Mary Skelter Finale
- September 12, 2023
- Ghostlight LTD
Get on Steam"Mary Skelter Finale" is the final chapter of the gruesome RPG series where players navigate the living prison of Jail, battling monsters and managing the powers of the Blood Maidens. In this installment, Jack and the separated group must face the being known as Pyre and uncover the truth behind their reality. Each character's unique abilities and struggles add depth to the story as they work towards a common goal.
Nintendo Switch
PC
Playstation 4
Windows
PlayStation
Reviews
- The game features a unique mechanic of switching between multiple parties to solve puzzles, enhancing exploration and gameplay variety.
- The story provides a satisfying conclusion to the series, with enjoyable character arcs and a great soundtrack.
- Despite its flaws, the game retains the fun dungeon crawling experience that fans of the series appreciate.
- The port suffers from performance issues, including poor optimization, long loading times, and graphical problems compared to the PS4 version.
- Experience points and grinding are frustratingly slow, making character progression tedious and unenjoyable.
- The English translation has inconsistencies and errors, detracting from the overall experience and immersion.
- story39 mentions
- 41 % positive mentions
- 51 % neutral mentions
- 8 % negative mentions
The story is generally well-received, with many praising its conclusion to a long-running arc and the introduction of new characters. However, some players feel that the narrative lacks depth and development, particularly in the midsection, which is heavily focused on gameplay rather than story progression. Overall, while the game offers a satisfying ending for fans of the series, it may be less engaging for newcomers without prior knowledge of the previous installments.
“The story is still incredibly good.”
“Despite having some problems when playing, I still enjoy it very much since I love the series anyway; great ending to the series story.”
“The story is great and I loved the new characters.”
“Game is okay, focuses much more on mechanical dungeon crawling than story for the most part.”
“It's got a whole lot of story at the beginning and at the end, but the midsection of the game, where you'd expect quite a bit of development, is marked by hours and hours of entirely plotless gameplay.”
“This is a huge disappointment because the story would really be improved with more development for characters, especially the newer characters and NPCs.”
- gameplay18 mentions
- 17 % positive mentions
- 67 % neutral mentions
- 17 % negative mentions
The gameplay is characterized by a unique mechanic that requires players to switch between multiple parties to solve puzzles in dungeons, offering a challenging and engaging experience. While the focus is heavily on mechanical dungeon crawling rather than story development, some players find this approach laborious, especially during the midsection of the game. Overall, the gameplay is solid and improved from previous versions, despite some criticisms regarding its pacing and reliance on specific abilities.
“Different parties to go through the different chapters, which is neat since not a lot of games I play use this mechanic, and it makes it more fun.”
“The main mechanic this time is having to switch between multiple different parties in different parts of the dungeons to solve puzzles to get the other parties to advance. It's a very unique idea and a challenging dungeon crawler.”
“In general, each floor of a dungeon relies on a mechanic for each team; you need to use one specific blood ability to resolve the puzzle.”
“It makes the overall gameplay experience a bit laborious.”
“You're gonna be surprised to find that this game is substantially more gameplay-oriented than it is story-oriented, much to my chagrin.”
“It's got a whole lot of story at the beginning and at the end, but the midsection of the game, where you'd expect quite a bit of development, is marked by hours and hours of entirely plotless gameplay.”
- music14 mentions
- 43 % positive mentions
- 43 % neutral mentions
- 14 % negative mentions
The music in the game has been widely praised, with many considering it the best soundtrack of the series, featuring a mix of nostalgic and engaging tracks that enhance the gameplay experience. However, some players noted a lack of background music in certain dungeon areas, which felt unusual and detracted from the overall atmosphere. Overall, the soundtracks, especially in the deluxe edition, are highlighted as a significant strength of the game.
“Great soundtracks! The deluxe edition will give you all of the soundtracks of the game from the first game to this finale game.”
“Best OST of the series, in my opinion.”
“A lot of the music makes me feel right at home with Sonic & the Black Knight, and the nightmare chase music is just a straight banger now rather than attempting to sound creepy.”
“The first thing that stood out to me was the lack of music in one of the dungeon areas.”
“While this could be intentional, it feels strange that one dungeon would have no background music or sound at all.”
- graphics12 mentions
- 17 % positive mentions
- 50 % neutral mentions
- 33 % negative mentions
The graphics of Mary Skelter 2 on Steam are generally considered acceptable but lack the detail and clarity of the PS4 version, which was not made available for this release. Players express frustration over the absence of enhanced graphical options, feeling constrained to the lower-quality visuals of the Switch version despite being on a more powerful platform. While the game performs better than its Switch counterpart, the overall graphical fidelity remains a point of contention among users.
“This is a port of the Switch version of the game and is missing the PS4 graphics, which add detail to the levels and make them much more readable.”
“The issue is not purely aesthetic either.”
“This is a port of the Switch version of the game and is missing the PS4 (which got an English release) graphics, which add detail to the levels and make them much more readable.”
“The only graphical options are the resolution and whether the game is windowed, borderless, or full screen. Again, it's a PS4 game; why can't we have options for that stuff on Steam?”
“Why are we stuck with Switch graphics?”
- optimization9 mentions
- 22 % positive mentions
- 44 % neutral mentions
- 33 % negative mentions
The game's optimization has been criticized for poor performance, particularly noticeable in movement and combat, which feel sluggish and delayed. While these issues do not lead to crashes or severe performance drops, they negatively affect the overall player experience. Players who are less sensitive to performance may find the game more tolerable, but the optimization remains a significant concern.
“If you're not too picky with performance stuff then there really isn't much problem with it.”
“To be fair, issues may be a bit harsh, as none of these cause the game to crash or performance to suffer in any way; these are things that impact the player experience in a negative way.”
“I used to believe Mary Skelter 2 on Switch was laggy because of my old Switch, but now it's clear that the cause was from the game's weird optimization.”
“Salvation Tower was badly colored and optimized: leaving aside the extremely white environment with the random nooses hanging from the ceiling filling the map to the point you cannot tell what they are.”
“To be fair, issues may be a bit harsh, as none of these cause the game to crash or performance to suffer in any way, but these are things that impact the player experience in a negative way.”
- grinding7 mentions
- 0 % positive mentions
- 0 % neutral mentions
- 100 % negative mentions
Players overwhelmingly criticize the grinding mechanics, describing the experience as tedious and frustrating, particularly in terms of XP gain, which can take hours for minimal progress. Many feel compelled to switch to easier modes to avoid the excessive grind, and the rewards from exploration and chests are deemed unworthy compared to the benefits of farming, leading to a lack of incentive to engage with the game's world.
“One of which is the XP and grinding; it's horrible, absolutely god awful. I can't stand it. It took me over 3 hours to gain 30+ levels just so I won't lose any of my party members, and this is on nightmare mode. Somehow, you made getting XP horrible.”
“It's to the point where I am forced to be on easy mode because grinding XP on easy would give me the same amount as it would on nightmare and normal.”
“Exploration can get really tedious, especially with the new three-party system.”
- atmosphere6 mentions
- 0 % positive mentions
- 33 % neutral mentions
- 67 % negative mentions
The game's atmosphere has been widely criticized for its overly bright lighting, which detracts from the intended dark and tense mood. Reviewers noted that washed-out cutscene backgrounds and poorly designed dungeons further diminish the immersive experience, leading to a significant disconnect from the original PlayStation version. Overall, these elements contribute to a frustrating atmosphere that fails to engage players as intended.
“The game is extremely bright, and it completely ruins the dark, tense atmosphere that the game is trying to present.”
“Again, this could be intentional, but it feels like such a strange decision as it again takes away from the atmosphere of the game.”
“Cutscene backgrounds are all washed out, crashes within the first hour, inexcusable loading times, dungeons look much worse than the PS version, lighting is overly bright, ruins the atmosphere entirely.”
