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thatgamefromthatad · 3 years

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3 more games like Merge Mansion - the genre is evolving!

More and more games like Merge Mansion (two-item merge games) are being released and I can hardly keep up, but I’m glad because I find this genre so satisfying! Here I’ll review three more relatively new games, which are all unique in that they break off quite a bit from the original Merge Mansion, and include their own mechanics not seen in the other Merge Mansion-esque games I’ve covered!

You can see my original Games like Merge Mansion review here, although it’s quite outdated as many of those games have made significant changes since I wrote that in early March. I’ll try to add some updates to the original post sometime in the near future to better reflect that current status of each of those games. You can also find links to the other two-item merge games I’ve previously reviewed in my final ranking at the end!

Read my full reviews of Plantopia, Merge Adventure and City Boom below:

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Plantopia: Merge Garden (Early Access)

Developer: Voodoo

Release Date: May 7, 2020 (Early Access)

This game is an interesting one because I only found it recently and started seeing ads for it recently although it’s apparently been around for about a year. I’m thinking it was soft launched and only recently made available in my region. The title screen indicates it’s still early access so that would make sense.

An initial release/soft launch date of May 2020 would actually make it older than Merge Mansion, which I believe was released in Sept. 2020. However I’m not sure about the exact timeline as they could have been in development/soft launched around the same time and the games are actually quite different overall so the basic similarities could be a coincidence.

This game truly amazed me because although it has the basic elements of what I would consider a Merge Mansion-like game, that being the two-item merge mechanic on a two-dimensional grid-like board viewed from the top, with item generators and item collection objectives, it’s otherwise very different from the other two-item merge games I’ve played. There are at least three separate boards, possibly more considering the tool shed and flower lab unlock a bit later in the game, and instead of completing objectives by getting items right off the board, you use items from the greenhouse and tool shed boards to start growing plants and then harvest the resources. The flower lab adds an additional step, as you can take the plants you’ve harvested to that board and merge them further to create bouquets and oils etc.

This game is probably the most complex and challenging out of all the two-item merge games I’ve played, which I think makes it more fun but less relaxing. Basically if I want something to play mindlessly while chilling out and watching YouTube videos I would play Merge Mansion or Merge Friends, but when I want to play something more advanced and for a longer period of time I play Plantopia.

🌼 Art: 3/3 (although I mostly prefer all 2D art, this game does the 3D/2D mixture better than some other games and I just love the colors and style of the different plants, boards and products. It all feels very “cottagecore” as the kids these days would say lol. The 2D character designs are also OK and pretty cute)

🌼 Story: 2/3 (it’s definitely a step above the “moving into this old mansion with my grandparents” story, I did get to know the characters a little better and some of the objectives are plot-related, such as growing aloe to help another character with his sunburn, or growing a special flower that reminds another character of her late husband etc. But I wasn’t really feeling like I wanted to learn more, and the storyline didn’t have a huge influence on my overall experience)

🌼 Gameplay: 5/5 (definitely the strongest game in terms of gameplay in my opinion, like I said it is more challenging and there’s more to think about but it makes for a really fun and varied experience!)

🌼 Variety: 2/3 (although there are three whole boards and you unlock different plants as you go along, there isn’t as much variety in the merging part since you basically just merge seeds into sprouts, sprouts into younger plants etc. until you have the full plant to place in a plot. You know exactly what you’re merging up to and there’s no thrill of discovering a new item by merging up. The items also come from boxes or from preset, unmovable generators so there’s no fun in discovering new generators either. But it is cool that each plant has its own planting requirements like more water, more fertilizer, more light etc.)

🌼 Playtime vs. Wait Time: 4/4 (another huge advantage of this game, there’s no energy system so you can play for very long, the only time constraint is waiting for plants to grow)

🌼 Overall Enjoyment: 4/5 (I’m definitely very impressed with this game but the things I mentioned in the Variety section are probably the biggest thing that prevents me from giving it a 5/5 overall. It is exciting when you unlock something new by progressing through the game but I especially enjoy moving up item ranks and discovering new generators, so in that area this game didn’t really do it for me. But otherwise it’s really a great game and a very unique entry within this genre!)

🌼 Total: 20/23

Merge Adventure - Dragons!

Developer: Ludigames

Release Date: March 25, 2021

First of all, even though the full name of this game includes the word dragons, I haven’t seen a single dragon unless one was mentioned in the written adventure logs, which I don’t usually read.

With that out of the way, this is another very unique game in terms of merge games as it is also an RPG. Some of the items you merge on the board are used to equip your hero, while others are used to unlock new adventures that yield different loot upon completion. You don’t actually get to engage in battles since the adventures themselves run on an idle system where you just get an adventure log to read to how your hero is doing and then collect the loot after a certain period of time. It is definitely something new for two-item merge games and deserves credit for the unique concept, but execution-wise it unfortunately fell short in a lot of ways.

🗡 Art: 1/3 (the art here isn’t necessarily awful but it is on the uglier side compared to a lot of the other games in this genre, specifically the board pieces. Maybe I’m biased because I prefer fun and colorful items, and these items involve a lot of wood and metal and such, but the board often seems so monochrome I can’t even tell certain items apart or remember which item track they belong to. Some of the level 1 items are just differently-shaped scraps of metal. The hero design isn’t bad but I only have one character to base that opinion on. We’ll get to that later)

🗡 Story: 2/3 (I honestly can’t remember if there’s an overarching plot but I will give it a point for the adventure logs, even though I usually don’t read them, it is cool that you can read what your character’s doing and how they obtained the loot they ultimately bring back)

🗡 Gameplay: 2/5 (I want to give it more points for being unique but despite the interesting concept I did have trouble with the gameplay. First of all, it has one of the smallest boards out of all the games I’ve played and a lot of different generators, which guarantees your board will become clogged very quickly. The numbers in the corners of each tile are supposed to help you keep track of what level items you have I presume, but they only make an already cluttered board look more cluttered, and the fact that I already couldn’t tell some of the item designs apart means having all the items crowded and jumbled makes for a very confusing and frustrating experience. Getting new items through loot from adventures seemed cool but then led to more frustration with more items to squeeze onto my fully packed board. Also I have no clue how to get more heroes, I’ve only had one this whole time playing so far, so there’s not much more to the RPG experience other than equipping more powerful items)

🗡 Variety: 2/3 (technically there’s a wide variety of items but as mentioned previously the very monochrome nature of the items makes the experience feel less varied and you can barely enjoy discovering new items when you’re just trying to find space on the board 90% of the time. Also, most of the item tracks just go: item, bigger item, bigger fancier item, biggest fanciest item, or, piece of item, more pieces of item, mostly put-together item, fully assembled item)

🗡 Playtime vs. Wait Time: 1/4 (your time is limited by the energy system, generators needing to refill AND waiting for your hero to return from an adventure)

🗡 Overall Enjoyment: 2/5 (sadly I didn’t really enjoy this game, although I guess my favorite part would be merging up weapons and other equippable items to make my hero more powerful, which isn’t something I could really do in any of these other games)

🗡 Total: 10/23

City Boom

Developer: Playwind Ltd.

Release Date: April 9, 2021

This game is very interesting as it’s the only merge game I’ve personally played that has you compete against other players. This game actually works pretty much exactly like a game I played loooooong ago called Coin Masters, where you gain coins by attacking or raiding other people’s bases while spending coins to build up your own base. The main difference here of course is that the other way to get coins is to merge items and complete requests, while in Coin Masters it was like a slot machine thing. I checked and they are not made by the same developer.

Anywho, the multiplayer aspect of this game was exciting since I definitely have a competitive streak, and I’ve been playing every day to try and climb up the leaderboard (I’m in the top 1,000 so far lol!) However this game is still new and pretty wonky, and it aggressively tries to get you to buy things, much more than any of the other two-item merge games. Also, this game is one of those games that’s very reliant on a constant internet connection so if you don’t have great internet (which I don’t) you will have a lot of issues with the game freezing, just a heads up.

💰 Art: 3/3 (I got to admit I’m a sucker for the cute, colorful and cartoony, and I just can’t get enough of the silly little cats in this game 😂 I appreciate that the 3D art style in this game is very consistent in all parts of the game, and this game also has 3D animated sections: for example, when you go to attack another player a cat rolls up in a little tank and rockets fly around)

💰 Story: 2/3 (there isn’t really a linear story but I give it a point for the different themed areas you progress through as you grow your town, plus the personality put into the cat characters)

💰 Gameplay: 3/5 (I do enjoy this game, especially the fact that I get to compete against other players, but there are a few issues. This game has a lot of limited time events, there’s seriously like 2 or 3 running at a time and seem to change every day, which does add some fun and variety, but creates a unique problem of having event-specific items on the board that I don’t know what to do with when the event ends. I don’t know if that event will come back again or if those items are just completely useless and should be sold now. Currently they’re just keeping my board very clogged. Also, this game really aggressively pushes overpriced microtransactions, which can get very annoying, but I will say that I was still able to play and enjoy the game a fair amount without paying anything. Lastly, the items make a really off putting clunk sound when they merge. May not seem important but it makes the merges less satisfying for me personally)

💰 Variety: 2/3 (There is a variety of event items but as far as the main items there’s very little variety, basically just four categories of items, so I put this in the middle)

💰 Playtime vs. Wait Time: 2/4 (what I like is that there are a lot of chances to get extra energy but what I don’t like is that rather than having energy refresh one at a time every few minutes, you have to wait like half an hour for all the energy to refill at once)

💰 Overall Enjoyment: 4/5 (honestly despite all my criticisms of it I kept coming back to this game, I really enjoy the competitive aspect and none of the problems with it are to the point where it seriously impedes my ability to play. That’s why I kind of have a separate category for overall enjoyment to begin with, because even if a game scores well or poorly in specific categories that won’t necessarily reflect my overall experience)

💰 Total: 16/23

Rankings

Plantopia (scored the same as Travel Town but after playing Travel Town for a while I’ve gotten more bored with it. Plantopia is the new reigning champion! 🎉)

Travel Town

Merge Design

Mergedom: Home Design

Merge Friends

Miss Merge

Merge Mansion

City Boom (scored the same as Merge Mansion but I preferred it less)

Merge Life (note: the linked review is outdated as the game has undergone a lot of updates since I wrote it, I will update it at some point but take the current version with a grain of salt)

Merge Matters

Merge Villa

Merge Adventure (scores the same as Merge Villa but I think I was a little harsh on Merge Villa to begin with, this game is much less playable)

Thank you so much for reading!!! I hope these reviews helped you if you enjoy merge games as much as I do! 💖 You can find more of my full game reviews here and follow me for more stuff about mobile games. Have a great day 🥳

#mobile games #merge games #plantopia #gardening games #merge mansion #merge adventure #city boom #rpg #mass multiplayer games #cat games #full review #casual games #weapons tw #image descriptions in alt text

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mamthew · 4 years

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Been playing the Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles remaster some since it dropped, and I have some thoughts on it. It’s been a…really long time since I last played the original, and I never was able to get too far in, since I was so new to video games that I was unable to intuit most of its mechanics. Despite this, I fell in love with the game. For quite some time, it was the only game with “Final Fantasy” in the title that I had played. I played, enjoyed, and beat its three sequels: Echoes of Time, Ring of Fates, and The Crystal Bearers (neither of the My Life As spinoffs, but eh).

This remaster is not a good remaster, but mostly not for the reasons I’ve seen put forth online. The developers didn’t do much to improve the visuals, sure, but honestly the art direction of the game was pretty enough anyway that it skates by on that alone. The load screens are not nearly as long as I’d been led to believe. The gameplay is unchanged from the original, and like…I like the gameplay of the original? That’s why I played the remaster? I want to play the game?

My biggest issue with the remaster is how the online is handled, but reviewers have straight up lied about problems with the online? Like…you have a permanent friend code you can give people. The temporary online codes you can generate are different from the permanent one. Why are reviewers saying your online code changes every 30 minutes and you can’t save permanent friends when that’s demonstrably false? Seems like a thing you maybe shouldn’t be writing in your official review.

I’m going to put my own issues with the online aside for a moment, though. I promise we’ll come back to it, but my issues with the remaster are only understood in the larger context of what the game did as a piece of art and what it no longer does now as a result of the changes. First, then, we’ve got to lay down what Crystal Chronicles did as a piece of art. Crystal Chronicles, I’ve come to realize during this playthrough, is a game about storytelling as collective memory, and much of the game’s mechanics work in service to this theme.

In the world of the game, something happened long ago that released poisonous miasma into the air and made much of the world uninhabitable to the four major races. The game follows the players’ customized characters as they take annual pilgrimages to collect enough “myrrh” from magical trees, which is used to maintain the barrier that keeps their town safe from the miasma. The game is broken up into years; it takes four drops of myrrh to maintain the barrier for a year, each dungeon’s tree only provides one drop of myrrh, and it takes several years for a tree to replenish that drop, pushing the characters’ caravan further and further out each year in search of trees that are not yet spent.

I’ve compared this setting to Death Stranding a few times in the past, and I think the comparison holds up. The game’s story has only gained something from the current moment, too. I go out and risk myself to get groceries, which I then bring back home so I can continue to hole up safe in quarantine until I run low again, and I think the game fairly accurately simulates the rise and fall of that pattern, the balance of risk and safety, and the way the dangerous unknown eventually becomes the mundane with time. Most of the locations in the game are old products of civilization that have been lost to nature, and walking through former farmland, abandoned roads, and empty towns in the game do remind me of walking down empty city streets back when coronavirus was still keeping people off city streets.

The game has several stories running in tandem, but the most central one is the ongoing story of the characters’ caravan, chronicled in a journal. After every new encounter, new area, or completed dungeon, a new entry is added to the journal, and at the end of the year, all the entries are incorporated into a cutscene, so the player can read them and relive the year’s events. The entries are very short and written in a simple style, but they still give the player an idea of how their character viewed the events. These end-of-year cutscenes are actually really enjoyable little rituals, and I’ve been avoiding reading the journal entries specifically so I can experience them for the first time in these retrospectives.

As the years progress, the character’s entries show that their memories of earlier years are fading. “Whenever I close my eyes, I vividly remember all my adventures,” says the entry at the end of the first year. By the end of the fourth year, however, “so many memories from my earlier adventures have dimmed, from the joys of chance encounters to the suspense of my first battles.” The entries also show the ways the annual pilgrimages have changed the player character. “It was an easy fight, so I spent a peaceful interlude over a light meal,” says an entry after revisiting an older dungeon. “I was a little surprised. I never considered myself a fighter.”

The written and oral records of the past permeate this game in so many ways. Before each dungeon, a narrator who is presumably another caravanner who went to the same places in the past introduces the location with either a history of the place or an anecdote about the place. The Mushroom Forest, to her, evokes a childhood memory of her mother. She introduces the Veo Lu Sluice by explaining the history of who built the sluice, what conditions allowed for its construction, and what its irrigation has done for the people since. After each dungeon, the player character receives a letter from a family member, telling them what has been happening in the town while they were away. At the beginning of each new year, the town’s patriarch tells your character a story about the previous caravanner, who mysteriously disappeared after announcing he had found a way to remove the miasma entirely.

It feels like history, generally, has been put on hold. The Lilty military once dominated most of the world, but had to shrink back into their capital city due to the miasma, and the city eventually diminished to a small trading post. The Yukes once were at war with the Lilties, but they’ve allowed trade between their towns again, so caravans can have safe havens to stay in while collecting the precious myrrh. The once-nomadic Selkies were unable to find a new homeland before the miasma spread, and now most are stuck on an island that was supposed to be a temporary stop. We hear much of this history throughout the game, but we don’t see any of it. It’s recorded and known but has little bearing on the culture or lived experiences of the inhabitants of a world where no one can leave their homes.

The moogle adventurer Stiltzkin asks the player character where memories go once they’ve been forgotten, and it’s a fair question in a world where everyone is as alienated from the past as they are from each other

The problem is, this isn’t supposed to be a game about alienation, exactly. It’s supposed to be a game about shared experiences and the ways we experience and remember the same events differently, as different individuals. It’s supposed to be a game about combatting alienation through shared experience. This is supposed to be a game in which I share a screen with three other players even as we each also have our own personal screens providing us with different objectives and showing us different letters from our different families. In the original game, the multiplayer was devilishly difficult to actually set up, as each player had to have their own Gameboy Advance, attached to the Gamecube and used as a controller, to control their own character. The players’ characters lived in the same town and were on the same caravan together but competed over who unlocked which powerups and picked up which recipes, meaning everyone’s stat spread and armor was different. Players had slightly different experiences within the larger shared story, and the use of the Gameboy Advances were meant to highlight those differences.

Which leads to my issue with this remaster. In the original, characters were saved to the same file, and every player’s character lived together in the same town. Their families each had different houses in the towns and would eventually provide the party with different supplies, depending on their jobs and the responses they received to their letters. At the end of each dungeon, the player characters would sit together in a circle and each receive a letter from their families. At the end of each year, the retrospective cutscene showed the characters and their families celebrating their return together. Your characters explored towns together, and your fellow players watched the random encounter cutscenes with you.

In this game, you can’t play local multiplayer at all. You can only play online multiplayer in dungeons, and clearing a dungeon with other players only counts towards the host’s file. At the end of each dungeon, the characters sit in a circle as the mail moogle tells all but the host that there is no mail for them. At the end of each year, the retrospective cutscene shows an almost entirely empty town; the character and his immediate family dance alone. Certain secrets have now been relegated to the single-player experience only, and the minigames you could unlock and play with friends were removed entirely. Towns are also exclusively single-player. The game is no longer a shared multiplayer experience so much as a dungeon-crawler where friends and strangers can jump into dungeons to offer brief help.

This creates a strange two-minded state of play, where I see and remember the vestiges of the game that once was while playing a game that’s in thematic opposition to it. As my character explores Tida Village and sees signs of the population that once lived there, I play this remaster and see leftovers from now-removed game mechanics. It’s a deeply unsettling and alienating experience.

The online isn’t inherently bad, then. It reminds me of FFXIV, where dungeons and bosses are their own separate experiences, removed from the rest of the game. But this online is inherently unsuited to the game it is in. Crystal Chronicles is not FFXIV; the developers put together a system of online play for a different game than the one they were remastering.

It would have been possible to change the game to suit this online system, too! The journal entries for dungeons could have also included the names of players who joined them for those dungeons. The online players could have still received letters, but from the host character’s family, thanking them for keeping their loved one safe. New random encounters could have been added between different online caravans, allowing them to trade items or play minigames with one another. The party at the end of the year could have included the families of randomly selected online companions These changes could have could have given us a synthesis of the old and new, and helped to center the chronicles over the crystals.

Instead, though, we have this incredibly flawed remaster, after almost a year of delays, that serves more as an empty reminder of what the game once was instead of actually allowing us to experience that game, or instead of, god forbid, actually building on that game’s premises and promises. I’m still enjoying the game a lot, but the experience is hella soured by my knowledge of how the game used to play. I’m not sure how enjoyable this remaster would even be to someone unfamiliar with the original.

This remaster feels like a purposeful nail in the coffin of Crystal Chronicles; an excuse to show that the franchise is no longer a potential seller. Whether that’s its actual intent doesn’t really matter, though, since I fear that will be its ultimate effect either way.

#Final Fantasy #final fantasy crystal chronicles #ffcc

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migstheruler · 4 years

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PLaystation 5 Event

initially great, despite the horrible pre-orders ordeal.

On Sept. 16, 2020, Sony pulled back the curtain on another slew of details regarding the PS5.

1. The PlayStation 5 releases on November 12th, 2020 in Japan, Mexico, Australia, New Zealand, South Korea, and the United States (why these states, only Sony knows even though I think it’s because of their distinct market in each of these countries).

2. The PlayStation 5 releases everywhere else on November 19, 2020.

3. The PlayStation 5 launches at $399.99 for the digital edition and $499.99 for the disc-based edition.

*IF backward compatibility with the PS4 is important to you, I’d recommend the disc-based PS5. Sony execs have confirmed 99% of PS4 games are compatible with their new Flagship console.

The event also gave us a look into some new games coming to the PS5 for launch as well as games we can expect during the first year of the PlayStation 5’s life cycle. Honestly tho, I think some of those games indicating they were launching during 2021 is a lie. You mean to tell me you’re going to launch Horizon, God of War 2, Final Fantasy 16 all in one year…..really… If these games were dique going to launch in 2021, you would think they would have had at least a working demo or something, instead of a teaser trailer with the games logo…but I digress, I’ll touch on this later.

Below are a few games showed that caught my eye and I just had to write about them.

Overall, Sony’s PS5 presentation was a good one, with all the information we as consumers were asking for since June and 10/10 would watch again (I’ve seen the presentation 4 times already (twice to write this piece 😊)).

The presentations started with a trailer showing a slew of different games coming to the PlayStation five system, most games we covered in https://migstheruler.com/post/620830163010240512/ps5-reveal-event but just when you thought this was another trailer, boom!!!

Final Fantasy 16

A nice mix of old and new: as if the folks from Final Fantasy 11 and 12 made a 15 esque type game.

Shiva the ice goddess is back, and looking deadlier than ever throwing out chilly ice crystals sure to cause anyone level seven frostbite

Who´s a good boy? This little pup looks ready to be pet and given treats.

It looks like our trusty steeds the Chocobos are back, hopefully, they are more useful this time around )I’m looking at you final fantasy seven episode one)

Marlboros are looking as menacing as ever.

Final Fantasy 16 was pretty unexpected to be honest, especially given final fantasy seven episodes one releasing a few months ago. However, it’s a nice surprise to see Square Soft jk Square Enix working on a new Final Fantasy game, especially one that likes to expand upon the action RPG elements (Think kingdom hearts series or final fantasy 15 and even 7). Aesthetically, this is giving me hardcore fantasy elements with realism thrown in there.

Either way, what a great way to start off the presentation.

Spiderman Miles Morales:

Next up, Sony gives us a seven-minute look into Spiderman Miles Morales, which expands upon 2018’s PS4 Spiderman. Sony has said this is not a direct sequel but instead a look to further expand upon the world through the eyes of Miles Morales. The graphics and presentation of this game are sure to entice any spiderman man. The lighting coupled with Mile’s powers makes this game a visual PS5 treat.

Last time we saw Miles, he had just shown Peter Parker he too had powers to which Peter Parker joined him upon the ceiling, it was a bonding moment the two spider-men would have. Fast forward maybe a year (I’m not sure how much time has passed since the last spiderman game) we are thrusted into the shoes of Miles Morales.

“Mom I��m home” Can we take a moment to appreciate my man’s line up here, dam that shit looks crispy.

Walking through Harlem, music playing, and folks dancing Salsa in the street. I’m not going to lie, this made me cheese from ear to ear.

This is what I expect to encounter when I have to mediate between clients ready to rip each other apart in a gory fashion (above).

Okay, knowing how strong spiderman is, I fully expect the dude’s Jaw to be broken after this power punch.

I forgot to mention (above) Miles can turn Invisible and has access to electric powers (below) sure to spruce up and affect the way Miles plays. I can only imagine a focus less on gadgets and more of an emphasis on Miles’ powers.

Although I know this game stars a new spiderman aka Miles Morales, the developers sure are making sure we know we’re not playing with Peter Parker anymore.

“Insert obligatory spiderman being pulled from different directions trope here” I’m not even going to front; this image is pretty cool.

Lastly, how dope is this launch title? It is one of the first games I plan to beat on my PS5.

- I do want to say one thing regarding this title. I think it’s pretty great from a representation perspective to see a Black and Puerto Rican spiderman. Representation matters. I’m not Puerto Rican but am Latino and I do appreciate the flags littered throughout the trailer, folks dancing salsa and overall, Miles Morales as a character.

One gripe I have with this game unfortunately is Sony’s anti-consumer stance regarding those that purchased 2018’s Spiderman. Folks that purchase the Deluxe Spiderman Miles Morales edition for $79.99 get both Spiderman Miles Morales and a supped-up version of 2018’s spiderman for the PS5, yet Sony hasn’t extended an olive branch to those of us that supported their 2018 game (even making it one of their best sellers). IF you want to play Spiderman Miles Morales, you can cop it for a cool $49.99 which is dope but doesn’t include any type of upgrade for those of us with the PS4 version of spiderman. Honestly, as someone that doesn’t plan on playing the game again but it’s pretty anti-consumer to not even offer some type of benefit to those PS4 supporters. Here’s to hoping they offer some type of upgrade via a patch to the PS4 spiderman.

· Turns out the game will run natively better on the PS5 given the consoles superior power but for a truly next gen 2018 Spiderman experience, you gotta pay those $69.99 duckats.

Looks Like we’re going back to Hogwarts and I’m not talking about Fantastic Beasts or Harry Potter. We received our first look (aside from the leak that was released last year). In Hogwarts Legacy, we go back to the late 1800s to visit the Wizards of the Waverly place (I think I said this right, I’ve only seen the Harry Potter movies once all the way through). Either way, it looks like they managed to capture the magic of Hogwatz. The walls of Hogwarts look alive, books flying all over the place and magic spewing from cauldrons of unknown potions.

Our journey begins going back to Hogwarts with a cool looking Owl to boot.

The sorting hat is back babi, it seems like this is a create your own character adventure, where we as the player will get to customize our very own character, sure to get into whatever wizardly fun is to be found. Team Slytherin all day!! JK, I’m team Gryffindor babi. But really tho, I have no idea what school I’d be assigned too.

In both of these pictures, its quite remarkable the little details you see; the more you look, the more you see. Did you see the candles above, or the candlelight below

Looks like our boys are cooking up work in the kitchen aka cauldron. I’d also like to bring attention to the lighting, truly impressive. Time to eat some delicious grub with my fellow wizards!! (Below)

Looks like we’ll be facing a litany of different monsters and foes. I know with my Avada Kedavra, I’ll be blasting fools like the one below away.

Dam son, we fighting Dragons out here too, sheesh.

Looks like combat will be a big portion of gameplay as the video showed of a created character fighting some pretty large beasts.

Looks like we’ll be playing quidditch in this game, and I honestly can’t wait.

I sure do hope we’re able to feed these little cuties and pet them.

Looks like this game is open world, as the characters are seen flying on Griffins across the vista. They draw distances in this game are spectacular.

Hogwarts Legacy launches in 2021.

*JK Rowling has no involvement with this game and that’s a good thing given her recent problematic statements.

Demon Souls

Full disclosure, I bought demon souls for the PS3 back in the day but unfortunately, did not stick with the game. It was fun and I would proceed to play other From Software and souls genre games in the future such as Sekiro, Bloodborne and Nioh to name a few. But here we have Bluepoint games remaking the PS3 Cult Classic and precursor to the Souls Genre. I for one am super excited to jump back in and try my hand again at Demon Souls.

This place here is the game’s main hub that allows you to access other portions of the world map. IT’s nice to see it in all it’s HD Glory.

Our Player is borne anew: Rise from your grave!!! JK, this isn’t a Sega title.

The environments look super luscious and literal indistinguishable from concept art. The leaves, lighting, and armor are truly a beautiful sight to see. (Below)

Nothing like chilling by a bonfire, although if you’re new to the genre, every time you heal at these bon fires, all the enemies you spent tirelessly fighting repopulate.

Call me crazy but in the original, players from other games could leave each other messages written in blood, as a way to help each other out. It looks like this concept is making a comeback this time around.

Dragons are so hot right now…. (insert Zoolander Gif here)

If you have ever played a souls game, you know this is something you can expect to see even in your dreams. I remember going to bed thinking how an enemy boss had beaten me 13-times in a row, only to go to bed thinking and imaging different strategies on how I could kill the foe standing between me and the game's progress.

The gameplay looks faster than the original but the difficult elements remain prevalent. The player is seen mowing down enemies which seems a bit off given the extreme difficulty of the PS3 game. But this could be Bluepoint addressing the sometimes-outrageous difficulty by making it more appealing to casuals.

Launch Title!!!!

God of War Ragnarök:

Last time we saw our heroes, Kratos and Atreus were shacked up in their home when they receive a visit from a mysterious visitor brandishing what looks like Mjolnir on his waist. The game ended in a great cliff hanger and is sure to improve on the many aspects the PS4 game

Get the fuck out of here. Sony decided to drop a nuclear ton warhead on us with the teaser trailer of God of War Ragnarok, a sequel to the PS4’s God of War. Although they did not show any game play, they did manage to build the hype with the screen below:

And then to top off the trailer the list the following with a supposed 2021 release date which I think is highly unlikely but, we will see. Either way, “we must prepare”.

Sadly, when the presentation ended, pre-orders went live . We were told by Sony that we would have ample time to prepare to pre-order, nothing but the contrary occured. I was one of the unlucky folks who failed to obtain his PS5 preorder despite having the funds to do so. Here’s to hoping I’m able to secure a pre-order prior to the Nov 12 launch. I did manage to get a PS5 camera which is a must for me since I like to stream games online, it’s really quite addicting. Check out my channel at: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCiazQqSufhmIGo2a7odLOpQ?view_as=subscriber.

I do want to say one thing, I am very fortunate to have the things i’ve accumulated over the years. I know there are people in the world that lack even basic necessities. If you’re reading this, please donate to cause/fund or organization you beleive in. I know my life’s work is to improve the living conditions of everyone regardless of their creed and that keeps me plenty busy.

All images used in this piece were obtained from the source below:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iG0G44G6RI8

Credit: IGN

#ps5 #ps5 release #ps5 reveal #demonsouls #god of war ragnarok #spiderman mile morales #hogwarts legacy #final fantasy 16 #final fantasy xvi

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betweengenesisfrogs · 5 years

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Homestuck is My Favorite Sprite Comic

Yes, you read that right.

Homestuck is my favorite sprite comic.

Those of you who remember the earlier days of the internet are probably looking at this post in disbelief right about now. Others of you might be scratching your heads, not knowing what I’m talking about.

But here’s my pitch: Homestuck is the culmination of an entire genre of internet art, and the tools that make it so powerful are the very tools that made that genre once so reviled.

Homestuck is the greatest and most successful sprite comic of all time.

And honestly, I’ve wanted to talk about that for ages, so let’s do it.

WHAT SPRITE COMICS WERE

Many of my readers are probably too young to remember the era of sprite comics. So: what were sprite comics?

Sprite comics were a genre of webcomics made entirely by taking pixel art from video games – especially character art, called “sprites,” but also backgrounds and other images—and placing them into panels to tell a story. They were near-ubiquitous on the internet in the early 2000s, emerging right as webcomics in general were seeking to establish themselves as an art form.

They were not, shall we say, known for their quality. The low bar to access meant that art skill was not an obstacle to starting one. The folks behind the huge swell of them tended to be young people, kids and early teenagers recreating the plots of their favorite video games with new OCs—not the most advanced writers or artists. They were the early 2000s’ quintessential example of ephemeral, childish art. Unfortunately, they look even worse today—blown-up pixels don’t hold up well when displayed on higher-resolution monitors.

Today, they’re mostly forgotten, remembered only as a weird, strange moment in the youth of the internet. Someone who evoked them today, such as a blogger who compared them to one of the most successful webcomics of all time, would be inviting good-natured teasing at the very least.

It would be unfair to dismiss them entirely, though. In this low-stakes environment, comics where the author could bring more skill—engaging writing, legitimately funny jokes, or especially, a real ability to work with pixel art—really stood out. (Unsurprisingly, these authors tended to skew a bit older.)

The obvious one to mention is Bob and George. Bob and George wasn’t the first sprite comic, but it was the most influential. Conceived initially as Mega Man-themed filler for a hand-drawn comic about superheroes, it quickly became a merging of the two concepts, with the original characters made into Mega Man-style sprites, full of running gags, humorous retellings of the Mega Man games, elaborate storylines about time travel, and robots eating ice cream. It was generally agreed, even among sprite comic haters, that Bob and George was a pretty good comic. Worth mentioning also are 8-Bit Theater, which turned the plot of the first Final Fantasy into a spectacular and hilarious farce, and of course Kid Radd, my second favorite sprite comic. (More on that later.)

But even if you weren’t looking for greatness—there was something just damn fun about them. The passion of sprite comic authors was clear, even if their ideas didn’t always cohere. To this day, I think the sprite comic scene has the same appeal pulp art does—it’s crude and rough, full of garbage to sift through, but every so often, something deeply sincere and bizarre shines through, and the culture of its authors is a fascinating object of study in itself.

Okay, full disclosure: I was one of the people who made a sprite comic. I’ve written about my experiences with that in more depth elsewhere, but yeah, I was on the inside of this scene, rather than a disinterested observer, and from the inside, maybe it’s a lot easier to see the appeal.

Still, let me make this claim: even with all their flaws, sprite comics were doing some incredibly interesting things, and Homestuck is heir to their legacy.

TAKE ME DOWN TO RECOLOR CITY

One of the problems people always had with sprite comics was the sprites themselves. They’re the most repetitive thing in the world. You just keep copying and pasting the same images over and over again, maybe with a few tweaks. That’s not really being an artist, is it? It’s so lazy. Re-drawing things from different angles keeps things dynamic, develops your skill, and makes your work better in general. Right?

I’m mostly in agreement. Certainly I think it’s fair to rag on the Control-Alt-Delete guy, along with other early bad webcomics, for copy-pasting their characters while dropping in new expressions and mass-producing tepid strips. And to be fair, digging through bad sprite comics often felt like an exercise in seeing the same slightly-edited recolors of Mega Man characters over and over again. You got really tired of that same body with its blobby feet and hands.

(It should be noted, though, that there were folks in the sprite comic scene who could pixel art the quills off a porcupine. I salute you, brave pixel art masters of 2006. I hope you all got into your chosen art school.)

All this said, I think the repetitive and simplistic nature of sprite comics was often their biggest strength.

THE POWER OF ABSTRACTION

In his classic work Understanding Comics, Scott McCloud makes an observation about cartooning that has stayed with me to this day.

McCloud notes that simple, abstract drawings, like faces that are only few lines and dots on a page, resonate with us more strongly than more detailed drawings. This is because our minds fill in what’s missing on the page. We ascribe human depth to simple gestures and expressions based on our own emotions and experiences – and this makes us feel closer to these characters as readers. Secretly, simple cartoons can be one of the most powerful forms of storytelling. If you want your readers to fall in love with your characters, draw them simply, and let them fill them in.

Video game sprites work very well in this regard. They have that same simplicity that cartoons do. In fact, I’d be willing to bet a huge part of the success of SNES-era RPGs was simple, almost childlike character sprites drawing people in. I think sprites did the same for sprite comics.

Here’s the weird thing: Bob and George worked. Despite four different characters being variations on the same friggin’ Mega Man sprite in different colors, they immediately began to seem like different people with distinct personalities. For me, George’s befuddled, helpless dismay immediately comes to mind whenever I picture his face, while with Mega Man himself it’s usually a wide-eyed, childlike glee. I would never confuse them. This, despite the fact that the only actual difference between their faces is that George is blonde. It’s pretty clear what happened. The personalities the author established for them through dialogue and storytelling shone through, and my brain did the rest.

Sprites, in short, were a canvas upon which the mind could project any story the author wanted to tell. Even the most minute differences in pixel art came to stand, in the best sprite comics, for wide divergences in personality and ideals, once the reader spent enough time with them to adapt to their style of representation.

Wait a minute, haven’t we seen this somewhere before? Character designs that focus on variations on a theme, with subtle differences that nonetheless render them instantly recognizable?

Oh, right.

Look at what greets us on the very first page of Homestuck. An absurdly simple cartoon boy, abstracted to a ridiculous degree—he doesn’t even have arms!—followed a whole bunch of characters that follow suit. Though many other representations of the characters emerge, these little figures never quite go away, do they? Why is that?

Simple: they’re very easy to manipulate. They’re modular—you can give John arms or not, depending on whether it’s useful. You can put him in a whole variety of poses and save them to a template. You can change out his facial expressions with copy and paste. You can give him a new haircut and call him Jake. It’s all very quick and easy.

Sprite comics proliferated because they were very easy to mass-produce. Andrew Hussie’s original conception of Homestuck was very similar: something he could put out very quickly and easily, where even the most elaborate ideas could rely on existing assets to be sped smoothly along. We all know the result: an incredible production machine, churning out unfathomable amounts of content from 2009-2012. I’d say it was a good call.

But it goes way deeper than that. The modular nature of sprites always suggested a kind of modularity to the sprite comic premise. George and Mega Man were different people, true, but also two variations on a theme. Was there something underlying them that they had in common? Perhaps their similarity says something like: We exist in a world which has a certain set of rules? One of my favorite conceits from Bob and George was that when characters visited the past, they were represented by NES-era Mega Man sprites, while in the present, they were SNES sprites, and in the future, the author used elaborate splicing to render them as 32-bit Mega Man 8 sprites or similar.

Suppose there was a skilled cartoonist thinking about his next big project, who wanted to tell a story centered around this kind of modularity, a narrative that was built out of iterative, swappable pieces by its very design. He might very well create a sprite comic named Homestuck.

Homestuck is a story about a game that creates a hyperflexible mythology for its players, where the villains, challenges, and setting change depending upon what players bring to the experience, yet which all share underlying goals and assumptions. What more perfect opportunity to create a modular story as well? Different groups of kids and trolls have motifs that get swapped around to produce new characters, whether that’s through ectobiology, the Scratch, or the eerie parallels between the kids and trolls’ sessions. And yet each character can be analyzed as an individual.

This is an incredible way to build a huge emotional investment from your readers. Not only does this kind of characterization invite analysis, the abstractions draw readers in to generate their own headcanons and interpretations. A deep commitment to pluralism is at the heart of Hussie’s character design. Then, too, it encourages readers to build their own new designs from these models. Kidswaps, bloodswaps, fantrolls—these have long been the heart of Homestuck’s fandom. And what are bloodswaps if not sprite recolors for a new generation? With the added bonus that now a change in color carries narrative weight, evoking new moods and identities for these characters in ways that early sprite comics could only dream of.

In Hussie’s hands, even the dreaded copy-and-paste takes on heroic depth of meaning. Even when Hussie moves away from sprites to his own loose art style, he continues to remix what we’ve previously see. Indeed, Hussie talks about how he would go out of his way to edit his own art into new images even when it would take more time than drawing something new. Why? Because he wanted to evoke that very feeling of having seen this before—the visual callback to go along with the many conceptual and verbal callbacks that echo throughout Homestuck. This is at the heart of what Doc Scratch (speaking for Hussie) called “circumstantial simultaneity:” we are invited to compare two moments or two characters, to see what they have in common, or how they contrast. Everything in Paradox Space is deeply linked with everything else. And Hussie establishes this in our minds using nothing less than the tool sprite comics were so deeply reviled for: the “lazy” repetition of an image.

(It’s fitting that some of the most jaw-droppingly gorgeous images in Homestuck—dream bubble scenery and the like—are the result of Hussie taking things he’s made before and combining them into fantastic dreamscapes.)

But it all started with the hyperflexible, adaptable character images Hussie created at the very beginning of Homestuck.

And if you need more proof that Homestuck is a sprite comic, I think we need look no further than what Hussie, and the rest of the Homestuck community call these images.

We call them sprites.

THE FIRST GENRE-BENDERS

Was Andrew Hussie influenced by sprite comics in the development of Homestuck? It’s hard to say, but as a webcomic artist in the first decade of the 2000s, he was surely aware of them. It’s likely that he quickly realized that his quick, adaptable images served the same purposes as a sprite in a video game or a sprite comic, and chose to call them that.

One purpose I haven’t mentioned up until now: sprites lend themselves very well to animations. In fact, in their original context of video games, that’s exactly what they’re for: frames of art that can be used to show a character running, jumping, posing, moving across a screen. It’s not surprising, then, that sprite comic makers quickly saw the utility in that.

Homestuck was, in fact, not the first webcomic to make Flash animations part of its story. There were experiments with various gifs and such in other comics, but I think sprite comics were among the most successful at becoming the multi-media creations that would come to be known as hypercomics..

Take a look at this animation from Bob and George. It represents a climactic final confrontation against a long-standing villain, using special effects to make everything dramatic, but ultimately, like many a Homestuck animation, leads to kind of a pyscheout. The drama and the humor of the moment are clear, though. This relies in large part on the music—which is taken directly from the game Chrono Trigger. This makes total sense. Interestingly, it also contains voice acting, which is something Homestuck never tried—probably because it would run contrary to its ideals of pluralism. What I find fascinating is that in sprite comics, animations like these served a very similar purpose to Homestuck’s big flashes: elevating a big moment into something larger-than-life. Another good example is this sequence from Crash and Bass. Seriously, it seems like every sprite comic maker wanted to try their hand at Flash animation.

(By the way, it’s a lot harder than it looks!! I envy Hussie his vectorized sprites. Pixel art is a PAIN to work with in the already buggy program that is Flash.)

The result: because of the sprites themselves, sprite comics were among the first works to play around with the border between comics and other media in the way that would come to be thought of as quintessentially Homestuck.

What it also meant was that another genre emerged in parallel with sprite comics: the sprite animation. Frequently these would retell the story of a particular game, offer a spectacular animated battle sequence, parody the source material, or all three. Great examples include this animation for Mega Man Zero, and this frankly preposterous crossover battle sequence. Chris Niosi’s TOME also found its earliest roots as an animation series of this kind. You also found plenty of sprite-based flash games, in which players could manipulate game characters in a way that was totally outside the context of the original works.

The website the vast majority of these games and animations were hosted on?

Newgrounds, best known to Homestuck fans as the website Hussie crashed in 2011 while trying to upload Cascade.

What’s less talked about is that Hussie was friends, or at least on conversational terms with, the owner of the site, hence the idea to host his huge animation there in the first place, and other flashes, like the first Alterniabound, were initially hosted there as well.

It’s hard to believe that Hussie wasn’t at least a little familiar with the Newgrounds scene. I suspect that he largely conceived of Homestuck as part of the world of “Flash animation—” which in 2009 meant the wide variety of things that were hosted on Newgrounds, including sprite animations.

The freedom and fluidity sprite comics had to change into games and animations and back into comics again was one of their most fascinating traits. Homestuck’s commitment to media-bending needs, at this point, no introduction. But what’s less known is that sprite comics were exploring that territory first—that Homestuck, in short, is the kind of thing they wanted to grow up to be.

PUT ME IN THE GAME

I would be a fool not to mention another big thing Homestuck and sprite comics have in common: a character who is literally the author in cartoon form, running around doing goofy things and messing with the story. This was an incredibly common cliché in sprite comics, no doubt because of Bob and George, who did it early on and never looked back. You might have noticed that the animation I linked above concerns a showdown between Bob and George’s author, David Anez—depicted, delightfully, as another Mega Man recolor—and a mysterious alternate author named Helmut—who is like Mega Man plus Sepiroth I think? It’s all very strange. I could ramble for hours about the relationship between Hussie and the alt-author villains of Homestuck and what it all means, but I’m not sure I can nail anything down with certainty for these two. Maybe Bob and George was never quite that metaphysical.

But yes, bringing the author into the story in some form was already a cliché by the time Homestuck started up. Indeed, I think that’s why Hussie’s character refers to it as “a bad idea” to break the fourth wall—he’s recognizing that people will have seen this before, and are already tired of this sort of shit. And then he goes and does it anyway and makes it somehow brilliant, because he’s Andrew Hussie.

Homestuck breathes life into the cliché by taking it in a metaphysical/metafictional direction. I don’t think that was really the motivation for most sprite comic authors, though. Let’s see if we can dig a little deeper.

I think the cliché kept happening because sprite comic authors were writing about a subject that very closely concerned themselves: video games. I’m only kind of joking. The thing about video games is that even though they’re made for everyone, playing through one yourself feels like an intensely personal experience. You develop an emotional relationship to a world, to its characters, that feels distinctly your own. Now, suddenly, thanks to the magic of sprites, you have an opportunity to tell stories about that world for others to read. Of course you’re going to want to put yourself in the story in some form.

When it wasn’t author characters in sprite comics, it was OCs. You know Dr. Wily? Well here’s my own original villain, Dr. Vindictus. You know Mega Man? Here’s my new character, Super Cool Man. He hangs out with Mega Man and they beat the bad guys together. Stuff like that. Most sprite comics retold the story of a game, or multiple games in a big crossover format, with original elements added in. There was quite a lot of “Link and Sonic and Mega Man are all friends with my OC and they hang out at his house.”

What’s interesting, though, is that because these sprite comics were very aware that they were about video games, this was where they sometimes got very meta. It started with humorous observation—hey, isn’t it funny that Link goes around breaking into people’s houses and smashing their pots? But sometimes, it grew into more serious commentary. Is Mega Man trapped in a never-ending cycle, doomed to fight the same fight against the same mad scientist until the end of time? Is it worth it, being a video game hero?

Enter Homestuck. What I’ve been dancing around this whole time is:

Homestuck is a sprite comic…because Homestuck is a video game.

Or more specifically, Homestuck’s a comic about a video game called SBURB, where the lines between the game and the comic about the game blur as characters wrestle with the narratives around them, both those encoded into the game and those encoded into our expectations.

Homestuck presents the fantasy of many a sprite comic maker: I get to go on heroic quests, I get to change the world and become a god. I get to be part of the video game. And then it asks the same question certain sprite comics were beginning to ask:

Is it worth it, to be that hero?

I want to tell you about my second favorite sprite comic, a comic called Kid Radd.

Kid Radd distinguished itself from other sprite comics of the time by being a completely original production. Its sprites looked like they could be from a variety of NES and SNES-era video games, but they were all done from scratch, and the games they purported to represent were all fictional. Kid Radd used animations with original music, and sometimes interactive, clickable games, to tell its story. It also used all sorts of neat programming tricks to make it load faster on the internet of the early 2000s, which was great—unfortunately, these same techniques made it break as web technology evolved, something Homestuck fans in 2019 can definitely relate to. The good news is, fans have maintained a dedicated and reformatted archive where the comics can still be seen and downloaded.

Kid Radd’s premise is that video game characters themselves are conscious and alive—more specifically, their sprites. Sprites developed consciousness as human beings projected personality and identity onto them, remaining aware of their status as video game constructs while also seeking to be something more. The story follows the titular Kid Radd, at first in the context of his own game, commenting on the choices the player controlling him. He must endure every death, every strange decision along the way to save his girlfriend Sheena. Then the story expands into a larger context as Radd, Sheena, and many other video game characters are released onto the internet as data. They try to find their own identities and build a society for themselves, but struggle with the tendency toward violence that games have programmed into them. The story culminates in an honestly moving moment where Radd confronts the all-powerful creators of their reality—human beings.

It’s a very good comic.

The first sprite comic authors wanted to fuse real life with video games. Later sprite comic authors decided to ask: what would that really mean? Would it be painful? Would you suffer? Would you find a way to make your life meaningful all the same? Despite the limitations of sprite comics, these ideas had incredible potential, and in works like Kid Radd, they flourished.

Homestuck is heir to that legacy.

It takes the questions Kid Radd was asking, and asks them in new ways. It tries to understand, on an even deeper level, how the rules of video games shape our own minds and give us ways to understand ourselves.

At its heart, Homestuck is a sprite comic, and it might just be the greatest of them all.

EPILOGUE

I’ve seen a lot of good discussion recently on how Homestuck preserves a certain era of the internet like a time capsule: its culture, its technology, its assumptions, its memes.

I think sprite comics, too, are part of the culture that created Homestuck. Do I think Hussie spent the early 2000s recoloring Mega Man sprites? No, probably not. But what I do know is that sprite comics were part of his world. The first webcomic cartoonists came of age alongside an odd companion, the weird, overly sincere, dorky little sibling that was sprite comics. Like them or hate them, you couldn’t escape them. They were there.

And maybe a certain cartoonist saw a kind of potential in them, in the same way he summoned Sweet Bro and Hella Jeff from the depths of bad gamer culture.

Or maybe he just knew, as some sprite comic authors did, that the time was right for their kind of story.

On a personal level—Homestuck came along right when I needed it.

Around 2009, the bubble that was sprite comics finally burst. People were getting tired of them, or growing out of them, and blown-up sprites no longer looked so good on modern monitors.

I was more than a little heartbroken. I’d enjoyed Bob and George, read my fill of Mega Man generica, and fallen utterly in love with Kid Radd. I’d been working on my own sprite comic for a long time out of a sense that there was huge potential in them that we were only scratching the surface of. I’d dreamed of maybe someday doing something as amazing as the best of them did. But I was watching that world disappear. I had to admit to myself that my work wasn’t going to continue to find an audience. That I could live with. But it was painful to think that the potential I sensed, the feats of storytelling I wanted to see in the world, would never be realized.

And then, in the fall of 2010, a friend linked me to a comic that broke all the rules, that mixed animation, games, music, images and chatlogs. A comic that crafted its own sprites, just as Kid Radd did, and remixed its images into an ever-expanding web of associations and meanings. A comic that took on the idea of living inside a video game with relish and turned it into a gorgeous meditation on escaping the ideas and systems that control us.

That this comic would exist, let alone that it would succeed. That it would become one of the most popular creations of all time, that it would surpass other webcomics and break out into anime conventions and the real world, that it would become such a cultural juggernaut, to the point where it’s impossible to imagine an internet without Homestuck—

I can’t even put into words how happy that makes me. It’s the reason I’m still writing essays about Homestuck nearly eight years after I found it.

And it’s why Homestuck will always be my favorite sprite comic.

-Ari

[Notes: The image of the kids came from the ever-useful MSPA Wiki—please support and aid in their efforts to provide a good source of info about Homestuck! They need more support these days than ever.

For more on Homestuck’s place as a continuation of the zeitgeist of early 2000s experimental webcomics, this article by Sam Keeper at Storming the Ivory Tower is excellent and insightful.

Thanks for reading, y’all.]

#homestuck analysis #homestuck #homestuck's influences #hypercomics #understanding homestuck #sprite comics #internet culture

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jonestownscoundrel · 7 years

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everyaccentthesame · 4 years

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BG:DIA. Some thoughts on how Chapter 1 could be improved.

Unconstructive criticism has its place, in helping consumers understand a product’s flaws, but more helpful to the artist and the DM is constructive advice, on how to improve a work of art. In this piece, I will be discussing my thoughts on how to improve the first chapter of Baldur’s gate: Descent into Avernus, as part of a series of posts on the topic of this module.

The fundamental issue with chapter 1, which I have tried to outline in my previous posts (bear with me if I expressed myself poorly, I’m new to this), is that chapter 1 fails to set up the rest of the adventure. It doesn’t provide emotional stakes, or a reason for the PC’s to pursue the plot beyond their metagame understanding that the DM is running a module, and that they are expected to play it. And perhaps I have been too harsh. In terms of providing interesting encounters, set-pieces, art-pieces and characters, the module is quite generous. So what we want to do is keep all the good work that has been done for us by the many, many authors of this adventure, but tie it together in a compelling narrative for our players.

In essence, there are three routes that I can see, that a prospective DM can take with the first chapter of this module, without causing the modules’ themes to be cheapened or without significant new material having to be written or improvised by the aforementioned DM.

1. The adventure can start in Elturel, and have Elturel descend into Avernus.

2. The adventure can start in Baldur’s gate, and have Baldur’s gate descend into avernus.

3. You can keep the original story-line of the module, and greatly increase the threat that Zariel and the forces of the Nine-Hells pose to Baldur’s gate, while tying the fate of Elturel to the fate of Baldur’s gate.

Each of the first two options involves getting rid of one of the cities described in the adventure, making the adventure a more thematically appropriate ‘tale of one city’. Each option involves similar work, where we have a description of Baldur’s gate as it is in it’s day to day life, we have none of what it might look like when it plunges into hell, and vice-versa for Elturel. Ultimately choosing between the two probably comes down to personal taste- if you and your players like the idea of Baldur’s Gate, perhaps from the video-games and fiction set there, run it there. If you find the idea of Elturel more compelling, due to the storyline of the Hellriders and Zariel’s connection to them, and the concept of a corrupt, supposedly ‘lawful good’ theocracy breaking down and crashing into hell, go with that city instead.

The last option takes the most work to create a cohesive and compelling narrative, while also remaining the most similar to the plot-line of the book. I personally don’t like this option, so I will only touch on it lightly, and don’t particularly recommend it, though I may write more on it at a later date.

Option 1: The Fall of Elturel, the brightest new star of the Sword Coast.

In this option we will be replacing all of the first chapter set in Baldur’s Gate, and instead setting it in Elturel. Instead of having characters create backstories in Baldur’s Gate, and creating a dark secret, I would instead have them create backstories and backgrounds for their characters that relate to Elturel. A good resource for this is Baldur’s Gate: Fall of Elturel which provides the Hellrider background. I’d also encourage backgrounds that relate to the city in other ways- acolytes of Torm, Helm or Lathander would be very appropriate, as would other city-related backgorunds. For those backgrounds that don’t make sense as being from Elturel, such as Hermit or Outlander, let them know that the dominion of Elturgard is watched over and purified by the light of the Companion, which keeps undead and monsters that fear the light at bay for a hundred miles around, and that the people of Elturgard owe Elturel their safety.

Next, we’ll want to familiarise ourselves with the city. The module gives you a large and detailed description of Baldur’s Gate and day to day life there. It’d be worthwhile reading up on the wiki page on Elturel. In addition, the Hellturel dmsguild product may be worthwhile inspiration (and will be useful in the next chapter as well!). Indeed the tavern, A Pair of Black Antlers, could stand in for Elfsong Tavern. It might also be worthwhile to look at the second chapter and include some of the locations from there in the first chapter, such as the high-hall. This means that when Elturel does descend into Avernus, you can bring the players back to familiar places, and have them be shocked by the deaths of those they knew there, or the destruction of these beloved sites. If you own the Sword Coast Adventurers Guide, it might be worthwhile reading up that section on Elturel, but honestly it’s not too worthwhile.

Depending on how you want to portray Elturel, you could describe it as a bastion of purity and good (now being corrupted from the inside, as a pure-of-intention but misguided theocracy (with a few bad apples), or as a totalitarian quasi-fascist state that hides behind a veneer of purity and religion. The streets are clean, people are well fed and happy, but it’s up to you how much secret crime goes on behind closed doors, or how dangerous it is to speak against the official religion. Questions like ‘Are other religions allowed in Elturel beyond the proscribed gods, Torm, Helm and Lathander?’, ‘How harsh are punishments for crimes committed?’, ‘How are people of races that are perceived as evil by many treated, are they even tolerated?’ and more are worth considering.

We’ll also want to consider what will precipitate the fall of Elturel- I imagine that the players will come close to revealing Thavius Kreeg’s corruption, which will force him to plunge Elturel into hell early (his original plan could have been to plunge all of Elturgard, or perhaps even other cities along the Sword Coast in simultaenously.). Since Thavius will become a major player in this version of the adventure, we should have him be spoken about by various NPC’s as well- usually singing his praises, but sometimes talking about him suspiciously.

The very first mission of the original module was to meet captain Zodge of the Flaming fist, where he will give them their. This works fine, and you could make the dear captain a member of the Hellriders, and use him to represent growing corruption in that organisation and the city as a whole. You could also replace him with Ontharr Frume of the Order of the Gauntlet, hiring the players as he no longer trusts the Hellriders to do their job properly. Obviously replace the mission with something related to cult activity, perhaps the quest-giver believes the cult of Malar that terrorized the city so long ago has returned?

You could use this point to introduce Reya Mantlemorn, though I’d advise against using her Veteran statblock just yet- she’d make a great 1st level fighter, or you could use the Adventure Sidekicks supplement to level her up with the party. This could be the mission that makes her (and any other characters with the Hellrider background) into a full Hellrider, or she could be there to watch the party as the mission-giver trusts her.

I would run the encounters at Elfsong as normal, but with the numbers filed off- rename the Tavern, perhaps to the ‘Pair of Black Antlers’, but the people that inhabit the tavern can remain the same, as should Tarina. This might also be a good time to introduce Reya Mantlemorn if the players are having trouble in the fight, and be certain to tell the players that the people in the Tavern could be persuaded to help out.

The next encounter, the ‘Dungeon of the dead three, I discuss in more detail below, in ‘What should be considered for change in all cases’. It might be worthwhile making the dungeon the old ‘Temple of the beast’, used by the cult of Malar to launch a ‘wild hunt’ from. At the end of the Dungeon, rather than the inclusion of Mortlock Vanthampur, you can insert a character of your own design- perhaps one of the Hellriders, perhaps Reya Mantlemorn if you’ve not introduced her yet. This individual should tell the players that they found out that someone in the Hellriders was funding the cult activity, and letting them into the city discreetly to perform dark rituals and rites. Someone high-ranking, with the power to authorise the funds and to get the Hellriders to look the other way from cult activity.

Run the dragon cultist encounter as normal, its good foreshadowing for Tiamats involvement in Avernus.

You should have the players be made aware of two options at this point- they can go to the one person they know who knows anything about the underworld of Elturel (literally, most criminal dealings would go on underground, away from the Companions light)- Amrik Vanthampur, or they can try to bring their findings to their Quest-giver. We’ll be reflavouring Amrik as an information broker, as well as a loanshark, and he can either be persuaded, negotiated with or threatened for the in for. If you want, he can send the players off on a side mission in exchange for the info, perhaps to smuggle goods past the Hellriders. If they choose to go back to the quest giver, have them give the PC’s their reward, and tell them to report back the next day- when they do, have Thavius Kreeg himself show up, and thank the PCs for their service personally, and inform them that he will take over the investigations personally. He will then tell any Hellrider PC’s or NPC’s that in the next Tenday they will be sent to act as guards of the High Hall, and removed from active duty. This in and of itself should be suspicious, and an insight check of 15 or above should confirm this.

Either way, the PC’s should be directed to investigate the High Overseers personal residence, the re-flavoured Vanthampur Manor. If the players investigate, it will come to light that he’s changed much of the normal security at the manor, and has refused the normal offer of Hellrider guards, preferring his own, personally chosen staff.

While in the manor, the basic dungeon serves as a perfectly good set-piece, but the Vanthampurs should be gone or replaced by Thavius’s servants- Hellriders who’ve lost their faith or paladin oaths but hidden it through infernal contract,or even Thavius himself. Falasker Fisk should be encountered at some point, and inform the players about the importance of the Infernal Lockbox, and send them to Sylvira Savikas, a mage who has long suspected Thavius of dark dealings. You may or may not choose to include the Shield of the Hidden Lord in the adventure. Instead of Thurstwell, have the Infernal Lockbox be found by the players on any serious investigation of Kreeg’s room, but protected by Imps that go to try to warn him what they found. It may also be fun to have the PC’s find a plan that indicates the Thavius has used his power and the cultist activity to create a Nonogram, a 9-pointed star, around the companion in Elturel. This is neat Foreshadowing for what will happen next.

Have the PC’s arrive in candlekeep, where you may wish to take inspiration from Elminister’s candlekeep companion. Have Sylvira meet them, replace her Quasit companion with Lulu, put her in a tower with a high balcony. When she opens the Lockbox (ooh art), have their attention be brought to a low rumble the moment they finish reading the contract. In the distance, have the sky turn red with Hellfire in the distance, and let them see a blinding flash of light and a terrible peal of thunder as the Companion (visible even from this distance), turns black then dissapears.

From here you can have the PC’s feel compelled via the power of the infernal contract to go to Elturel, and Lulu can tell them about Zariel, her Sword, and how she thinks that with the Sword, they can save Elturel. You could also tie their fate to the city, letting them know that if the city falls, so do they- if they swore an oath to defend Elturel, for example, they could suffer a point of exhaustion for every ten-day they stay away from it.

In addition, if the players choose not to go to Candlekeep, and instead try to expose the High Overseer, or even manage to kill him, have the city plunge into Avernus with them in it. That’d be pretty fun, but would require some improv and your players would have to meet Lulu (if they meet her at all), another way.

Option 2: This time, Baldur’s Gate actually descends, first into madness, then Avernus

In this option, Baldur’s gate will be the city that plunges into Avernus. This will keep the first chapter mostly the same, but will require a significant rework of the second chapter (which I will discuss at a later date).

What we will change in this chapter is make Thalmara Vanthampur a far more active villain- while the game goes forward, have her campaign to become Grand duke become far more vocal. She will be using the spat of murders the cult of Zariel has been commiting (on her orders) to justify a series of new laws that will reform the security of Baldur’s Gate, and she becomes highly popular amongst the nobles, who have been victimised by many of her attacks. One of these laws will involve every Baldurian citizen over the age of 16 swearing an oath to defend the city, similar to the one that Elturians swear.

In addition, the refugee crisis that threatens Baldur’s Gate will have to be re-flavoured or removed. I have suggestions about that below. Reya Mantlemorn and the Hellriders will have to go in their current incarnation, but re-flavouring Reya as a Flaming Fist recruit that stumbled on something they shouldn’t and refused to look the other way would be an interesting way to keep her character in the game.

Have them meet Mortlock as usual who tells them about his brothers and how they’re supporting his mothers plans for taking over the city, but that he suspects that her association with the Cult of Zariel goes deeper than just using them as a tool. After the players finish the ‘dungeon of the dead three’ (see the recommendations on that dungeon below), have them hear about Thalmara’s successful election to the position of Grand-Duke, and the new laws being enacted.

Remove Thavius Kreeg from Vanthampur Manor, and have Thalmara not be present- indeed, make it clear that the manor is light on guards due to her moving into the more secure High-hall. Have the Lockbox be experimented on by Thurstwell because he wants to know what deal his mother has made, exactly, so that he ensure he will be spared, or so he can take advantage.

As before, if the PC’s try to expose Thalmara, she will dump the city into Avernus with them in it, and if they go to Sylvira (as before), the city will be sent to Avernus the moment they open the lockbox.

It might be interesting to hint that the Flaming Fist are actually descended from the Hellriders- scrap the Hellriders Elturian origins, and have them be the predecessors of the Flaming Fist mercenary company. This would explain Zariel’s interest in the city and the mercenary company, and could be an interesting and fun revelation for the Players.

For further advice, you might want to check out Eventyr Game’s supplement on this chapter.

Option 3: Now this is actually going to be a tale of two cities

(I will discuss this point in the future, as writing it proved more challenging than I anticipated. I think this does prove my point that having two cities in this adventure does not make terribly much sense.)

What should be considered for change in all cases

There are a few things, that for the sake of thematic consistency could be changed in all of these options for chapter one.

First, the ‘dungeon of the dead three’, while a good dungeon and solid mini-adventure in its own right, should be changed to the ‘dungeon of the infernal cult’. There’s no reason for worshipers of the dead three to be in this adventure, so swap them with cultists of Zariel, and possibly other Archdevils. Have them be working on the Orders of Thavius Kreeg or Duke Vanthampur, but don’t reveal that right away- the cultists probably only know that they’re working through Mortlock or one of Kreeg’s corrupted Hellriders. You can even keep the stats of the cultists of the dead three, just reflavour them as worshipping different devils! Have the Bane-worshippers worship Zariel, have the Myrkulites worship Mephistopheles and have the Bhaalites be devotees of Bael (You don’t even have to change the name for that one much!). If you’re running the dungeon in Baldur’s gate, you could even say that the cult wiped out a local cell of dead three worshippers, and were pretending to be them, albeit sloppily.

In addition, the sojourn to Traxigor’s tower is just unnecessary in my eyes. If the players are in Candlekeep already, filled with Archmages, why not just do the ritual there? Personally, I find Traxigor much more compelling than Sylvira as a character, but his cuteness does distract from Lulu’s. If you want to replace her with him, do so, otherwise just remove him.

If your players are struggling to find a reason for why they should be the one’s to go to Avernus, rather than the other qualified adventurers of the Sword Coast, you may want to introduce a plot point relating the adventurers to the sword of Zariel, or a create a mysterious prophecytm for them to be part of the rescue of the fallen city. You could also tie their fate to the city, letting them know that if the city falls, so do they- if they swore an oath to defend Elturel or Baldur’s gate, for example, they could suffer a point of exhaustion for every ten-day they stay away from it.

If you want to introduce a Refugee-angle into the game, you could place the adventure in the middle of the events of another module, such as the Tyranny of Dragons or Elemental Evil. Whichever city the PC’s are in should be flooded with Refugees from the countryside or towns that have been attacked, desperate for the safety high walls and armies can give.

I’ll be responding to any thoughts or criticism anyone has on these ideas, and may be expanding on them, before I begin my critique and analysis of chapter 2!

#d&d #d&d 5e #dnd 5e campaign #dnd 5th edition #dnd 5e #baldurs gate: descent into avernus #descent into avernus #vanthampur

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entergamingxp · 4 years

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Sucker Punch talks Ghost of Tsushima’s inspirations, cultural authenticity, and the studio’s growing identity • Eurogamer.net

What’s most interesting, of course, is the influence behind it. Sucker Punch and publisher Sony have leaned heavily on the film references, both in the marketing up to launch and the numerous nods in-game. Speaking before the game’s launch to Sucker Punch’s co-founder and producer Brian Fleming, along with art director and creative director on Ghost of Tsushima Jason Connell, what immediately interested me was how broad those influences were, as well as how deep that influence went. Has the studio tried to do more than just copy the look of mid-century samurai cinema? And how does such a distinctively American studio tackle the culture and history of Japan? The feudal era is one that’s steeped in misconceptions, and Japanese culture as a whole can slip so easily into stereotype when replicated from the outside, I was intrigued to know how they bridged the gap. (Since this interview was conducted, there’s also been a fantastic discussion raised around whether the game has gone too far in the other direction, playing into a more glorified idea of a complex point in time.)

There are lots of little things that hark back to previous games from the Washington-based studio, too, like some remarkably pretty particle effects and, interestingly, an above-average emphasis on getting the most out of the PlayStation 4’s controller, so alongside the questions of cultural influence and sensitivity there was plenty more to talk about, from the studio’s evolving DNA to its (largely still unsaid) plans for the PlayStation 5.

How much of some of your previous games like Sly Cooper and inFamous have made it over into Ghost of Tsushima?

Brian Fleming: I mean, obviously, the history of the company has been important in building the path of our corporate journey. And so sure, you know, I think those games and the people who worked on them do carry forward. But I think Ghost was also super transformative for the company because of its scale, the fact that it’s melee based – all these things caused us to uproot a lot of that and rebuild it. But that’s part of the reason we wanted to do new IP: to challenge ourselves to renew a bunch of what we’re doing and to rebuild the company, to make it better, to make it stronger, to make it capable of doing this. The last thing I would say is, I think it’s unequivocal that we could not have built Ghost – especially at our size, we never could have done that – had we not had those previous experiences to build on and ratchet ourselves up.

Do you feel there’s an identity of what makes a Sucker Punch game at this point?

Brian Fleming: Yeah, I think so – and Jason, you should tackle this too. I think for me, the throughline on all those franchises is the feel of the controller in your hand and trying to get that to disappear so that it has this immersive quality – when you’re in combat, it doesn’t feel like you’re pushing buttons. It feels like you’re doing the action. I think that’s something we’ve always viewed as one of the principle pursuits, trying to find a way to get the game to feel right. And I think that that began with Sly and continues into Ghost.

Jason Connell: That’s that’s the I think one of the ones that have stuck with Sucker Punch even long before I came here, it just being this very fluid experience. I would add over that though, all Sucker Punch games have always been artistically interesting or unique have an interesting style. As with our last game, and now especially moving into this game, I think that using the art and the graphical power to not just be like, ‘Oh, that’s good graphics,’ but to stop you in your tracks and make you go, ‘wow’. The last game it was pushing on the particle effects and making people go ‘Holy shit, you can do that with particles? That’s insane’ to now using those particles, again in a completely new way to exaggerate the beauty of an island and the lighting and just really to make people stop and look at the world and be like, how did they do this?

I was going to ask about those particle effects, because it seems like one of the most obvious things to have carried over from inFamous.

Brian Fleming: I was gonna say, the VFX system is one of the iconic things that we brought forward! But the answer was getting a little long on that question! But certainly that is a great example of something where Ghost stands on top of the shoulders of that system that was built to do a superhero game. So it’s incredibly powerful and put to great use in Ghost.

Image Credit: Sucker Punch

Has it been a challenge moving from the cartoonish side of things to photo realism – or a version of photo realism – with stuff like Tsushima? Has that changed how you’ve had to do things, in terms of say mechanics and the actual feel of it?

Brian Fleming: It’s all part of the tone of the game, right? You know, the tone of the Sly Cooper games is exaggerated and cartoonish for a reason – the shading is cartoonish, the writing is cartoonish, it’s part of a piece. Then you’re making a superhero, which is a different genre. It’s exaggerated, but maybe slightly less so than a cartoon. There are more grounded rules. Now we’re making something that’s even less exaggerated. I think of it as like you’re learning to play music. And at the beginning, everything is kind of dramatic and exaggerated. But as you mature, and as your abilities get more refined, you can get more complex emotion out of the piano. It might be the exact same piece of music even, but you’re able to play through the emotional content, rather than the mechanical content. So I do think we are able to communicate more sophisticated thoughts and emotions and feelings. That’s part of our development as a studio.

You started this generation launching a game, and now you’re closing it out by launching a game. Have they been quite different experiences?

Jason Connell: They’re definitely very different experiences. And to piggyback off what Brian was saying earlier, the beginning is a little bit different because you have this new tech in front of you, you’re trying to figure out how to utilise it as well as how to make a unique flavour for your game – inFamous: Second Son being that game. As we’ve progressed forward to this game, we did spend a bunch of time figuring out how to utilise tech to make this game, because it’s a completely different game – you know, large scale terrain, procedurally generated and created forestry. We didn’t have a lot of trees – our lead environment artists was talking about how they could probably count the amount of trees in our last game. And in this one there’s just absolutely no way there’s millions I don’t know there’s tonnes.

Brian Fleming: There’s a number! It’s three million trees.

Jason Connell: Three million trees! That’s just insane you know, so you can’t hand-place those, you have to develop tech in order to make that artfully and technologically work out. I feel like being towards the end is certainly super exciting. Obviously as creators you put a lot of pressure on yourself whenever you make a new IP.

Brian Fleming: I was talking earlier about the difference between jumping platforms and having a long sustained build on the PS4. In a lot of ways, I think we benefited because we weren’t switching consoles. We made the transition to the new hardware on an existing IP and then did our innovation once we were across, and that may have actually helped us – I’d like to claim lots of credit for that brilliant tactical strategy. And we did think about it, but I think it worked out fairly well for us that we had a stable technical base, [so] as we had to reinvent all this we weren’t also trying to adapt to new hardware.

How’s development gone? Just generally speaking of crunch.

Brian Fleming: Well, I think that video games are tough to make. But I think we’ve done pretty well overall. The biggest challenge for us, of course was, at the end, we had to transition to work from home. And that certainly brought its share of problems. And I think probably the most stressful weeks involved trying to get everybody out of the studio because there were so much networking work to do and all that. The most acute crisis we faced was was really the transition to account for COVID.

Image Credit: Sucker Punch

Obviously the PS5 is a big thing on the horizon. Is there anything you’re particularly excited about as a studio, working with that as a new platform and the things that you can do?

Jason Connell: For me that I’ve been so incredibly focused on our current experience that I honestly haven’t spent much time thinking about. I’m sure we’ll find to get, you know, dig in there and, you know, talk about particles again, or something. It’s gonna be an exciting time, I was one of the first artists that got to work on the PS4 and you know, the dev kits and all that. It was a really exciting time to try to develop those worlds. So it’ll be great, but my head’s been so into Ghosts of Tsushima and getting it out there and seeing what the world thinks that I haven’t had much time to think about it.

Brian Fleming: If you’re gonna be one of the final big titles on a console, you’re kind of necessarily one of the trailing groups getting on to the next hardware and that’s kind of where we are. That all said I think I’m particularly nerdily excited about haptic feedback in the controller. We talked about how we really love how controllers kind of connect [you to the game], and anything that gives us more ability to give the player better tactile feedback about what’s going on I think will be a big deal. So I think for Sucker Punch, that’s a particularly interesting area, right?

Yeah, for sure – I noticed that with Tsushima. You use a lot more of the controller, I guess is the way I would put it, than other games and I’m assuming lot of that comes with the territory of being first party?

Brian Fleming: I think about, you know, using the controller as a spray can holding it funny. You had to shake it or rattle it, I guess is the word they made us use to spray. We think this is a really important part of the experience. And so we spent a lot of time thinking about how we could use it, trying crazy stuff. And, you know, in the end, that’s the point where the player touches the game. And so you put a lot of attention into it.

Jason Connell: It’s kind of, it’s like embedded studio philosophy, even little stuff like when you use the wind and it kind of comes through the little speaker in the controller. That was our audio guy. He just thought it’d be kind of cool. And that’s utilising the controller in a totally different way. That’s just this embedded philosophy that gets people to think that way.

I think I know what the answer is going to be to this question but have you got plans for putting Ghost on to the PS5, upgrading or anything like that?

Brian Fleming: We’re desperately trying to make our ship date and survive the transition from our working on it to it becoming a real game – we’ll get to PS5 and future stuff in the weeks to come!

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That’s fair enough – don’t worry, I won’t keep quizzing you on controllers and PS5! You’ve talked a lot already about inspirations, specifically cinema. 13 Assassins was one that came up with the combat in particular, and lots of Kurosawa, obviously. Do you feel like your goal is to make a game that is about samurai, or is it about samurai movies as a genre instead?

Brian Fleming: This is a cop out answer, but I think it has to be both. So much of our inspiration comes from samurai cinema – not just Akira Kurosawa, but just movies in general, including movies that were inspired by samurai movies like westerns, Star Wars, all these other different types of Western media that have been inspired by it. It’s hard to divorce the two, right, because they’re so embedded in the way that we think about samurai. Now there’s obviously a huge side of what we’re doing that’s inspired by historical kind of things that may have happened, the types of armour that could exist in that time period that maybe you haven’t seen in movies. So I think it’s both.

What’s been your approach to research? I know these are things you’ve talked about a bit already but I’m just wondering if you could elaborate a bit more on the specifics of bringing consultants in and how that worked.

Brian Fleming: We’ve hired consultants for various aspects of the game. Very early on we reached out to our Japanese partners, the Japanese localisation team that’s worked on our previous games reviewed the game and reviewed the pitch. And they gave us some guidance early and extended the offer to help us come out to Japan and do a research trip – directors and some of the leads got to go out there on two separate trips. That was an incredible amount of research, photos and museums and getting to stand on Komodo Hama beach, the actual beach where the invasion happened. That’s very, very real.

Subsequently over the years you hire consultants for script review and mannerism coaches when you’re on vocab stage to try to understand the cultural differences – it’s an important part of it. And then some of these some of these turn into great collaborations. The Japan audio team recorded birds and deer for us, so that we could actually put it to the game.

Image Credit: Sucker Punch

You’re making this game as an American studio, and it’s based on Japanese culture and Japanese history. Japan can be a difficult culture to nail from an outsider perspective – how have you tried to balance that?

Jason Connell: I think it would have been immensely harder if we had not had the Japanese localisation team that was helping us so much throughout the course of this project, even from very early on. It’s certainly challenging, and I think I would say that it’s challenging even when we created Seattle, right? [For inFamous]. This is our home. We live in the northwest, we live right outside Seattle, some of us. And so when we recreate that area, it’s very easy to picture what it could look like, but even then you get into the conversation of like, ‘Well, you know, this street looks like this, there’s this building on the left’. It’s like complete, utter realism, stone for stone. And we decided even for that game that we didn’t want to do that. We wanted to create a feeling of being in Seattle, right? And so we wanted to do the same thing for this.

And it’s way harder, right? Because it’s in feudal Japan and the 13th century isn’t something that’s incredibly well-documented. It’s very hard to understand exactly, even if you wanted to do stone for stone, it would be challenging. There’s the balance between the game entertainment side, keeping people entertained, getting people excited about what they’re playing, and the faithful representation that we got lots and lots of guidance on. But in the end, that’s what our goal is: that faithful representation that is an enjoyable, fun experience for people.

Artistically speaking, are there any specific examples of something like artwork or antiques you used as inspiration for the game?

Jason Connell: As an artist, the thing that I tend to head towards is photography and lighting. I usually look at the lens of the world through an actual lens. I like to look at cinematography as references, which is one of the reasons we talk about samurai cinema so much, because it’s the chief way that I view pieces of inspiration and how to translate that into our game. It’s where the wind came from, you know – one of our very early art direction goals was everything should move. We didn’t quite understand the mechanics of it yet, but we realised very, very early. Instead of just talking about contrast and colour and composition, we wanted to talk about movement because all of these films – especially Kurosawa – have movement in every frame. I did look towards Ran for colours and composition, look towards Yojimbo for characterisation.

When I went to Japan, I didn’t know what a tsuba was before – I’d watched so many samurai movies but I didn’t know what the little ring on a sword was, I didn’t understand the exact terminologies. And when I went to Japan, we went to this little district that had all these antique shops, and we went to this one antique shop and they took us in the back. The person I was with was like, ‘are you really interested in buying expensive old stuff?’ and I was like ‘Do you have anything from the 13th century?’ and they just look at you and laugh, because no one has anything from the 13th century. But they had close to it! They had 14th century stuff – they brought these tsuba out, and I had only just learned what these were, and they had these antique beautiful dragons on them, and pampas grass on it. And they’re just these super rare collectible items. And I was amazed at the artistry and the precision work that went into these. They’re kind of patinated and old looking and they’re heavy. And they are in very, very good standing – they stood the test of time. I was amazed and to see that up close, it’s just amazing that somebody created these so long ago – it just brings a pure sense of like, how can I recreate that in a game and get people to feel those old, old, old textures? So that was definitely an inspiration for sure.

Image Credit: Sucker Punch

I guess it’s part of the cyclical nature of these types of films, right, that they were inspired by westerns as much as the other way round – riding into a town and solving problems with your sword and all that sort of thing. Have you branched out beyond samurai cinema to draw inspiration?

Jason Connell: None that we continually talk about – I mean, there’s like, Fistful of Dollars or something like that. And it’s a remake of a Kurosawa film! That’s the problem – many of these are either direct remakes and like just kind of change the name, or they’re heavily inspired by them. So we just tend to just go straight toward the source.

Speaking purely artistically, I will say that there are games like Breath of the Wild and Shadow of the Colossus that I take a lot of inspiration from. They’re both actually Japanese games, directed by Japanese teams, that have this great Japanese aesthetic to them. We wanted to go a little bit more grounded and photo real and really bring that feudal Japan out there. But there were things that we could draw from that like a little bit more minimal landscape.

Brian Fleming: I think an obvious inspiration for us is the first Red Dead game, too. You try out lots of different philosophies, and I’m certain that someone around here was like, ‘Oh, yeah, it’s kind of like the samurai Red Dead’. That is kind of a mental space that we occupied – clearly that had an influence on us!

from EnterGamingXP https://entergamingxp.com/2020/07/sucker-punch-talks-ghost-of-tsushimas-inspirations-cultural-authenticity-and-the-studios-growing-identity-%e2%80%a2-eurogamer-net/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=sucker-punch-talks-ghost-of-tsushimas-inspirations-cultural-authenticity-and-the-studios-growing-identity-%25e2%2580%25a2-eurogamer-net

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mamthew · 4 years

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A Final Fantasy Ranking

Over the course of the quarantine, and because I had such a good time with the Final Fantasy VII Remake, I've ended up blazing through a ton of Final Fantasy games. Since April, I've played IV, V, VI, VII, VIII, IX, X, XII, and XIII. 6, 7, 9, and 10 I'd beaten before. 4, 12, and 13 I'd played to some capacity before. 5 and 8 were completely new experiences. I had no interest in going further back than IV, since it was the first one to really put any effort into character work, and I didn't play either MMO because MMOs don't really appeal to me (I'm planning to try XIV whenever this new update drops that makes the story mode more accessible, but it keeps getting pushed back so oh well). I also didn't replay XV because I've played XV three times and watched other people play it in its entirety twice, so I have a much better handle on it than any other game in the series.

Anyway, I didn't really have any plans for what I'd do with this, besides get a better understanding of the series as a whole, but I was kinda inspired to do my own Final Fantasy ranking. I'll probably be a bit more detailed than I should be because I tend to overanalyze my media and end up having too much to say. I’m actually not placing VII Remake in this ranking half because I regard it as a spinoff and half because it’s not yet a complete story, even though Part 1 is unquestionably a complete game. If I were to put it somewhere, it would probably be close to the top, possibly even in second place. Also worth noting that this is gonna have SPOILERS for every game I discuss here. I really just wanna use this as a place to nail down some of my thoughts on these games, so they’re pretty stream of consciousness and I didn’t bother avoiding any details from the plots.

10: Final Fantasy VIII.

I don’t think there’s another game in the series with a more obvious corporate hand in it than VIII. It’s kinda the Fant4stic of FF games; there are the bones of a substantive game in there somewhere, but every aspect of the game is such a bald attempt at checking off a 1999 list of “things gamers want” that the whole affair feels hollow and sickening. A major trend I’ve noticed throughout this series is the extent to which FFVII’s success pushed the architects of almost every subsequent game to try to recapture whatever it was that worked about VII, and VIII got the worst of it. It’s got the sullen guy with a special sword. It’s got the sci-fi. It’s got the terrorists with hearts of gold fighting against an oppressive state. It’s got the train scenes. It’s got the case(s) of amnesia that hides the true premise of the story. It’s got the ability to give any character any loadout.

Besides that, they kinda crammed in just a bunch of stuff popular with kids at the time. Jurassic Park? It’s in there. Beauty and the Beast? Here’s the ballroom scene. Hunchback of Notre Dame? Here’s that carnival. Alien? Now you’re alone on a spaceship running away from a horror monster. Saving Private Ryan? The party shares brains with war veterans and dreams of their experiences at war I guess. Half of anime? It’s all about a high school for mercenaries and the party is trying to get back in time for the school festival. Fandom culture? Zines are a collectible item, and each one you find adds an update to Selphie's Geocities page. It also has astronauts, and transformers, and a haunted castle, and a prison break, and Rome, and Alpine Wakanda, and war crimes, and lion cubs that have attained enlightenment, and there’s almost no connective tissue from one idea to the next.

Also the junction system is convoluted and terrible, using magic makes your stats worse, all enemies level up every time you do, and I couldn’t tell you which character excelled in what stats. The characters were all very flat, and the first time I felt like I was seeing the characters interact in ways that helped me to understand them was in the cutscene that plays during the end credits.

Also the female lead’s role in the story changes entirely with no warning every five hours or so. She’s a terrorist, oh no she’s aristocracy in the country she’s terroristing against, oh no she’s jealous of the others because they grew up together and she didn’t, oh no she’s Sandra Bullock in Gravity, oh no she’s the villain and it’s too dangerous to let her out, oh no it’s actually fine and they were bad for locking her up.

It’s an absolute disaster of a game. However, the music and background art is absolutely beautiful. Maybe they never gave me a good enough reason to be in an evil time traveling haunted castle, but damn is it a gorgeous rendering of an evil time traveling haunted castle.

9: Final Fantasy XII.

I’ve known for years that FFXII had issues in development. The writers came up with a story for it, and execs got scared because there were no young characters and they’d convinced themselves that young protagonists are what makes games sell. So two more characters - Vaan and Penelo - were added, one was framed as the protagonist of the story, and the entire story was rewritten so it could feasibly be from his perspective.

While the two characters they added are egregiously tangential to the plot, XII honestly has no protagonist. The writers originally wanted Basch to be the protagonist, but his entire arc is really just following Ashe around and being sad about his evil twin. Ashe is probably the most important to the story, but doesn’t have much presence for a good chunk of the story, and makes her most character-defining choice offscreen before having it stolen from her by a side character. Balthier has the largest presence in the story, and is most closely related to most of the events of the story, but has pretty much no role in the ending.

Honestly, if I were writing FFXII and told it needed a young protagonist, I would have aged up and expanded the role of Larsa, the brother of the main villain, who shows up as a temporary party member from time to time. The entire game is about family ties, and a journey spotlighting Larsa could have involved his learning about Ashe, Basch, Balthier and Fran’s family situations and using their experiences to grapple with his own. Damn, now I’m sitting here thinking about how good that could have been.

As it is, the game feels disjointed and aimless, and the ending is so bad it’s farcical. When I reached the ending, I watched Basch and Ashe forgive Basch’s evil twin for his villainy rampage, harking back to the moment earlier in the game when Ashe turned down the chance to gain powers that would have allowed her to avenge her country because she realized that those powers could also drive her to hurt innocents in the crossfire. In this moment, I realized how Vaan fit in as the protagonist of the game. “Oh, he’s going to realize that violence begets violence, and that he must break the cycle by forgiving Vayne for the death of his brother. He’s going to let go of that hatred he’s been trying to push onto someone for so long, and it’ll finally allow him to heal.” I realized that even though the road to this point was rocky, the writers had managed to craft a satisfying ending from the seemingly disparate pieces of this uneven plot.

And then Vaan picked up a sword and screamed AAAAAAAAAAA and charged Vayne down and stabbed him, and Vayne turned into a shrapnel robot dragon and exploded all the star wars ships and I threw my controller aside and laughed uncontrollably while my characters beat him up and completed the game on their own without any further input from me.

Oh yeah, the battle system is also incredibly boring. Instead of battling, the player writes up an AI script for each character, then lets them act based on those scripts. I would straight up put the controller down and watch youtube videos whenever a group of enemies showed up. I was pretty excited about the job system, but then there didn’t really feel like much of a difference between jobs, and my characters all behaved pretty much the same as each other.

The hands-off battle system, unfocused story, lethargic voice acting, and tuneless music all left me pretty uninvested in the whole affair. The art style and locations are beautiful, though, and it did make me want to eventually check out some of the Tactics games, which take place in the same universe but are supposed to have excellent stories and gameplay.

8: Final Fantasy XIII.

I’m not sure I’ve ever had two such opposing opinions of a game’s story vs. its gameplay. This game is the only one that plays with a bunch of story elements from FFIX, which did a lot to endear it to me. It’s sort of a game in which the protagonists are Kuja, the villain of IX. Like Kuja, they are created as tools by an uncaring god for the purpose of fighting against one world on behalf of another world, and are subsequently forced to grapple with the horrors of having an artificially shortened lifespan.

The story actually has a lot of Leftist themes, too. The gods of that universe spread ideology among the populace, and the people unquestioningly believe these false stories, as the gods have provided for them for as long as there has been written history. Much of the character arcs center on the characters being forcibly removed from their places within those ideological frameworks and having to unlearn what they’d always believed to be objectively true about the world.

So the story actually is pretty good, but it’s held back by some really clumsy storytelling; it constantly uses undefined jargon, has almost no side characters with which it might flesh out the world, actively fights against players trying to glean information from environmental details, and maintains (at least for me) a weird disconnect between the characters in the gameplay and the characters in the cutscenes. I think this partly stems from Square’s original failed plan for FFXIII to be the first game in a much larger series of games sharing themes and major story details. Despite these issues, however, the characters are all likeable and (mostly) believable, and their interactions are grounded in real emotional weight even while their universe feels intangible.

This all got dragged down by the gameplay, which is total dogshit. It’s got the worst battle system I think I’ve seen in an RPG. The game only stops being doggedly, unflinchingly linear about thirty hours in, the whole game took me about fifty hours, and I spent the last fifteen hours beating my head against each individual battle, waiting until the system hiccuped long enough to accidentally slide me a win. That meant I had about a five hour window of euphoric play, convinced that I actually loved this game, thrilled with every new experience it gave me, and excited to see what would happen next. I guess those five hours are what pushed this game over XII in my ranking.

7: Final Fantasy V.

Until FFXV, this game was the last of the “Warriors of Light” games, in which the game follows a party of four set characters for its entirety. To this day, it’s the last of the “Warriors of Light” games to let the player customize which character holds which roles through the job system.

FFV’s job system is the reason to play the game. Its story is mediocre, and its characters are all fairly flat, but there’s something viscerally satisfying about building party members up in jobs that might enhance the role they ultimately will fill. For my mage character, I maxed out Black Mage, Blue Mage, Mystic Knight, Summoner, and Geomancer. Then at the end, I switched her to a Freelancer with Black Magic and Summoning, and she kept all the passive skills for those jobs and also the highest stats across those jobs.

It was super fun and kind of a shift of focus for me, since I tend to place story above anything else in games. Despite the story not being special, though, the game’s writing is actually a ton of fun. It’s definitely got the most comic relief in the series, and I came away loving Gilgamesh as much as everyone else does.

And while it’s nothing special graphically, it does have some really cool enemy designs, and the final boss design is one of the most memorable ones they’ve ever done. Which is impressive because I keep having to look up Exdeath’s name because the character himself is super forgettable.

6: Final Fantasy IV.

This wasn’t the first game in the series to feature actual characters with names and depth, but I have no interest in playing FFII, so it might as well be. I actually played the DS Remake for this game, so it definitely had some quality of life improvements, like full 3d characters and maps, voice acting, an updated script, the ability to actually see the ATB gauge, and the ability to switch to other characters whose turns are ready without using a turn.

Apparently one thing the remake didn’t do was rebalance the difficulty for more modern sensibilities. Instead, this remake is...harder? It requires more grinding than the original? Why??

Either way, though, the story is actually solid! The game opens on its protagonist, Cecil, committing a war crime on the orders of his king, who raised him as a child. The first ten hours of so of the game follows Cecil as he tries to understand why he was ordered to kill so many innocents, turns his back on his country, and works to redeem himself.

This arc is reinforced by the game mechanics, too, which is super clever. His redemption is marked by a change in job from a Dark Knight to a Paladin, which also resets his level. For a time, his life is considerably harder because he’s finding his footing as a new person, which is marked by battles which had been easy becoming much harder for the player for a time.

This game places storytelling over gameplay more than I think any other game in the series. Each character is locked into a job, which I much prefer in my RPGs to games where characters function pretty much interchangeably. I dunno if it’s because I cut my RPG teeth on Tales, but it really bugs me when I can give Tifa the exact same loadout as Barret. I want the lives of the characters to bleed into their functions as gameplay devices.

However, the developers clearly had a ton of different jobs they wanted to add to their game, but hadn’t figured out how to allow for the player to switch in and out party members in standby. To fix this, they increased the in-battle party to five characters rather than or four (or the later constantly frustrating three), rotated the roster a ton, and had a ton of characters who straight up leave permanently. One character dies and never comes back. Two characters die and only are revived after it’s too late to rejoin the party. Four characters end up too injured to continue traveling.

This let the developers make a ton of jobs, but it doesn’t let the player exploit these jobs to their fullest. Characters’ stats reflect their role in the story, as well. One character is quickly aging out of adventuring, so his magic stats increase on levels, but his attack and defense stats actually decrease, signifying his failing body. Another character has already achieved some form of enlightenment, so he gains no stats when he levels up at all. The purpose of IV is the story, over any other aspect of the game, which makes it even more mindboggling that the remake would have increased the difficulty.

Besides that, the biggest issue I had with this game was the overbearing constant drama of it. While there were a few more lighthearted parts, they were mostly relegated to NPC dialogue and sidequests. The characters in this game don’t become friends so much as they become companions who bonded over shared tragedies, and this makes for quite a few scenes of every character separately wallowing in their own immeasurable sadness. I played FFV directly after this game and the light story and jokey dialogue was a much-needed palette cleanser.

5: Final Fantasy VI.

Before the unexpected success of FFVII irreparably changed the franchise, Square constantly mixed up the story formula for the series. IV, V and VI all handled their stories really differently from each other, and what I remember of III also felt fairly different from the games that came after.

Every game from VII on had a very clear protagonist (except XII, whose botched protagonist was still clearly marketed as the protagonist). The concept of the Dissidia crossover series is built on the idea that every FF has a protagonist at the center of its story. FFVI’s Dissidia character is Terra, but Terra is not the protagonist of FFVI.

Apparently while developing FFVI, the directors decided they didn’t want the game to have a clear protagonist, so they asked the staff to staff to submit concepts for characters, and they’d use as many as they could. This game has fourteen characters, each with their own fun gameplay gimmick in battles. Three of the characters are secret, and one can permanently die halfway through if the player takes the wrong actions. Of these fourteen characters, the main story heavily revolves around 3-6 of them, while five more have substantial character arcs.

There’s kind of a schism in the fandom over whether this game or VII is the best one in the series, and I can see why; this game is absolutely fascinating. No other game in the series has done what this game did, which means it’s one of the two FF games I really want to see remade after they complete this VII remake.

The first half is very linear. It breaks the beginning party into three pieces, then sends each character to a different continent, where they meet more characters and build their own parties before everyone reunites. Once the story has taken the player everywhere in the world, the apocalypse hits. The villain’s evil plan succeeds and tears the entire world apart.

The second half of the game picks up a year later with one character finally getting a raft and escaping the island on which she’s been marooned. In this half, the player navigates the world, which has all the same locations, but in completely different parts of the map. The driving factor for much of the second half is to learn from incidental dialogue where each party member has gone in this new world, to track them down, and to try to fix some of the bad that’s been done to the world before finally stopping the villain who destroyed it.

It’s unique and clever and occasionally legitimately tugs at the heartstrings some, which is impressive for a poorly translated SNES game. The final dungeon is a masterpiece all on its own. It requires the player to make three parties of up to four characters, then send them in and switch between them as new roads open. This way, the game manages to feel like an ensemble piece up to the very end.

4: Final Fantasy VII.

As I previously mentioned, there’s kind of a schism in the fandom over whether FFVI or FFVII is the best game in the series. Neither is the best game in the series. FFVII is better than FFVI. Oops.

When I was first drafting up this list, it was before I’d reached my replays of VI or VII, and I tentatively placed them next to each other, with the strong assumption that I’d end up placing VI a bit higher than VII, since it has so many strongly differentiated characters with solid story arcs, beautiful artwork, great music, etc. etc. Then I reached FFVII and not even four hours in, I realized it would have to be higher on my list than VI.

VI has a better battle system, its characters are much more differentiated by their gameplay, its character sprites have aged much better than VII’s character models, and it has four party members in battles instead of three. But I couldn’t overlook VII’s gorgeous artwork, sharp character work, and character-driven story. In the end, I had to give it the edge.

VII is a strange beast. It simultaneously really holds up and has aged horribly. The story is excellent and I love the characters, but the actual line-to-line writing is pretty bad, making the whole experience of the game a bit like swimming upstream; you’re getting somewhere good, but the age of the game is still pushing you back the best it can. Similarly, the background artwork is fantastic and gives the game locations a sense of place incomparable to anything that had come before it, but the character models are so low-poly that the two are constantly at odds with each other.

Still, the game is more a good game than it is an old one. I think it’s managed to duck the absurd level of hype around it by actually being very different from what the most popular images of it make it out to be, if that makes sense. The super futuristic techno-dystopia city only makes up a very small portion of the larger game, and most newcomers to the game won’t have seen Junon, or Corel, or Cosmo Canyon. Heck, I didn’t know Cait Sith or Red XIII were characters before I played the game for the first time. One of the many reasons I’m excited for the rest of this remake is to see newcomers to the story learning just how much variety there is to the world, events, and characters of this game.

FFVII also began (and pulled off really well) a number of storytelling trends that continued in subsequent games in the series. Obviously, almost every game since this one has a clear protagonist with a cool sword for cosplayers to recreate, and an androgynous villain whose story is closely linked to the protagonist (or one villain who is linked to the protagonist and a second one whose purpose is to look like Sephiroth), but it’s started broader, more quality shifts, too.

FFVII is the first game in the series to try to give all its characters arcs based on a similar theme, for example, a trend that has helped give it and future games a sense of thematic unity, especially in IX, X, and XV. Heck, that trend was why I almost came around on XII before they nuked it. It was also the first game in the series to have a real ending, rather than closing out with essentially a curtain call featuring all the party members, like they did in IV through VI (and I assume earlier).

Another common feature of FF games that it didn’t start with VII but certainly was canonized with it was the mid-game plot twist tying the protagonist to both the villain and the larger story. FFIV had this as well, of course, but I feel like the orphanage twist in VIII, the Zanarkand dream twist in X, and the time skip twist in XV were all meant to recall VII’s twist of Cloud’s…very complex existence (IX’s two worlds twist actually is a clear homage to IV, but it’d be hard to argue that Zidane’s connection to Kuja - and the character of Kuja generally - weren’t more influenced by VII).

2: Final Fantasy X and Final Fantasy XV.

Sorry, this one is a two-fer. I’m not gonna spend too much time on why I placed these two together in the #2 spot (I wrote a long thing on it here, if you’re interested). In summary, the games kinda mirror each other, in story and design. Each game can be seen in the negative space of what the other game leaves out, and at the end, the characters react to similar situations in completely opposite ways. For this reason, and that they’re of comparable quality, I think they’re best viewed as companion pieces.

FFX was the first mainline Final Fantasy game I ever completed, six years late. It was the first FF game with voice acting and many fully modeled locations. It also kinda marks the beginning of the series’ constant changes to the battle system.

That’s not to say the previous games’ battle systems didn’t also differ from each other, but they all had the same setup, with levels and an ATB gauge. This was the first game since III not to have any real-time element to its battle system, nor numbered levels gained through experience points. Since X, no two FF battle systems have been remotely comparable, which is cool and innovative and keeps things fresh, but also means I’ve been starved for just a regular ATB FF game for too long.

In many ways, FFX feels like a bridge between the PS1 games and the later games. It feels much more streamlined than VII, VIII, or IX, in terms of both storytelling and design. The game is very linear, pushing the player from one area to the next and not allowing much backtracking until the very end. It also loses the aging look of the PS1 games’ menus and UI, finally updating the classic font and the blue menus with white borders to fully modernized and sleek graphics.

However, movement still feels very similar to movement in VIII and IX, the music definitely evokes the PS1 games more than the later games, and most locations are portrayed with beautifully painted backgrounds, rather than modeled in (which I actually prefer, and I was glad to see that VII Remake has gone back to that in some places).

Voice acting in this game is phenomenal for 2001, and honestly on par with many contemporary games. I can’t think of a voice actor for the main cast who didn’t do a great job. Tidus’s narration, especially, is emotional and evocative in all the right ways. Grounding the plot in a very personal story about Tidus’s difficulty coming to terms with and proving himself to his abusive father keeps the story relatable and real.

Something interesting about my experience with X is that because it was my first Final Fantasy game, I thought for a very long time that the series was about organized religion, and the ways it is used to justify evil acts. This might be the only game of the ones I’ve played that is about organized religion, or even prominently features a religious doctrine, which really sets it apart from the rest of the series.

The game’s thematic unity is on point, even if there is a scene where they state the central themes a bit too plainly. Every character, and even the entire universe of the story, is held back by the past, and every subplot and the main plot revolves around finding ways to move forward and leave the past behind.

I love FFXV. It feels like a return to form after XII and XIII. It’s also probably the furthest any game in the series has strayed from the original formula. Battles are entirely real-time, and the game is a straightforward action game. There is very little time spent with menus, and even the leveling system has been stripped down to a few skill trees. It’s immediately obvious that the game was originally created to be a spinoff, not a main title.

FFXV is also probably too much a product of the current era of microtransactions and payment plans. The full story is spread out across *deep breath* a feature film, an anime series, an anime OVA, a standalone demo, two console games, four DLC story chapters, a multiplayer side game, a VR fishing game, four phone games (though really three phone games because A New Empire straight up isn't in that universe and also is terrible), an expansion including several entirely new dungeons, and finally a novel set to release sometime this year. That’s a whole lot of story. I’ve not played the phone games or the VR fishing game, or read the novel yet, but I’ve experienced all the rest.

But I also played FFXV when it first released, before any patches, before I knew there was a film, just the game all on its own. So you can believe me when I say that without any supplementary material, the game is still great.

It goes back to the FFI, II, III, V “Warriors of Light” system, where the party has four characters who do not change at all throughout the game. While this bugged me at first, I soon came to appreciate having a story where almost all character interactions involved these four characters. It meant I came to understand them well enough to feel like they were my friends, too. Most characterization in this game is understated, presented through small shared moments, dialogue, and body language as they travel the world together. Much like X, the overarching story might be expansive and far-reaching, but the real show is in the personal journeys the friends have.

Much of the first half of the game is spent exploring an open world, driving along the road and getting out of the car for pit stops or to explore the forests nearby. This is one of the very few games where I don’t mind just exploring an area without the promise of an upgrade or a new scene, just to see what’s around the corner, or to hear whatever banter the characters might engage in next.

The entire world of this game is gorgeous, and the orchestrated music is some of the best they’ve ever done. The main plot is beautiful, too. It’s bittersweet and emotional, with a charismatic villain and a twist that blew me away the first time I reached it.

The supplementary material is also mostly really quality. I’d recommend the Royal Edition over the original edition for sure, and to watch Kingsglaive as well. The anime series is quick and fairly fun, and Comrades expands on the universe in some great ways, but neither has as much bearing on the overall plot as the DLC chapters and Kingsglaive. I’m so in love with the DLC chapters, actually, that two years ago I wrote a piece just on how much Episode Ignis affected me (here if you care).

This is definitely getting long, so I guess I’ll move on after saying I’m upset that they patched Chapter 13 to make it easier, and I’m angry at everyone who complained that Chapter 13 was too hard. It was a brilliant piece of storytelling through game mechanics, and it’s mostly been stripped of all that, now.

1: Final Fantasy IX.

It’s IX. It was always IX. I actually did come into this with an open mind, wondering if one of the new games I’d experience (IV, V, VIII, XII, XIII) might end up hitting me harder than Final Fantasy IX, but as I replayed my favorite game in the series I quickly realized that wouldn’t be happening.

There are only a handful of games that make me cry. IX is one of two without voice acting. There are several songs from IX that make me tear up just when I hear them.

The story of the black mages gaining sentience, learning that they can die, and trying to force themselves back into being puppets just to lose that knowledge really moves me. The same goes for the story of Dagger no longer recognizing her mother, setting out to find a place to belong, learning that her birth family is long dead, then watching her mother return to her old self a moment before losing her forever. And Zidane’s story, where he has nowhere to call home, finally discovers the circumstances of his birth, and realizes that had he stayed in his birthplace, he would have become a much worse person than he ultimately did.

More than any other, though, Vivi’s story will always stick with me. He was found as a soulless husk by Quan, a creature with the intention of fattening him up and eating him, but each of them awoke something in the other, and Quan ended up raising Vivi as his grandson. When Quan passed, a rudderless Vivi went to the city to find a new home, and eventually learned he was created as a weapon. Other weapons had also gained sentience, but none had the worldliness that Vivi had gained from his loving relationship with Quan. When Vivi discovers that most weapons like him die after only a few months, he grapples with the possibility that he may die at any time, and eventually decides that he can only take control of what life he has by living each moment to the fullest. He ends up becoming an example for the other weapons to follow.

FFIX is a game about belonging: both yearning to have somewhere to belong and learning that the place where you think you belong is actually toxic and harmful to you. Even the menu theme is a tune called “A Place to Call Home.”

IX ran counter to the trends of the series in a number of ways. It was a return to high fantasy after the more sci-fi VII and VIII, and was also much more lighthearted than those games, while still being heartfelt and occasionally bittersweet. Gameplay-wise, it locked each of its characters into a single job, gave them designs based on their jobs, brought back four-character parties, and introduced a skill system in which characters learn skills from equipment. It also had a much softer, less realistic art style, and mostly avoided the attempts to recapture VII that have plagued most other subsequent titles (besides Kuja’s design, I guess).

The story is also structured so well. It regularly shifts perspective for the first thirty hours, allowing the player to spend ample time with each of the party members, and shaking up character combinations for fun new interactions. It introduced a system similar to the skits from Tales games, showing the player often humorous vignettes of what’s happening to other characters at the time. Once the characters have all come together in one party, the game has earned the sense that all of them (except for the criminally underexplored Amarant) have become a family.

The supporting cast are a blast as well. Zidane’s thief troupe (who double as a theater troupe) are likeable and fun. Kuja’s villain arc allows him to be sympathetic without losing his edge. The black mages are tragic without being overdone.

The development team for this game put so much more work into this game than they had to. The background artwork was all made in such high-definition resolutions that the act of downscaling them to fit in the game removed details. Uematsu traveled to Europe to make sure he’d get the feel of the soundtrack right, and has said it’s his favorite score he’s ever done. Sakaguchi, the creator of Final Fantasy, says IX is his favorite game in the series.

FFIX is one of the two games I would like them to remake after they finish the VII Remake, but I’m terrified they’ll mess it up in some way. Honestly, the game’s only flaws (which I do desperately want them to fix) are a lack of voice acting, the underdeveloped party member Amarant (and to a lesser extent Freya), the dissonance of Beatrix never getting punished in any way for her hand in a genocide, and the fact that very few of the sidequests are story-related because so many of the smaller story details that would normally be relegated to sidequests are covered in the main plot.

Despite the danger, though, I think revisiting IX is absolutely essential moving forward. It represents so much of what made older games like IV and VI great, and its story is much more grounded in real emotion than many current Square stories tend to be. Remaking VII will be good for getting VII out of Square’s system. Remaking IX would be good for putting IX back into Square’s system.

Here’s a IX song as a reward for getting this far. I’m gonna go listen to it and tear up again.

#final fantasy #final fantasy iv #final fantasy v #final fantasy vi #final fantasy vii #final fantasy vii remake #final fantasy viii #final fantasy ix #final fantasy x #final fantasy xii #final fantasy xiii #final fantasy xv

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z-tertle-blog · 5 years

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A Project Proposal

As a Digital Media student I find a lot of wonder in the making of movies and photography. But I also love video games and the technical artistry that needs to go into them in order to make them look they way that they do. I appreciate the work that goes into the art and I love to talk about it as much as I can, but this is where I find an issue. Whenever I want to talk about a certain movie or game I usually get stopped in one of two ways.

“I haven't seen / played that.” which is fine and we can talk about something else.

“Oh i didn’t like that at all!” then they give some grievance about the film / game and not allow me to talk about this really cool thing. When I honestly thought that they would enjoy what I had to say. I find it even more difficult to talk about video games because they have certain social taboos associated with them so the great things that they actually do is cheapened significantly. Either people come from a place that they fail to see any sort of artistic merit or deem them as cheap play things and me talking about it makes me an immature man-child, or, they come from a very political background and have their opinion colored by others blaming large, complex problems on them. So I would like to create an appreciation piece for the technology that goes into digital media. Specifically video games, because all of digital media would be far to general of a subject. How I would like to do so is to create a timeline that showcases great advancements in the technology of video games and the titles that pushed them. These technical showcases are well remembered by those that played them way back when they came out but historical preservation is not something that was in the cards when these games were made. So finding professional historical records can be difficult to do. Most records that people are familiar with were compiled by people that are big fans of the medium. The most esteemed collection of artistic history in relation to video games was compiled by the Smithsonian Museum in the year 2012 called “The Art of Video Games”.

These larger outlets are what I would like to assign as primary research points. Secondary research outlets are going to be development journals from video game studios and developers along with other, modern, experts on video game technology like Digital Foundry. A Germany based website that analyses video games and the hardware that they run on. This outlet is quoted constantly in other media outlets and they have become the go-to when it comes to this subject. Digital foundry has had its own website for a very long time but has only recently started to become a huge player in the youtube space with visual breakdowns of how these technologies work and compare them to other, similar, pieces and are probably the most “academic” outlet that most people can come across that is always updating the content that they make. Whereas others are confined to the time that they were published. Such as the Smithsonian exhibit mentioned above.

Being in a University I have the opportunity to talk to many people that are in a variety of different fields and I also have many friends that are deep in the video game scene and have a great history, along with others that are just really long time fans of games. I would like to interview the students that are in game development courses and ask them what they remember impacting them in video game technology and ask my experienced friends what video games impressed them the most. This is the generation that grew up playing video games as a kid and are now in the position that they are able to make their own. This is the first time that this has happened in the history of the medium of video games. “The first wave” creates an incredibly unique perspective on where the medium started and where it is now because they lived through all of it. And they are the ones that would care the most about the technology and how to make it better.

There are some major pitfalls to talking about technology. Chief of which is that it becomes easy to get lost in the jargon and vocabulary of all of this and I feel that this is the main reason that most people lose interest in the subject.

“I do not understand what was just said so I’m going to check out because it does not apply to me.”

this is common in any niche subject so I will also create a kind of dictionary to help people who do not know much about the subject these terms would include, but are not limited to...

Software - The programs and other operating information used by a computer

Hardware - the machines, wiring, and other physical components of a computer or other electronic system

Game Engine - The basic software of a computer game or video game

Platform - Hardware that the software was developed for specifically

My joy in the medium of Video Games is fueling my passion in this subject. And even if people do not want to read it, I know that there is value in preserving the history of these games and the work of the people that made them. There are so many different lists of books that you must read if you are a fan of literature, movies that you have to see if you want to be considered a “real” filmmaker. I want to make a list of games that are so worth your time to see where these games came from and where they started.

All forms of art should be critically observed and we should be familiar with the art form’s genealogy in order to be considered a great critic. Otherwise it is useless.

Art is a combination of different techniques, not learned naturally, applied to create a piece for others to enjoy. Having no need to defend its own existence as it possesses no other significance other than itself.

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operationrainfall · 5 years

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Title Type:Rider Developer Novelab (Switch) Publisher ARTE Experience (Switch) Release Date April 25th, 2019 (Switch) Genre Puzzle-Platformer Platform Switch,PS4,PS Vita,PC,iOS,Android Age Rating E10+ for Everyone 10+ Official Website

Different periods of human history are largely defined by the different types of writing associated with them. Whether this writing includes cryptic hieroglyphics found etched into a pair of ancient stone tablets or some generic Comic Sans found printed on a menu somewhere, every type of writing has a great deal of history behind it. Type:Rider is a puzzle-platformer that aims to teach players a little bit about that history. More specifically, it intends to make players more aware of how each type of recognizable typeface found today originally came to be.

Type:Rider is structured into nine different levels, each comprised of four stages. Each level corresponds to a different type of historically significant font or typeface. You start out by exploring the origins of written language and some of the earliest examples of structured fonts. From there you will unlock subsequent levels based on the order in which each font was developed throughout history. These fonts include Gothic, Garamond, Didot, Clarendon, Futura, Times, Helvetica, and Pixel. There’s even an additional, special font to explore after the end credits roll. I’ll leave that one up to your imagination for now though as it’s meant to be a surprise.

The purpose of each level is to traverse all four of its stages while collecting every letter of the alphabet (all written in that font) as well as asterisks which are scattered throughout. These asterisks unlock historical information about that font as well as the time period associated with it. While it’s not paramount that you collect every letter or every asterisk, not collecting all of them will lower your overall score for that level. In earlier levels, collecting all letters A-Z isn’t overly difficult, but it becomes a bit harder as the later levels roll in.

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Each level is unique in that it explores not only the history of one particular font, but all of the music and background imagery as well as the structure of the level itself corresponds to the period of time in which that font was first developed. For example, the Gothic level is backed with ambient orchestral pieces that fit with that era and backgrounds full of gothic architecture. On the opposite end of the timeline, the Pixel level is full of 70s computer and video game imagery. The music that accompanies that level makes it feel as though you’ve just stumbled into a old-school arcade. Personally, my favorite level was the one centered around Helvetica due to its red and white color scheme as well as the heavy contrast between the background and the foreground. Its interesting level design also struck a chord for me.

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This brings us to the next point of differentiation between levels. The types of gameplay in each level tend to be pretty varied. Make no mistake, Type:Rider is a platformer through and through. The types of platforming that you’ll be doing though will change from level to level. Some of the earlier levels are pretty standard fare in that you’ll just be timing jumps appropriately and collecting letters as you proceed. As you move forward though, you’ll find that some levels introduce new mechanics not found in the others. For example, the Didot level introduces these pipes that create shafts of wind. This wind pushes your dots in whichever direction the pipe is pointing. The Helvetica level has these cannons that allow you to fire your dots through the air. The Pixel level even includes a section where you need to traverse a maze of falling Tetris pieces as they fall from above. Much like the music and art direction, the types of gameplay presented in each level correspond in some way to the period in time associated with that level’s font.

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I spoke a bit about the music, the art design, and the level design, but I didn’t give my overall thoughts on any of them. I found the music to be rather enjoyable, though the direction taken by some levels was better than others. Overall, I thought that the ambient backing tracks of each level fit the atmosphere very well and I could honestly see some of them making the cut for an official soundtrack. In terms of the art direction, I’d give it a solid A. The developer went for a rather minimalist approach for many of the levels and those were among my favorite. There’s a stellar usage of contrast between the foreground and background in nearly every level and each has a unique design. The levels are also designed perfectly to fit with each particular font and time period. In summary, the designers of this game know exactly what they were doing and did a fantastic job bringing each level to life.

My only concerns with Type:Rider include the consequences of making mistakes and the factor of replayability. If you’re one to place a heavy emphasis on setting and breaking high-scores, then this game will satisfy you. Depending on how many times you fail, how successful you are at collecting letters and asterisks, and how fast you complete each level, your score will rise or fall. That score is about the only consequence of making mistakes though. There are no lives, not restarts, and really no consequences for missing letters or asterisks in any level. Additionally, each level only takes about 10-15 minutes to complete, which means that the average overall playtime for someone is likely to be in the ballpark of 1.5-3 hours. Without any real consequences for failing, there’s little incentive to replay levels unless you’re looking to improve your high-score or if you want to experience the sights and sounds again. Even if the only consequence was not unlocking a new level until all letters in the previous one were collected, I would have been happier.

Overall, Type:Rider was an enjoyable experience and I walked away having learned a bit about fonts and typography in general. As mentioned above, I only sunk about 3 hours into this one as it can be completed in a rather short span of time. There are some additional trophies that you can unlock by doing special tasks throughout the game, but I managed to grab most of those just by playing through once. If it there was a bit more content available in each level, I could see this game being even more enjoyable. Having said that, the content that is there is still really neat and for its listed price of $2.99 on the Nintendo Switch eShop, it may still be worth taking a look at if you enjoy platformers.

[easyreview cat1title=”Overall” cat1detail=”” cat1rating=”3″]

youtube

A review copy was provided by the publisher.

REVIEW: Type:Rider Title Type:Rider

#ARTE Expereience #nintendo switch #Novelab #Puzzle Platformer #Type:Rider

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musicplayperformance · 6 years

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A Ratchet during Purim

By Derk van de Hulst

At one of my gigs with my klezmer band a few years ago, we had to play for the Jewish community of Utrecht. As a non-Jew myself, as are my fellow musicians, we had no idea what to expect. We were told to dress funny and as carnivalesque as possible and we had to play a few special songs we didn’t knew. These songs were Purim songs and we had to enliven Purim with our music, were everybody, even the rabbi himself, was dressed hilariously. But, honestly, we had no idea what Purim was and what the community was celebrating. The rabbi knew of our non-existing knowledge and gave us a summary of what Purim was all about. After that, he told us that we had to play one of the new songs on certain moments which he would point out to us. But, in all his enthusiasm and organizing, the rabbi forgot to mention one thing which made me remember this event so vividly.

Purim is centered around the reading of the Book of Esther. In the Book of Esther the Jews are about to be exterminated by Haman, but they are saved by the Jew Esther. This book is recited or read out loud at Purim while everybody listens. While listening, the children, around the age of 6 and 14 years old, hold a gragger (a ratchet) and every time the name ‘Haman’ is said, the children start to make as much noise as possible with their graggers (it is also common for the adults to do the same with whistles and other noise-making instruments) to erase the name ‘Haman’. This noise came as a surprise for us musicians and it made me ask some questions to myself: why and for what purpose do they use a ratchet?

A ratchet is a percussion instrument categorized by the Hornbostel-Sachs system as a scraped idiophone <1>. The instrument consists of a long stick, which fits in one’s hand, and an almost equally long part perpendicular to the gripping stick, which contains of a piece of wood that revolves around a gear-like object which doesn’t revolve. When revolved, the gear will stay put while the perpendicular piece revolves around the gear, which results in a clicking noise. Made out of wood, it is not uncommon to see them painted in vivid colors. The ratchet is used for many purposes such as the replacement of bells of a church and as an alarm signal <1>. Nowadays, it is more common to entertain children with it and to use it as a cheering device in sports games <1>. But none of these examples are sufficient answers to one of my questions.

Of course, the question ‘for what purpose’ is, on first sight, easily answered: the ratchet is used to ward off the name of Haman, to react to the name of the man who would have murdered all of the Jews, if it weren’t for Esther’s braveness. But, because of the superficial nature of such an answer, I would like to propose that the use of the ratchet is more ludo-musical than practical. The ratchet is only used when the Book of Esther is recited or read out loud, and, in my experience (and a lot of YouTube examples), the ratchet is primarily used by children. Therefore, I would suggest that the use of a ratchet in the reading of the Book of Esther is to create immersion.

Immersion, according to the Oxford English Dictionary, means the “absorption in some condition, action, interest, etc.” According to Oliver Grau (a German scholar with a focus on immersion in visual art), immersion is “characterized by [the] diminishing … distance to what is shown and increasing emotional involvement in what is happening” <2>. Both the “absorption” and the “diminishing distance and increasing emotional involvement” are useful ways of reading into the purpose of the ratchet while reading the Book of Ester during Purim. Children are by nature very energetic and easily distracted by other things that are more fun. The Book of Esther is not a very short story (in comparison with, for example, some of the Short Stories by Road Dahl), and, although a summary is very exciting and packed with action, the long version is not. As a way to involve the children into the reading of the religious scroll, creating absorption of the children into the text, the name ‘Haman’ is given a ludo-musical action. Because ‘Haman’ is called out 54 times during the reading, giving the children 54 times the chance to burst out their energy in blotting out Haman’s name, it creates 54 opportunities for the children to react to the story. This results in attention to the story by creating action opportunities, for no child would miss an opportunity to do something fun. This, in turn, could lead to interest in the story and perhaps, later in ones live, into his or her Jewish religion and heritage. In terms given by Oliver Grau, the purpose of the ratchet is to be found in the diminishing of a distance between the listener and the reciter (or reader) by means of the use of a sound-making actions signaled by a name, which will lead to more emotional involvement in what is happening.

But, does this make a ratchet a ludo-musical object? Is the ratchet the pivot between story and emotional involvement? If we were to switch a ratchet for a whistle, would that make a significant difference? Or, if we were to switch it for a different action such as boo-ing? I don’t think it will make a significant difference, other than changing a tradition (it is just as easy to carry). Does this mean that the action must contain sound? If the ratchet was changed to a physical action, would the results be the same? By changing the ratchet for showing the middle finger, would that lead to the same results? Yes, probably it will (although I take no responsibilities for the consequences). This means that the object of study here is not the ratchet, but the Book of Esther, because Haman’s name is able to bring up deep emotions (such as anger). But, a physical action does not fade the name from the story, as is the initial purpose of the use of the ratchet.

So, does this mean that all sounds are fitting for a reaction to his name? It seems that, by creating a major triad, the name ‘Haman’ is not given the appropriate ‘sound’, because of the emotional load it carries. A minor triad would be more fitting, even better a diminished triad or a diminished seventh. But, the tradition prescribes a noise-making instrument. This means that there are some rules and requirements hidden beneath the practice of reading and reacting to the Book of Esther.

The requirements are easily found: we need (1) a reader or reciter and (2) an audience willing to hear (3) the story of the Book of Esther. Then there are some operational rules <3>. Rule one indicates that the role of reader/reciter and public/responder must be clear (for it will lead to a messy story otherwise). Rule number two states that the reaction must occur only when the name ‘Haman’ is recited or read. Rule three has to do with what kind of reaction is given. Because we concluded that the reaction must contain noise, the appropriate reaction to the name ‘Haman’ is by bursting out in noise-making action. The only implicit rules are to be found in the use of the instrument, which is the ratchet because the Purim tradition says so, and the carnivalesque clothing. This means that I will change my initial thoughts: the ratchet is nothing more than a carefully chosen medium for the ludo-musical requirements for the reading of the Book of Esther during Purim.

In hindsight, the execution of this story resembles interactive theatre for children. Interactive theater is not musical on its own but, in this example, it is made musical by the use of instruments. This is easily compared with Purim were, by the use of an instrument and a carefully chosen signal, children are allowed to take part in the performance of the story and become just as important as the actors.

That day, everybody was an important player in the story that was central, even we, the band, with no knowledge of what was happening in front of us, just smiling and faking it to the end, hoping that we did a good job for them.

<1> James Blade a d James Holland, “Ratchet,” Oxford Music Online, gepubliceerd in 2001, http://www.oxfordmusiconline.com.proxy.library.uu.nl/grovemusic/view/10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.001.0001/omo-9781561592630-e-0000022927?rskey=vScsvA&result=1.

<2> Karen Collins, Game-Sound: An Introduction to the History, Theory, and Practive of Video Game Music and Sound Design, citing Oliver Grau’s Visual Art: From Illusion to Immersion (USA: MIT Press, 2003), 13.

<3> Eric Zimmerman, Katie Salen, Rules of Play: Game Designs Fundamentals (USA: MIT Press, 2003).

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aurimeanswind · 6 years

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Back on the Saddle—Sunday Chats (12-10-17)

Woohoo! Let’s get back on it!

Hey I Stopped Writing

So, as intended, I stopped writing on Wednesday, and I’ve taken a few days off. I think I’ll continue to take some much needed time off, but it’s been an exceptionally weird few days since then.

If you missed it, I wrote this very person feature, finally taking my more personal writings to IrrationalPassions.com, about what the experience for writing 1000 days has been. Check it out here:

http://irrationalpassions.com/feature-learned-lost-pained-in-1000-days-of-writing/

I have been holding off on writing since then and I’ll say, it’s been exceptionally weird. Not writing on Sunday was actually the weirdest thing I think I have done in a really long time. I had that itch, and that craving, and it hasn’t gone away. Making this thing I’ve been doing habitual was always the goal, but to take the time off actually puts it in perspective and lets me appreciate it. That itch to make, and create, and do is still there all these days later, and it’s become a part of me. I don’t see it ever going away.

But also there is so much less stress about. Fighting my procrastinating has always been a struggle for me in all the seven years I’ve been making stuff on the internet, and now I feel like I am in an era after it. But I thought the same with writing, and it resulted in bad habits like not releasing things, not editing things, and not finishing things, so we’ll see if it really pays off. But I’m hopeful.

I’m also significantly less stressed than I was. There was this pressure to make and do things and be a part of that creation every day, and even with Sunday Chats now, I don’t have to feel that overwhelming pressure anymore, and it’s kind of great. This was the right decision, and I’m really happy to be in a new era of creation for myself.

Thank you to everyone who took a little bit of time out of their day to congratulate me for hitting 1000 days of writing. You all have no idea how much that means to me. To think people are following along this saga with me and watching me create and do things. It honestly moves me to my core. That piece I wrote was very real, very true, and very honest, and it’s one of my proudest writings that has been out there. Thank you all. For reading.

Always.

What I’ve Been Working On

It’s been a minute for a check in with this! So I wanted to give everyone a little preview of the new year. I’m sure I’ll touch on this stuff again soon, but to give you a preview:

I have finished writing a book. The book is entirely about a specific video game from this year, and it’s a collection of essay/article-style writings. I need to find an artist to help me make a cover for it and get it edited, but I’m hoping it’ll be out in early 2018!

I am working on a brand new podcast that I actually want to start. I’ll likely announce it in January as opposed to actually start it then. I’ve had this idea for a very, very long time, but it’s time to put it into action. Once I am cleared of GOTY content, I will be announcing it, and I intend for the first episode to release in February.

Video has been on my mind a lot lately, and I’m excited to get back into it. What exactly I’ll be doing... Well, more Alex Talks, that’s for sure. But I want to change things up. And I want to make it more consumable. I always want to do real, strict video essays, and that’s going to be a new endeavor going forward. We’ll see how it turns out.

There is a TON of great Game of the Year content coming from Irrational Passions, from the written word, to our content, to guest content, and the team has all been exceptional with helping me put this together. It’ll start rolling out at the end of this month, and I can’t wait for you all to see it!

What’s on Tap

There are honestly too many games to talk about, so I’ll just focus on the one I played today, which is Pyre.

I talked about my other games on Friday’s podcast, so listen to that for my full thoughts on things like Wolfenstein 2 and Death of the Outsider.

Pyre seems very good. I have pretty much just played the content I saw when I played it initially at PAX East 2016, and previewed it there. It was limitlessly impressive then, and continues to impress now. Its blend of visual novel-esque gameplay and weird, sporty-action is awesome, and so unlike anything else out there. As far as games that do new things, it is a standout in a year that is full of things like that.

I like the characters, I love the art, and I love the world, I’m really stoked to play more!

I’m also probably going to play some of that Monster Hunter World Beta tonight so god wish me luck.

Questions

I’ve been playing some goddamn video games!

It’s been surreal and I’ve wanted to stop and write and I’ve honestly had to force myself not to. I know that may seem counterintuitive to some, but It’s been really helpful to get some distance from this boot-camp style creation process.

But I finished a couple of things last week and I’m excited to continue going through games and finishing them in preparation for GOTY.

WE AER CONFIRMED FOR PHILLY!

The BrO-C is having a holiday get together and y’all should be excited.

I think I have and I haven’t. I think I fall into a lucky category that a wide swath of genres hit with me and resonate with me in a big way. I can sit down and really appreciate the five hour Call of Duty campaigns, but I can also play a Cuphead and get lost in it, and dig into Hearthstone for a few weeks, or lose myself to Animal Crossing Pocket Camp for a week or two on top of that. I love a multitude of genres, but this year has specifically hit with me as two sequels to my two favorite franchises in games were released: Persona and Zelda.

I think there is always a difficulty with representations in games to players. Like, I am also a white dude, and there are a ton of games trying to get to me, but I’m happy to say that this year definitely felt different, and many of my favorite games starred not white dudes. And that’s great! So I think your feelings of games not hitting with you is not alone.

But I think in those circumstance I try and challenge myself to new things even more. Things outside of my comfort zone. For me, the biggest one this year was Doki Doki Literature Club, which made me very uncomfortable, but paid off a lot, and also Wolfenstein 2, which going into I thought I wouldn’t like, and ultimately it didn’t work for me, but I’m glad I tried it.

Lean into your niches for the comfort food, and explore out of them for something that will (hopefully) surprise you. But don’t write of games that you haven’t played just because you didn’t like previous entries. Maybe you will, maybe you won’t. Time to look and see!

I mean for me it’s still the jump from SD to HD. But also the jump from 2D and 3D. I want to believe some HDR shit will change my life, but the more I hear about it the more it turns me off, honestly? Like I’m not surrounded by 4K HDR TVs and I don’t want the more placid experience to be “ruined” for me or anything.

OOOOH!

I love Christmas. Winter is my favorite season.

OMG.

Okay, so like definitely go on a cute walk through a lights-of-some-kind-celebration, so we have the Festival of Lights here in Maryland. Get some scarves and hot cocoa and go nuts!

Fireside cuddling, for sure.

And Gingerbread lattes from starbucks because they’ll make you fat and holiday ready and also taste like Christmas.

More enthusiastic, honestly! I think the biggest thing I took away from my 1000th day of writing was that it... well, it just felt like all the other days, ya know? There was nothing special about the act that day, aside from all the congratulations. The day after, where I didn’t write, that was the weird one. The special one.

Since my hunger for writing has been building a while, I’m excited to do this. To make this tentpole remain so. And I love Sunday Chats so much, so it’s definitely a big boon to it.

I’ve talked a lot about this on shows, but the Game Awards was excellent. A great show all around.

PSX was fine. It was not a press conference, and was more of a panel, what they had said it would be, so I think it was definitely more fun for the folks there.

The big stickers with me are HD MediEvil, which I am SUPER stoked for. Loved the game from before, and I hope they bring up the second one too since I love it even more, and that new Campo Santo game looks great. From Software can make whatever at this point and I am probably on board. It’s probably Tenchu, apparently, but I’m still in.

I’ve touched on it already, but it’s definitely been a bit of a shock to the system. I love all the questions about it! Makes me think folks really care ;)

JAPAN.

MAKE AND ASSASSIN’S CREED IN NINJA JAPAN.

PLEASE.

But for real probably 1800s London. I didn’t even play that one but it sounds awesome.

Well, I mean I don’t know. I have partially convinced myself that I definitely dont inspire others, even if there is evidence to the contrary, because I mean... it’s just too crazy for me to believe otherwise. Humbling? I guess?

And I have not realized that. I think I touched on this in my 1000 days piece. I think if that was your takeaway, you missed the point. Even when it feels like nothing is impossible, factors come in that will change that perspective. And holding onto that humility will keep you strong in your weakest moments. And somedays, the most impossible will feel so until it isn’t, and the possible will be very much so until it’s suddenly impossible.

Remember that. Because it hurts when that rug is pulled from under you.

47.

YES. VERY EXCITED FOR THIS QUESTION.

Spoilers, we’ve talked extensively about this, but I’m excited to share my answers here.

So.

Here we go.

With some wiggle room.

Earth Kingdom - Ravenclaw

There is this know-it-all cockiness that I think fits across both of them, and I think there is also this tried and true brilliance as well. There is an established empire of the Earth Kingdom, and it lines up with what Ravenclaw’s ideals would have been. There is also a rigidness to their way of movement, and I think it lines up with the rigidness of Rowena’s belief in knowledge.

Fire Nation - Slytherin

I think this could EASILY be Griffindor as well, I want to say that up front.

The two have this kind of strength from within that they draw from, that breath that the fire comes from. And I think the kind of natural jealous of the Fire Lord to the Avatar is similar to Salazar’s jealousy of Godric that brought about that divide, and brought about the Fire Nation that we see in The Last Airbender. There is also a great cunning and brilliant there too, and that can’t be undersold. But there is this feeling of inclusiveness that I can’t shake.

Water Nation - Gryffindor

In a similar way, there is this ego and overconfidence that the Northern Water Tribe holds that puts them in this camp. I could see this swapped with the Fire Nation, like before, as I think Gryffindor/Slytherin are the most similar of all the houses. But there is this idiocy and bravery beautifully melded together there, and a fluidity of response to the water bender’s movement that lines up with the bold and headstrong Gryffindors.

Air Nation - Hufflepuff

The crowd pleasers. The people-loves. The pacifists. It lines up with the feelings I think are true to what Helena had in mind, but there is a self-loyalty there too. This idea of trying to deflect conflict down really resonates with Air Benders I think, and a loyalty to their own ideals. They were monks who rigidly followed that, and I see that very deeply.

Jazz I LOVE this question so damn much. Folks should tweet at her your thoughts too!

I know this was a bit briefer a Sunday Chats, but I have a ton of stuff I still need to do and get done tonight, but thank you so much for reading.

I will keep trucking along and keep making cool things, but please, keep reading, and letting me know what you think.

I’ll keep writing, but beyond that, I’ll keep talking, and podcasting, and tweeting, and making video, and making an argument for games, because really, it’s all I know how to do.

All I ask you to do, is

keep it real.

(And please Buy Okami HD)

#video games #gaming #sunday chats #writing #don't break the chain #wolfenstein #pyre

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thelabyrinthoftime · 7 years

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Six or seven weird “facts” about The Labyrinth of Time

I’ve had this subject kicking around in my head for a while. I thought about making a YouTube video out of it, but it seems sort of...

Brilliant! But pointless.

So I’ll dump it here, and yes, there will be spoilers:

1.) You don’t need your quarter(s) to win the game

The Labyrinth of Time is sometimes cruel to the player, or maybe the game itself wasn’t well thought out, but there are several things you can do in the game that will prohibit you from completing the game, but you won’t get a “GAME OVER” screen, or any other indication that you have to start over- you’ll be stuck, much like I was when I first played the game when I was 9 or 10, and I have to do a write up about that, later.

All your walk-throughs will tell you that you can fuck up the game by doing the following:

Head to the lower level of the Labyrinth without a lantern.

Get thrown in jail and not have a key to escape the cell

Use your quarters improperly

Number 3 is wrong. Technically.

In the original version of the game, released by Electronic Arts, you are given just one quarter. The “proper” way to use it is to first place the quarter into the pay phone across from the pay toilet. When you do this, 13 more quarters pop out. This allows you to use one quarter to open the door to the pay toilet and eventually find the solution to a tile puzzle that can be found earlier in the game. Another quarter is supposedly needed to use on the jukebox across the hall from the pay phone. Putting the quarter in causes a silver key to come out of the coin return, and this key is required to beat the game.

What makes the game “cruel” is that you encounter this jukebox right before the pay phone, and it can be tempting to put the quarter into the jukebox first. For the Wyrmkeep re-release, you start the game with two quarters, which I thought was kind of lame, but I kind of understand it.

HOWEVER, there is a glitch in the game that will allow you to take the key even though it’s not supposed to be “there” for the taking, and I’m surprised no one ever encountered it. NOT ONCE have I seen it discusses anywhere, and if you see something that talks about the quarters and the glitch, it’s probably something I made or wrote up.

In fact, you’ll probably also read that I was always under the impression that getting an unseen key from the jukebox was how the game was supposed to go. It certainly makes more sense that a key would be under or on top of the jukebox than inside the coin slot.

So that’s one quarter down.

Now for the tile puzzle. It never changes. Let’s see if I can recite it by memory:

7 2 9 10 1 11 5 13 8 15 14 12 3 4 6 [ ]

Once you have this written down or committed to memory, you never need to waste a quarter on the pay toilet ever again.

2.) You don’t need a helmet, either!

About a quarter (pun?) of the way into the game, you encounter a mountain road, which kind of reminds me of the windy mountain road at the beginning of The Shining, and there are bowling ball sized rocks tumbling from heaven. You can move forward to the next area, but it’s a one way trip. If you attempt to go back, the game will tell you that you decide your head is no match for those rocks.

Deeper into the Labyrinth, you can find a medieval helmet to wear, and the game will let you pass, saying “Good thing you wore head gear.”, which is sort of obnoxious because that helmet looks about as thick as tin foil, but this game is obnoxious, so it’s okay.

Alternatively, if you go through the game out of sequence- meaning you solved the tile puzzle before “you” had the solution, you can get access to a bunch of other things, including a pith helmet. That works as well.

Occasionally, I’d play this game and I’d get the “Good thing you wore head gear” message going through the mountain road the first time without having picked up, let alone used a helmet. The first time I got this glitch was the first time I played the Wyrmkeep version, and I thought there might have been a problem with the re-release, but it didn’t always happen, and then I worried that I scratched my game disc in such a way that this glitch appeared, but this happens in both versions, I later found out.

The glitch was being caused by what ALL the walk-throughs claimed was a useless item: The whiskey bottle, and I’m not entirely sure it was unintentional. Attempting to use the bottle will cause the game to tell you that you feel more cheerful, but less intelligent. It also allows you to pass through the mountain road as much as you’d like without a helmet, and the rocks never hit you.

It’s a little too on the nose for me to think it was purely an accident. It’s perfectly logical, at least as far as this game’s logic goes. Booze lowers your inhibitions, and it was those same inhibitions that prohibit you from backtracking without protection.

3.) There are (unused) museum entries for the alien belt and device with the three levers

I’m certain it’s the webmaster of the Obscuritory that dug around in the disc data and discovered some unused text for the museum. All the other exhibits have a little computer terminal next to them that will give you information about the artifact in question, but there are no terminals for those other objects. Still, text was created for these objects:

ALIEN BELT This unusual object was discovered floating in Earth orbit during construction of the Space Station. Research into its past has proved inconclusive. New Worlds Development (a division of Terra Nova Development) acquired this exhibit after keeping it in the company's Lost and Found department for twelve years.

ALIEN CONSOLE The origins and purpose of this machine are completely unknown. It was discovered during the early stages of terraforming at the NWD Mars project. PLEASE DO NOT TOUCH THIS DISPLAY. We have no idea what it does when activated.

Source: The Cutting Room Floor

4.) Is there a significance to this teapot?

It would have been obscure enough of a fact to say “the paintings hanging up in Room 14 are pieces of computer art that the game’s artist did in the 1980s”, since this is an extremely obscure game, but I want to take it further, and this is where it stops being strictly about trivia facts, all the more reason I didn’t make a video out of this stuff.

The images in TLOT are made up of ray traced three dimensional objects. At one point, it’s very likely all the objects in the game were saved as 3D files which could be pulled up and looked at from any angle.

The teapot is another one of those objects that have no in-game purpose, but I’ve wondered if this could be one of the earliest 3D objects designed for the game. I’ve learned that when artists learn how to make 3D objects, one of the first objects they make is a teapot, largely because of all the shapes and contours and that these unusual surfaces have a way of throwing light around- that sort of stuff. A teapot can be seen in the first 3D fractal animation, “Vol Libre”, an animation that was so warmly received, the artist, Loren Carpenter, was immediately invited to work at what would eventually become Pixar.

vimeo

His groundbreaking animation technique was refined and used to create the still to this day mind blowing “Genesis Effect Demo Video” from Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan.

Some of the mountains in the background of some of the Labyrinth’s various scenes look a lot like the mountains in this video. I wonder if BWS used a similar technique to render them.

Edit: I’ve since learned these special teapots have a name: Utah Teapot

5.) There is (...was) an actual Doyle’s Bar and Grill

It’s a generic enough name that it had to be around somewhere. A google search says there’s such a place in Easton, MA, although it appears to have changed it’s name to “Tommy Doyle’s Pub and Grill”... yes, I just confirmed it now. Tommy Doyle bought the place from his brother Kenny and changed up the name about six years ago.

Source: https://patch.com/massachusetts/easton-ma/tommy-doyle-s-expands-restaurant

It’s almost certainly not the inspiration for the bar in the game, but I really have no way to know that. I wish I could grill the creators of the game about where some of this stuff came from, but I doubt they’d want to spend the time going over the obscure minutiae of this game. I’d love to hear a long yarn about how it was based on a real place and there was something special about it that inspired them to not only mention it in the ads on the subway, but actually feature the bar exterior elsewhere in the game...

But I wouldn’t be surprised if it was just made up, or the origins forever lost to time.

If for some reason, I find myself on the East coast, I’d love to check out Tommy Doyle’s Pub and Grill- it had good reviews... and I can pretend to dodge lightning bolts in the parking lot, but honestly, I haven’t been more than 20 or 30 miles east of the I-5 corridor in almost 30 years, and I’m likely to keep it that way. I’m more likely to search for ghost towns in California.

6.) The dumbest way to lose the game:

There’s a fourth way to ruin your quest through the Labyrinth. I’ve never seen it written up, probably because it’s a pretty stupid thing to do, and if you’ve made it this far in the game, you’re unlikely to make this “mistake”.

Near the end of the game, you are confronted by a threatening bust of the Minotaur! Ooooh! If you try to approach it, it will try to gore you with his horns. Across the room from the bust are two large oval mirrors that are reflecting light over to the bust; the Minotaur is a kind of projection, then, and you use the two cans of paint to cover up the mirrors to eliminate the illusion and do two more actions that will win the game.

HOWEVER, if you paint one mirror... and then decide that maybe it needs a different paint job, the game will happily help you out with that, but then you’re minus one paint can for the other mirror, and you’re forever blocked from the end of the game by a semi transparent Minotaur bust.

7.) The punishment for theft is meant to be death:

Near the end of the game, history is altered, and a special artifact appears in the museum where previously, there was just an empty broken tube. The tube is still broken after history is altered, allowing you to take it and use it to win the game. Attempting a five fingered discount triggers an alarm and attempting to use the futuristic museum’s teleporter throws you inside the jail cell in the old town of Revolver Springs, California.

But what’s chilling about it is that your arrival date. Entering the Daily Bullet, a local newspaper company, establishes the date as April 30th:

History records, as these notes suggest, that the town was destroyed the next day. The final Daily Bullet paper confirms that the time period you are in when you visit the old town is the day before the town’s destruction:

I guess this last one isn’t so obscure if you play through the game. Yeah, it’s the town’s final day of existence, but how much thought is given to the fact that if you don’t have that key, you’ll eventually burn or be crushed by falling timber and bricks.

Cruel game, indeed.

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symbianosgames · 7 years

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The following blog post, unless otherwise noted, was written by a member of Gamasutra’s community. The thoughts and opinions expressed are those of the writer and not Gamasutra or its parent company.

This is a public service announcement to all game developers who are also Harry Potter fans: The Hogwarts Express is real, and it’s called Train Jam!

Train Jam is an annual pilgrimage of game developers who decide to meet up in Chicago and ride a train all the way to San Francisco for Game Developers Conference (GDC). Train Jam is organized by Adriel Wallick and John Lindvay, and has been running annually since 2014. Growing exponentially each year, 2017 is the first year that the train was filled entirely by game developers!

This year was my first GDC and Train Jam, and I have to say honestly, Train Jam was the best part of the whole experience. What could possibly top a cross-country voyage with 300 fellow gamedev wizards and witches? Well, how about if all those magical people made a bunch of amazing games on the train together and showed them off at GDC!

Logistically speaking, the Train Jam runs from Chicago, Illinois to Emeryville, California during the week preceding GDC. Participants meet up in Chicago, get the jam theme, form teams, board the Amtrak California Zephyr Express, and jam out a game over the next 52-hours while soaking in the sights of the great American countryside. When the train arrives in Emeryville, participants disembark, take a big group photo, and head to downtown San Francisco.

Left: Union Station, Chicago. Right: Emeryville, California. (Sadly, no magical barrier to pass through on platform 9 3/4)

Atmospherically speaking, there’s no safer and more inclusive space within the gaming industry than the Train Jam. The diversity initiatives this year focused around geographic and gender diversity, providing assistance for game developers from non-western nations and for those who identify as female, gender fluid, non-binary, agender or otherwise non-male. All this diversity engenders an atmosphere where creativity reigns supreme and no game idea is too silly, cute, serious, ridiculous, or mysterious to make a reality.

This year’s jam theme was unexpected anticipation, which lead to a wide variety of games being made. Some were serious in tone, like the game my buddy Malcolm’s team made called : “What The $!#&@! Do They Need Now?” covering the increasingly difficulty and prohibitive travel restrictions imposed on travelers to the United States. Other games were silly, like the game my teammate Sam and I made, called “Bad Hombres.”

The pitch for Bad Hombres goes like this: “You know that moment in a western film where someone walks into a saloon, and you’re not sure if they’re there to shoot up the place, or just have a drink? In bad hombres, a you have to determine if each person entering the saloon is a threat, and outdraw them if they draw on you. Shoot an innocent person however, or get outdrawn, and it’s game over.”

I thought this idea sufficiently embraced the unexpected anticipation theme, providing randomized periods of anticipation while the player waits to see if the new saloon patron is going to draw on them or not. The unexpected outcome is whether or not the hombre is going to be bad and draw on you or not. In addition to fitting the theme, the idea lent itself to a simple one-screen art perspective and one-button input. My philosophy for game jams is: pick a very simple idea and spend as much time as possible polishing that idea.

Sam Elsbernd and I teamed up, with him creating the art and music, and myself doing the design and implementation. We used Unity to create the game, synced files via flash drives provided by Train Jam, and looped two sound designers Reuben Brenner-Adams and Roger Smith II into the project to make a few sounds for the game. Overall, we both spent about 40 hours a piece working on the game, and probably 10 hours sleeping on the train.

Sleeping on the train is a tricky proposition when you’re in coach class. There are a few sleeper car tickets available each year, but they go quickly. In coach, your seats will recline, but you won’t be able to get fully horizontal. It’s not particularly comfortable, but if you wait until you’re too exhausted to keep working before attempting to sleep, you’ll probably be able to catch a few solid winks. Here are a few tips for being comfortable on the train.

Try to grab a table to work at in one of the observation cars. This will give you a better surface to work on if you’re an artist, and will provide you with amazing views of the American countryside when the train reaches Colorado and further west. (If you plan on taking a break for an extended period of time, make sure to take your stuff with you so someone else can enjoy an observation car seat for a while!)

Make sure to schedule mealtimes on the train. You have to make reservations to have a real meal in the dining car, so be sure to sign up for a timeslot. There are more convenient snack car options, but the quality of the food in the dining car is much better and well worth the price. (Take care of your body, you still have a whole GDC ahead of you after Train Jam!)

Stretch your legs, see what your fellow gamedev wizards, witches, and warlocks are up to. Walking around the train is a great way to meet new people and give you a moment away from your jam game. The train also makes infrequent stops where you can get some fresh air for a few minutes. (Just don’t wander off and get left behind when the train moves on!)

Be hygienic. There aren’t showers on the train for coach class passengers, but the liberal use of deodorant, hand sanitizer, and body wipes can provide a kind of refreshment and cleanliness that you and your fellow passengers will appreciate. This year Black Box provided all of those materials to each participant in a care package. If you’ve got long or naturally oily hair, dry shampoo is also a good idea.

The development of Bad Hombres went smoothly. Limiting scope gave us plenty of time to work on polishing animations, adding sound effects and music, and score keeping mechanisms to make the game feel more arcade-like. I highly recommend working with a team of 2-4 people, and not growing any larger than that unless those extra people are going to work on aspects ancillary to the game itself, like making a video trailer for the game, documenting its creation in blog format, or acting as a producer that keeps scope limited and removes impediments from the core team members.

One of the best aspects of Train Jam is that it also makes you an exhibitor at GDC! The Train Jam has a booth on the 3rd floor of Moscone West that showcases all the games made that year aboard the train. You can sign up to help staff that booth, and use it as a kind of home base whenever you want to meet people at GDC! Simply show off your game, talk to attendees, and tell them what it was like making a game on a train! What better way to meet new people?

Train Jam is a networking accelerator. It’s a warm opener to GDC for any participant. By the time you get off the train in Emeryville, you’ll know dozens of game developers by name, and at least recognize the faces of a couple hundred. Starting off GDC week this way means that you know about as many people as you would after having attended GDC for a period of several years! There’s a value there that can’t be understated. If you’re going to be attending GDC for the first time ever, I highly recommend making Train Jam a part of your travel itinerary.

If you’d like an indication of what it costs to attend both Train Jam and GDC as an indie developer, here’s a record of my expenses for my 2017 trip.

I saved money by using hostels instead of hotels. Hostels have a somewhat dubious reputation in the United States, but travelers from abroad know that hostels are an amazing way to save money, are generally clean and safe, and can in fact be as hip and swank as a fancy hotel. The only thing you’re actually sacrificing is a bit of privacy, but even then, most hostels have private room options available as well. If I were planning the trip again, I would 100% for sure use hostels again.

I also decreased costs by paying for my flights using credit card points that I had saved up over the previous year. I’ve included the dollar amounts for those flights in the chart for your edification. One could probably save even more money on meals by strategically attending certain parties that offer free food to GDC attendees. Also, most hostels and hotels provide free breakfast!

Finally, one could save more dough by attending GDC by downgrading from an IGS Pass to an Expo-only Pass.

The total from the Train Jam + GDC trip cost me $1,764.06. I paid my own way and didn’t take advantage of any kind of diversity initiative or other subsidy. Some game developers can ask for financial assistance from their employers (with various levels of success), and if you qualify for diversity initiatives, you should definitely apply. Hopefully the numbers I’ve shared with you here can help you set a target for savings so you can make your own trip next year!

Overall, the Train Jam is one of the most magical experiences possible in the world of game development. I sincerely hope that everyone who wants to attend will be able to at some point in their gamdev careers. It’s a phenomenal way to meet other talented developers and network before attending GDC, and I guarantee the people you meet at Train Jam will be just as unique and stunning as the American countryside that the train travels through.

#IFTTT #Blogger

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engagedfamilygaming · 7 years

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Nintendo Switch Games Through the End of 2017

Nintendo held a press event on January 12th, 2017 at 11pm EST. The event was livestreamed from Tokyo and provided all the of the details players would need about the upcoming console including the consoles hardware specs and the launch lineup.

It is well known that software is what sells systems so many gamers, myself included, have been waiting patiently to know what Nintendo was going to be bringing to the console at launch. The last year has been VERY light for Nintendo as only a few games came to the WiiU in 2016.

Take a look below for a list of the games that Nintendo has announced for the Switch.

Launch Day

Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild

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Breath of the Wild is the real headliner here. We have known about the game for several years and to find out that the game will be releasing at launch for the Switch is a relief. I have to be honest when I say that I thought the game was going to be delayed again. I am very happy to have been wrong.

The Nintendo Switch is launching with arguably the most ambitious Zelda game in franchise history. This definitely bodes well for the console. Very few Nintendo consoles have launched alongside a game that has the potential to be a killer app.

Breath of the Wild is gorgeous to behold, grand in scale, and full of secrets to discover. The only question we have now is whether it will be fun to play. Fortunately, we’ll find all of that out on March 3rd, 2017 when the console launches.

1 2 Switch

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1 2 Switch is a launch title that is intended to help show off all of the unique features of the Switch hardware and controllers. It feels like it is intended to help facilitate board game like experiences.

I have my doubts about this one even though it looks like it could be fun. First, why isn’t this game themed after Wario Ware? That is a known commodity with a certain cache with Nintendo fans. That would have added value to the game all on its own. Second, why isn’t this game bundled with the hardware? I don’t think we’ll ever get an answer to that question, but it feels to me like this would have been a perfect game to include with the console as opposed to releasing it at $60.

Just Dance 2017

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As the world flies through space circumnavigating the sun, so to does a Just Dance game get released by Ubisoft. This was announced prior to the Switch reveal event, but even if it hadn’t been this would have been a safe bet. This series has always sold well on Nintendo platforms and I see no reason why it would stop now.

I actually think the Switch might be in a position to make this game better because players can take it with them and are no longer confined to your living room. The screen might be small, but that is, unquestionably, added value to the game.

Skylanders: Imaginators

Imaginators is another game that I am not surprised to hear is releasing for the Nintendo Switch on day one. I have said it before, but it is worth repeating. This is in my opinion, the best Skylanders game in the history of the franchise, so seeing it on more consoles is great. This version of the game includes a neat twist though. You only need to scan your Skylanders toys into the system once and then they will be loaded onto your copy of the game permanently. That is definitely a useful feature. I’m sure my kids would love not having to lug their figures all over the place if they wanted to play a quick game.

Super Bomberman Z

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Bomberman is a franchise that has lain dormant for a number of years. The last entry in the series came out in 2010 for the Xbox Live arcade. I’m glad to see it come back and I am especially happy to see it launch on day one for the Switch. This is a franchise that is built around multiplayer action and it is simple enough for just about anyone to pick up and have fun.

March

Snipperclips: Cut it Out Together

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(Video from Gamersprey YouTube channel).)

This might be, quietly, one of the best games to launch for the Switch in its first year. This is a cooperative puzzle game with a very interesting art style. The puzzle aspect of the game is what makes the game cool though. Each player controls a different shape on the screen. When the two shapes overlap each other a player can choose to cut out a shape from their own piece. Players then have to complete different objectives with their newfound shapes. These objectives will include things like moving objects, popping balloons (after creating a sharp point, filling in a shape template, etc.

I can’t wait for this one!

Fast RMX

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(Video from IGN YouTube channel)

Fast Racer Neo came to the Wii U last year and was a welcome addition to that consoles library. In a way, it was the F-Zero game that fans have always wanted, but never would have gotten otherwise.

This is another edition of the game that will be brought to the Switch. It will feature thirty new tracks and fifteen new ships while letting you and up to eight of your friends play in local or online races.

Just be careful, this game is absurdly fast.

Has-Been Heroes

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(Video from GameSpot YouTube channel)

This is a new game from Frozenbyte Studios that feels right at home on the Switch’s tablet based platform. It is a strategy RPG where players control a team of heroes who are past their prime while going on an epic quest to bring their King’s twin daughters to school.

The premise is silly, but the gameplay looks like it will be remarkably deep. We can’t wait to give it a whirl.

April 28th

Mario Kart 8 Deluxe

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The Switch trailer released in December of 2016 showed footage of a game that looked like Mario Kart 8, but on a track that wasn’t in the original game and featuring King Boo. This made a strong implication that a new version of the wildly successful kart racing game would be ported over to the Switch.

Mario Kart 8 Deluxe will include all of the characters and tracks from Mario Kart 8, including the two DLC packs. It will also include a number of new racers as well as an upgraded battle mode.

Spring 2017

ARMS

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ARMS is a casual fighting game that plays like Wii Boxing, but with more elements from other fighting games. This was playable at an event at the Nintendo World Store over the weekend and it was compared, favorably, to Splatoon in that it simplifies the fighting game genre enough to make it accessible, while still having a lot of depth and interesting gameplay.

I know it is early, but I am keeping my eyes on this game. It looks like it could be really good.

Disgaia 5

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Disgaia 5 is already available for the PS4 so this doesn’t really count as a new game. With that said, Disgaia is a strategy RPG that, I think, will fit in very well on a handheld device. The Fire Emblem series has done very well on the 3DS and I think this has a similar appeal as a game to take on the go.

Puyo Puyo Tetris

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I never thought this game would ever see the light of day here in North America. Puyo Puyo Tetris is, essentially, two arcade puzzle games stacked into one. The highlight of this game is the head to head multiplayer where players can choose to play either Tetris OR Puyo Puyo against each other. Both of these games feature similar themes. Shapes (either Tetrominoes in Tetris or piles of jellies in Puyo Puyo) fall from the top of the screen and players manipulate those shapes to compete rows or match colors.

They play differently enough that it will be fun to be able to pick the game you play when competing without the games being so different that it is distracting.

Rime

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Rime was announced as a PS4 exclusive back in 2014. Since then Sony dropped their support for the game and Tequila Works, the developer, had to seek a new source of funding. Fortunately, they were able to find it from Gametrust (then games publishing arm of GameStop) and are going to be able to bring the game multiplatform.

The game itself is stunning. Its art style evokes some of the same feelings I get when I look at video of The Legend of Zelda: Windwaker (which is one of my favorite games of all time). We don’t know many details about the game from a gameplay perspective, but it definitely includes extensive platforming, and puzzle solving.

I am sure we will hear more about this game as we get close to its launch.

Summer 2017

Splatoon 2

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We knew that a Splatoon game was going to be coming to the Switch thanks to the footage included in the reveal trailer in December. We did not, however, know that it was going to be a sequel. I would have bet that it was going to be a port of the original game (and, honestly, would have been happy with that.

Splatoon 2 includes a number of new features like new weapons, new specials, new battle modes and new maps. It also solves the problem of requiring a second screen to see the game map by allowing players to simply tap the x button to bring up the game map at any time. The animation for the map coming up is slick and fast so skilled players should be able to use it without having to slow down too much.

My favorite addition to the game is a set of dual pistols that players can use. These pistols have a reasonable range and can cover a lot of area fast, but what is most interesting is that they change the way players can move. Instead of jumping, they give players the ability to use a dodge roll. Weapon changing the way a player moves around the map opens up a lot of interesting design space for new weapons specials, and gear. Here’s hoping that Nintendo takes advantage of it.

Autumn 2017

Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim Special Edition

Part of me feels like this might be a bit late for the game’s release to make a splash. However, this will be the first time that players will have been able to take an Elder Scrolls game and play them on the go on a handheld platform. That could be just the hook that some players have needed to dive back into Skyrim again.

I will be very interested to see how this game continues its development over the course of the year.

Holiday

Super Mario Odyssey

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One of the chief complaints about the Wii U was the lack of what some people would consider a “proper” 3D Super Mario Bros. game. Super Mario 3D World was most definitely a thing that existed, but I suppose that wasn’t good enough for them.

Fortunately for those folks, Super Mario Odyssey looks like the spiritual successor to Super Mario 64 that fans have been clamoring for since it came out. It features large, gorgeously rendered, and very diverse environments to explore. It definitely includes secrets buried behind platforming challenges. And it looks gorgeous to boot thanks to the Switch’s improved hardware power.

Unfortunately, we have to wait until Holiday 2017 to enjoy it, but this one looks like it will be worth the wait.

2017 (No specific window announced)

Xenoblade Chronicles 2

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Xenoblade Chronicles was a Wii exclusive that earned a lot of positive praise for its story and its action oriented gameplay. Unfortunately it was buried on the Wii so it was held back graphically. Xenoblade Chronicles 2 looks like it is attempting to follow up on the original title while fixing some of the graphical shortcomings that tied the first game down.

Minecraft

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You simply cannot release a console in the post Minecraft world without including it on your console. It is too big of a force in the gaming world to ignore. Minecraft won’t be launching on day one with the Switch, but it will be out within the 2017 calendar year. Here’s hoping they can get it on their sooner rather than later as this is another game that works incredibly well on a handheld device and I am sure that a lot of kids would love to have a Minecraft game that they can play both at home and on the road.

FIFA

FIFA is the biggest sports franchise in the world. It comes as no surprise that EA will be bringing it to the Switch. I don’t really know how well hardcore fans of the franchise will take to playing the game on a handheld device, but I can imaging that casual fans will love the idea of being able to plug away at the games in their franchise modes while traveling.

Ultra Street Fighter II: The Final Challengers

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This is an interesting one. Super Street Fighter II: The New Challengers was released for the SNES many, many years ago. This is a sequel to that title that includes an option for an updated aesthetic (a beautifully hand drawn one at that) and two new characters (Evil Ryu and Violent Ken).

I am a huge Street Fighter fan, so this is easily one of my most anticipated games for the console even if it is only so that I can show my kids how Street Fighter games used to look.

Syberia 3

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Syberia 3 is an adventure game that takes place in a Steam Punk setting. Players take control of Kate Walker, the hero from the first two games, as she embarks on a new adventure. The last Syberia game came out ten years ago and I am sure there are fans who have wanted to continue her adventures. This will be their chance.

NBA 2K18

My love for NBA 2K18 is well documented. I think it is a remarkable basketball game, but it is also a great RPG as well. I, personally, cannot wait to play this game on my Switch. The NBA season is quite long and having the ability to play while on the road will be a great way to sneak a few more games in.

I Am Setsuna

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I am Setsuna released for the PS4 in 2016. It didn’t set the world on fire, but it was generally well received. I am excited to see it come to the Switch because I strongly feel that RPGs will have a great home there.

I am Setsuna was developed by the Tokyo RPG Factory (a subsidiary of Square Enix specifically built to make old school RPGs) and was intended to remind players of the fun they had playing Chrono Trigger in the late 90s. It did successfully evoke those feelings, but in a way that was to the game’s detriment as it didn’t live up to those expectations.

Dragonball Xenoverse 2

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Dragonball is a franchise that refuses to go away. Xenoverse is an action based role playing game that heavily features fighting game mechanics.

The split screen multiplayer feels like it would be a great fit for the Switch in tabletop mode. I am just hoping that someone creates some sort of headrest mount so my boys can play it. This feels like a game they would appreciate, especially as the oldest starts to get into the show.

Sonic Mania

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Sonic the Hedgehog has been around a long time and has evolved a lot over that time. Unfortunately, a lot of those evolutions have been for the worse. Sonic Mania is an attempt to bring Sonic the Hedgehog back to his 2D roots

Steep

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Ubisoft released this game quietly on the PS4, Xbox One, and PC towards the end of last year. It was announced at E3, and received almost no marketing between then and its release. This surprised me because people who played Steep were enjoying it quite a bit.

Steep is billed as an open world extreme sports game that includes snowboarding, skiing, and wing-suit flight. The game’s big “thing” is that instead of being a linear set of courses like in SSX players are encouraged to explore a wide open world searching for new courses to run and zones to to be dropped in.

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