is this singleplayer MMO on the ps2 the best RPG ever?

[@wep_vs]

When i was younger i would seek out anything even slightly resembing an offline MMO cause i hated being social but wanted the experience and a vast world to explore, found a surprising amount of great rpgs that i would never play otherwise

[@alexiere]

Same.

[@Theverymemeshorts]

Oh boy, dragon's age would wet your pet with offline mmo

[@crpineo]

I loved the .hack and .hack GU games. Yes, there were lots of flaws, but they were still fun for me

[@MegaMcCurtis]

Yo the .Hack series was one of my defining games growing up. It helped me make one of my best friends and we're still best friends to this day. I still remember walking to his house after school and we'd talk about word combinations for dungeons and the grunties and which characters are the best. And for what its worth, the GU games were also super solid. Expanding upon the original but it also just felt really good to play, plus I'm a sucker for twinblades. The games have aged a bit but I think anyone interested in what vibe/aesthetic it was believed that future MMOs would have should check this game out.

[@MegaMcCurtis]

I'm also going to take my rose tinted glasses off after watching your review. When I said the games had aged a bit, I didn't realize quite how much. This was a super solid review though pretzel, I genuinely enjoyed hearing your thoughts on it. Thanks for the vid and have a merry christmas!

[@onceuponatimeonearth]

December is PS2 MMO month

[@logansmith3513]

Lets goo!! Pretzel videos keep me going. The holiday blues have been hitting hard, but I know I can always rely on pretzel to always bring some chill vibes to the mix. Thank you for your work, it is helping people 😊

[@STARSVeteran]

Happy holidays pretzel! 😊❤

[@DiabolicCrusher]

Fair, but i still think those are great games and i look forward to when i get to original .hack games in my backlog, the ones that have Kite and that one other guy as protagonists. Without going into spoilers, the story does get better in following volumes, combat will stay just as repetitive however, you get 3 more weapons, if memory serves me right. That said, if it all seems cliche and "like a tv show", well, it's technically inspired by early 2000's anime culture, after all, so ofcourse it is. What i like is how they've done the outside of the game stuff with the forums and whatnot, not many games do this and i love it when it's done properly, not to mention expands the worldbuilding beyond just "The World", unlike the SAO games which you could say are spiritual successors of .hack, the hollow fragment/realization ones, anyway. And it's probably a hot take, but i really liked Haseo as protagonist(I'm totally not biased because he kind of reminded me of myself back in the day).

[@Ahmenthi]

I loved .hack at the time, but I do see the flaws after playing through Last Recode. It's a great idea with lackluster execution. Count yourself lucky that Last Recode boosted the experience gain from the original release, because it was a nightmare to level up to max in each game (though it did give you ample opportunity to farm virus cores in later volumes). I would absolutely love to see .hack executed with more development put into combat, characterization, and lore. The art direction is nice, especially when it comes to the glitches and bugs. And I have a soft spot for the music.

[@ThommyofThenn]

I saw some awesome retrospective about these games. Gotta say I loved the premise and ive enjoyed the "regular guy gets succed into another world and becomes a champion" genre. I heard the story and thought it was kinda neat but i can also see why it doesn't holdup today

[@aarongoosby5532]

Ahh man, I LOVED these games haha

[@kuzter884]

Yeah I understand, although, seeing every volume as and independent game or season I think is a bad aproach. I always saw and judged all volumes as just one game, because I think that no one could exist fully without other. Cool comentary tho

[@belot217]

CrossCode is the best faux-MMO

[@Vulpas]

12:38 God forbid a female character isn't a tired, strong, independent womyn and is nice & helpful to a guy she likes. This is actually refreshing characterization nowadays. Overall, I disagree with literally EVERY criticism here in this video. Aside from the above issue I respect your opinions, but still, I definitely disagree.

[@TheFloodFourm]

Great review. Would you be willing to elaborate on why you disliked the optional forum posts in this game but appreciated optional social media posts in GTA5? Not trying to “catch” you just genuinely curious 🙂

[@PretzelYT]

It very likely could just be something that depends on my mood at the time, but something that does actually play a part is that it'll say "NEW" in red text on the menu when there's new posts to see. I kinda hated the constant reminder of it. And to be fair (to myself), I didn't keep up with the posts in GTA V either. I only discovered those while writing the script for that video.

[@phooz_n]

dang

[@FARDEENKHANQWE123]

no

[@MateriaGirl]

Saying "the series" when you mean "this series of videos" but without clarifying that confused me each time. I was like, surely he knows xenoblade chronicles isnt a dot hack game?

[@MrScoffins]

1st

[@notanonchampignon9837]

In the most summarized way I can say, .hack//G.U. series can be described as "it's really mid, but god bless them for what they did trying to be good". As you said, the game suffers a lot from being shallow in a lot of points: from characters (piros the 3rd is BARELLY a character in the WHOLE TRILLOGY) to plot (I'll get to this in a moment) to gameplay (battles where such a chore that i just spammed smoke screens to avoid battles (which in case you didn't know, for I sure didn't, you CAN use them before battle to become invisible, it even gives you the oportunity to do a garanteed surprise atack)). At the very least it nails in it's lore, both the .hack world (especially forums and salvador aihara) and 'The world R.2' (the second game will make sure you know about it), which makes me wonder what the game would look like if they decided to commit A LOT MORE to what I would call "playing an MMOPRG expirience" simulation, because this is where I was getting my whimsical fun, from almost 15 years ago, when I first played it and was willing to fool myself thinking it was an actual online game, and from more or less one year ago, where I decided to finish the whole trillogy. I believe the worst misstep of the game is the plot relying too much in another .hack entry, .hack//ROOTS (an anime about everything BEFORE .hack//G.U.), which explains what you feel about the spoiler part of the video, it was already told in a completely different entry (which btw, this will become even MORE apparent as the trilogy goes on). I didn't bother to watch it, so I can't say how much it will change the expirience with the game if you watch it. Said that about the game, I am really glad someone decided to take a look on this (very) rough gem of a game and make not only an analysis of it, but a showcase of the game's maps designs. I couldn't thank you enough for making a video about the very first game I've owned, the one I have the most nostalgia about. Speaking of, I've been on the cliffhanger of the first game for more or less 14 years! I had no way to get the other games and it was totally not a painful time to wait to get the resolution in the second game :)

[@notanonchampignon9837]

Before I forget, I truly love your content, keep up the good work (but please, don't overwork yourself, breaks my heart seeing youtubers left and right getting burned out and i really don't want this happening to you)

[@thedrunkenmudcrab]

But this isn't the first of the series - .hack//INFECTION - Part 1 is the very first one. Kite comes from this, as a protagonist.

[@TheRealPOTUSDavidByrd]

Excellent video as always. Pretzel reviewing Cyberpunk 2077 weird and unusual places... when? 🥨🥨