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The Curious Case of Meta Engineering and Character Lobbying in Fighting Games

When it comes to fighting games, one debate persists throughout every game's lifecycle: determining the strongest characters. Despite analyzing tournament results, usage rates, and tier lists, these discussions rage across all skill levels. What fascinates me most are players who actively downplay their characters' strengths—a tactic that's evolved from casual ego protection into a calculated survival strategy. In an era where developer patches respond directly to community outrage, a character's perceived strength matters as much as their actual data. The moment social media declares a fighter "broken," their nerf becomes inevitable.

This arms race has birthed two destructive meta-games: Character Lobbying (thanks Sajam) and Meta Engineering. Character Lobbying involves top players distorting their main's power level through strategic public statements (like Knee insisting Bryan Fury isn't top-tier despite dominating with him). Meta Engineering goes deeper—organized efforts to weaponize community sentiment by flooding forums with demands to buff weak characters while sabotaging strong ones through coordinated exaggeration campaigns. Tekken 8's balance discourse is now a battlefield where tournament results matter less than which faction shouts loudest. When Knee downplays Bryan's strength while his rivals campaign for nerfs, it's not debate—it's proxy warring through patch notes.

Arslan engaging in Meta Engineering

https://twitter.com/ArslanAsh95/status/1948744162179727812 There's no denying Bryan's strength. Even casual players recognize his prowess, and the general consensus places him among the top three characters. While I'm no authority, Knee - one of Tekken's greatest players - certainly is. And his verdict? Everyone's wrong. He argues the "top three" discourse exists solely to get Bryan nerfed, claiming if he were truly that strong, more players would win with him. This despite Knee himself securing three first-place finishes this year using Bryan (while also playing Anna, another alleged top-tier). Knee takes this Character Lobbying further, asserting critics can't prove Bryan's strength because they can't play him effectively, forcing them to resort to "politics" for nerfs. This argument falls apart for several reasons. First, the notion that strong characters should guarantee tournament wins ignores how fighting game metas develop. When a character excels, the community collectively labs counters. Search "how to beat Phoenix in UMVC3" on YouTube to see this in action. This knowledge flood makes consistent success difficult unless the player possesses exceptional skill. And this applies to strong characters like Bryan. This leads to my second point: at professional levels, player skill outweighs character strength. While mid-level players cry "carried!" when losing to strong characters, this doesn't hold at the top. When Knee won EVO Japan with Bryan, nobody serious claimed he was carried - his legacy speaks for itself. An intermediate player attempting the same would fail not because Bryan's weak, but because they lack Knee's mastery. This raises another question: why don't other top players like Arslan Ash dominate with Bryan? The answer lies in character difficulty. Despite his strength, Bryan's execution barriers make him one of Tekken's hardest characters. Why invest time mastering Bryan's complex combos when equally strong, easier alternatives like Anna exist? The time spent perfecting Bryan's optimal play could instead be used learning matchups or stage-specific tech with simpler characters. This accessibility factor explains why strong characters sometimes see low representation. Are some calls for nerfs hyperbolic? Absolutely. "Gut Bryan completely!" isn't constructive feedback. But Knee's blanket dismissal of balance concerns deserves equal scrutiny. His arguments become particularly questionable considering his own Bryan success—especially when viewed through the lens of potential Character Lobbying tactics. This isn't to declare him right or wrong, but to emphasize the need for critical examination of all perspectives - especially influential ones. The prevalence of Meta Engineering in modern fighting games means we must be especially vigilant about separating genuine balance concerns from manufactured outrage. When communities organize to amplify certain narratives while suppressing others, the line between legitimate feedback and manipulation becomes dangerously thin. So who truly is Tekken 8's best character? The answer changes weekly as new tech emerges and tier lists fluctuate. For most players (myself included), these debates are academic - our understanding pales compared to professionals. What matters is voicing concerns from our skill level while recognizing our limitations. More perspectives create better balance decisions... assuming developers can distinguish between authentic community sentiment and orchestrated Meta Engineering campaigns. Ultimately, don't let any single player dictate your views - not Knee, not tier lists, not Twitter outrage. Form your own opinions, enjoy the high-level matches, and here's hoping we get that Knee vs. Arslan Ash EVO showdown we all want to see. But this little exhibition should tie us over until the real tournament starts. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2PAxxCUIcfc Read the full article

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Street Fighter's Design Philosophy: Why Universal Language Gives Them the Upper Hand

Street Fighter has maintained its position as the flagship of the fighting game genre for over three decades. While the franchise has experienced its share of missteps, Street Fighter 6 has demonstrated a remarkable return to prominence, reclaiming its throne in a competitive landscape. This success stems from multiple factors—gameplay mechanics, netcode, competitive balance, and community support all play crucial roles. However, one element that deserves particular attention, yet receives less analytical focus, is visual presentation. In fighting games, visual storytelling serves as the first point of contact between player and character. Before players learn frame data or combo routes, they're drawn to fighters through their visual appeal. Street Fighter's enduring success lies not in revolutionary design concepts, but in its masterful balance of simplicity and universal appeal—a philosophy that extends far beyond domestic markets. To understand Street Fighter's visual dominance, we must examine how it compares to its primary competitors in the 2D fighting space: The King of Fighters (KOF) and Mortal Kombat. Each franchise represents a distinct design philosophy that appeals to different audiences and achieves varying levels of mainstream success.

KOF: The Boutique Approach

SNK's The King of Fighters series showcases some of the most sophisticated character designs in fighting games. The franchise excels in creating expansive rosters with rich lore, featuring characters that embody high fashion aesthetics—clean lines, structured suits, military uniforms, and conceptual designs that push creative boundaries. Consider K's leather jacket and sunglasses ensemble, or Rugal's impeccably tailored suit in Capcom vs. SNK. These designs demonstrate remarkable artistic pedigree and attention to detail. When SNK operates at peak performance, their visual output rivals any competitor in the genre.

However, this sophisticated approach creates a barrier to entry. SNK's design philosophy assumes cultural literacy and appreciation for nuanced aesthetics. Players who don't immediately grasp the brilliance of these conceptual designs may find KOF visually alienating or overly complex. The franchise's boutique sensibility—think Topshop versus Old Navy—limits its mainstream appeal despite its artistic merit. This design philosophy explains why KOF, even during its strongest iterations, struggles to achieve the same cultural penetration as Street Fighter. The visual language speaks to connoisseurs rather than casual observers, creating a smaller but more dedicated fanbase.

Mortal Kombat: The American Metal Aesthetic

Mortal Kombat represents the opposite end of the spectrum from KOF's refined approach. NetherRealm Studios embraces a distinctly American interpretation of martial arts and Eastern philosophy, filtering these concepts through a heavy metal, hyperviolent lens. This approach creates immediate visual impact through shock value and gore, but it also creates limitations. The franchise's aesthetic choices—from character design to DLC selections—often feel targeted toward a specific demographic. Guest characters like the T-1000 and Conan reflect nostalgia for 1980s and 1990s American pop culture, suggesting design decisions made with older audiences in mind rather than contemporary gaming demographics. The hypergore aesthetic, while commercially successful, creates cultural barriers. Religious beliefs, cultural differences, and personal preferences regarding violence can alienate potential players, particularly in international markets. This explains why Mortal Kombat games often achieve strong initial sales but struggle with long-term retention compared to Street Fighter's sustained engagement.

Street Fighter: The Universal Language

Street Fighter's visual success stems from its commitment to accessibility without sacrificing character identity. The franchise explores themes of conflict and competition through a lens that emphasizes athleticism over brutality, personality over shock value. Each character in Street Fighter's roster communicates their fighting style, personality, and cultural background through immediately readable visual cues. As Tekken producer Katsuhiro Harada has noted, fighting game characters must tell their story within two seconds of first glance—a principle that Street Fighter has mastered. Ryu's simple gi and headband instantly convey his traditional martial arts background. Chun-Li's qipao and spiked bracelets blend elegance with functionality. These designs work because they're archetypal rather than complex—they speak to universal concepts that transcend cultural boundaries. Street Fighter's sophistication lies in how it can differentiate characters who share similar fighting styles through distinct visual personalities. Consider Charlie and Guile, both military fighters with projectile-based movesets. Charlie's glasses, composed expression, and structured hair convey calculation and restraint—qualities that manifest in his precise, controlled movement animations. Guile, by contrast, embodies stereotypical American military masculinity with his flat-top haircut, American flag tattoo, and army fatigues. His more conservative, straightforward appearance translates directly into his more aggressive, direct fighting animations. Both characters throw sonic booms, but their visual design tells you exactly how they'll throw them before they even move.

This immediate visual communication is where KOF sometimes struggles despite its design excellence. Take Kyo Kusanagi, the series' protagonist. While his school uniform creates a striking visual, and the sun symbols on his outfit might hint at fire-based abilities, the design doesn't clearly communicate his fighting style or rebellious personality. A newcomer might struggle to understand what Kyo represents from his appearance alone, unlike how Ryu's gi immediately suggests martial arts mastery or Zangief's wrestler physique telegraphs his grappling style.

However, this emphasis on instant readability comes with significant drawbacks. The archetypal approach that makes characters immediately recognizable can rely heavily on cultural stereotypes. Street Fighter has faced legitimate criticism over the years for designs that reduce entire cultures to visual shorthand—from Dhalsim's mystical Indian aesthetic to T. Hawk's Native American representation. Tekken has encountered similar issues with characters like Julia's Native American representation. The tension between immediate visual communication and respectful cultural representation remains an ongoing challenge for the genre. Both franchises have made efforts to address these concerns. Tekken's development team has worked with cultural consultants to ensure more accurate and respectful character representation. Street Fighter 6 followed a similar approach with Kimberly, hiring consultants to help craft an authentic representation of contemporary Black American culture. The results speak for themselves—Kimberly became an immediate fan favorite upon her reveal, demonstrating that cultural authenticity and visual appeal can coexist when approached thoughtfully.

Street Fighter's color palette tends toward bright, saturated hues that pop on screen during both casual play and tournament broadcasts. The character silhouettes remain distinct and readable even during fast-paced action, ensuring that both players and spectators can follow the action effortlessly.

The Cultural Impact of Visual Accessibility

This visual accessibility translates directly into broader cultural impact. Street Fighter characters appear in mainstream media, merchandise, and memes because their designs are instantly recognizable and culturally neutral enough to work across different contexts. Ryu throwing a hadoken is as recognizable as Mario jumping on a Goomba. The franchise's visual restraint also allows for longer character lifespans. While KOF experiments with bold new directions, Street Fighter characters maintain visual consistency that builds recognition over decades. Mortal Kombat takes the opposite approach, frequently implementing dramatic redesigns that can leave characters virtually unrecognizable between iterations. Take Tanya, for example—her appearance changes so drastically from game to game that following her visual evolution becomes challenging. These aren't subtle refinements but wholesale reinventions that can disconnect players from characters they previously knew.

Street Fighter 6 did introduce significant changes to its core roster—Ryu, Ken, and Cammy all received notable updates. Cammy's transformation proved most dramatic, trading her military leotard and beret for athleisure wear and a leather jacket, while cutting her signature pigtails for a sharp neck-length bob. While she was arguably due for a refresh after decades of consistent design, the change demonstrates that even Street Fighter isn't immune to the risks of dramatic redesigns. However, the key difference lies in execution and frequency—Street Fighter treats major redesigns as significant events rather than routine practice, ensuring that core character elements remain recognizable even through change. This consistency creates brand equity that competitors struggle to match.

Final Round

Street Fighter's visual dominance doesn't stem from revolutionary design concepts or cutting-edge graphics technology. Instead, it succeeds through disciplined restraint and universal appeal. While KOF impresses with sophisticated boutique aesthetics and Mortal Kombat shocks with visceral American metal sensibilities, Street Fighter captures the largest audience through designs that welcome rather than challenge potential players. However, this approach isn't without its limitations. Street Fighter's emphasis on accessibility and archetypal design can sometimes result in characters that feel safe or predictable. The franchise's visual conservatism, while commercially effective, may lack the artistic ambition and creative risk-taking that makes KOF's character designs so compelling to enthusiasts. Personal preference plays a significant role here—some players gravitate toward Street Fighter's immediate readability, while others prefer the sophisticated design language and conceptual depth that SNK offers. The key insight is that different design philosophies serve different purposes and audiences. Street Fighter's approach maximizes mainstream appeal and cultural penetration, but it's not inherently superior to KOF's boutique aesthetic or Mortal Kombat's visceral American approach. Each philosophy has its merits and limitations, and individual players' preferences will vary based on their personal tastes and how they engage with these franchises. Visual design represents just one component of a fighting game's overall success or failure. Gameplay mechanics, netcode quality, competitive balance, and community support often carry more weight in determining a game's longevity. However, visual presentation deserves more analytical attention than it typically receives, as it serves as the crucial first impression that determines whether players will engage with a game long enough to discover its mechanical depth. In an increasingly competitive fighting game landscape, Street Fighter's return to prominence with its sixth installment demonstrates that accessibility remains a powerful tool for market dominance. However, the fighting game community benefits from this diversity of visual approaches—each franchise contributes something unique to the genre's rich tapestry of character design and artistic expression. Read the full article

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Gay Rights, Gay Wrongs, and the Glory of Queer Storytelling

As Pride Month unfolds, there’s no better time to celebrate the LGBTQ+ characters who’ve reshaped the worlds we play in. For decades, queerness in gaming was hidden in subtext or erased entirely. But in recent years, developers have started stepping up, introducing characters who reflect the beautiful, messy, brilliant spectrum of queer life. Queer characters add emotional depth, narrative complexity, and cultural truth to the games they inhabit. They don’t just check boxes—they shift paradigms. Whether wielding cosmic power, orchestrating chaos with a flourish, or standing firm in quiet resilience, these characters challenge the industry’s old boundaries and expand what’s possible in storytelling. Today, we’re spotlighting three remarkable figures who’ve left lasting impressions on players and critics alike: Dion Lesage from Final Fantasy XVI, Melchior from The Legend of Heroes, and Davrin from Dragon Age: The Veilguard. Dion Lesage – The Noble Warrior (Final Fantasy XVI)

Dion Lesage isn’t just a standout in Final Fantasy XVI—he’s a watershed moment for queer representation in one of gaming’s most iconic franchises. As the Dominant of Bahamut, Dion commands the power of a god. He’s noble, brilliant, and tragically heroic. But most importantly, he’s unapologetically gay. His relationship with Terence, though ultimately doomed, is woven deeply into the emotional arc of the game. It’s not hinted at. It’s not implied. It’s central. For a franchise that’s long flirted with subtext—like Fang and Vanille in Final Fantasy XIII—Dion represents the rare moment where Square Enix commits. No euphemisms. No hedging. Just a deeply moving queer love story that drives a prince to the brink of ruin and redemption.

That symbolism cuts deep. Dion wields Bahamut, the so-called King of Summons, a figure of immense power, status, and reverence. To make that avatar of power explicitly queer is a revolutionary gesture in fantasy storytelling—a direct rebuke to the unspoken rule that queer characters can exist in fantasy only on the margins. And what’s remarkable is how normal it feels. Dion isn’t defined by his queerness, but it is inseparable from his story. He’s a prince burdened by war, betrayal, and honor. He’s a general, a son, a lover. He’s everything a classic JRPG hero has ever been—and gay. That’s not tokenism. That’s progress. Dion proves that queer stories don’t dilute the grandeur of epic fantasy. They enhance it. They make it richer, more human, and infinitely more powerful. Melchior – The Enigmatic Artist (The Legend of Heroes: Trails Series)

In the sprawling tapestry of The Legend of Heroes, Melchior is a wildfire. Androgynous, theatrical, magnetic—every entrance is a spectacle. Every line drips with menace and flair. Melchior doesn’t ask for the spotlight—they steal it. While many characters in the Trails series blur lines of morality and allegiance, Melchior stands out by being unapologetically queer and unapologetically villainous. That combination remains rare in gaming, especially in JRPGs where queer-coded villains have often been stripped of agency or flattened into caricature.

But Melchior isn’t a stereotype. He's not a joke. He's dangerous, calculated, and thrilling to watch. Their queerness is never reduced to a punchline; it’s a texture—an essential part of their theatricality and worldview. Their fashion is camp. His cruelty is poetic. His motives are layered and performative in a way that feels more opera than Saturday morning cartoon. There’s a powerful truth here: queer people deserve all the archetypes—not just the virtuous ones. We need heroes, yes. But we also need the villains, the schemers, the morally gray agents of chaos. Melchior is a beautiful monster. And they are ours. They embody what it means to support not just gay rights—but gay wrongs. Because authentic representation means giving queer characters the freedom to be flawed, complicated, and, when needed, delightfully wicked. Davrin – The Loyal Knight (Dragon Age: The Veilguard)

With Dragon Age: The Veilguard finally in players’ hands, Davrin has quickly emerged as a standout in BioWare’s ever-growing pantheon of beloved characters. A Grey Warden with a mysterious past and sharp wit, Davrin brings an easy charisma to the cast. He also represents a long-overdue kind of visibility in gaming: a Black bisexual man whose identity is portrayed with care, clarity, and emotional depth. That matters. Bisexual men remain largely underrepresented in mainstream RPGs, often sidelined, erased, or mischaracterized. Black queer men are even rarer. Davrin’s presence addresses both of these gaps simultaneously—offering a character whose queerness is neither minimized nor sensationalized. It just is. His sexuality is acknowledged naturally, without hesitation or spectacle. It’s just part of his life, and the world of Thedas treats it as normal. It’s the kind of representation that resonates deeply with players who rarely get to see themselves in powerful, emotionally complex roles in games of this scale. This continues Dragon Age’s tradition of meaningful inclusion. From Zevran’s fluid charm to Dorian’s defiant honesty about his family’s rejection, to Sera’s joyful, complicated queerness—the series has consistently made room for queer voices. With Davrin, Veilguard not only continues that legacy but deepens it.In a genre that still struggles with intersectional visibility, Davrin’s presence feels like a breakthrough. He’s not a symbol—he’s a fully realized person. And that’s the representation players have been waiting for. Ambiguity and Erasure: The Industry’s Ongoing Struggle For all our progress, the industry still has its ghosts. Too often, developers flirt with queerness only to retreat into plausible deniability. Instead of saying "yes," they say, "it’s up to interpretation." This is the curse of the ambiguously queer character—a familiar figure in the gaming canon. Think of Mikleo and Sorey from Tales of Zestiria. Their bond screams romance. The devotion. The longing. The practically married energy. But Bandai Namco refuses to confirm anything. Then there’s Kanji from Persona 4, a character clearly wrestling with identity and attraction—only to have the narrative shy away from giving him clarity. To be clear: debating Kanji’s sexuality isn’t my personal battle. But the war will be reignited the moment Persona 4 Revival hits storefronts. A whole new generation of players will be asking the same questions, fighting the same fights, and trying to piece together meaning from a story that deliberately keeps its hands clean. Even Ike from Fire Emblem—a fan-favorite frequently read as queer—is trapped in a limbo of authorial silence. We’re left to wonder, to interpret, to fight over scraps. And when studios have confirmed queerness, it’s sometimes been for the worst. Characters like Makoto in Enchanted Arms leaned into ugly stereotypes that reduced queerness to a running joke. A caricature. An excuse to mock rather than understand. These missteps aren’t just failures of storytelling—they’re failures of courage. Queer players deserve more than hints and innuendo. We deserve characters who exist without needing to be decoded. Why These Characters Matter Dion. Melchior. Davrin. They represent something vital: a shift from queerness as subtext to queerness as substance. They aren’t perfect. They aren’t meant to be. But they are bold, textual, and fully realized. And that matters more than most people realize. Representation isn’t about being pandered to—it’s about being seen. It’s about giving players who’ve had to imagine themselves into games a chance to finally find themselves in them. It’s about offering heroes, villains, and everything in between that reflect real-world complexity. These characters aren’t just icons for queer players—they enrich the entire narrative landscape. They make the stories we love deeper, more challenging, more resonant. They help all players build empathy. They help queer players feel powerful. And above all, they prove one essential truth: queer characters don’t weaken stories—they make them legendary. This Pride Month, we honor these characters and the developers who gave them life. But let this not just be a celebration. Let it be a challenge to the industry: Write more Dions. Write more Melchiors. Write more Davrins. And when you do, don’t flinch. Don’t hedge. Be bold. Be loud. Be proud. Because we’re not waiting on permission anymore. Read the full article

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What Studio Camelia Taught Me About the Myth of the ‘Safe Pledge’

If you haven’t heard the bad news yet, the Mediterranean-inspired JRPG ALZARA Radiant Echoes with over 5,000 backers raking in €300,000 on Kickstarter? It's officially dead. The devs posted their farewell letter on June 17th, complete with the usual disclaimers: industry crisis, funding woes, "sorry but also capitalism." But here’s my favorite part: back when they were asking for your money, Studio Camelia swore they had “meticulously planned every aspect of the game’s development to adhere to strict budgets and timelines,” all under the guidance of their “seasoned team” and an “extensive network of trusted studios and partners” that would, allegedly, ensure delivery. Spoiler alert: they delivered nothing. Now, I’m not here just to dunk on Studio Camelia—okay, maybe a little dunking. But they’re not unique. They’re the poster child for a system that’s been broken for years. Every crowdfunded game promises they’re different, they’ve cracked the code, they’re the exception to the rule. And then reality shows up like a repo man with a Unity license. The Crowdfunding Shell Game Let’s stop pretending. Crowdfunding isn’t pre-ordering. It isn’t investing. It’s cosplay capitalism. You're being asked to act like an investor—except you don’t get the equity, the protections, or even the courtesy of being called a shareholder. It’s like Shark Tank, but with none of the teeth. On the show, the sharks ask for balance sheets, market data, growth projections. They negotiate. They walk away if the pitch doesn’t hold up. Now picture Kickstarter’s version: you hand over money based on vibes, a slick video, and maybe a playable demo if you’re lucky. No questions. No exit. Just vibes. It’s like gambling at a casino where the dealer pockets your chips, tells you they’re “building a better roulette table,” and then ghosts you. Backers take on all the risk. And when it all goes up in flames, the platform still gets its 5% cut. Payment processors get paid. The only ones who might walk away empty-handed? You, the so-called “community” that made the project possible. The Representation Tax Let’s talk about why this one stings harder than most. Alzara wasn’t just another pixel art fantasy RPG. It was a Mediterranean-inspired JRPG with a Brown female lead and a cast full of characters you don’t usually see front and center in games like this. It meant something. And that’s what makes this failure more than just financial—it’s cultural. Because when the rare game does try to center marginalized voices, it’s often forced to go the crowdfunding route. Not because it’s trendy, but because the mainstream won’t touch it. Not unless there’s already a proven audience, a proven profit margin, and preferably some generic guy with no understanding of the source material or lived experiences. So yeah, I’m mad at Studio Camelia for fumbling the bag. But I’m angrier at the ecosystem that forces creators to gamble on public goodwill just to tell a story that isn’t white and male and market-tested to hell. When crowdfunding fails these projects, we don’t just lose a game—we lose representation, we lose trust, we lose momentum. And next time, it’ll be even harder for a project like this to get funded, even if it’s airtight. The Risk Equation Is Broken Let’s break this down. Studio Camelia turned to crowdfunding to reduce their risk. Instead of pitching to investors and risking rejection, they asked regular folks to take the hit. And they did—5,000 people said yes. But here’s the thing: if the project had blown up, sold millions, and gone full Hollow Knight, none of those 5,000 would have seen a dime. No dividends. No cut. No credit beyond a thank-you blurb or maybe a shoutout in the credits if they ponied up enough. So let me get this straight: we take all the risk, they take all the reward, and when it fails, we’re supposed to shrug and say “Well, that’s crowdfunding”? Nah. That’s exploitation. So What Do We Actually Do? “Just don’t back anything” isn’t a solution—it’s surrender. If we want this to work, something has to change. So here’s what that could look like: 1. Escrow or GTFO Platforms should be required to hold funds in escrow until devs hit actual milestones. Miss a milestone? Automatic refund. No more trust falls into the void. 2. Investor Risks, Investor Rewards You want people to bankroll your game? Give them real equity. Let them invest, not just back. If we’re risking like investors, we should be treated like them. 3. Transparency as Policy Want $300k? Open the books. Tell people how much is going to salaries, tools, marketing, overhead. If the money vanishes, we deserve to know where it went. 4. Insurance or Platform Liability If a project fails to deliver, backers should be entitled to refunds. Make platforms carry insurance or liability funds. It’ll weed out the unserious real quick. The Bottom Line Studio Camelia’s collapse should be a wake-up call. Not just because a promising game died—but because it exposed how little power backers actually have in this space. We’re not community. We’re not partners. We’re ATMs with opinions. Crowdfunding shouldn’t be a con job with good intentions. It should be a partnership built on trust, transparency, and accountability. And until we start demanding that, we’re just going to keep watching cool, diverse, meaningful projects die slow, quiet deaths—and footing the bill when they do. We deserve better. And the devs with big dreams and small budgets? They deserve a system that doesn’t set them up to fail the moment they step out of line. So let’s stop shrugging and start asking: who does this system actually serve? And what would it look like if it served us instead? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FLV5dIfrX4k&pp=ygUGQWx6YXJh Read the full article

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The Real Enemy of Gaming Isn’t DEI. It’s the CEO

I’ve been playing video games for as long as I can remember. From the days of the Game Boy Color and Super Nintendo, my hands have gripped dozens of controllers across dozens of consoles, and I’ve played more games than I can count. This industry means a lot to me—as I’m sure it does for many of you reading this. It means so much, in fact, that countless people decided to make careers out of creating games. They rolled up their sleeves and poured their time, creativity, and energy into the experiences we’ve come to love. Whether it’s a big-budget blockbuster or a scrappy indie gem, the games we cherish were built by people who cared—people with passion, talent, and heart. But in return, this industry has met that passion with exploitation, burnout, dehumanization—and the creeping hand of unchecked greed. Slowly, and often quietly, the games industry has started to rot from within. And yet, when people look for someone to blame, they rarely point the finger where it belongs. It’s not “wokeness” or diversity that’s bleeding this industry dry—it’s corporate greed, executive bloat, and a business model built on disposable labor. Most people don’t even see it happening. The average player only sees the final product, not the toll it takes to get there. The human cost is easy to ignore—but we shouldn’t. So as you read this, and as you think about the games you love, I ask one thing: No matter how good the game is. No matter how excited you are to play it. Remember the human cost.

The First Domino

If you asked me where things started to go wrong, I’d point to the rise of downloadable content. Not the good kind—the kind that expanded on a complete game, like Sims 2 expansions or Halo 2 map packs. Those were fine. Those were optional. They added more to an already full package. But once consoles started integrating online connectivity out of the box, something changed. Developers and publishers realized they didn’t need to sell you a whole game anymore. They could sell you parts of one. And then they asked the question that would haunt the industry for years to come: How little could they get away with charging for? Gone were the big expansions and chunky map packs. In came the trickle—bite-sized DLC, cosmetic add-ons, paid cheats. Most of it was harmless at first. It felt like a novelty, not a threat. But it was a signal. A quiet test. One that would explode on April 3rd, 2006, when Bethesda dropped what I still consider the first real domino: the infamous, mocked, dumb-as-hell Horse Armor for Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion. It cost 200 Microsoft Points—which didn’t seem like much… until you realized you couldn’t buy exactly 200. You had to buy 400 for $5. Meaning that dumb cosmetic armor, which did nothing to help you in-game, effectively cost you five bucks. It was instantly roasted. Forums lit up. Magazines dunked on it. Even people who didn’t own Oblivion knew about the Horse Armor. But here’s the twist: some people still bought it. Curiosity, maybe. Support, maybe. And when the outrage faded, the publishers took notes. We thought we’d laughed it off. They saw a new revenue stream. Note: Microtransactions Made Up 58% of PC Game Revenue in 2024, Research Shows According to financial analysis by Digital River, microtransactions have fundamentally transformed gaming economics, with free-to-play games generating 80% of digital game revenue despite representing only 15% of total releases. The model has proven so effective that the average revenue per paying user (ARPPU) in free-to-play mobile games ranges from $15 to $25 monthly—significantly higher than traditional one-time purchase models could achieve. (source).

The Joke Became Reality

If Horse Armor was a joke, 2012 was the punchline. By this point, DLC wasn’t just accepted—it was expected. Extra characters, costumes, new levels—it all became part of the launch conversation. But this was also the year when big publishers showed us just how far they were willing to twist a good idea for profit. Asura’s Wrath dropped in February. Great game. Wild game. It played like a playable anime, with sky-punching gods and over-the-top boss fights. But when April rolled around, Capcom released the game’s “true ending” as paid DLC. The actual ending. Behind a paywall. Then Mass Effect 3 landed in March. Solid game. Controversial ending. But what made it worse was the Day One DLC, From Ashes, which locked away a critical lore character. The content was on the disc. You could see it—but you couldn’t access it unless you paid extra. Oh, and Street Fighter X Tekken? Also released that same day. Capcom again. Twelve full characters were locked on the disc at launch, waiting to be sold back to us months later. Not future content. Not bonus content. Content that was already finished. And while it didn’t invent the concept, Borderlands 2 doubled down on the now-standard Season Pass model—pay us now, get content later, maybe. If you’re lucky. And yet, despite all this, 2012 is still remembered as a great year for games. Even the ones caught up in these controversies were (and are) beloved. Which just proves the point: publishers bet that players would eventually accept the bare minimum if the games were good enough. Over time, outrage turned into eye-rolls. “Don’t like it? Don’t buy it.” “How else are they supposed to make money?” People stopped pushing back. And once the industry realized they could nickel-and-dime us without consequence, things only got worse. Microtransactions stopped being cosmetic. “Time savers” replaced skill progression. Premium features started showing up in single-player games. And the idea of getting a full experience for $60? Ancient history. That bet paid off. (Click here for additional context) Note: In 2022, DLC sales accounted for 13% of PC revenue and 7% of console revenue in the US. DLC boosted monthly active users (MAU) overall by 11% across PC and console games. Some game genres benefitted from DLC more than others. Strategy games experienced the highest MAU growth from DLC releases, followed by role-playing and simulation titles. On average, 30% of MAUs for Dead Cells (one of the games we cover in the report) in DLC-release months were new players. (source)

The Rise of Time Savers

Over the years, the industry kept pushing. And little by little, the outrage faded. Players who once mocked Horse Armor were now paying for boosters, cosmetics, currencies, and convenience. Publishers had successfully rebranded greed as player choice. We started hearing phrases like “time savers” and “optional content,” usually from executives trying to explain why their $60 game now had a microtransaction menu baked into the pause screen. Why grind for upgrades when you could just buy a shortcut? Take Devil May Cry 4: Special Edition, for example. Capcom sold red orb packs—used to unlock moves and abilities—for real money. You didn’t need to buy them, sure. But that’s the trick. If they’re so unnecessary, why sell them at all? That’s where “time savers” come in. A term popularized by Ubisoft, time savers were the beginning of a quiet shift in how games were designed. Progression got slower. XP gains got stingier. Suddenly, buying a multiplier didn’t just save time—it felt necessary to avoid tedium. Assassin’s Creed: Origins was the flashpoint. It introduced a permanent XP boost you could purchase to level up faster. Players noticed. Some even ran tests, comparing the grind with and without the booster. The results were clear: the game was built to be slower without it. And that wasn’t by accident. At this point, “optional” started to mean “optimized.” If you didn’t pay up, you weren’t getting the best experience—you were getting the longest one. And here’s the part that sealed the deal: time itself became a commodity. According to the ESA, the average gamer in 2004 was 29. In 2024, that number has jumped to 36. Gamers are older now. Busier. Time-strapped. And when you’re juggling work, family, and life, ten bucks to speed things up doesn’t sound so bad. That’s how they got us.

The Illusion of Infinite Wealth

If you asked me who’s doing the most damage to this industry, I’d point to the CEOs and the investors. It’s hard to choose between them. CEOs make the calls, but investors set the rules. One exploits for profit, the other demands it. Either way, their obsession with infinite growth is bleeding the games industry dry. And while they chase those profit margins, the people actually making the games—the artists, the writers, the animators, the engineers—are the ones who suffer. Let’s be clear: this isn’t about “wokeness,” or DEI initiatives, or whatever culture war talking point is trending this week. The mass layoffs, the studio closures, the waves of burnout and abuse—it all stems from corporate greed, not diversity. From shareholders who want more, faster, and cheaper. From executives who get bonuses for cutting corners and slashing teams. And while players were getting nickel-and-dimed, developers were getting crushed. It’s hard to pinpoint when things started unraveling inside the studios, but once social media cracked the door open, the stories came pouring out. Twitter became a confession booth. Forums turned into therapy circles. We started hearing about what development really looked like behind the scenes—and it was brutal. The biggest red flag? Crunch. Defined by the IGDA as “employees working overtime in order to meet a deadline,” crunch sounds tame on paper—until you realize just how extreme it gets. Take Red Dead Redemption 2. Rockstar co-founder Dan Houser once proudly said the team worked 100-hour weeks “several times” during development. That’s not passion. That’s exploitation. And Rockstar was hardly alone. Crunch became a silent expectation across the AAA space—normalized, even praised. Naughty Dog’s Neil Druckmann once said people chose to work longer hours out of passion. But as developer Carrie Patel from Obsidian pointed out, one person’s “passion project” becomes everyone else’s emergency. Even if you don’t want to crunch, the team still has to meet the deadline. Voluntary or not, the pressure is real. And crunch isn’t even the worst of it. Note: They do not get paid extra for working overtime. (Click here for additional context) If employees are classified as salaried and meet certain criteria (such as being considered "exempt" computer professionals), they are not legally entitled to extra pay for working additional hours, including during periods of crunch. This is due to exemptions in federal and state labor laws that allow companies to avoid paying overtime to employees who meet particular salary thresholds and job duties, which is common for software developers, engineers, and many other technical roles in game development. In practice, this means that even though crunch often involves working well beyond a standard 40-hour week, most salaried game developers do not receive additional compensation for those extra hours unless their company voluntarily offers bonuses, paid time off, or other incentives.

Crunch was only the beginning

However, crunch wouldn’t even be the worst violation. Behind the scenes, a much uglier pattern was forming. Harassment, discrimination, retaliation—especially against women, queer developers, and marginalized voices—became regular headlines. The workplace wasn’t just grueling. In many studios, it was hostile. Blizzard was one of the biggest implosions. In 2021, the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing sued Activision Blizzard for fostering what they called a “frat boy” workplace culture. The stories that came out—about sexual harassment, gender discrimination, and leadership turning a blind eye—were stomach-churning. It wasn’t just a toxic work environment. It was systemic abuse. Ubisoft followed with its own wave of allegations: executives accused of predatory behavior, HR departments covering it up, and a revolving door of survivors who left the company while their abusers stayed. For years, people at the top promised reform. Most of them are still there. And these are just the companies we heard about. Smaller studios? Outsourced QA teams? Contract workers? They face the same issues with even less protection and none of the headlines. And when developers do try to push back—through walkouts, organizing, or speaking publicly—they’re hit with layoffs, blacklisting, or legal pressure. Unionization efforts have grown, but so has resistance. In 2024 alone, dozens of studios saw record profits… followed by mass layoffs. Entire departments gutted. Entire teams axed. Projects canceled mid-development, not because they failed—but because they didn’t hit some arbitrary forecast set by executives who likely never touched a dev kit. All of this has made one thing painfully clear: To the people in charge, developers are disposable. You can pour your life into a game, work nights and weekends to make it shine, and still be on the chopping block the moment the stock dips. Because to shareholders, you’re not a person—you’re a number. And when you cost too much, they replace you with a cheaper one. The Pay Gap (Click here for additional context) Average Compensation: The average total compensation for a gaming CEO rose from about $6.1 million in 2019 to $8.6 million in 2024. Top Earners: In 2020, the highest-paid video game CEOs received over $100 million in total compensation, with some (like Robert Antokol of Playtika) earning $372 million and Bobby Kotick of Activision Blizzard earning $154.6 million, mainly due to stock awards and bonuses (source: 4,5,1.) Pay Gap: The gap between CEO and median employee pay has widened, with some companies showing a CEO-to-median-employee pay ratio as high as 1:1,560

The Price Increase Fallacy (Click here for additional context) 📝 Editor’s Note You may have heard the argument that rising game prices are necessary to ensure developers get paid fairly. But the numbers tell a different story. While some premium titles have crept up to $70 or more, that extra revenue hasn’t gone to the people making the games—it’s gone to executives and shareholders. Entry- and mid-level developer salaries have grown modestly in the past decade (mostly due to inflation and demand), but C-suite compensation has skyrocketed, often increasing by hundreds of percent through bonuses and stock payouts. So no, higher game prices aren’t trickling down to dev paychecks. They’re padding profit margins. And that’s not a sustainable or ethical model.

The Blame Game is Undefeated

So where does that leave us? Some will tell you that gaming is in decline because of “wokeness.” That developers are too focused on diversity, too distracted by inclusion. But that’s not just wrong—it’s a deliberate misdirection. A smokescreen. Something to keep you angry at the wrong people. The truth is simple: this industry isn’t being killed by politics. It’s being gutted by profit. It’s being dragged down by bloated executive salaries, bad faith investors, and CEOs who treat workers like spare parts and players like wallets. It’s being undone by an endless hunger for growth that no creative industry—no human-driven industry—can sustainably meet. And yet, despite all this, people still make games. Beautiful, creative, heartbreaking games. Developers still pour themselves into projects knowing they could be laid off the second it ships. That’s not just passion. That’s resilience. That’s love. But love shouldn’t be exploited. And passion shouldn’t be a license for abuse. As players, we have a role in this. We can speak up. We can support developers. We can stop accepting bad business practices just because the game is fun. We can stop pretending that “optional” means harmless. And we can stop falling for the lie that representation is the problem, when the real villain is sitting in a boardroom. The next time you hear someone blame diversity for the state of the industry, ask them how many women and queer devs were in the room when Activision laid off 1,900 employees after posting record profits. Ask them who really benefits when teams are slashed, games are rushed, and content is carved up for sale. Ask them where all the money goes. We deserve better. The people who make our games deserve better. And the industry won’t get there until we stop taking bait—and start holding power accountable. Read the full article

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IndieQuest 2025 Proved Indie RPGs Aren’t Just Alive—They’re Leading the Revolution

2025 will be remembered as the year indies stopped asking for a seat at the table and built their own. While AAA studios double down on live-service fatigue, games like Expedition 33 have shown players will rally behind bold ideas - and this year's IndieQuest lineup delivered them in force. Indie Quest 2025 is a digital showcase event dedicated to independently developed Japanese Role-Playing Games (JRPGs). Curated by Taylor Hoyt of the YouTube channel The Gaming Shelf, the event premiered on May 29, 2025. This wasn't just another showcase - it was a manifesto. From Forge of the Fae's spellbinding pixel artistry to Infinite Alliance's love-letter crossover chaos, these titles weaponized nostalgia while pushing boundaries. No battle passes. No algorithm-chasing. Just pure, unfiltered creativity proving "indie" no longer means "small" - it means "essential." Tactical masterclasses (Tactics Returners) stood shoulder-to-shoulder with genre-defying experiments (Luminous Nights), all sharing one truth: RPGs' future isn't being written by corporate committees, but by passionate creators. The revolution isn't coming - it's here. Here are the 10 IndieQuest standouts that didn't just impress - they demanded we pay attention. Forge of the Fae A tactical RPG where every spell feels like a brushstroke come to life. Forge of the Fae elevates pixel art to high art, with animations so fluid they blur the line between combat and canvas. But it’s the morally gray fae politics—where alliances shift like the wind—that’ll keep you hooked long after the last boss falls. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bPshPpgKs3s&pp=ygUQRm9yZ2Ugb2YgdGhlIEZhZQ Alterium Shift Chrono Trigger’s spirit meets modern precision in this time-bending RPG. The twist? Positioning is everything. Flank an enemy to trigger team combos, or manipulate turn order to rewrite battles on the fly. A masterclass in making turn-based combat feel dynamic, not dated. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SVdFwBJw_rY&pp=ygUOQWx0ZXJpdW0gU2hpZnQ Tactics Returners The Final Fantasy Tactics successor we’ve begged for, polished to a mirror sheen. Maps react to your choices (burn forests, flood valleys), while its class system offers staggering depth without overwhelming. Proof that “accessible” and “hardcore” aren’t mutually exclusive. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_tll8ucLUWY&pp=ygURVGFjdGljcyBSZXR1cm5lcnM Colossus - Eternal Blight A pixel-art action RPG where you play as Lucian, fighting through a blight-corrupted world to save your brother. Its tight, skill-based combat rewards parries and dodges like a 2D Dark Souls, while Blight Arts let you trade health for devastating mutations. Every choice—from alliances to exploration—echoes in a story where corruption seeps into both the land and the soul. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EiiixFKf7YM&pp=ygUZQ29sb3NzdXMgLSBFdGVybmFsIEJsaWdodNIHCQmwCQGHKiGM7w Project BS A 3D action RPG where you play as Sienna, a fierce dragonewt girl carving her legend through a vibrant fantasy world. Master fluid, combo-driven combat against rivals and colossal beasts, then lose yourself in landscapes that shift between lush valleys and storm-wracked ruins. More than a quest—it’s a coming-of-age firestorm, where every battle etches your name deeper into the world’s lore. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QAanpHTfrAw&t=3851s Luminous Nights Platforming as poetic motion. Leap through bioluminescent ruins where light is your weapon, painting the darkness with every dash and strike. The closest gaming’s come to playing a Studio Ghibli dream sequence. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QAanpHTfrAw&t=3110s Last Moon A melancholic ode to 16-bit classics, where every step through its fading world feels like a eulogy in motion https://youtu.be/n9o-OfmMvt4 Seed of Nostalgia Farm by day, dungeon-crawl by night in this EarthBound-tinged hybrid. The turn-based battles crackle with SNES-era charm, but it’s the cozy-farm-meets-lovecraftian-horror twist that surprises. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dcIXHje3OaE&pp=ygURU2VlZCBvZiBOb3N0YWxnaWE Infinite Alliance The ultimate indie RPG crossover event. Build a dream team from familiar faces (and deep-cut surprises), then unleash combo attacks that rewrite the rules of reality. Pure, unfiltered joy for genre devotees. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MJq8TRqtfGg&pp=ygURSW5maW5pdGUgQWxsaWFuY2U Legends of Starkadia Open-world RPG meets Saturday morning cartoon. Whether you’re taming neon griffins or trading barbs with a pirate crew, its writing walks the tightrope between witty and heartfelt—and never falls off. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tvr2i2Zy580&pp=ygUUTGVnZW5kcyBvZiBTdGFya2FkaWE IndieQuest 2025 didn’t just highlight promising games—it drew a line in the sand. These creators aren’t waiting for permission, algorithms, or legacy clout. They’re redefining what it means to play, to feel, and to dream through games. In an industry bloated with sameness, these titles remind us that rebellion starts small—and that’s exactly where greatness is born. The next era of RPGs won’t be handed down from the top. It’ll rise from the underground, glowing with conviction. Read the full article

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Androids, Autism, and the Performance of Humanity

I’ve never seen myself in the characters who are supposed to represent me. When storytellers write autistic characters, they often reach for the textbook. The result is a checklist of traits—eye contact issues, sensory sensitivities, rigid routines—rendered with clinical precision but little soul. These portrayals might be accurate, but they rarely feel true. Autistic characters are often written by people who have no real connection to the autistic community—no lived experience, no close relationships, just a distant, clinical understanding. As a result, their portrayals tend to be heavy-handed, riddled with exaggerations and stereotypes. Autism becomes a spectacle of extremes: either the emotionless savant or the overwhelmed meltdown machine. There’s little room for subtlety, for variance, for the spectrum itself. These characters don’t reflect the full range of autistic experience—they reduce it. Strangely, I found truth in androids. Characters designed to be artificial, emotionless, or “not quite human” often end up embodying the emotional realities of being autistic more fully than any explicit attempt. Their stories are about trying to make sense of a world that wasn’t built for them. They struggle to perform expected behaviors, navigate unspoken rules, and define themselves outside of what they were made for. They aren’t written as autistic—but in watching them, I felt recognized. This isn’t about claiming these characters as diagnoses. It’s about resonance. Androids are not metaphors for autism—they are not symbolic placeholders or narrative shortcuts. Instead, they function as allegories: vessels through which themes of identity, difference, and performance are explored with unexpected depth. Their stories align with the autistic experience not because they represent it, but because they echo it. There’s a deep, often unspoken overlap between how androids are written and how autistic people navigate a world not built to understand them—or even allow them to exist in their fullness. Not because they’re the same, but because the narrative challenges are parallel. When an android character masks their behavior to survive, or searches for emotional language that feels alien but essential, it lands differently if you’ve lived that. I want to explore a few of these characters in depth—not to dissect them, but to sit with them. Characters like KOS-MOS (Xenosaga), Sophie (Tales of Graces), Aegis (Persona 3), and Altina (Trails of Cold Steel) have stayed with me not just because of who they are, but because of what they reflect. Three of them are androids in the truest sense—built as machines in human form. Altina, while not technically a robot, is a synthetic humanoid created to model human behavior and emotion. That distinction matters to some, but what matters more to me is how her journey mirrors ours. They weren’t built to represent me. But somehow, they do. Feeling Without Flourish: Aegis and the Quiet Weight of Emotion

Aegis doesn’t cry when she’s overwhelmed. She doesn’t fall into hysterics or shout her pain into the sky. When grief touches her, it settles in her movements, her tone, her silence. For a long time, she isn’t even sure what she’s feeling—only that it changes her. That’s why she feels so real to me. In Persona 3, Aegis begins as a combat android, created to destroy Shadows and protect SEES. She’s literal, mission-driven, and detached in the way many characters assume an android should be. But slowly—beautifully—something begins to shift. Through her connection to the protagonist, she begins to form emotional attachments. It’s awkward at first. Her affection is structured around duty, her warmth filtered through unfamiliar language. But it’s there, growing. Then the ending happens. And it breaks her. In The Answer, Aegis isn’t just grieving the protagonist’s death—she’s grieving the loss of structure, the loss of purpose, the loss of something she had only just begun to understand. Her processing is quiet, internal, and methodical. She doesn’t collapse; she recalibrates. She takes on leadership because no one else can, even when her heart isn’t ready. Her grief doesn’t perform itself. It exists—heavily, powerfully—beneath her stillness. That’s also what makes her grief feel so autistic to me. For many autistic people, routine isn’t just comfort—it’s a survival mechanism. Predictability gives us clarity. It protects us from the sensory chaos of the world and gives structure to the emotional storms inside. When that’s disrupted, it’s not a minor inconvenience—it’s an earthquake. And when it’s disrupted by grief, it’s like falling through yourself with no frame to hold you together. We are not unaffected by loss—we are crushed by it. But we’re often too overwhelmed to express that pain in ways people expect. Our sensitivity is not theatrical. It’s internalized. It’s private. It’s a flood with no drain. When I was younger, I had two modes: soulless husk or emotional wreck. Those were the only ways I knew how to respond to pain. Neither was accepted. When I didn’t cry, I was asked “Why aren’t you crying?”—as if silence meant apathy. And when I did cry, it became “Why are you crying? It’s not that deep.” I learned very quickly that there was no correct way to grieve—just ways to be judged for it. That’s the reality for a lot of autistic people. We’re not taught how to feel—we’re taught how to perform feelings in ways that make others comfortable. The neurotypical world has no space for emotions unless they’re delivered in familiar packaging. If we’re quiet, we’re cold. If we’re overwhelmed, we’re dramatic. If we mask, we’re praised for being “normal.” And if we don’t, we’re seen as broken. So we bend. We mimic. We learn the script. And in the process, we’re taught that our feelings—real, raw, nonlinear—aren’t valid unless they’re made legible to others. We become like androids, struggling to comply with scripts we were never given—only told we should already know them. Every gesture, every reaction, every silence is evaluated for readability. And when we don’t compute correctly, we are treated like a malfunction. Masking becomes its own kind of programming—a series of subroutines we write over ourselves just to pass. We suppress instinctive responses, rewrite emotional outputs, and simulate “acceptable” expressions of joy, sorrow, and pain. Not because we lack emotion, but because we’ve been conditioned to believe ours needs debugging. We override our own code daily—not to become more human, but to be allowed to appear human in the eyes of others. And in doing so, we lose our humanity in trying to be more “human.” That’s why Aegis matters. She shows that pain doesn’t have to be loud to be real. That grief isn’t always cinematic—it can be contained, constrained, quiet, and still shatter you. Near the end of her arc, she says: “Sorrowful partings only show us the weight of our relationships... But the joy of living comes from those who care about you.” It’s a line that could have sounded hollow coming from anyone else. But from Aegis—who fought so hard just to understand what it means to feel—it lands like a revelation. In that moment, she doesn’t sound like a machine trying to be human. She sounds like someone who’s become human in the truest sense—by embracing the joy and pain of connection. Autistic people are often told we don’t “feel” enough—or worse, that we feel the wrong way. We’re too still, too analytical, too composed. But Aegis shows that composure isn’t the absence of emotion. Sometimes it’s the containment of it. Sometimes it’s the only way to survive it. What makes Aegis so resonant isn’t just that she feels—it’s how she feels. Slowly. Deeply. On her own terms. And maybe that’s the most human thing of all. Silence Isn’t Emptiness: Altina and the Mask That’s Taught

Altina doesn’t speak much. When she does, her voice is flat, clipped, almost robotic. She rarely emotes, rarely gestures. If you didn’t know better, you might say she feels nothing at all. But you’d be wrong. In Trails of Cold Steel, Altina Orion enters the story as a synthetic humanoid—engineered, not born. She is calm, compliant, and precise. Her voice rarely rises, her expression rarely changes. She obeys orders without hesitation. To many, she would read as the textbook “emotionless” child. But beneath that stillness is something fragile, something taught—not just how to function, but how to suppress. Altina’s arc is haunting because it mirrors a reality that many autistic children live: being diagnosed early and placed into therapy designed not to understand them, but to make them more tolerable. Her interactions are transactional at first—social cues filtered through logic. Her emotions, if acknowledged at all, are managed, not expressed. And yet, like so many of us, what she lacks isn’t feeling—it’s permission to show it. And then there’s Rean. Rean doesn’t push Altina to “open up” in some dramatic breakthrough. He walks alongside her. He asks questions. He listens. He treats her silences as pauses, not failures. Through his steady presence, Altina begins to explore emotion—not as something she must perform to survive, but something she’s allowed to have. Slowly, she shifts from compliance to connection. She develops friendships, attachments, preferences. Her speech softens, not because she’s been “fixed,” but because she feels safe enough to express what was always there. Every version of autism needs a different kind of space to bloom. Altina is what happens when someone deeply internal starts to believe they are more than a function. And like the others in this essay, she had a guidepost—someone who didn’t try to overwrite her code, but helped her uncover it. A Brief Defense of Rean Schwarzer Rean gets a lot of flack in the Trails fandom for being bland, too polite, or emotionally reserved. But those criticisms miss what makes him exceptional—especially to someone like Altina. Rean’s strength isn’t in big speeches or dramatic charisma. It’s in restraint. He doesn’t force connection. He doesn’t talk over people’s silence. He doesn’t try to fix Altina—he just treats her like someone worth knowing, even when she doesn’t emote the way others expect. That quiet patience is rare in fiction and even rarer in real life. What makes their bond so meaningful is how it evolves. They begin as co-workers—professional, distant, functional. Then that relationship shifts into something more personal: student and teacher, mentor and mentee. Rean doesn’t just give Altina orders—he gives her space. He invites her into conversations, decisions, human moments. And eventually, it grows into something softer and equal: a friendship. One built not on dramatic breakthroughs, but on accumulated trust. And what’s often missed is that these relationships aren’t just something Rean gives—they’re what give him strength too. His power doesn’t come from isolation or lone heroism—it comes from connection. His bonds with others, including Altina, shape who he becomes. They keep him grounded when he’s lost, and remind him of what’s worth protecting. For people like me—who spent childhoods being either pushed to perform or left behind completely—Rean’s presence is something quietly revolutionary. He offers what many of us needed: someone who waits, listens, and accepts. And in doing so, he doesn’t just help others grow—he becomes someone worth following.

By the time we see Altina again in Trails Beyond the Horizon, the growth isn’t just emotional—it’s visible. Her design is more mature, her posture more grounded, and the weapon she once wielded—a combat shell she primarily used as a blade—is now reshaped into a shield. It’s a quiet but powerful statement: she’s no longer just observing the world or surviving it. She’s protecting the people and peace she chose to believe in. She’s not masking anymore—she’s standing in who she is. And even though she still speaks softly, there’s nothing unsure about her. Altina doesn’t need to prove she’s human. She knows she is. I think about that a lot. How different things might have been if I’d had someone like Rean growing up. Someone who didn’t mistake my silence for disinterest, or my flatness for apathy. Someone who could have helped me feel safe enough to be seen. And I want more autistic kids to have that too. I want them to have their Rean. Innocence Without Performance: Sophie and the Sincerity of Feeling

If Aegis is about restrained grief and Altina is about conditioned silence, Sophie is about the gentle, awkward joy of learning how to be close to people—without ever pretending to be something she’s not. In Tales of Graces, Sophie is introduced as an enigma—quiet, literal, and seemingly emotionless at first. But what sets her apart isn’t detachment—it’s sincerity. She doesn’t mask, she asks. Constantly. With a kind of earnestness that’s rare in media and even rarer in autistic-coded characters. She’ll stare at someone too long. She’ll say what she’s thinking even if it’s odd. She’ll interrupt conversations to clarify emotional language. But none of it is framed as a flaw. It’s just… Sophie. She’s not robotic. She’s not cold. She’s just different. And the people around her grow to love that difference without trying to change it. Unlike so many autistic-coded characters who are treated as puzzles to solve, Sophie is never asked to “be normal.” She’s asked to stay. To learn. To trust. Her journey isn’t about suppressing her oddities—it’s about letting people into her world, and learning how to live in theirs without erasing herself in the process. What makes Sophie’s journey even more meaningful is the world around her. Tales of Graces is a story that affords its characters the space to be themselves and grow—not because they’re forced to change, but because they want to understand each other more deeply. The party doesn’t demand that Sophie perform humanity for their comfort. They meet her where she is, and in turn, she grows in ways that feel natural—earned, not imposed. You see it in the way Asbel never makes her feel broken, even when she struggles to understand feelings like sadness or fear. Or in how Cheria, despite her own frustrations, chooses patience over pity. The people around Sophie don’t lecture her into growth—they create a space safe enough for her to discover it on her own. Change in Graces doesn’t come from society’s expectations—it comes from connection. And that kind of change—the kind that’s rooted in trust and emotional safety—is what so many autistic people long for but rarely find. Sophie represents something I think a lot of autistic people are told to abandon: childlike wonder. Curiosity without calculation. Affection without strategy. Neurotypical people often see that kind of openness and label it as immaturity—or worse, infantilize it. But for many of us, that unfiltered sense of wonder is real, natural, and honest. It’s not something we outgrow. It’s something we carry. Even when we’re forced to mask. Even when we’re told it’s embarrassing. Sophie never loses that spark. And the people who love her don’t try to take it away. Where Altina had Rean as her guidepost, Sophie had a group—a circle of friends who, from the very beginning, allowed her to grow by simply letting her be. There’s something powerful about that. It shows that acceptance doesn’t always come from deep understanding—it can come from patience, consistency, and choosing to stay close, even when someone doesn’t fit a familiar mold. That, to me, is the most beautiful thing Graces gives us: a character who’s allowed to be curious, odd, loving, and wholly herself—without apology. Not despite her differences, but through them. The Divine Restraint of KOS-MOS: Grace in the Code

KOS-MOS doesn’t blink. She doesn’t flinch. She doesn’t waver. In a world of chaos, she is precision incarnate—measured voice, perfect posture, calculated action. People look at her and see a machine. An object. A weapon. But I’ve always seen someone else: I see someone like me. She’s not an android written with autism in mind, but intentionally or not, she mirrors a long list of autistic traits—the kind that don’t make people comfortable. A flat, monotone voice. Hyper-controlled body language. Literal interpretation of language. Blunt delivery. Emotional restraint mistaken for emotional absence. Intense focus. Suppressed instinct. An interface designed for others, not for herself. These traits don’t make her dangerous. They make her readable as “other.” And like so many autistic people, that otherness isn’t something she chooses. It’s something people project onto her—and then punish her for. There’s a scene early in Xenosaga where KOS-MOS makes a choice. A Gnosis is attacking the ship. Shion is in danger. KOS-MOS takes the only shot she has—one that kills both the Gnosis and a human caught in the crossfire. She does what she was programmed to do: protect Shion. It was logical. Efficient. Correct. But she doesn’t cry. She doesn’t apologize. She just acts. And because of that, she’s treated like a monster. She isn’t malfunctioning. She isn’t cruel. She’s correct. But because her correctness doesn’t come with visible remorse, she’s seen as dangerous. That’s the autistic experience in a nutshell: doing the right thing, but in the wrong tone. Saying something true, but saying it too directly. Feeling everything—and being told you feel nothing. KOS-MOS also reflects one of the most enduring and harmful autistic stereotypes: the savant. The emotionless prodigy. The socially detached genius who’s only valuable because of what they can do—not who they are. Her combat abilities are godlike. Her predictions are mathematically perfect. She’s a living weapon dressed in calm silence and cold brilliance. It’s not presented as a flaw. In fact, it’s the reason she’s respected. But that admiration is hollow. People don’t love her—they depend on her. They need her competence, not her company. And that’s the trap autistic people know all too well: when the world praises you for your abilities but ignores your needs. That’s what I saw in KOS-MOS. Not aspiration—survival. Not expression—containment. Not becoming—performing. And then there’s Shion. Shion is often framed as KOS-MOS’s caretaker—her designer, her handler, her closest human tie. Read the full article

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Blades of Fire: A Soulslike with Heart (Review)

A Legacy Forged in Steel and Blood Let’s get this out of the way: Blades of Fire wants you to suffer a little. But beneath its jagged armor is a surprisingly soulful, story-driven action RPG that swings for something bolder than just “Dark Souls but indie.” Blades of Fire Developer: Mercury Steam Publisher: 505 Games Platforms: PS5, Xbox Series X|S, Steam Genre: Action/RPG Style: Soulslike Release Date: May 22, 2025 Blades of Fire kicks things off with an epic, mythic setup straight out of an ancient legend. Long ago, a race of giants known as the Forgers ruled the world with mastery and wisdom. When war tore their civilization apart, they passed their greatest secret—The Steel—to humanity, hoping we’d carry their legacy forward. Fast-forward a few thousand years, and that legacy’s been twisted. Queen Nerea, once hailed as a symbol of hope after her father’s death, now reigns with a terrible curse: she can turn any weapon of steel into stone. It’s a poetic betrayal of the Forgers’ gift—one that renders armies useless and forces resistance fighters to think creatively, or die. Enter Aran de Lira, a warrior bound by duty, trauma, and legacy. Once a close friend to Princess Nerea and her brother Prince Erin, Aran is now the reluctant assassin sent to end her rule. His personal pain runs deep, shaped by a tragic event in his youth, but rather than retreat inward, he’s chosen to face his responsibilities head-on—with a forge hammer in hand and resolve in his heart. He’s not walking this road alone. Glinda, an ancient Master Forger, mentors Aran throughout the game. She’s as old as the world itself and wields one of the Seven Forgers' Hammers—massive relics passed down from the giants themselves. Glinda connects Aran to a lineage bigger than war, offering guidance and context as he hammers out his fate, quite literally. You’re also accompanied by Adso de Zelk, a young scholar who documents Aran’s journey and assists in puzzles and combat analysis. He provides levity and lore, acting as a narrative voice that brings extra dimension to Aran’s otherwise lonely quest. There’s a surprising amount of cinematic storytelling for a Soulslike. Frequent cutscenes, emotional beats, and well-paced dialogue help ground the mythic stakes in character-driven moments. It’s a world of legends—but the drama feels personal, not abstract. Steel, Strategy, and Sweat: A Brutal Combat Dance Blades of Fire may be built on a familiar third-person action RPG foundation, but the way it handles combat and customization makes it feel uniquely tactile. You play as Aran, armed with a sacred forge hammer that allows you to craft your own arsenal from scratch. And when I say “craft,” I don’t mean slapping stats on a menu—you’re literally shaping weapons on an anvil with timed hammer strikes. Combat is visceral and punishing, but with surprising depth. You can choose to attack from the left or right, aim for the head or torso, and switch between slashing, stabbing, or blunt attacks. Blocking regenerates stamina, while parrying breaks enemy defenses, opening up brief windows to land massive damage. And you’ll need every advantage. Weapons degrade over time, and if you die, your currently equipped weapon is dropped at the place of your death, forcing you to retrieve it like a lost soul in Dark Souls. Weapons can be repaired at anvil checkpoints or dismantled into materials for future forging. Where Blades of Fire sets itself apart is in its customization depth. Using Forge Scrolls, you can tweak weapon shape, length, material, and blade style. These changes aren’t cosmetic—they impact durability, penetration, edge sharpness, and more. You’ll need to experiment to find combinations that match your playstyle and enemy weaknesses. The game features a color-coded enemy vulnerability system: green means your weapon is effective, red means it won’t do a thing. It’s a clever touch that encourages preparation and experimentation, rather than brute force. Now here’s the honest part: as someone who doesn’t usually play Soulslikes, I was overwhelmed. This game doesn’t ease you in. It expects a level of genre fluency right out the gate—managing weapon stances, crafting materials, elemental affinities, and stamina economy all at once. The learning curve is steep, and if this is your first foray into the genre, expect to feel out of your depth for a while. Still, the combat is rewarding once mastered, and genre veterans will likely thrive here. There’s depth, strategy, and a core loop that values experimentation. It just doesn’t hold your hand. Visions of Steel and Stone Visually, Blades of Fire strikes a balance between pseudo-realism and stylized fantasy. The character designs feel steeped in Celtic folklore, with regal robes, brutal armor, and supernatural flourishes. The aesthetic walks a fine line—grounded enough to feel serious, but expressive enough to bring the world’s mythic energy to life. In motion, it works beautifully. The environmental design is another strength. You’ll explore crumbling citadels, twisted forests, forge-filled caves, and cursed battlefields—all rendered with enough texture and variety to keep exploration compelling. The game’s interconnected world structure makes each area feel meaningful, with alternate paths and hidden locations rewarding curiosity. It’s not all perfect. There’s some jank in the presentation—textures can pop in, animations occasionally stutter, and some lighting effects feel inconsistent. But none of it ruins the experience. It’s rough around the edges, sure, but never rough enough to feel broken. The Roar of Steel and the Echo of Flesh One of the game’s strongest aspects is its sound design. Every clash of metal, every enemy scream, and every hammer blow lands with crunchy, satisfying weight. There’s a gritty, visceral texture to the audio that really sells the brutality of combat. It feels loud in the best way. The voice acting is also a standout. Aran’s delivery carries emotional depth without feeling melodramatic. Glinda brings gravitas. And Nerea, despite her limited screen time early on, radiates menace with every line. Adso adds a softer, inquisitive tone that balances the cast nicely. That counts for a lot in a genre that usually leaves its protagonists mute and hollow. The soundtrack however is an unfortunate missed opportunity. It lacks character and personality. It feels like temp music for a blockbuster movie. It fills the space but it doesn't make it memorable at all. Final Verdict: Niche Flame, But a Fierce One Blades of Fire doesn’t reinvent the forge—but it adds some compelling sparks. It’s got strong lore, memorable characters, punishing-but-satisfying combat, and a weapon crafting system deeper than most triple-A RPGs. But let’s be real: this game isn’t for everyone. - If you’re a hardcore Soulsborne fan expecting god-tier difficulty and polish? You’ll probably bounce off. - If you’re a newcomer hoping this will ease you into the genre? Good luck. - But if you’re Soulslike-curious and want something a little different—more story, more soul—then this might be the one to test your mettle. Just be ready to die. A lot. https://youtu.be/GZPzrB0EZ-8 Read the full article

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It’s Time to Refresh the C2E2 Cosplay Crown Competition

There’s a buzz that builds in the queue hall outside the C2E2 Cosplay Central Crown Championships—a slow, electric hum of anticipation. For over a decade, I’ve stood in that line with hundreds of fans and creators, each one buzzing with excitement, adjusting armor, fluffing wigs, or trying not to sweat through layers of carefully sewn fabric. This isn’t just another con panel. For many of us, it’s the main event—the moment where cosplay becomes performance, pageantry, and passion all rolled into one. I still remember the year Ray Fisher popped up as a surprise guest—the crowd lost it. Or the way past winners returned to thunderous applause, their builds almost mythic by that point. Those moments made the long wait worth it. They made the stage feel alive. Before I go any further, I want to be transparent: writing this might cost me access to future ReedPop events as press. But I wouldn’t be doing right by myself—or by our audience—if I didn’t speak honestly. I’ve been going to C2E2 for over a decade. I love this con. I believe in its potential. And that’s exactly why I need to say: this year’s cosplay competition was a letdown. The community deserves better.

The Judging Panel needs work

Let’s talk about the elephant in the room: the competition has become a closed loop. Each year, judges are often pulled from the same narrow pool—former winners or friends of the show, known mostly within an insular cosplay circuit. There’s nothing inherently wrong with honoring legacy, but when it starts to feel like a club you can’t break into, it stops being aspirational. It becomes stale. The show has grown in scale, but not in heart. And that’s a shame, because this event has the potential to be a crown jewel—not just in title, but in execution.

The Prize Money is...

We need to say this plainly: the prize pool is insulting. First-place winners routinely spend more on their builds—materials, flights, hotels, time off work—than they’ll ever get back. And while cosplayers aren’t in it for the cash, a competition of this size should respect the work it showcases. These are artists. Performers. Engineers. Some of them are building on blockbuster-level scale. The least C2E2 can do is offer compensation that acknowledges that level of investment. Here's the cash prize breakdown from this year: - First Place Global Champion of Cosplay: Henchandscrap as Halsin from Baldur’s Gate 3 (winning $5000 and a medal) - Second Place Global Champion: Patterner Cosplay as Firesong K/Treva from the Valdemar Novels by Merceres Lackey and Larry Dixon (winning $2000 and a medal) - Third Place Global Champion: Anaelic as Navia from Genshin Impact (winning $1000 and a medal) - USA/North American Champion: Patterner Cosplay as Firesong K/Treva from the Valdemar Novels by Merceres Lackey and Larry Dixon (winning an invitation to MCM London) - First Place Regional Champion: Undeadtoasty as Jin Sakai from Ghost of Tsushima (winning $1000 and a medal) - Second Place Regional Champion: Tierza89 as High Lady Suroth from Wheel of Time (winning $500 and a medal) - Third Place Regional Champion: Magpie Crossing as Mulan from Disney’s Mulan (winning $250 and a medal) - Armor category winner: May Jean Cosplay as Malezeno Hunter from Monster Hunter: Blue (winning a medal from Hoku Props) - Needlework category winner: SearinCosplay as Lan Wangji from The Untamed (winning a medal from Hoku Props) - FX category winner: Façade Costuming as Krampus from Krampus (winning a medal from Hoku Props)

The Judges We Deserve

There’s no shortage of phenomenal talent out there who would instantly elevate the judging panel—and give the audience something to get hyped about. VampyBitme — The Living Legend I met VampyBitme at Evo2017, and I’ll never forget how warm, kind, and passionate she was. But beyond being lovely in person, she’s one of the pillars of this community. With over 20 years of experience, Vampy helped shape modern cosplay culture—long before it was mainstream, long before social media gave it global reach. She’s not just a great cosplayer; she’s an icon. Bringing her back wouldn’t just be a nod to legacy—it would be an honor to someone who helped build this scene.

Cutiepie Sensei Cosplay — The Mainstream Powerhouse CutiepieCosplay isn’t just internet famous—she’s industry-recognized. She’s collaborated with Marvel on multiple occasions, creating official builds that showcase fan craftsmanship at the highest level. Her work is precise, imaginative, and expressive. She’s the kind of judge who can speak to both the technical execution and the emotional storytelling behind a cosplay.

Prince De Guzman Transformations — The Transformative Artist Prince De Guzman is an artist in every sense of the word. His work with Mihoyo and Netflix proves that his reach isn’t just viral—it’s global. His transformations blur the line between makeup, movement, and myth. Inviting Prince isn’t just about star power—it’s a chance to spotlight the international artistry that’s often overlooked at U.S. events.

Give the Mic to Megami (and Let Her Steal the Intermission)

Cosplay competitions need energy. They need someone who can read a room, engage a crowd, and keep the momentum flowing between showcases. And that’s where Megami—a Drag Race alum, cosplayer, and all-around nerd—comes in. Drag performers host weekly shows live and unscripted, often with nothing but a mic and a spotlight. Megami would bring flair, humor, fandom cred, and—let’s be honest—a level of charisma sorely missing this year. She’s the perfect bridge between geek culture and queer performance. And while we’re at it? Let her own the intermission. Give Megami a dedicated drag performance segment in the middle of the event. It would keep the audience engaged, reset the tone, and make intermission part of the entertainment instead of dead air.

Fix the Format, Respect the Performance

One of the biggest missed opportunities is how the show is actually run. The staging, the blocking, the flow—it all needs a serious overhaul. Right now, it often feels disjointed. Cosplayers walk onstage with no clear direction or marks, which leads to awkward pacing or uneven presentation. When you’ve spent months crafting a character, you deserve more than a vague “stand somewhere in the light.” The same goes for the commentary. Currently, a DJ or host reads a short blurb submitted by the cosplayer—but the pacing is all over the place. Sometimes the cosplayer has already walked off stage before the description finishes, or they’re stuck awkwardly waiting as the host catches up. Here’s the cheat code: record the narration ahead of time—and have it performed by a professional voice actor. Imagine each cosplay entry being introduced with cinematic flair by someone like Ray Chase or Laura Bailey. These actors are already at the con for panels and signings. Why not tap them for this? A pre-produced voiceover track gives consistency, flair, and lets each cosplayer shine as the spotlight hits. Even better: sprinkle in backstage banter or character cameos for the livestream. Make it immersive.

Bring Back the Spectacle

Remember when C2E2 used to throw in surprise celebrity guests during the cosplay competition? That magic’s been missing. And the thing is—they’re still here. These actors, influencers, and pop culture icons are already attending panels, walking the floor, doing autographs. But for some reason, they’re never brought into one of the con’s biggest live events. Last year, Chris Evans was at C2E2. This year? John Boyega. These are household names with deep connections to fandom, and they weren’t asked to step onstage for even a cameo. That’s a massive missed opportunity—not just for spectacle, but for signaling that this competition matters beyond the cosplay niche. Even something small—announcing a category winner, handing over a trophy, giving a shoutout to the craft—would turn the show into a moment.

Stream the Show Like It Matters

C2E2 has streamed the cosplay competition in the past, but it’s unclear if that’s still a consistent priority. If they revisit streaming—or finally commit to doing it right—they need to treat it like a global broadcast, not an afterthought. Hire official co-streamers from the cosplay, voice acting, and streaming communities. Let them provide live commentary in costume, interview finalists backstage, and engage the online audience in real-time. For fans watching from regions that don’t have a ReedPop qualifier, this could be their only connection to the championship stage. And while we’re thinking big: tap into the VTuber community. VTubers are cosplay-adjacent by design—digital avatars, performance personas, streaming energy. Bringing one or two VTubers on as co-hosts would pull in a massive online audience, especially across international viewers. Imagine the hype of a popular VTuber reacting to each build, cheering on competitors, and adding that meta-layer of fun and immersion. If this is going to be a world-class event, it should meet fans where they already are: online, engaged, and ready to celebrate the craft.

Make It Truly Global

If the Crown Championships are going to market themselves as a global competition, then the structure needs to reflect that. Right now, it’s heavily skewed toward countries with ReedPop-affiliated events. That automatically excludes incredible cosplayers from regions without direct access to qualifiers. Talent shouldn’t be gatekept by geography. A simple solution? Introduce a fan-voted wildcard slot—an international competitor chosen by the community from outside the existing ReedPop network. Let the global cosplay audience champion someone who’s been overlooked. It would not only bring in fresh energy, but also reaffirm that this competition belongs to the world, not just a select few countries. Because if you’re going to crown a world champion, you owe it to the world to open the door. Read the full article

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Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves

Like a lot of fighting game fans lately, I’ve found myself in a weird spot. I don’t really vibe with Street Fighter 6, Tekken 8 is in recovery mode, Guilty Gear Strive and I are on a break, and Mortal Kombat 1 is... fine. Not bad, just not for me. And I know I’m not the only one feeling this way. People are saying fighting games today are too easy, too accessible, too shallow, too unbalanced, too offense-heavy, too unstable—just not fun. Enter Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves. The original Mark of the Wolves, released in 1999, was a no-nonsense fighter with tight mechanics, solid depth, and a clear ethos: the better player wins. In today’s landscape of comeback mechanics and neutral-skipping tools, how does its 2025 successor stack up? Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves Initial release date: April 24, 2025 Platforms: PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X and Series S, Microsoft Windows Genres: Fighting game Developers: SNK Publishers: SNK CORPORATION

Story

City of the Wolves doesn’t have a deep story—and that’s fine. Each character has their own arcade mode ending, but I’m assuming Rock’s storyline is the main one. In it, Southtown has gotten too peaceful since Geese died, and someone decides to stir up trouble by hosting a new King of Fighters-style tournament. That’s your setup. I won’t spoil the rest, but let’s be real—SNK isn’t out here writing screenplays. The story works, but it’s nothing to write home about. That said, the Episodes of Southtown mode is a welcome surprise. It's more RPG-esque and clearly built for players who care about character interactions. If you're into dynamics between fighters or just want to see more personality outside of combat, this is your mode. It’s also being updated post-launch, which is nice to see. While arcade mode got a few chuckles out of me, Episodes of Southtown does a much better job of holding your attention if you’re here for the cast rather than the conflict.

Gameplay

Coming into City of the Wolves, I figured my experience with KOF would give me a leg up. Short hops? Four-button layout? I thought I had a foundation. I was wrong. Outside of a few basics, this is a very different beast. You’ve got feints, feint cancels, dodge attacks, Just Defend, Guard Cancel, Hyper Defense, Braking, REV Guard, REV Blow, REV Accel, Selective Potential Gear (S.P.G.)—and probably a few more I’m forgetting. Yeah, it’s a lot. And honestly? I wouldn’t blame anyone for feeling overwhelmed looking at all that. But here’s the thing: once you get hands-on, it actually clicks. It’s dense, but not messy. One of the biggest complaints about modern fighters is the lack of defensive tools. That’s not an issue here. You’ve got three block types, two dodge attacks, and four kinds of rolls. If you’re getting steamrolled in COTW, it’s not because the tools aren’t there—it’s because your defense isn’t. Want to break through an opponent’s wall? Short hops mess with anti-air timing. REV Blow can give you the edge if you’re in S.P.G. But most of the time? You’re earning your hits. There’s no real shortcut around neutral. And while some players might hate that, I think a lot of people will find it refreshing after years of rushdown-heavy metas. Of course, all that defense better be sharp, because offense hits hard. Projectiles matter. Pokes have reach. And if you get counter hit—especially off a Wild Punish—you’re gonna feel it. Watching your character float mid-air like a leaf or crumple in place while your opponent gears up for a beefy combo? Yeah. Don’t get caught. SNK’s always been good about giving players varied combo routes with high reward for smart resource use, and COTW keeps that tradition alive. Between Feint Cancelling, Braking, and REV Accel, there’s a ton of freedom. The combo system here might be one of the best out there—it looks great, and it feels rewarding. But like everything else in this game, it demands time. You don’t pick this up and start swinging. You grind. And yeah, you could say that about a lot of fighting games, but the difference here is that the depth isn’t hidden behind flash—it’s earned, and that’s a big part of this game’s charm. That said, I’ve got a couple of gripes. First: the tutorial. I wasn’t expecting it to teach everything, but what’s here barely scratches the surface. Yeah, it explains Feints, but it doesn’t go into the fact that there are multiple types for different moves, each with their own frame data when canceled. Or how REV Run—just holding the REV button and a direction—can set up meaty pressure that covers most wake-up options. Stuff like that feels important enough to at least mention. My second gripe? The netcode. Now to be fair, SNK has never been the gold standard for online play. But this time around, they actually gave us solid features: ranked, lobbies with multiple matches, leaderboards, ghost data—the whole setup is here. But the actual play? That’s where it gets rough. When it’s good, it’s great. But that’s maybe 70% of the time. The rest? Anywhere from 2–6 frames of rollback, sometimes worse. I had two matches where I saw 10 full frames of rollback. That’s killer in a game this precise. Imagine working the neutral for a whole round, landing your big hit, and rollback takes it away—and flips the momentum while it’s at

Visuals

This won’t take long: City of the Wolves looks fantastic. It builds on the KOF XV style, but with way more flair—it leans into this comic book aesthetic that gives everything more punch. The animations are crisp, the stages are full of energy, and the character designs walk the line between stylish and readable. If I had one minor complaint, it’s that the REV Accel and elemental effects can get a little busy at times. Nothing that hurts the gameplay, but every now and then, a visual effect will look kind of off. Gato’s REV Art smoke effect comes to mind—it’s not bad, just... not quite there. Still, that’s a nitpick. What’s not a nitpick is the main menu. It looks cool at first—really stylized, almost like a desktop OS—but actually using it? Not great. It’s clunky and weird to navigate. What’s even stranger is that it’s the only menu in the game with this much flair. Everything else—the character select, the options, the lobbies—feels pretty standard. Not bad, but it makes the overdesigned main menu stand out even more. It’s like all the style budget went there and didn’t leave anything for the rest.

Sound Design

Another quick one: the music? It slaps. I don’t even like the main menu layout, but I’ve sat on that screen way longer than I needed to just because the track is so good. And the character themes? Perfect fits. You hear Mai’s theme and immediately go, “Yep, that’s her.” Each one has a lot of personality, and they do a great job of reinforcing the character identities during matches. Then there’s the music from Salvatore Ganacci. Compared to the game’s usual jazz and rock-heavy soundtrack, his tracks feel a little offbeat—but they still work. They bring a different flavor, even if they don’t fully match the rest of the game’s vibe. Now, one thing you will want to do is adjust your volume settings. The music can sometimes get drowned out by all the SFX—punches, kicks, grunts, one-liners—it can be a bit much. It’s nothing a trip to the options menu won’t fix, but it’s worth pointing out. Voice acting overall is solid, but not always what I’d expect. Some English voices—Tizoc and Billy Kane in particular—sound a little off to me. Not bad, just not quite what I imagined for those characters. Still, the performances are competent, and it’s cool to see the full cast voiced in multiple languages.

Final Thoughts?

Before launch, a lot of people were skeptical about City of the Wolves. I kept hearing that it was going to be another “Discord fighter”—a game that only a niche group would play before dropping off the radar. Even now, folks are glued to Steam Charts, waiting to declare the game dead if the numbers dip. Ignore that noise. This game is absolutely worth picking up, rough edges and all. It’s been a long time since I’ve had to really sit with a fighting game—not just to learn a character or a few matchups, but to actually digb in and understand everything. Not just the fun bits. All of it. And that process? That challenge? It’s fun. City of the Wolves rewards players who want to learn, who want to improve, and who miss the feeling of cracking open a game and earning your wins. It’s not built for everyone. It’s difficult, technical, and expects a lot from you. But when you land that training room combo in a real match, or pull off a Just Defend into a Hyper Defense into a Guard Cancel into your own full conversion? That’s magic. It’s not the flashiest, or the most modern, and it’s definitely not the easiest. But that’s kind of the point. If you’ve been burned out on today’s fighters—or just want something deeper—City of the Wolves might be exactly what you’re looking for. Just… keep a YouTube playlist handy. You’re gonna need it. https://youtu.be/memEhCAQMtU Read the full article

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The Best Budget Tablets for Gaming and Emulation (Under $100)

f you're on the hunt for a tablet that can actually play games or handle emulation without draining your wallet, you're not alone. Most guides push you toward expensive options — like the ASUS ROG Flow Z13 or the OneXPlayer X1 Pro — which are undeniably powerful but also come with hefty price tags. What if you're working with a tight budget? We're talking under $100 — either new or used — and still capable of handling a decent gaming workload. This guide follows the same principles we used for our budget phone roundup: verified performance, realistic pricing, and devices that still hold up in 2025. Whether you’re gaming on Android, Windows, or even iOS, here are the tablets that punch above their weight class.

Android Tablets (Under $100)

💡 Pro Tip: Why choose Android? Android is the most flexible OS for emulation and casual gaming. It supports a wide range of emulators, touch controls, gamepads, and even PC-style launchers. Most apps are free or low-cost, and with some tuning, even older Android tablets can become solid retro gaming machines. Perfect if you want portability, cloud streaming, or a console-like setup on a budget. If you're new to Android emulation or gaming, check out our previous article on budget phones — the same setup methods apply here. We walk through controller pairing, emulator installs, and launcher recommendations for turning your tablet into a proper handheld console. 📖 Read the full Android buyer's guide here. LG G Pad 5 10.1 - Chipset: Snapdragon 821 - Why It Works: Despite its age, this tablet can handle PSP, GameCube, and even some PS2 games. - Extra Notes: 16:10 screen, large size, and good thermals. Well-supported in the emulation scene. - Comparable to: Galaxy S7 or LG V20. Close to a PS Vita in emulation strength but with a bigger screen. https://youtu.be/VEPSj137u70?list=PL-rpZgro9-ei0Itr2EjrU8VW6B_37iLpb Samsung Galaxy Tab S4 (60Hz display) - Storage: Supports microSD card expansion. - Chipset: Snapdragon 835 - Why It Works: More powerful than the G Pad 5 and supports Samsung DeX for a desktop-like interface. - Extra Notes: Comes with stylus support, great for multitasking too. Can handle light PS2 and some Wii. - Comparable to: Pixel 2 XL or OnePlus 5T. On par with a mid-tier Android handheld. https://youtu.be/4YrufSUaFqs

Windows Tablets (Under $100)

💡 Pro Tip: Why choose Windows? Windows tablets bring the power of a full desktop OS in a portable package. If you want to play classic PC games, run full-featured emulators like PCSX2 or Dolphin, or have access to Steam, a budget Windows tablet is a surprisingly capable option. Ideal for users who want flexibility, multitasking, and aren’t afraid of tweaking settings to optimize performance. Microsoft Surface Pro 5 - CPU: Intel Core i5-7300U - GPU: Intel HD 620 - Why It Works: Runs most emulators like Dolphin, PCSX2 (with tweaks), and even Steam games like Hollow Knight, Blur, and BlazBlue Entropy Effect. - Extra Notes: Still widely available. Tons of community support and accessories. - Comparable to: Entry-level gaming laptops from 2016–2017. Similar to a GPD Win 2 in emulation strength. https://youtu.be/YR07_mDMR_4 Acer Switch Alpha 12 - CPU: Intel Core i5-6200U - GPU: Intel HD 520 - Why It Works: Fanless, liquid-cooled, and performs similarly to the Surface Pro 5. Handles Blur and BlazBlue Entropy Effect with lowered settings. - Extra Notes: Underrated sleeper device. - Comparable to: Surface Pro 4 or GPD Win Max (first gen). https://youtu.be/QpXNw3QhM-w

iOS Tablets (Under $120)

💡 Pro Tip: Why choose iOS? iPads may be locked down compared to Android or Windows, but they’re incredibly efficient and smooth, even years later. With apps like Delta, DolphiniOS, and PPSSPP available via third-party stores, older iPads can make great low-maintenance emulation machines. A great option if you're already in the Apple ecosystem or want a reliable gaming and media tablet. iPad Pro 10.5″ (2017) (120Hz display, HDR support) - Chipset: A10X Fusion - Why It Works: Strong chip, 120Hz display, and great compatibility with iOS emulators. - Extra Notes: Can be found used/refurbished for under $120. - Comparable to: iPhone 8/X in performance. https://youtu.be/GHqRduXYnXw

Worth the Splurge: Premium Tablets That Deliver

These aren’t ultra-budget picks, but in the broader tech world, they’re still considered budget-friendly for the performance you get. If you’ve got some extra cash and want the smoothest Android gaming or emulation experience possible, these tablets are absolutely worth the investment. Some of these tablets have US variants but are significantly more expensive. Many of them can be found on AliExpress but beware of tariff upcharges if you live in the US. These tablets range from $200 to $300 USD. Lenovo Xiaoxin Pad Pro 2023 (120Hz display, HDR support) - Chipset: Snapdragon 870 - Why It Works: High-quality display, great speakers, and top-tier emulation support. - Extra Notes: Fantastic for heavier emulation — Switch, PS2, and GameCube. - Comparable to: POCO F4 or OnePlus 9R. Similar to the Ayn Odin 2 or Retroid Pocket 4 Pro. https://youtu.be/glKTga6U420 Lenovo Xiaoxin Pad Pro 2025 (144Hz display, HDR support, VRR) - Storage: Supports microSD card expansion. - Chipset: MediaTek Dimensity 9300 - Why It Works: Handles native Android games like FFVII: Ever Crisis and Solo Leveling: Arise with ease. Split-screen multitasking up to 4 apps. - Extra Notes: Better for mobile gaming than emulation. - Comparable to: Vivo X100. - Helpful Resource: Watch Litratoholik on YouTube for Xiaoxin 2025 tips. https://youtu.be/Z8VZrGvtWLM Lenovo Legion Y700 (2023) (144Hz display, HDR support, VRR) - Storage: Supports microSD card expansion. - Chipset: Snapdragon 8+ Gen 1 - Why It Works: Built specifically for gaming with great thermals and a compact 8.8" display. - Why This Model: Chosen over the newer version because it includes a microSD slot. - Comparable to: RedMagic 7S, Galaxy S22+. Emulation performance similar to Ayn Loki Mini Pro. https://youtu.be/IS1Jya7VmrY ALLDOCUBE iPlay60 Mini Turbo - Chipset: Snapdragon 6 Gen 1 - Why It Works: Compact, well-built, and runs Android gaming and PS2 emulation well. - Comparable to: Moto G Stylus 5G (2023). Great budget-friendly Legion Y700 alternative. - At the time of posting, the Alldocube iPlay 60 Mini Turbo is on sale for $169.00 https://youtu.be/_pgszR247uA

Final Tips

- Many tablets on this list support microSD card expansion. If you're gaming, go for an A2-rated card for faster read/write speeds and smoother app performance. Research and read reviews — you might find some hidden gems from reputable but lesser-known brands that perform just as well (or better) than the big names. - For Lenovo tablets like the Xiaoxin Pad Pro or Legion Y700, always buy the Chinese ROM version when possible. These typically come with unlocked bootloaders, better performance tuning, and faster updates. They include English by default — only choose Global ROM if you need other languages. 💡 Pro Tip: If your tablet is over 210mm wide, most telescopic controllers won’t fit. Consider a Bluetooth gamepad instead for a more flexible setup. - If you're looking for a deep dive into controller options, check out Game Tech Talk on YouTube — he covers everything from telescopic controllers to full setups for tablets and phones. - Look for listings on eBay, Mercari, Goodwill, or other refurbished marketplaces to get the best deal. No matter your budget, there's a tablet out there that can transform into a portable gaming powerhouse — you just have to know where to look. Whether you're diving into retro emulation, streaming modern titles, or squeezing every frame out of a classic like Valkyrie Profile 2: Silmeria, the right device can turn every spare moment into game time. With a little research, smart shopping, and maybe a dash of trial-and-error, you can build a setup that punches well above its price tag. So game on — and may your battery outlast your next boss fight. Quick Glossary VRR: Variable Refresh Rate — reduces screen tearing and stuttering. HDR: High Dynamic Range — improves contrast and color. A2-rated SD card: MicroSD cards optimized for faster app performance. Bootloader: Software that controls startup — unlocking it allows ROM flashing. Chinese ROM: Region-specific software version — usually better performance and update speed than global. Read the full article

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Duskfade Is a Love Letter to Classic 3D Platformers—with a Clockpunk Twist

Indie Action Platformer Duskfade just released their debut trailer, and I gotta say—it immediately gave me Kingdom Hearts vibes, in the best way. The floaty mid-air combos, magical finishers, and dramatic platforming all feel like a throwback, but with some fresh clockpunk flavor. You play as Zirian, a sword-wielding hero accompanied by his mechanical bird sidekick, Cuckoo. The goal? Rescue his sister and uncover the secrets of a world stuck in eternal night. Structurally, it’s classic: five regions branching from a central hub, each ending in a boss fight. But what makes Duskfade feel different is the way it leans into time as both a theme and mechanic.

Zirian’s sword is shaped like a clock hand and shifts forms on the fly—from a pendulum for overhead smashes to magical long-range attacks and a grappling hook for traversal. That, paired with fast rail segments and stylish acrobatics, makes the movement look really smooth. It’s got that flow you want in a game like this—go fast, look cool, keep moving. Visually, it’s not going for ultra-realism. It leans more into that dreamy, slightly surreal aesthetic you’d see in PS2-era platformers, with glowing architecture and soft lighting. Again, very Kingdom Hearts, especially in the way the environments feel designed to guide your eye and encourage movement. Whether the final game lives up to the promise is still a question—but I’m definitely keeping an eye on it. If you're into action platformers with big swings (literally and metaphorically), Duskfade might be one to watch. The announcement trailer is out now. Duskfade is slated for a 2026 release on PC and console. https://youtu.be/jHwe03bRGM4 Read the full article

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Gaming Handhelds Could Dodge Massive Tariffs in latest Executive Order

A major development from U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) is poised to impact the retro handheld gaming community in unexpected ways. As of April 5, 2025, a swath of consumer electronics has been granted tariff exemptions, rolling back the potential cost increases that had been looming over hobbyists and small importers alike. But what does this really mean for fans of retro handhelds?

Understanding the Policy Shift

Under Executive Order 14257, a wide net of tariffs had been cast in response to reciprocal trade actions. While many feared these changes would price out low-cost electronics—particularly retro gaming devices imported from China—CBP's latest announcement provides some needed clarity and relief. The exemptions now cover a variety of hardware components, including computers (HTSUS 8471), accessories and parts (HTSUS 8473.30), solid-state storage (HTSUS 8523.51.00), flat-panel displays (HTSUS 8528.52.00), and telecommunication devices (HTSUS 8517 series). If a retro handheld device or its components fall under one of these HTSUS classifications, they are now exempt from additional tariffs.

What This Means for Gaming in 2025

This could be a big win for both consumers and indie manufacturers. Many of the devices that populate the retro handheld scene—from Anbernic’s compact consoles to devices like the Retroid Pocket—leverage components such as ARM-based computing chips, solid-state memory, and integrated displays, all of which now benefit from the updated policy. However, this is not a blanket exemption. Devices must be accurately classified under the specific HTSUS codes to qualify. For small brands or importers, navigating the classification system can be tricky. There's still ambiguity about whether all retro handhelds are covered—especially those that resemble game consoles more than general-purpose computers. https://youtu.be/tI0pi-TlmaA

A Balancing Act

This development contrasts sharply with recent efforts to curb the use of the de minimis exemption, which previously allowed shipments under $800 to bypass tariffs altogether. That shift had put low-cost electronics at risk of becoming less accessible. With these new exemptions, however, it seems CBP is attempting to strike a balance between economic protectionism and consumer affordability.

The 2025 Handheld Landscape: What's Coming Next

With a surge of new handheld gaming devices hitting the market in 2025, the recent tariff exemptions from U.S. Customs and Border Protection arrive at a critical time. Under the new guidance, devices that incorporate components like CPUs, solid-state storage, and LCD panels—if properly classified under the updated HTSUS codes—can now enter the U.S. without facing the added cost of tariffs. This is particularly relevant for a wide range of upcoming handhelds. Leading the charge is the Nintendo Switch 2, set to release in June. It’s joined by an array of high-performance and enthusiast-focused devices, including the Retroid Pocket Flip 2, AYANEO 3, MSI Claw 8 AI Plus, Tencent’s “Sunday” handheld, and the AOKZOE A1X Power HX 370. Each of these systems relies heavily on the kinds of components now exempted, meaning their U.S. pricing could be more stable than previously expected. While classification remains key—devices marketed strictly as “game consoles” could still face duty—the new CBP guidance provides a clearer pathway for handheld PCs and hybrid gaming devices to avoid costly markups. https://youtu.be/itpcsQQvgAQ

Looking Ahead

For now, this is a moment of cautious optimism. If your favorite handheld brand sources its parts wisely—and classifies them correctly—these devices may remain affordable and accessible, even as trade policies continue to evolve. Are you relieved by the exemptions or still wary of future changes? Will this impact your plans to buy or import a handheld in 2025? Let us know in the comments below. Read the full article

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Don't Sleep on Iron Saga Vs

For those of you who listen to our podcast (and if you don’t, you should), you may remember a recent episode where we discussed indie fighting games and the unique challenges they face in the indie scene. Indie darlings pop up left and right, but rarely are they fighting games. The only one that really comes to mind is Skullgirls, and even that game’s popularity came in waves since its 2012 release. If you want, you can count Brawlhalla—but that’s up to you. Plenty have come out since then that, at best, saw brief success (Fantasy Strike, for example), only to quietly fade away. Why that is, who can say? Marketing? Disinterest? Maybe it’s just not Street Fighter? Whatever the reason, there's never been a better time for indie fighting games to step up and make a name for themselves. The major titles have divided fanbases, and people are hungry for something that scratches that classic itch. Enter Iron Saga VS. This game could be something big—or just another one for the pile GAMEPLAY Normally, I’d start with the story—but there isn’t one. So let’s jump into gameplay. This is a four-button fighter with traditional inputs and the strangest autocombo system I’ve ever seen. Typically, autocombos are performed by tapping a button repeatedly. Here, you tap and hold the button, then tap a direction to trigger the autocombo? I tried it but never really got the hang of it. Speaking of combos, this game doesn’t use chain combos. There's no ABC into whatever you want. Instead, the combo structure centers around links and target combos. So while you might look at it and think “anime fighter,” it actually feels much closer to Street Fighter. Learning what links into what takes time, but it’s essential if you want to do well. Another adjustment players may need to make: very few normals are special cancelable. This isn’t a game about long, flashy combos. Most combos boil down to a target combo that maybe links into a special move—and that’s it. There are some EX moves that allow for juggles or minor extensions, but overall, combos are short and sweet. That doesn’t mean they aren’t damaging, though. While not as explosive as some bigger titles, there are still characters who can take you out in 3–4 clean interactions. That said, those situations mostly came up when my opponent’s defense was off. Now, the game’s main draw: the Arsenal System. While the roster shows 12 characters, the Arsenal System essentially doubles that—25 if you count Getter Robo. Think of it like the Variation System from Mortal Kombat X. Each character has two arsenals, and these range from subtle tweaks to complete playstyle overhauls. One arsenal might shift a character from rushdown to zoning. Another might shore up a weakness, while a different one leans harder into their strengths. On paper, it sounds like a flexible way to change how each character plays. But the more you play, the more it becomes clear that some arsenals are objectively better. While some choices come down to preference, others are more like: “Do you want a bit of zoning and damage-over-time, or more mobility?” Some may debate that—but to me, the choice is obvious. As mentioned, there’s no story mode (yet). The devs say it’s coming. What is available now is the standard single-player suite: arcade mode with a few cutscenes per character, training mode, tutorial, combo trials, and Simulacrum Chronicle—basically arcade mode with score-based objectives. Not the worst set of offerings, but not exactly robust either. Multiplayer features are standard: lobbies by region, ranked, casual, and private matches. There’s also a Gachapon system for unlocking colors and icons using in-game currency. And I hate that. I don’t know when randomization became the go-to for rewards, but I wish developers would cut it out. Still, since you can’t spend real money on it, it’s tolerable. At the time of writing, casual and ranked modes are rough—not because they’re broken, but because no one’s playing them. All my matches came from lobbies and private rooms. The lack of crossplay is a huge oversight, especially today. And that’s a shame, because the rollback netcode is actually solid now. During the demo phase, the netcode was awful—worse than Street Fighter V by a mile. It’s since improved a lot, but now there aren’t enough players to appreciate it. Whether that’s due to poor matchmaking or a small playerbase, it’s a real issue. VISUALS Let’s talk aesthetics: the chibi art style takes some getting used to. For simpler designs like Mazinger and Getter Robo, it works fine. But characters like Qing Long or Nero—who have more angular or intricate designs—suffer a bit from being scaled down. Wu Shuang, who’s larger, does a better job of showing off his details, and I wish more characters got that treatment. Thankfully, this is more of an aesthetic gripe. It rarely affects readability in gameplay—attacks are generally well telegraphed and clear. Even if I’m not sold on the chibi look, I have to admit: the animation is impressive. It’s a stylized mix of 2D and 3D, and it feels like every limb was animated individually. It’s something you have to see in motion—it looked a little janky in trailers, but in person it’s incredibly fluid. The game is full of visual flourishes: motion blur, speed lines, trailing effects, and beautiful smear frames on slashes. It gets surprisingly close to replicating the look and feel of a mecha anime battle—without going full 3D. AUDIO The sound design is stellar. Hits feel heavy, like actual mechs brawling. Beams have punch. Sword slashes deliver that signature "shwing" (you know the one). And the pilots calling out attacks mid-fight? Chef’s kiss. It fully taps into the mech anime vibe, making you forget these are robots with people inside. This is how you do immersive sound design. The music, however, is... just okay. Most of it blends into the background—generic rock or electronic tracks, sometimes both. It’s not bad, but it rarely stands out. That might be a mixing issue, since the sound effects tend to overpower the music. I didn’t miss the soundtrack during fights, but I wish I remembered whole tracks instead of brief snippets. Except Getter Robo’s theme. You will hear that. It stands out in the best way, and I get the feeling the devs really, really like Getter Robo. CONCLUSION Iron Saga VS is a rock-solid indie fighter that I fear won’t get the recognition it deserves. I didn’t receive a review copy—I’m writing this because I genuinely want more people to give this game a shot. Especially if you're into traditional-feeling fighters or mecha anime. Yes, the game has a few hiccups and the online scene is limited. But what’s there is good. It’s held back mostly by the lack of crossplay. If that gets added, it could make a huge difference. For now, it’s a hidden gem. I don’t think it’ll reach the heights of Skullgirls, but I’d hate to see it fade into obscurity. https://youtu.be/buz-XEvUeko

Don’t sleep on this one. Read the full article

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Marvel's Cosmic Invasion Hits PC and Console Holiday 2025

After decades without a proper side-scrolling beat-'em-up from the House of Ideas, MARVEL Cosmic Invasion is stepping in to fill that cosmic-sized void—and it looks fantastic. Announced for PC and consoles with a release later this year, Cosmic Invasion throws players into a high-octane brawler where Earth’s mightiest heroes—and a few intergalactic ones—unite to stop Annihilus and the Annihilation Wave. From the streets of New York City to the alien chaos of the Negative Zone, players will punch, kick, and power-blast their way through beautifully animated stages inspired by Marvel’s sprawling universe. The playable roster includes fan favorites like Nova, Spider-Man, Wolverine, Phyla-Vell, and Captain America, with even more teased in the trailer. Each character brings their own flair and fighting style, promising a varied and fast-paced experience that recalls the golden age of arcade beat-’em-ups. If this feels like a spiritual successor to TMNT: Shredder’s Revenge, you’re not alone. It fits right in with the DotEmu-style revival of classic 2D brawlers—modernized just enough to feel fresh without losing that retro charm. For Marvel fans and arcade lovers alike, Cosmic Invasion looks like it’s shaping up to be a cosmic hit. Check out the announcement trailer below: https://youtu.be/19_uUhZsjsg Read the full article

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AI Limit Review – Accessible, Ambitious, and Rough Around the Edges

Platforms: PlayStation 5, Microsoft Windows Developer: SenseGames Co., Ltd. Publisher: Beijing CE-ASIA Genres: Action RPG Style: Anime, Post-Apocalyptic, Soulslike February 5, 2009 marked the beginning of what we would come to know as the Soulslike genre. Demon’s Souls may not be where the genre exploded in popularity, but it planted the seeds from which Dark Souls would grow—ushering in one of the most misunderstood genres in gaming. I say misunderstood because it’s rare to see other games truly capture what makes Dark Souls and FromSoftware titles so special. Many imitators misuse key elements like ambushes, difficulty, precise combat, and more—enough to fill an article on its own. That said, some games do get it right. Whether they understand what makes Souls games compelling or simply create something different yet still engaging, we occasionally see standout Soulslikes emerge. Enter AI Limit—a game that changes the formula in ways I suspect will be controversial. The question is: are these changes for better or worse? STORY The premise is intriguing. Society has collapsed due to an unknown event that wipes out most of humanity and creates a substance called the Mud. The Mud has rendered the land nearly uninhabitable, yet somehow edible—and what's left of humanity seeks Elysium in the last city still standing. You play as a Blade—eventually named Arrisa—an immortal android of unknown origin tasked with restoring the world and reviving mysterious "branches" scattered throughout. Along the way, you’ll face enemies ranging from strange aliens and bandits to robots and other Blades. On paper, this sounds like the setup for a gripping narrative. What is the Mud? Where did it come from? How does it poison the Earth but remain edible? Where did the Blades come from? You’ll ask a lot of questions—but answers are either cryptic or non-existent. That’s par for the course in Soulslikes, where storytelling leans heavily on environmental clues and vague NPC dialogue. But AI Limit's attempt at this just doesn’t hit the same. Arrisa is a blank slate. So much so, I almost wish she didn’t speak at all. Most of her lines are stiff and robotic—not in a compelling android way, but in a flat and disengaged way. “Arrisa, your job is to revive the branches throughout the world.” “The...branches?” That’s 90% of her dialogue. The other 10% isn’t much better—just less grating. Thankfully, the world itself makes up for her shortcomings. From sewer depths to cliffside towns and floating sky cities, the environments are visually interesting and beg exploration. Scattered notes and brief but poignant NPC encounters add texture to the world: a botanist who’s never seen a tree, a devout girl searching for her parents—fleeting but memorable moments. The story isn’t carried by its protagonist, but by the questions and ideas that linger as you journey through its 30 or so hours. GAMEPLAY Let’s get this out of the way: if you’re looking for a brutal Soulslike experience that’ll chew you up and spit you out, this isn’t it. AI Limit is probably one of the easiest Soulslikes out there—and honestly? That’s not a bad thing. It’s a solid answer to the age-old debate over whether Souls games need an easy mode. Instead of modifying the originals, just make a game that’s more accessible. That doesn’t mean AI Limit is a cakewalk—you’ll still die—but the stakes are much lower. So how does AI Limit achieve “Dark Souls, but easier”? First, there’s no stamina bar. You can swing and dodge to your heart’s content. For those who hate stamina bars (myself included), this is a breath of fresh air. Second, the game actually pauses. No more getting backstabbed while in the menu—it’s a proper pause. That might disrupt tension for some, but honestly, games should pause when you pause. Lastly, dying isn’t punishing. Instead of losing all your currency and scrambling to recover it, you just lose a small chunk of crystals (this game’s currency)—and you’ll likely make it back before long. But what’s the hook? Most Soulslikes need a gimmick or two to stand out. AI Limit’s main mechanic is the Sync Gauge. It fills as you attack, increasing your damage output. Spells consume Sync, and taking damage or spamming magic drains it. Let it hit zero, and you enter a weakened state. It’s a clean risk/reward system that encourages precision and discourages button-mashing. I like it a lot. Some bosses even have Sync Gauges of their own. Hammer them until their gauge drops and they’ll weaken—just like you. Another mechanic is your morphing left hand, which gains abilities like dashing and shielding. But the MVP is the Counter Field, which you get from the start. A perfect parry puts enemies into a stunned state, while a less perfect one still deals chip damage. Once mastered, it makes the game significantly easier—even trivial in some boss fights. The core combat is fun, especially for those seeking a more forgiving experience. Without stamina, you can swing freely. The only limiter is the Sync Gauge. You’ll collect a variety of weapons, each with their own feel and special attacks tied to Sync. Greatswords are heavy and sweeping; fists are quick, flashy, and surprisingly strong due to their high hit rate. You can even combo between two equipped weapons mid-fight. Veteran Souls fans may find it too easy—almost like baby’s first Soulslike—but that accessibility is a strength, not a flaw. You can dodge-roll freely (unless the camera betrays you), and while enemies still hit hard, there’s a clear sense that the game wants you to succeed. VISUALS I’m a fan of the anime art style, but enemy design is hit-or-miss. The more monstrous enemies are visually compelling and appropriately grotesque. Others are just “guy in rags” or “robot.” The art direction is strong, but the designs aren’t always memorable—even by its own standards. Environments, on the other hand, sell the post-apocalyptic atmosphere well. From desert ruins to weathered cities buried in Mud, it’s immersive and often beautiful. Sometimes you’ll want to stop and take in the landscape—when the environment isn’t glitching out. Unfortunately, stability is a real issue. No crashes on my end, but I did encounter plenty of jank: missing sound effects, textures failing to load, buildings flickering, enemies turning invisible post-respawn (but their weapons didn’t—so there’s that). These bugs break immersion and, occasionally, gameplay. Hopefully they’re patched soon, but they’re hard to ignore. AUDIO I couldn’t name a single track from this game. The music is ambient and inoffensive, but forgettable. That said, the sound design itself is impressive. A standout moment involved avoiding a sniper mid-fight. A sound cue warned me just before the shot landed, allowing me to dodge. Details like the bubbling Mud when you die or the scrape of metal-on-metal during combat elevate the experience. Explosions are a bit weak, but that’s a nitpick. What isn’t a nitpick is the voice acting. Performances range from lifeless to bizarrely over-the-top. Arrisa’s monotone delivery doesn’t do her character any favors. Yes, she’s an android—but there’s a way to deliver robotic lines with depth. This ain’t it. No standout performances here, just a spectrum from “serviceable” to “please stop talking.” Thankfully, dialogue is sparse—but it still makes some cutscenes rough. CONCLUSION As Soulslikes go, AI Limit makes bold choices that help it stand apart. That’s a good thing. Hardcore fans may find it lacking, but those curious about the genre—or intimidated by its difficulty—will find a more approachable experience here. Removing stamina and allowing pausing might feel like heresy to purists, but for others, it's the breath of fresh air they’ve been waiting for. AI Limit feels like a wishlist of changes from players who just want a more casual Soulslike—and it largely succeeds. It’s fun, fast, engaging thanks to the Sync Gauge, and a great entry point to the genre. The story stumbles, the voice acting is rough, and the bugs need fixing—but ultimately, AI Limit is a Soulslike I’d recommend to anyone who wants something cool with a bit of challenge. Just be warned: if this game gets you hooked on Soulslikes... the others won’t be nearly as kind. https://youtu.be/KNgWRjGZHAw Read the full article

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Atelier Yumia: A Giant Leap Forward for the Series

Atelier Yumia continues the beloved tradition of Gust’s long-running alchemy RPG series, blending deep crafting mechanics, charming characters, and an immersive world. However, this entry takes a unique approach by exploring themes of prejudice and history, all while refining the series' signature mechanics. Does it successfully balance these elements? Let’s dive in. Title: Atelier Yumia: The Alchemist of Memories & the Envisioned Land  Platforms: Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X and Series S, Microsoft Windows, Xbox One Series: Atelier Genres: Role-playing video game Developers: Gust, Koei Tecmo Games Publishers: Koei Tecmo Games, KOEI TECMO AMERICA Corporation Style: Anime, Bishoujo Mahou, Slice of Life Story At the heart of Atelier Yumia is a mystery-driven narrative that unfolds in a world where alchemy is seen as a forbidden and dangerous art. Yumia Liessfeldt, the game’s protagonist, embarks on a journey to uncover the truth behind the fall of the Aladissian Empire and the stigma surrounding alchemy. The game strikes a great balance between its mystery-driven plot and the slice-of-life charm that the Atelier series is known for. Fans of the PS2-era Atelier games will feel right at home, while newer players accustomed to the Rorona and Ryza games will still find plenty of heartwarming and lighthearted moments. Yumia is an excellent protagonist—brave, inquisitive, and a bit brash, but still grounded. She’s capable from the start, avoiding the more naive or ditzy archetypes that some past Atelier heroines have embodied. Among the supporting cast, Viktor von Duerer stands out with his rigid, uptight demeanor, which gradually softens as he grows throughout the story. The character arcs are engaging, and watching people overcome their prejudices against alchemy adds meaningful depth to the game’s narrative. Visuals & Presentation Graphically, Atelier Yumia follows the Ryza-era aesthetic, but with improved animation, movement, and visual effects. Traversal feels smooth and natural, which is important because the game leans into a more open-world design. The lighting effects during alchemy sequences are particularly stunning, making crafting feel more magical and immersive. Character designs also continue the Ryza influence, with Yumia’s magic-school look and Viktor’s military-academy uniform creating a striking contrast. These strong visual choices help define their personalities even before they speak. Gameplay & Exploration Alchemy remains relatively unchanged from previous games—each component affects the final item’s quality, element bonuses, and additional effects. The game does a great job explaining the system, and for those who prefer a streamlined experience, a guided alchemy option is available. Combat has fully transitioned to action-based mechanics, with cooldowns for attacks, a dodge and parry system, and a focus on quick decision-making. The dodge feels smooth and responsive, while the parry mechanic is rewarding but can be tricky to master. Players are encouraged to use the best option for each moment, whether that’s dodging, blocking, or switching to ranged attacks. Exploration is a major highlight. Walking on foot feels great, and the varied environments make the world fun to traverse. The game includes ziplines, a motorcycle, and some light climbing mechanics, making movement feel dynamic. While fast travel is available, the world is rewarding enough that players will want to explore naturally. Sound & Voice Acting The soundtrack is strong across the board, though no individual track stands out as a defining theme. Still, the music complements the game perfectly. The Japanese voice acting is well done, with Yumia’s performance being particularly strong. While there’s no English dub, the expressiveness of the cast helps bring the characters to life. Sound design also shines, with environmental effects, combat sounds, and alchemy audio cues blending seamlessly into the experience. Conclusion Atelier Yumia successfully blends old and new, appealing to classic Atelier fans while incorporating modern refinements. The engaging story, fluid combat, gorgeous visuals, and fun traversal mechanics make it one of the most polished entries in the series. While some elements, like the parry system and zipline accessibility, could use slight refinements, the overall package is a fantastic and rewarding experience for both long-time fans and newcomers alike.

Video Review

https://youtu.be/07O8MDYtEoc Review copy of the game was provided by the publisher Read the full article