Recent reviews by Pickleton

It feels a lot more modern than the other Shantae games, but it definitely doesn't feel as good as most of the other ones.
Not a "bad" game by any stretch, just that it seems like they tried to make the game "silly" and "funny" to the point where the gameplay itself feels a bit neglected.

If you loved the game then, you'll love it now.
If you're unfamiliar with the game, it's an SRPG that leans really hard into the "RPG" side of the equation, if that makes sense.
Broken to heck but some people love that side of it.
Gameplay aside, story is incredible, especially for when it was made.

Personal scores (outta ten):
Music - 7
Gameplay - 4
Story - 8
Overall - For its time? 9. In 2025? Probably a 6 or so. They added difficulty levels and a speedup button to try to help with the tedium, but it doesn't help the fact that FFT feels so slow to play. And unlike Tactics Ogre (it's predecessor), the remaster's QoL don't include some of the things that I think really helped get people into PSP and Reborn, mainly the auto-battle.

I'd still highly recommend playing this game in some incarnation if only to experience the story.

Lewd scenes aside, this is a pretty solid grinding game at its core, not unlike something from the Disgaea franchise. If you like the Neptunia games or Disgaea, this is definitely worth a check out, though not exactly something I'd introduce to somebody who isn't down for self-referential and self-deprecating anime otaku culture humor.

It was pretty good. Not normally a fan of the 3D animated feel (almost feels like a PS1 or PS2 game at times), but I do like a good Metroidvania and this was a good Metroidvania.

It's basically just a tamagochi that you can dress up with costume pieces you get from in-game gacha.
Game uses more system resources than one would expect.
My first thought was "omg crypto miner" but it's actually legit. Probably just need to turn down the settings, but I swear it uses more system resources than some newish games.

All-in-all, it's just a cute little AFK game.

Been a huge RPG fan for a long time, and these games are right in my strike zone.
Of the 3 that have been released so far on Steam, EO3 is likely the most popular.
The mechanics can be a bit overwhelming if you haven't been with the series for a bit, but at its core it's a straight dungeon crawler.
This game does introduce subclassing after you finish the second area, so don't make the mistake I did and spend several hours agonizing over re-theorycrafting my party part-way through the game.

For what this game has, it was pretty fun.
However, it will never be finished.
If somehow the game is finished at a later date and I get a notification of such, I will likely revise this review.
I had such high hopes from the artwork and the first stage (that's how long ago I bought into it), but it's literally been on "making small adjustments to stage 3" for several years now.

Was honestly surprised to see Gal*Gun of all franchises turned into a Castlevania-type game.
Note that I said "Castlevania", not "Metroidvania". The game has specific levels. You can go through the entire game without doing any backtracking, though if you want to get the other endings, you'll need to play through other routes using later upgrades to find collectables, etc.

Game is very cute, and I like me a good puzzle game, but ....

They give you absolutely no help on anything, and so often your problem is that the setup you made has 1 piece 1-pixel off, but because of the physics you don't know it's 1 pixel off until you've run the simulation. This doesn't sound so bad until you get past around level40, at which point it can take 10-15 minutes just to fix one part of your machine.
For example: you're using 4 mirrors to light a fuse on a bomb while it's midair. You run the simulation twenty times to get your mirrors to a point where you can light using a magnifying glass. The positioning of the magnifying glass lights the fuse too late, and the timing of the explosion isn't right. You decide to shift the mirrors around to light the fuse in a slightly different position, only to find that to get the right angle, you have to move a piece from a completely separate part of your machine, throwing off THAT balance. Once you pass about level 40, the game gets brutally specific like that, and it makes the stages turn into an hour or more of trial-and-error. And it's not that figuring it out is so hard, so much that getting it EXACTLY right is such a chore. I like the feeling when I figure it out, but from then I have to spend 15-20 minutes tweaking it to actually make it work, and the frustration makes me say "f***ing FINALLY!" when I get it, which is not a good way for a game to make you feel.

If you've never played it and don't get what I'm talking about, imagine this:
Imagine playing Worms: Armageddon, but only the basic rocket, the gravity and wind follow weird rules like "gravity strength is on a gradient depending where you are on stage, the rocket has a 1-pixel hitbox, and only direct shots count. Games would go on for days until someone gets a lucky shot.

I gave up the game after spending about 45 minutes on stage 55, for whatever that's worth.

tl;dr - It's a good game, but not a good remake.

Here's a few nitpicks. Things you wouldn't really care about UNLESS you played the original.
For example, when you sleep at the inn in the SNES version, the characters get in bed, it plays the music, the characters get out of bed, pump their fist in the air, and as they do so, their HP/MP is filled and a chime plays. In this version, they get into bed, the music plays, the HP/MP is filled and chime plays, then they get out of bed, and finally pump their hands in the air for no apparent reason.
Similarly, when you beat a boss and the congratulations music plays, there's a 3-5 second pause and THEN you get your HP restored and your orb. Something about those little differences just loses some of the charm for me.
Also loading screens can go F themselves.