The story sucks until the very end of the postgame, but even then, the way they reveal things sucks. The art style is nostalgic and weirdly beautiful. The music reaches god tier, particularly in the boss fights. Personally I like the gameplay a lot too. Good game imo, but the criticism it gets is generally fair.
I'm sorry, but 10,000 of ANYTHING on a PS2 would absolutely destroy your framerate. It'd be like playing chess through the mail.
~johnboy1