Lurker > Kenri

I almost made this exact topic.

It's Xenoblade DE for me, I think. Pretty sure I hit 100+ on the Wii version too though, so other than that I think it's Hades.

As much as I hate to give Harry Potter any sort of kudos in the year of our lord 2023 I think it is unfortunately quidditch, at least of these options.

Probably Pokmon Red for me, I obsessively played and replayed that game for years

They definitely used to be political theatre, he's not wrong about that.

Right now though I'm pretty sure the idea is to throw enough insane fascist garbage at the blatantly corrupt court system to hope some of it slips through.

"I support home rule, except in cases where I don't like the rule made by the home. In those cases I don't support home rule."

Shantae: Half-Genie Hero - Ultimate Edition (Switch)

Good game! This is definitely the best Shantae has ever looked (up til now, haven't played the most recent game yet), and it's in the running for best gameplay as well, but I might give the edge to Pirate's Curse there.

I do think the story is a big step back. It's like it wants to be a partial reboot, but there are tons of references to continuity and minor antagonists from previous games, so it doesn't even have the main advantage of rebooting. Also, just in terms of personal taste, if you give me a hero that is half-genie and half-human I will find stories where they have to rely on the human side to be inherently more interesting than ones where they can just rely on genie powers, and this game is nonstop genieing after Pirate's Curse was all humaning. Nobody's playing Shantae for the plot but this one does feel pretty unimpressive after Pirate's Curse at least had some legitimate hooks.

I 100%ed the main game because of course I did. There are roughly 43 other gameplay modes in this thing so I'll probably give at least one or two of those a whirl eventually.

Some beats from the last couple days:

Fire Emblem Engage (Switch)

I went into more detail about my thoughts in the FE topic(s) but the long and short of it is: I liked it but it's really messy, and the story/setting/aesthetics are pretty irredeemable. That said, the gameplay is probably the best its been since FE12, with only 3H being even potential competition. Also all the characters are incredibly bisexual for each other and it's great.

Florence (Switch)

This is a very short (~45 mins) story game about a relationship; there are no words, but you play out little minigames as the story progresses that are sorta like WarioWare level of complexity, but without the pressure of failing. It's fun and the art style is adorable! I can even forgive it for being a hetero romance because it's really cute (this is mostly a joke)

I thought the ending was pretty weak, and not for the reason other people say. I have no issues with the characters not staying together and I actually really liked that the moral is basically "you can end up not being right for each other and still keep those memories of the good times you had without bitterness". What I don't buy is Florence becoming a successful artist so quickly. Yeah the story was obviously leading that way but it didn't put in the work to make it believable, and it doesn't help that the art of hers we see is pretty bad. That said this is just a personal gripe, not really a flaw with the game. I recommend it if you can get it on sale.

Picross S 3 (Switch)

Counting this as beaten because I did all the normal picross, color picross, and clip picross, but not all the mega picross because I don't like it. And I don't really know how to play it, but I am getting better, so maybe I'll finish it out someday.

Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night (Switch) (replay, Aurora mode)

I posted more thoughts in the Game of the Month topic. To summarize, they have screwed up this game sometime between when I first played it and now. The performance is really really bad now and all the flaws that were there before are still there.

Aurora mode isn't great either. Like in Child of Light, you get infinite flight quite early and that's always fun, but it does kinda defeat the point of a platforming game. Aurora's attacks are a little onerous to use but incredibly powerful so you can even just tank through a lot of the boss fights (on normal difficulty at least). There's a little bit of story that attempts to tie the Child of Light and Bloodstained worlds together but it's pretty clearly not something they spent a lot of time on.

Unfortunately I still don't like Bloodstained! Money well spent on the kickstarter, I guess.

Kenri has beaten Bloodstained

I did Aurora mode, which is mercifully short because Aurora is super OP. Honestly I did not like Bloodstained the first time I played it and if anything my opinion of it is even lower now. Even though I played on Switch both times, I feel like the performance is actually worse now than the first time I played it, with a constantly unstable frame rate and frequent dropped inputs. Right around when a boss' death animation caused the whole game to look like a video streamed at 144p, I realized I had to look this up and find out what the fuck was going on -- and sure enough, lots of people report the game's performance has been notably worse since at least the Child of Light update, if not earlier.

I'm not sure I'd like the game even on another platform, because it's ugly and buggy and the controls feel very sluggish, but I can definitely 100% anti-recommend the Switch version right now.

Sorry this was so negative! I know lots of people like this game and that's fair, it just isn't for me.

masterplum posted...

That directly violates federal law. It doesn't get cleaner cut than that

Republicans are constantly allowed to violate federal law without repercussion.

Probably nothing but I'm keeping an eye on Bayonetta Origins

andylt posted...

https://twitter.com/headfallsoff/status/1630594762586705925

"We can't have sports while a war is going on" is an incredible way to tell someone you don't live in America without telling them you don't live in America lmao

Grimlyn posted...

the one good thing about it is the newspaper print version

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/6/3/1/AAeYFbAAEOav.jpg

Now this is funny

I think it's an okay set-up but he kinda fumbles the actual joke, mostly because "I identify as white" is incoherent in this situation.

Yeah Dilbert used to be pretty solid, and God's Debris was a formative book for me as a teenager. It's a shame that Adams has gone full brain-rot in the last ~10 years.

I can definitely believe that Scott Adams "lost three careers to direct racism so far".

But like.

His.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/8/8/6/AACm-yAAEOPG.jpg

Skipped gens 8 and 9 because I don't really know any of those Pokemon. Tried not to use the same Pokemon for multiple boxes if there were others I really liked as well.

some categories really have nothing good to choose from, huh

I don't have any experience with Persona specifically but SMT: Devil Survivor was a pretty lousy experience just playing through without a guide. Ended up only having the option to side with dumb people with bad plans because even though I prioritized other characters, apparently I didn't prioritize them enough. I'd definitely be inclined to just use a guide for other SMT games based on that, if it hadn't kinda turned me off the whole series.

The translators trying to decide whether to cut that or not:

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/5/5/1/AACm-yAAEOJ3.jpg

Johnbobb posted...

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/9/3/0/AAS3NhAAEOAK.png

oh yeah this is The Good Shit

Epic Game Store

Finally finished Engage. That last chapter was sure something. Can't believe they let Alear say "it's morphin' time!" she even did the pose with her wrists crossed

Did I kill Sombron too fast? Or were there only like 4 Dark Emblems? I was expecting a 3rd phase or at least reinforcements at some point. Also I hate that they included villain emblems but only in the last fucking chapter and with no graphics or VA. we could have been fighting these guys all game instead of the dogfuckers. remember what they took from you, etc.

I gave the pact ring to Veyle mainly for the gameplay benefits but despite being ostensibly platonic it's still. kinda sketchy. should've picked Ivy because I don't think I even used Emblem Alear in the final fight lol

Overall I liked the game but it's definitely a mid-tier FE for me. I've heard it described as "messy" and that's a good way of putting it. The Somniel sucks for all of the same reasons as the Monastery, but is significantly less fun to run around and talk to people in. The gameplay is solid but I'd still prefer less mechanics, less skills, etc. These are probably the best maps since FE12 but they're also still worse than most older games in the series. The story is, uh, garbage. Not as bad as Fates but it has a lot of the same failings, not to mention a lot of the exact same plot beats for some reason. I think it's largely because of an inability to write nuanced or even interesting villains. Hard to take the plot seriously when the bad guy is straight up a Power Rangers villain. That and the FMVs are just atrocious for some reason.

But, overall I had fun with it and it's good to know that Fates team can make a good game, they just need a completely new writing team.

Leonhart4 posted...

Yeah but that game is not for us

It's popular among people that game is for

Hogwarts Legacy is absolutely for us, except in the sense that B8 is more LGBT and politically informed than the general population. But in terms of age, interests, etc? 100% we are the target audience.

This is a joke for exactly one type of guy and it's not even very funny to them, sorry.

I see Hogwarts Legacy fuckin everywhere but only ever in the context of either "this exists and is Harry Potter" or "this gives money to an anti-semite and transphobe". I think to be an iconic video game people have to actually care about it as a video game.

You can but if I understand it correctly, the Switch doesn't actually have IR pointing capability in its controllers, it just kinda fakes it with gyro which is usually not the best. Also the layout/size/shape of the joycon seems like it wouldn't be a great match, but the IR is my bigger concern.

Dual stick would probably be fine but it's really hard to go back to that after the convenience of "just point at whatever you want to point at".

Ugh I wish there was a demo available for Prime Remastered, I really don't want to buy it without knowing if I like the controls or not.

On the other hand I could just play the Wii version that I already know is a 10/10...

I mean yeah there's the ideological angle but I also meant stuff like climate science, which are potential threats to their bottom line.

Conservatives might hold a particular hatred for classes like gender studies and accurate American history but what they actually hate about higher education is not that these classes exist, but that colleges bring together people of different cultures and values in a situation where they can freely socialize and cooperate on goals. I suspect the real agenda of this move is not to gut American history (though it'll be used to do that too) but to make Florida schools much, much less attractive to people from out of state, from out of country, or with left-wing beliefs. If they need to kill science and math to do that then they'll kill science and math too. (Also conservatives fucking hate science arguably more than other subject so I'm not sure why that one's being brought up as potentially safe.)

OK the other topic is hit 500 so I'm moving my running Engage reactions here.

I don't know what to think, plot-wise, of the time travel chapter except that it's extremely funny that after taking the entire game and a long, long cutscene to finally die, Zephia immediately shows up again. The VA did a good job on Past Alear, actually pretty creepy. I liked the chapter itself, though I can see it being a real slog if you don't have canter on everyone and an overleveled Sigurd!Chloe to pick off all the ballistae ASAP.

why is the voice acting so much worse during the FMVs??? how does that even happen? Evil Lumera really phoning it in. also this is just another plot beat from fates. why is this game's plot so much like fates in so many weird, random ways.

i cannot believe the game seems to expect me to feel sorry for zephia and griss. fuck off and die. debating marching mauvier to his death too so i can be rid of all of these awful, awful people.

I didn't really like Bloodstained the first time I played it but maybe I'll give it another shot. I never tried any of the extra modes so maybe one of those.

Not interested in Adios but I have it on EGS and it's short, so maybe.

Very interested in Hi-Fi Rush but shouldn't spend the money right now.

So this whole month is a big maybe for me!

masterplum posted...

Ah yes, please punish me for having a custody agreement that makes it so I can't move

making the mother of all omelettes here jack, can't be concerned about a few eggs

Other states really gotta start punishing Florida for this nonsense.

The Mario Odyssey or Smash Ultimate themes maybe?

LA is fucking awesome but also, the answer is LA.

People from LA will be like "I miss these little cream-filled cookies I used to get at the LA supermarkets :(" and then show you a picture of Oreos. And when you tell them you can get those anywhere they're just like "they aren't the same :("

That makes sense. I thought it looked more like FE6 than FE7 but I assumed they wouldn't do that after giving every other character an appropriate level. My choice probably would have been Noble Lady of Caelin, or maybe the final chapter of Lyn mode, but of course neither of those take place in Sacae...

Micaiah's was easy but at least I did it early. Doing Eirika's, Roy's, and Celica's so late meant barely any of the enemies could even hurt me.

Story-wise they were implemented pretty poorly, I agree. It was never going to be particularly graceful but they could have done better. Maybe explain the trial concept once in a non-optional chapter so it doesn't have to happen each time.

The actual maps I thought were pretty good. Roy's kinda looks like crap because they tried to recreate the abstracted GBA terrain icons with the current non-abstracted graphics, and I couldn't even tell you which chapter Lyn's is based on despite FE7 being the game I'm most familiar with. Overall I just wish they were a little harder, which is maybe a complaint I have with the game in general. It's way too easy to end up overleveled, especially when you're grinding out 13 paralogues in a rather short span of time.

skullbone posted...

Oh man I thought you were talking about a different cutscene that's WAY worse but it's coming up later.

worse than Mauvier's anguished "aaahhhh" after he absolutely 100% got Marni killed on purpose?

can't wait

big spoilers for a dumb line

"You are the thirteenth Emblem. The Fire Emblem."

i want to hate it but at least it's really funny

also I guess I wasn't in the final sequence of the game after all

Yeah I was just thinking "we need to shunt FE back to a system with GBA-level specs, they officially can't be trusted with cutscenes anymore"

I guess that's just Vestaria Saga. :/

No, this is definitely the worst FE's plots have ever been. Like overall Fates (and maybe Awakening) is worse but this cutscene dump was way worse than anything in those games.

So I'm in what's seemingly the final chapter sequence and man, if this game's writing was intended to be the worst fucking garbage on the planet then these cutscenes sure hit the mark

Nominate: Nier: Automata

AI art seems like it's at least a useful technology. There are plenty of times in my life I've been like, "I wish I had an image to stick here, unfortunately I cannot draw worth a shit" and something like DALL-E makes that problem feel solvable in a way that doesn't involve spending 10,000 hours learning a new skill.

I can't see the use case for AI writing, though, outside of extremely niche cases. Maybe to generate text that exists only to look realistic, not to actually be read -- like generating a bunch of flavor text for a library in an RPG or something. But AI-written fiction or even articles feel meritless by definition. I can't imagine a world where I'd bother reading any of it unless essentially tricked into it, and the fact that I even have to worry about that now is truly frustrating.

Either one can be fun as a toy though, so at least there's that.

Blazing Blade's easiest difficulty is not notably more difficult than Sacred Stones imo. You should be fine.

Nominate:

Shantae: Half-Genie Hero
Astalon: Tears of the Earth

being a republican sounds so fucking rad i wish i lived in a world where ghosts are real and conservatives justices are hunted for sport

MoogleKupo141 posted...

did something suddenly change with the trains or the tracks or something

I've seen some people mention that Trump rolled back regulations on train maintenance during his presidency

I compared it to the game's other horses and the game's other camels and it looks like neither?? why is the cupido horse so fucked up. maybe something about the color or its dumb horse armor is throwing me off.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/9/8/3/AACm-yAAEMD_.jpg

this is a horse in the same way sommie is a dog

Also I needed 7 rewinds to beat Leif's paralogue, I think that's a record.