ShogunRok

@Nightcrawler71 It has the potential to be mind-blowing but also a complete mess. Not many games you can say that about these days!

@trev666 I genuinely think this is the answer.

If Microsoft has higher (and let's face it, unrealistic) sales expectations for Obsidian then it needs to hand the studio an established IP. I like The Outer Worlds but it's not and it never will be Fallout.

An Obsidian Fallout game would make real waves, assuming Bethesda would be okay with it happening.

@Deadhunter @DonkeyFantasy Haha, unfortunately it's the usual Dragon Quest themes throughout. Nothing new for the non-fans here.

@Don Unfortunately I think you'll miss one or two story-related Trophies, yes.

Unless they automatically pop when you import your save, but that doesn't happen in most games, in my experience.

@somnambulance That's a tough one, because I almost think you need to be in the right mindset to properly immerse yourself in a Dragon Quest game. Or at least that's how it is for me.

They're always quite special games but they can be surprisingly easy to bounce off if you're not in the mood for the typical DQ whimsy and charm.

And like the review says, DQ7 still feels slow at times, despite the streamlining. It takes a while to get going and there are definitely times when the pacing sags.

I think this is a great remake overall. but I probably wouldn't recommend it right off the bat if you're really divided on the original.

So, in your case, I'd maybe leave it for now since you're in no rush. You might really feel like some DQ cosiness in the future, and then you can jump in with less concern.

@lazarus11 There are a couple of minigames but nothing you'll spend time actually mastering or anything like that, just brief distractions.

Your equipped weapons and shields actually show on the characters, but armour doesn't.

And there are technically side quests, but they're not the busywork stuff you find in other RPGs. They're basically optional side stories, and there are only a few of them.

@Rich33 I remember doing some digging on Cyberpunk back in maybe 2021, and it was apparently a sizeable team still working on it with the intention of fixing and improving just about everything.

CDPR then basically established a new team under Gabriel Amatangelo, who spearheaded the entire 2.0 update and directed Phantom Liberty. Not sure when this first took place but the resources involved were pretty significant.

Anyway, long story short, I'd be shocked if BaRB is putting anywhere near that amount of effort into MindsEye. Hell, I'm shocked there's still talk of any kind of revival!

If anyone's got any questions about the game or the review let me know and I'll try to answer them.

It was nice to play a 3D Dragon Quest again!

@Coversnail For what it's worth I think it's a solid action RPG, and probably worth checking out when it's got a big discount.

It's quite generic though, in terms of story, characters, and anime tropes. It struggles to stand out in the way that Falcom's established franchises do.

Fun gameplay if you can stomach that stuff.

@Rich33 MindsEye currently has 8 people playing it on Steam right now, so I'm inclined to agree that there's simply nowhere near enough interest to warrant continued development.

Even Cyberpunk remained popular despite being a disaster at launch. This just seems like madness to me, but I suppose it comes down to how big the team is, what they're actually working on, etc.

I feel like this is the video they should have shown about two years ago instead of the random boss battle clips.

But even then, the amount of stuff this game's trying to do seems insane. It really does feel like one of those games that no one will be sure on until they actually play it.

What a huge waste of time, bloody hell.

SNK have officially lost their minds.

@Areus Actual nightmare scenario.

@IntrepidWombat @Czar_Khastik I started with Cold Steel as well, having no real intention of exploring the rest of the series.

But I enjoyed the Cold Steel saga so much that I got completely hooked on Falcom's style of RPG. An incredible franchise that I'm so glad I stuck with.

@naruball There's no official number from what I can tell (probably because there have been so many Dragon Ball games since the 1990s) but estimates put it somewhere around 45-50 million.

And 30 million of that is down to XenoVerse 2, FighterZ, and Kakarot alone.

@ItsAlwaysSunnyyy It's incredibly cool that Kakarot got you into the whole thing!

Big thanks to everyone who voted throughout the year!

We've had several publishers and developers reach out about Game of the Month, asking if they can use our award to promote their winning games. So we like to think it's worth doing!

Hopefully this year will be just as successful.

"No more cosmetic purchasing – you can acquire all cosmetics free through gameplay."

It'll be very interesting to see if this change to a paid product works out for them. I feel like it's the kind of change in direction that a lot of floundering free-to-play games would benefit from.

@Areus I agree, and I think part of it is because in the Daybreak games, Van just drives everywhere and then the chapter takes place in a set space.

It just doesn't have that same sense of adventure that the Sky games or Cold Steel games had, where you'd have stretches of countryside to explore outside of the town / city you were in.

@Areus It'll probably be contentious with some fans but Erebonia is still my favourite setting. I felt like it was the most fleshed out and it made the most thematic sense (but it also had four whole games to nail things down).

I like Calvard but it feels a little... messy at times. A lot of diverse locations that don't quite feel like they're part of the same country. I like Edith as the central city but even then, it's starting to feel quite boring after three games.

Like I said in the first comment, I do think Horizon 2 (or whatever it ends up being called) needs to freshen things up. The setting is definitely part of that.

@belmont Just don't expect everything to be answered in this game, either. A lot of storylines get moved along, but there's still stuff that Falcom's clearly leaving unanswered for now.

@belmont Yes, especially compared to Daybreak 2. Horizon's story actually moves the overarching narrative along quite a bit, although like the review says, it's held back slightly by a very slow start.

Big improvement in the story department, in my opinion, but it also builds on a lot of stuff that Daybreak 2 introduced. So I'd still recommend playing Daybreak 2 before this, but if you can't stomach it, it'd be worth watching a recap.

If anyone's got any questions about the game or the review, let me know and I'll try to answer them.

Personally I think Horizon is probably the best game in the Daybreak saga (so far) but as the review says, it relies very, very heavily on the games that came before it — perhaps more so than any other Trails title (including Cold Steel 4 and Reverie, in some ways).

Falcom's done it again, then, but I do think Horizon's sequel needs to bring something fresh to the table, especially with how well 1st Chapter has been received in the meantime.

Thanks for reading!

Thanks again to everyone who took the time to read our GOTY stuff and to everyone who voted in the public polls.

The GOTY content always takes a lot of time and effort to properly produce, so we hope you enjoyed it!

A few interesting points from the poll results:

• Every game got at least 2 votes, which is impressive.
• Wolverine was beating GTA 6 in votes for the vast majority of the voting window.
• GTA 6 actually overtook Wolverine at one point, but it couldn't keep the lead.
• Saros started really strong but fell out of the top five after just a few hours.
• Crimson Desert ended up with almost exactly the same number of votes that it did last year (a difference of just 7).
• Halo took a couple of days to make the top 10 — it didn't get many votes at all until later.
• There's been a very even split in popularity between new games and sequels, which is nice to see.
• We've seen actual, uncut gameplay from 6 of the top 10, which is an improvement over last year's results.

Thanks to everyone who voted!

@Czar_Khastik Atlus reading this comment like "Wait... There's a Persona 1 and 2?"

@Oram77 I'll never forgive Square Enix for this.

@Nei Haha, it's a Christmas miracle!

Totally agree on the delivery gameplay, there's nothing quite like it. I found it so relaxing, and the game's obviously gorgeous so I always try to take my time.

I've got so many screenshots of the landscape...

@TheArt Rey Dau might be one of my favourite monsters to fight in any Monster Hunter game to date, and that's saying a hell of a lot.

@Nei Only just saw this comment, I'm shocked we've somehow landed on the same GOTY! Must be a first?

@Jammer Yeah, easily skippable if you've already played them. Only reason to revisit is if you've been wanting to replay them or you want the new Trophy lists.

@UltimateOtaku91 I think I'm the only one, unfortunately!

@MightyDemon82 Makes me happy to hear that, and I'll also apologise in advance for the hundreds upon hundreds of hours I'm going to cost you / have already cost you.

Rob... How is it that your taste in games only grows more powerful by the year?

Every other writer on Push Square should be ashamed that their work is allowed to be published alongside your own. Especially Sammy, who is well known to be a hack fraud.

Congratulations on being the Greatest Man in Gaming once again.

Oh, and Hideo Kojima sends his personal thanks. He said you're his best friend now that Geoff has betrayed him.

• Yours forever, the Official Robert Ramsey Fanclub (which has thousands of highly attractive members + Hideo Kojima) xoxoxoxo

**** wrong account

Seems like a good idea to me. The more we can space out all the Feb / March releases, the better.

If anyone's got any questions about the review or the game, let me know and I'll try to answer them.

I'd always recommend Yakuza 0 to anyone interested, but SEGA's approach to the Director's Cut is ultimately quite disappointing.

Hopefully the inevitable remake on PS6 will make everything better!

Been looking forward to seeing the comments on this one!

@get2sammyb @Oram77

@Olskeezy Totally wrote the release date down instead of the stream date. Thanks for pointing it out!

@Ravix Maybe if I had an infinite amount of time!

I'll be there.

(In 2030)

@somnambulance Weirdly enough, that's sort of what's happening with that The Expanse game. It sounds very Mass Effect and it's being developed by Owlcat Games, who are historically a (very highly rated) CRPG studio.

For what it's worth I think Larian would make a fantastic Mass Effect game, assuming it could get the action-shooter combat right on its first try. But I'd trust them!

@SterlingEyes It's like you say, DOS2 is clearly a fantastic RPG in its own right but BG3 (in my opinion) is basically an evolution and refinement of everything Larian had done previously.

And in that sense, it's definitely hard to go backwards.

@somnambulance Yeah there are quite a few (slightly contradictory) quotes from Larian about their next game.

A couple of years back they strongly suggested they were revisiting Divinity after BG3 because it's what the studio was built on.

Then there were quotes about them wanting to do something completely different.

There were also reports that they were going to work on two games after BG3, which would make more sense of the previous quotes, but nothing on that front will be made concrete until we get official reveals.

But after BG3, you can totally see how they'd step things up, so part of me really does believe this rumour after considering all the possibilities.

@BearsEatBeets Larian released the original CG trailer for BG3 long before the game was shown off, so I would suspect that (if this is true) it'll be another CG thing rather than a full reveal.

@somnambulance The theory is that the port is announced alongside the new game in order to help carry the hype.

So the statue is for a new Divinity (supposedly), and the port leak adds weight to that.

@IceClimbersMain I think the negative perception of Rebirth's sales come from it doing (reportedly quite a bit) worse than Remake.

And that's despite it being a much bigger game, although we don't really know how the budget for each game has shaken out.

But surely Square Enix should have seen this coming? Splitting the remake into three games was always going to impact sales, especially when Remake itself made divisive changes to story and gameplay.

That might actually be what this investment fund is getting at. A lot of these criticisms that everyone has of modern Square Enix ultimately boils down to mismanagement (both of key properties like Final Fantasy and the wider company's operations).

I remember when it was just me and Sammy running Push Square, we used to try and spread the Yakuza word as much as possible.

It's cool to see it be so recognised all these years later. We always said they were amazing games!