This game was originally released on the Wii in 2010, and I played it back then. I got very far in, but didn’t finish it. This is the Definitive Edition released on the Switch, which I also played when it was released but never got to the end. This time I thought I’d give it a quick try on the Switch 2 to see what it looks like, and ended up completing the game finally. The game is extremely long. I think the game timer was around 80 hours when I saw the ending, with plenty for me to do in it if I wanted.
In the game’s mythology there are two giant gods fighting in a boundless sea, the Bionis and the Mechonis. One is made of rock, and one is a mechanical robot. They end up killing each other in the fight, and later life develops on their corpses. In the game’s opening the main characters are living in a settlement on the Bionis, but get attacked by robots called mechon invading from the Mechonis.
I really enjoyed the setting, and the story. The story itself has large parallels with XenoGears on the original PlayStation which I loved. It turns out that the gods are selfish and have created life solely as a means to resuscitate themselves and resume the fight.
The reason that it took me three attempts to finish, however, is that I’m really not keen on the fighting system. It’s a chaotic mess, and it never feels like much is connecting. It plays like an MMO with moves that have timers before you can reuse them. I end up babysitting these timers, and it feels like every fight is pretty much the same rather than having to figure out a strategy for different enemies. Despite very much liking the setting as well, I find the running around in huge spaces takes a lot of time and wears thin after a while.