
Stranger of Paradise gets slept on HARD.
Yes, the story is campy, chessy and ridiculous, but goddamn did the developers make up for it in the gameplay. I always thought the idea of making a soulslike Final Fantasy game could turn great and this is it.
The combat is very fast and you constantly have to be absorbing attacks to build your MP in order to use your abilities. You can equip 2 Jobs on your character and instantly swap between them during battle, with multiple weapons, abilities, equipable combos and even unique abilities provided by certain weapons or stolen from enemies during the fight. Certain weapons can execute different attack animations depending on the direction you're pressing. Its really deep and extremely replayable.
If you're not a soulslike fan, don't worry... it has difficulty options. You can play completely solo on the highest difficulty or add up to two CPU characters and/or choose a lower difficulty.
It reviewed well back when it was released and now that I played it, I'm surprised it's not brought up too much compared to even indies in this genre. Which makes me think it's never getting a sequel. I was thouroughly surprised by this game.