@McGhee_the_Insomniac: I think the problem is that until you've figured out the way to block physics work, all the puzzles seem like an impenetrable wall of nonsense that you have to be lucky to change into a staircase. It's hard to just glance at them the way you would a sudoku puzzle and say "Yep, that's a puzzle." Even then, I wouldn't say there are any solutions either, since you can climb pretty much any way you want. I found myself doing a lot of the same three-block exchange (I think they called it the "Inazuma").
@Crushed: It still comes off as kind of silly. The most supernatural thing in the game is the communal nightmare closely followed by the dream deaths, which is already a rumor in real life. Everything else can be written off as insane dream logic, which would be complementary to the Jungian psychology they're kind of based on.
Compare with a normal Shin Megami Tensei game where the basic premise is: It's the apocalypse and demons are everywhere, what do you do? I just don't feel the Atlus pedigree extends into a game that had thus-far taken itself very seriously about skepticism. But I guess it all boils down to personal preference.
I think I might have felt better about that bizarre twist if it just wasn't so sudden and uncalled for. It was nice to have some answers to some of the more minor mysteries, but it was much different compared to something from a Persona game where you have 25th hours and magic television worlds. Those phenomena need answers and are perfectly fine with strange explanations because the games were already revolving around concepts equally supernatural. When a game based on more realistic human emotions and interactions like Catherine tries to pull the same kind of twist, it just feels out of place.
But enough about that. I really agree that Catherine deserves playing, if only to support variety in the market, and if that sounds like a bad reason, maybe you don't really want as much change as you might think, because this is it.
Though I actually ended up enjoying the block puzzles by the end. It just took me half of the goddamn game to figure out how to do them.
I liked Catherine well enough, but there was a huge chunk of time where I wasn't good enough at the puzzles to not be frustrated at them that started me thinking of how much I would enjoy an Atlus RPG using that style of animation. Maybe not even Persona 5 and maybe not even Shin Megami Tensei. In the end, I think Jeff was right about the balance between puzzle and story. Personally, I didn't spend as much time on the puzzles, but I did think the story segments were teasingly short to the point that the game felt like it was moving too fast. Then again, I am the kind of layabout who has the time to finish 40 hour games.
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