Been playing this for a while at my friend's. The game is great, especially in co-op. They've really nailed the flow of combat and the need to manage your stamina and find a good balance between offence and defence. Planning ahead really makes a difference.
The boss encounters are fantastic. They hit hard, act aggressively and keep you on your toes (especially Ornstein & Smough).
There's a great sense of teamwork as well, and you end up playing different roles depending on your character class.
RNG is pretty limited, which is nice in a board game. Since it is a turn based game though, there is RNG, but nothing too frustrating.
My only other gripes are:
* Normal encounters can get a bit tedious when you are overpowered, as getting through them still takes a long time just to complete all the turns.
* Items drops are randomized and you could end up with a bunch of useless stuff
* The manual is a piece of shit. As a seasoned board game player, this is some of the worst shit I've ver seen. Sure, the game is complicated and deep, but that doesn't mean the manual has to be some arcane dead sea scroll. Okay, I might be exaggerating, but the structure of the manual is illogical, there's a bunch of contradictory information and everything is over written and unnecessarily verbose.
Still, if you have a bunch of friends and 3-10 hours to kill, it's great fun!