Do you ever have those moments where, despite any flaws, you're enjoying a game almost the entire way through-

- and then, at the very end, a series of utterly baffling choices ruins the entire thing?

I so badly wanted to love this game. I love the art style, I love the moment-to-moment gameplay, I love the fantasy of being an airship captain. I even enjoyed the story, despite what I've seen about other people's opinions on it.

But the ending.

Oh my dear Jesus Christ the ending.

Without spoiling anything, the end of the game essentially boils down to two incredibly difficult battles. So far, so normal - the boss, and the final boss. Whatever. It's fine.

The problem is that, for some *ungodly reason*, these are the *only two fights in the entire game* where not only does the game not autosave immediately before them; it actually *prevents you from manually saving* before or during either. I get that they were trying to create tension, you know. I get that they wanted it to be like "ohhh, this is going to be so hard, they have to play as well as they possibly can~!"

But all it ends up being is an extra five to ten minutes added on to every attempt at the final boss, with the extra bonus of potentially royally messing up during that first fight and either losing one of the three ships you're allowed to have - in other words, instant reload - or actually getting yourself killed - again, an instant reload.

That's, of course, not mentioning the *incredible reflexes* and *extreme speed in every direction* the AI seems to have during these final fights that makes it so they always manage to stay out of your firing arcs, while always keeping you in theirs. I just... agh. I wanted so, so badly to enjoy the ending of this game. I feel genuinely pained that they managed to mess it up this badly.

I don't think I've ever had a game that I enjoyed so much of during the vast majority of its runtime drop the ball at the ending this hard. I even liked the story leading up to it, and it's a very solid game. Just... don't expect to complete it. I don't think I'm ever going to try another game from this company if this is how they do it.

Do you ever have those moments where, despite any flaws, you're enjoying a game almost the entire way through- - and then, at the very end, a series of utterly baffling choices ruins the entire thing? I so badly wanted to love this game. I love the art style, I love the moment-to-moment gameplay, I love the fantasy of being an airship captain. I even enjoyed the story, despite what I've seen about other people's opinions on it. But the ending. Oh my dear Jesus Christ the ending. Without spoiling anything, the end of the game essentially boils down to two incredibly difficult battles. So far, so normal - the boss, and the final boss. Whatever. It's fine. The problem is that, for some *ungodly reason*, these are the *only two fights in the entire game* where not only does the game not autosave immediately before them; it actually *prevents you from manually saving* before or during either. I get that they were trying to create tension, you know. I get that they wanted it to be like "ohhh, this is going to be so hard, they have to play as well as they possibly can~!" But all it ends up being is an extra five to ten minutes added on to every attempt at the final boss, with the extra bonus of potentially royally messing up during that first fight and either losing one of the three ships you're allowed to have - in other words, instant reload - or actually getting yourself killed - again, an instant reload. That's, of course, not mentioning the *incredible reflexes* and *extreme speed in every direction* the AI seems to have during these final fights that makes it so they always manage to stay out of your firing arcs, while always keeping you in theirs. I just... agh. I wanted so, so badly to enjoy the ending of this game. I feel genuinely pained that they managed to mess it up this badly. I don't think I've ever had a game that I enjoyed so much of during the vast majority of its runtime drop the ball at the ending this hard. I even liked the story leading up to it, and it's a very solid game. Just... don't expect to complete it. I don't think I'm ever going to try another game from this company if this is how they do it.