You know how comedy geniuses and chronic dieters will say their favorite brand of chips is "dangerous," because once you rip open the bag it’s a swift trip to the bottom? That’s me with JRPGs; Kingdom Hearts’ absurd garble of a plot breached my treasured memories after I spent 100 hours with its cast, and the Wii’s Xenoblade Chronicles infected me with a deep-seated bitterness at the fact that I don’t live on a giant mech with a laser sword and a tax evading hamster.
These games demand you live in them for a while, slowly fostering a bunch of level one nobodies into god-killing besties, and I'm susceptible enough to that demand I go into new JRPGs prepared to get lost in them, love them, and succumb to ennui when they’re finally over. Clair Obscur’s offbeat take on Belle Époque France promised blockbuster action, a cast of brooding sorcerers to mold into an apocalypse prevention squad, and a battle system which cleaves to genre standards while infusing them with twitchy QTEs and a dang gun I can fire in real time. Dangerous.
