2020’s Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity showed that applying the 1 vs. 1000 Musou-style gameplay to a more narrow scope of an IP can be successful. Now Nintendo and Omega Force have revisited their other Musou spin-off with Fire Emblem Warriors: Three Hopes. Like Age of Calamity, Three Hopes bears the same visuals as its progenitor and benefits from the more focused vision with a story that is in some ways better than the original Three Houses, and in some ways worse. The story supports the familiar Musou combat with some neat strategic additions, but the game ends up far overstaying its welcome.
Within my first thirty minutes of stepping into the George R.R. Martin-inspired world of Elden Ring, I opened up a booby-trapped treasure chest that flung me to—what I thought at the time was—the far corner of the map. I had no horse yet, nor a way to level up, and was surrounded by enemies that could kill me in one hit. Even so, I spent the next hour or so pushing onwards into this area I clearly wasn’t supposed to be in yet, in constant fear of a swift death at any moment. And I was loving every moment of it.
Monster Hunter Rise continues to push the envelope by adding a level of dynamic movement never before seen in the series.
Omensight has a lot going for it. The central murder mystery is genuinely captivating and the combat has a fluidity that just feels damn good. An eye-catching world is populated by equally colorful and memorable characters. To its credit, Omensight manages to somewhat avoid the repetition associated with looping narratives but not completely, and it's that fault that brings the entire experience just ever so lower.