Tales games are more intertwingled than it appears from the viewpoint of each individual game.; VI. Japanese voice track. BGM, SFX, Voice, Movie (cutscene) volumes separately adjustable. Great opening and music. Translation/localization in the subtitles is a bit rocky in places. (As in, wrong.); VII. Guide states that level 60 is the target for the final large, eight-boss dungeon at the end of part four, and my party easily reached that level early in part four, switching to play on the 'hard' level of difficulty. Given the storyline, what one knows about the future (in Zestiria) and hints dropped along the way, one doesn't expect a happy ending, and things do look pretty grim at one point.; My thorough playing style had consumed 100 hours early in part four. By the final dungeon I was easily playing on 'chaos' level for better drops (boss battles on 'hard'). My party reached level 83+ with equipment aggregate level 45 for the battle party and a total of about 183 hours playing time. (Sixty-three of those hours were spent in menus, i.e., mostly doing equipment enhancement.) The complexities of equipment enhancement beg for a second play-through now that I thoroughly understand things.; VIII. I have the Namco Japanese complete guide.
Tales of Vespiria: Definitive Edition: I. Bandai Namco, 2019. JRPG. ESRB: Teen. Playing October 2019.; II. Nine player characters, four in battle party. The AI is a bit clunky, especially with less than four in the battle party. Visible and often avoidable encounters that re-spawn quickly in the field, but only when leaving and re-entering areas in dungeons. Initially Yuri is the visible character, but eventually that may be changed.; III. There are a surprising number of settings, even including a choice of fonts for subtitles. Controls are configurable. Camera control only on the world map. Save at save points or on world map. In some long dungeons there are heal and save pointes. Pause anywhere. [R3 to allow item usage is not working for me and I cannot figure out why.]; IV. In many ways Vesperia feels similar to Abyss. Tutorials continue for quite a while, but it didn't feel like hand-holding. However, there are a few places and a few ways in which one can end up in trouble and it takes some head-scratching to figure out what went wrong. Two important points for the first part of the game: 1) If you find yourself using all your healing items to survive a boss fight, you're doing something wrong and you may not survive the next battle before you can restock and/or save, so reload and fix the problem. 2) Some weapon skills lower damage or waste TP, so if a character is suddenly doing much less damage or burning through TP check their skills and turn some off. (Some support artes also burn TP and are best used only manually.) [freedom, overall difficulty]; V. Cooking after battles. Easy to understand item synthesis. Many sub-events and optional things to do (many of which are not at all obvious and are missable). There are sub-events that cannot be completed until new game+ and there are more dungeons available. There is DLC which, as usual, I am ignoring.; VI. The Definitive Edition has both Japanese and English voice acting, with subtitles in English, French, Spanish or Portuguese. More sound sliders than I have ever seen; music, SFX, voice in and out of battle, and voice for the skits, too. Anime style graphics, which is my preference. Great music. The Japanese cast is quite a list of talent.; VII. [length, ending, replayability]; VIII. I have the Namco Japanese PS3 complete guide. (The game was originally released on XBOX 360 in 2008, then ported to PS3 in 2009 with expanded content. The Definitive Edition is essentially a remastered version of the PS3 edition.)
World of Final Fantasy: I. Square Enix, 2016. RPG. ESRB: Teen.; II. Two main human characters. ATB battle system, so no player AI. Random encounters, but at a reasonable rate. In a sense, anything but a boss battle may be retried. You may have to repeat part of your way through a dungeon, but dungeons are not large, and any puzzles solved or switches set remain that way if you leave and return.; III. Very little camera movement. Save and heal at save points, which generally occur only before boss battles. Every dungeon and town has a gate to which one can easily transfer from a central location. One huge quirk is that there is only one save file! However, most ways in which a party can be wiped out do not result in game over, only in being teleported back to a central location without loosing progress. Areas in which a true game over may occur are clearly marked in-game, and preceded by a save point. Pause anywhere.; IV. This game is amazingly configurable and playable in terms of level of physical difficulty. There is sufficient but not annoying hand-holding. The game is fairly linear in a forward direction, but you can always return to towns and dungeons, and there are some areas that must be returned to at a later date, i.e., when you can survive them.; V. This game is made for people who love Final Fantasy, and have play many of the FF games over the years. It's one of the most frustration-free games I have ever played, but that doesn't mean it's always easy.; VI. The animation quality, voice acting (Japanese) and music are first class.; VII. The many ways in which 'mirages' can be used and combined in the two types of stacks invites replaying. And it's cute as all get out.; VIII. I have the Day One DLC, including the Japanese language track, and the English language strategy guide from Prima.
Ys VIII: Lacrimosa of Dana: I. Falcom, 2017. JRPG. ESRB: Teen. PS4.; II. Ys Seven, Ys: Memories of Celceta and Ys: Lacrimosa of Dana all have very similar mechanics, so I primarily note the differences from Ys: Celceta, the one I played first.; AI can be toggled between offensive and defensive. Required boss battles may be retried, with the option to go down a level in difficulty. Game over anywhere else results in resuming from the most recent area boundary, way marker or one can load a save file.; III. Every control button can be remapped, which is awesome! The camera is decent, for the first time in an Ys game. Save anywhere. Pause with the PS button.; IV. Map completion is again a thing, and one can see completion by area, which is a big improvement. Warping to significant points already visited can be done early on using the world map, making exploring the vast island easier, as one needs to periodically return to base camp.; There are places off of which one can fall. Climbing and jumping, including jumping sideways while climbing, is required in places. Occasionally you run into a beastie that stomps the party to mush in a few seconds. Reload and run around it for now.; The world map is huge, and there's a good deal of freedom to revisit places one has been. Progress through the map is not at all linear, and one could skip large areas. Occasionally the game blocks access to areas or forces events, but it all makes sense in terms of the story.; Playing on normal difficulty pushed my hands to the limit, sometimes beyond. There were a few things I simply could not do, and I had to resort to using the turbo feature of the HORIPAD FPS Plus controller that has become my favorite for the PS4.; V. The game begins with a scene of sexist stupidity (on the part of the developers, not the characters). [Also, developers, please realize that an ultra miniskirt is not suitable garb for a fighter. Why don't you try fencing and see how much exposed skin you want to have? And really, are fart jokes actually funny?] There is a wide range of DLC. Good story, interesting characters, tons of stuff to do. The harvesting quests and building up of the base camp remind me of something like Harvest Moon, which is a good thing in my opinion.; [Spoiler!] Playing Dana in both time periods is a bit challenging, as she has a different level, different equipment and different abilities. So I stuck with Laxia in the present time.; Clear save unlocks some extra content and options, and allows a few things to be carried into a new game. (Neither of which I have done.); Item creation is woven into the theme of being castaways on a deserted island. There is no money. You find stuff, find people who can do things with found stuff, then ask them to make or improve stuff. There is cooking, and fishing. The fishing mechanic is the best I've yet seen.; VI. This was originally a PS Vita game and has been upscaled for the PS4, but on my setup it looks great! BGM, SFX and voice are separately adjustable. Good music. Japanese audio and French subtitles included with my version. Subtitles and localization a bit weird in places.; VII. I played for 120 hours at normal difficulty, reaching character levels of 75-80. The ending is somewhat unusual, in that it isn't simply beat the final boss and roll credits. Definitely replayable, if I'm able.; VIII. Limited Edition. I have the Japanese guide.

Notes

I've worn out one (maybe two) PS2 consoles and have purchased two more as spares, as there is no PS2 backwards compatibility in either the PS3 or PS4. I have two PSP 2000s (one imported) and one 3000, a spare PS3 (diskless), two Vita TVs, and a PS4. (The only one of those that is still in production is the PS4, which is why I have only one of them.)

I also own used Nintendo Gameboy Advance and Gameboy Advance SP hand held consoles, primarily for Blue Sphere, but also for a few other games (Tales and Zelda). The SP, with a backlit screen, is easier to read, but the GBA has better button ergonomics. Recently I've added a used Retron 5 and a new Wii U, with the Sony Playstation Classic on order.

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lisa at lisalees.com

Game Playability Reviews

Sony PSP

Sony Playstation TV / Vita TV

Sony Playstation / Playstation 2

Sony Playstation 3

Sony Playstation 4

Notes