I'm avoiding spoilers as I play through this because discovering it is really part of the fun for such a game. But I just wanna say that it's very entertaining and fun. The story's an interesting take of the base storyline and themes of FF1 and is laid out as a sort of identity mystery about who exactly arranged this whole... Warrior of Light legend, for what purpose, and who the hell are Jack and the others. And I find it all very neat, especially how they're portraying the Lufenians here.
The levels are just...awesome. I love how creative they are and you can't help but pay attention to the design and interact with them as you explore and fight. They're linear but not boringly so. They're intuitive enough to explore with enough hidden stuff to keep you interested and keep your brain awake. Favorite level by far has been the Earth Shrine modeled after the Tomb of Raithwall. That level was fucking awesome.
The boss fights are well done and really challenging. Although Tiamat was a bitch and I literally needed co-op help to take her down. She was the "wake up call" of the game, because you HAVE to have some grasp and mastery of the gameplay concepts to overcome her, otherwise you're getting your shit rocked HARD. Fucking ridiculous. But she went down. Thankfully the other bosses haven't been this hard, which I guess shows I'm learning something
This game just feels like a fun yet engaging and interesting Final Fantasy and I love it. Jack's definitely a hilarious and badass subversion of the typical JRPG FF protagonist which is sorta actually impressive since so many FF protags are already subversions of the typical hero you would see in most JRPG stories. So for Jack to be able to make such a memetic and memorable impression and keep going as an interesting and amusing character is... Sorta cool. The whole cast are sorta just a collection of tropes but they've got good chemistry, characterization and what's been revealed so far is really nice.
It reminds me of KH1 with how Sora, Riku and Kairi literally just are fucking the most basic of JRPG tropes but as the story unfolds they become well... More characterized and interesting. It's sorta like that except not starting from a level of "zero" like they did at least. But it's the same concept. You literally know nothing at all about them and they're just tropes but they unfold more and more and get more rounded as the story progresses.
So yeah, given that I've taken down two Fiends, I'd say I'm about half way through the game now. And so far it has not trainwrecked or come off as something disappointing. I'm glad to say.
I'm so fucking glad I didn't pre-order/buy Chocobo Racing GP and instead got this. There was a time I prioritized
that game over this and I'm so fucking happy I didn't