#modern remakes of 90s games be like:

[reinabeestudio]

Posting this one by itself 'cause the difference between the doodle I made while I had a fever & the final thing is so funny to me

The original doodle btw↓↓↓

[guideaus]

Damn fullmetal alchemist brotherhood

[skyburger]

people who go on and on about old 3D video games having "bad" graphics are genuinely baffling like?!?! resident evil (1996) is gorgeous. alone in the dark (1992) is so pretty. metal gear solid (1998) is probably stylistically my favorite game in the whole metal gear series. some of you claim to love modern ps1-style horror but youre LYING!!!! low poly horror "fans" when theyre faced with actual ps1 games:

[alsgrid]

Why retro graphics are sometimes better

For the past few days, I have been playing through this game called Signalis. It's a survival horror game, and a throwback to the genre classics of the 90s in both gameplay and visuals. And I like those visuals. A lot, in fact, I think it looks better than any of the Resident Evil remakes, or any modern horror game. Looking at gameplay screenshots, that might sound absurd, but hear me out.

For a long time, I felt like older games were in many ways more atmospheric and immersive, specifically because of the way they looked, but playing through Signalis finally helped me articulate why that is. In the pursuit of realism and fidelity, a lot of games have stopped having a distinctive, deliberate visual style. In other words, instead of drawing inspiration from art, they draw inspiration from reality. This might work well for many kinds of games, and I won't say that a lot of modern AAA games aren't good looking or the people working on them aren't talented.

But for fantasy, sci-fi, and horror, a lot of the time, photorealism just doesn't cut it. In Signalis, everything from the color palette, the character models, the environments, to the animations and even the lighting is designed to create a certain mood, and transmit an emotion. The game is scary, and melancholic and mysterious because every facet of the world was specifically designed to look that way. Instead of trying to reproduce objective reality, the game creates a subjective representation of it, filtered through the lens of whatever it wants you to feel. It also leaves a lot of details to the imagination, which is, quite frankly, the trick to all good horror. No one can frighten you more than your own imagination.

Now, I have no actual background in analyzing art, and quite honestly, I'm talking out of my ass here, but I do think it's an interesting example, and an example that mainstream developers can learn from. Not every game needs to be as close of a reproduction of the real world as you can muster, and in fact, for some games it is quite counterproductive.

Oh, and I will also be posting a full review of this game soon, cause I think it's excellent(you can find it on gamepass BTW)

[retronator]

I never played Karateka in the 80s, but as a big fan of Prince of Persia and Jordan Mechner's journals, I was stoked to hear that an interactive documentary about Jordan's prototypical cinematic platformer was in the works by Digital Eclipse.

Released this week, The Making of Karateka on the surface looks like any other game you buy through Steam ($20, Windows-only), GOG, or whichever favorite store or console you prefer (available also for Xbox, PS4/5, Switch). Once the thing loads though, you really get 3 things: a documentary, the original Karateka, and a new remaster.

The documentary part is an audio-visual slideshow retelling Jordan's development story starting with his teenage years pitching his earlier title Deathbounce to the publishing house Brøderbund. It's an interesting look into the iterative process, seen through correspondence letters, journal entries, and many playable builds at various stages of completion. After we reach the eventual rejection of that title, Jordan comes back with a prototype of a visual-narrative experience unseen on home computers. We get to follow Karateka's full life cycle from pre- to post-production, ending with the conception of its sequel (which eventually turned into Prince of Persia). It's a real treasure trove! Fellow pixel artists will appreciate the many graph-paper sketches and interactive overlays of final game sprites compared to rotoscoped outlines and filmed footage. There are also video segments, from a comprehensive breakdown of the music to interviews with other developers reflecting on the impact Jordan's games had on their careers. You'll even encounter a fan letter signed by the one and only "John Romero, Disciple of the Great Jordan and worshipper of the Magnificent Mechner!" (I kid you not, you can't make this stuff up).

Perhaps just as crucial for an interactive documentary like this, you can launch any of the floppy disks in the emulator, trying out various iterations and ports of Karateka.

The emulation is fantastic and lets you fiddle with display settings (monochrome or color display, scanlines, pixel perfect or zoomed) as well as enhance the frame rate. You can even rewind the many deaths you will face if you've never played the game before (like me). If you spend some more time obsessing over the weird artifacts of the Apple II hi-res graphics, you might even go down the rabbit hole of realizing that on the Apple II you didn't really paint colors as much as you used different monochrome dithering patterns that the graphics display would then turn into 4 different hues. A fascinating learning experience if you include some of your own research online!

Add to this the Commodore 64 and the Atari 8-bit versions to compare how the graphics got adapted across the earlier ports and you have a nice way to relieve the mid-80s with a bit of help from modern emulation (I did beat the C64 version without rewinding though!). I'd love to see more art from the other remakes, especially the 16-bit Atari ST port, but I understand their decision to omit playable versions of those due to the lower quality on the gameplay side of the translations.

This brings us to the final part of the package, the modern remaster. Unlike the 2012 complete reimagining of the game (with 3D graphics and all), Digital Eclipse approached the remake as the ultimate port of the original to an imaginary system along the lines of a 90s VGA PC.

It's well done. Some of the fully-redrawn scenes are a bit overpainted for my taste (I'd prefer a pixel art rendition of the castle than a blurry photographic collage, although there were many games in the 90s that did take this approach), but the in-game graphics are really in style, including the smooth animations that are like one would imagine granted a beefier CPU. It's also a sort of director's cut with previously unseen scenes added, in particular, the battle with the leopard as a clever action-puzzle in the middle. The AI is unfortunately even less challenging than Jordan's implementation. As great as the 6-move fighting system could have been, you yet again resort to simply kicking away opponents as they tirelessly crawl into your range. There isn't even the nuance from the original where you were the one who had to approach some enemies with skilled timing. On the other hand, you now have optional goals and achievements that make the repetitive/easy combat work in your favor (stringing various combos, beating opponents or the level under a time limit …). As the Digital Eclipse president Mike Mika admits at the end of the welcome commentary mode, they didn't manage to achieve their perfect port, but they did come close.

In conclusion, I thoroughly enjoyed playing both the original as well as the remake and while the combat system lacks any sort of depth beneath its stunning animations, Karateka is instead a monumental experience for its presentation. Big characters with personality and realistic motion are displayed through cinematic camera cuts and story vignettes (3 years before Ron Gilbert came up with the word "cutscene"). There are details like animating the unfortunate falling off the cliff at the start of the game, or respectfully bowing to the first guard as they bow in return. Jordan's creative work is precious and worth the attention this release gifts it.

I highly recommend The Making of Karateka to all retro gamers and/or game developers for its immersive documentation which provides an experience that goes beyond the usual video documentaries. It's interactive—just like the subject it's talking about—something I want to see more in the future. And if the $20 by any chance seems high to you, consider that the original retailed at $35 (and that was in 1984 dollars).

[kinokoshoujoart]

mini post: rock being a meme in response to the blue feather in AnWL - WL for girl

fig. 1: cool collected sane and popular guy who can’t stand the idea of being tied down by marriage and stuff

So for AnWL Natsume rendered Rock’s response to the blue feather simply as “Aha!!” which doesn’t even capture 10% of how insane he sounds in JP, especially given that he Definitely Isn’t Into Marriage And Stuff

(…unleeeeesssss?)

(screenshots from taison_ch’s playthrough of AnWL, which is extremely funny and i highly recommend it)

When you present him with the Blue Feather, Rock screams “KITAAAAAAAAAAAA!” which is literally “IT’S HEEEEEEEEEEEERE!” but a feeling of like. “it’s finally happening!!!!!!” like. a pretty mid 2000s memey dying-of-excitement for-something-long-awaited sort of thing to say. It became a Meme Phrase because of actor Yuji Oda yelling it in Sante FX eyedrop commercials in the 90s, if you want to hear the kind of energy Rock likely exuded out loud:

And he reprised his role for the 20 year anniversary!

I’m not sure how you’d localize it in English in 2005… One suggested modern translation was YAAAAAASSS! which… yeah, matches the idk manic dated-meme cringefail wife vibe

also, it doesn’t actually appear in the final version of the remake, since the blue feather response was changed for everyone to give you a yes/no option, but it’s still leftover in the game’s files! and xseed rendered it “Oh, man, FINALLY!” according to Rock’s dialogue file)

Anyway, i wonder if it’s the same energy as doing this (there’s probably a better example)

[electronicfurbymusic]

"The new Furby was made just for profit" is an absolutely pointless criticism cuz like... Literally every toy made by every big corporation ever was created for profit?? The Furby looking like most of the interactive robot pets nowadays shouldn't be surprising either because every other Furby was made to appeal to the trends at the time, it's just how the toy market works (I don't like the trends of nowadays either but let the kids have it like come on at least they might finally play with something other than those cheap mobile games lmao)

However I do think it would be cool if they brought back the original Furby too, I feel like releasing some to see if people would want it could be worth a try for Hasbro, a part of the new Furby's marketing campaign is basically "millennial parents can introduce their kids to a toy from their childhood" so I just think it would be neat if they also released a remake of the 90s Furby models along with the modern ones so the parents can show their kids how the Furby from their childhood looked and compare them (I think I would've loved something like that as a kid), but idk that's just an idea I have

[alln64games]

Mystical Ninja Starring Goemon

JP release: 7st August 1997

NA release: 16th April 1998

PAL release: 18th April 1998

Developer: Konami

Publisher: Konami

N64 Magazine Score: 90%

I remember seeing the scores for Mystical Ninja in N64 magazine, but it didn’t seem like my kind of game. I was very wrong about that – Goemon’s first N64 game is kind of a hybrid of Super Mario 64 and Ocarina of Time, mixed with edo era Japan and a gloriously absurd plot of musical performers trying to turn Japan into their stage.

The game starts out in a Zelda-style town, but what’s impressive is that this is from before Ocarina of Time. You can swap between Goemon and Ebisumaru (plus more you meet along the way) at any time, each with their own set of weapons and abilities. These are uses sparingly throughout the game, so for the most part you can play as who you prefer.

Connecting each town is a large overworld with some nice locations. The first one I encountered brought back strong childhood memories as I recognised the music from Krazy Konami Racers, but the rest of the music in the game is also great, with lots of great tracks throughout the game. I was bopping my head to quite a lot of the music which mixes classical and modern instrument sounds.

Dungeons also play a big part in the game. While there are map/compass items to collect and keys to find, they’re a lot more platform-oriented than Zelda dungeons. One downside is the game’s camera (which can be turned holding R and using the c-buttons), but it’s something you get used to. While there are some bottomless pits, other areas just have you fall to a section where you work your way back – although one handy thing is that there’s no fall damage.

There’s also a variety of other sections, including multiple giant robot boss fights, which treat you to a song each time you use your giant robot, Impact. Each starts off with an arcade-style section to build up your health and ammo before taking a first person perspective as you shoot and punch your opponent. It’s a lot of fun, although they do become more frustrating the longer they go on.

Goemon is an incredibly charming game that’s still a ton of fun to play. Some of the puzzles do have a sign flat out telling you what to do, although these mainly relate to Ebisumaru’s camera item, which reveals hidden things, so I would probably get stuck without being reminded that the object exists. Even with that, the main story is amusingly silly and the game likes throwing new things at you. It’s a great game.

It’s a clever game, not only because there’s simply so much to do, but because you’re never quite sure what’s going to come next. Mini boss? End-of-level boss? Ludicrous sub-game involving a big yellow man and some falling shrinking pills? Erm, yes, quite. Mystical Ninja is a supreme example of game invention.

- Tim Weaver, N64 Magazine #14

Remake or remaster?

An updated version of Mystical Ninja would be great, with a better camera and fine tuned controls. A bit of extra side content would also be welcome. And perhaps a quest log as instructions are a but unclear at times.

Official ways to get the game.

There is no official way to get Mystical Ninja Starring Goemon.

[cinnamonest]

I know nothing about Persona let alone Goro Akechi but after reading the bsf and yan profile post I want to give this man a hug (and my tits). His story seems so sad ;-; and he's so pretty and for what?? 💢

Honestly, as much as I enjoy genshin I never truly found it to have any meaningful or extremely well written characters (which is not a bad thing, I just can't take them seriously when they all look like that lmao). All credit to making me think twice about them goes to writers and artists in the fandom. So the change in content feels soooooo nice. Made me appreciate your writing in another way

I've heard about Persona a LOT for years, but I didn't have a huge drive to play it until your liveposting (p.s I love the LP so much) and especially the posts with that one insane policeman guy who is a loser (affectionate, also giving him my pussy). Any recs? 😅

HE IS MY BABY BOY you're so right he is so pretty 😖😖😖 Akechi is genuinely an excellently written character, and Persona 5 Royal is one of the few games I think fully deserves to be so hyped as it is.

Tbh I think the problem genshin and similar games has is that there's so many characters, you have to essentially go out of your way to dig into lore to get anything beyond surface level from them. This happens a lot in series with lots of characters — like with Danganronpa for example, your experience of a lot of characters completely changes upon playing their free time events. A lot of genshin characters get very little screen time on the main story, so all their characterization is in their quests, lines, and character profile content. Which to be fair, with a game of this nature that's kinda the only way to really do it, so, I'm just glad they give us that extra content tbh. I've played some gachas that would introduce new characters but give very little beyond a design and name which is kinda sad when you want to know more about the lil guy you're playing with.

But AAAAAAAAAAAAAA thank you so much anon I am going to ramble here, but I'll put a tl;dr at the bottom!

Soooo if you want to get into Persona, I'd recommend the series in a certain order with some notes. There's 5 main entries in the series and a lot of spinoffs.

A word of advice in general with marathoning a game series: with any series it's a good idea to play in order of chronological and thus technological progression, especially if you intend to play the series back to back, otherwise going from a more recent game to an older one can damper your experience due to the decrease in graphical quality, gameplay smoothness, and general content quantity.

However for this series, the ideal order to play really depends on the factors of 1) which version of Persona 3 you choose to play, and 2) if you want to play Persona 1 & 2.

Regarding Persona 1 and 2: These are some of those games where your enjoyment will strongly depend on whether or not you're a person who is okay with some of the frustrations, limitations and slowness/jankiness common to old games (they came out between 1996-1999). I know some people don't mind or see it as a sort of vintage charm, while others get very frustrated with that — if you're the latter, I'd recommend saving yourself the frustration and skipping them, but if you like old games or have a high tolerance for jankiness, you could start here. I will also say that, even amongst the vintage/90s games fan crowd, P2 is definitely more popular and considered better than P1. It's also much better on the aforementioned issues.

Also, unless you have an original PlayStation or PSP, you'll have to emulate these.

Regarding Persona 3: there's several versions — the original came out in like 2006, then there was a remake version called P3 FES which added an epilogue (which is being added to the recent remake soon anyway), then a PSP remake called Persona 3 Portable (which has ports on modern consoles), then the most recent remake, Persona 3 Reload, came out just a few months ago in 2024.

Obviously the newest remake has vastly improved graphics and added lots of gameplay content. However, one of the biggest differences is that P3 Portable had the option to play as a female protagonist — this altered a lot of aspects of the game and is exclusive to that version (which has disappointed a lot of people hoping she'd be in the 2024 remake), so you can't play as her if you play Reload (unless, I believe, you play PC, there's a volunteer team currently making a mod for her).

Personally, I bought P3 Reload, and couldn't get into it, so I dropped it. Then I bought P3P on a whim and LOVE it so far. Getting to play as the girl protagonist makes a massive difference in my opinion, and more than compensates for the older graphics/gameplay. It's not just the romance routes either, her dialogue options, interactions, music, and overall vibe is different enough that it changes the feel of the story.

It really depends on what you value more — 2024-tier visual quality/gameplay and the epilogue, versus the Female Protagonist experience, so just pick which you prefer.

For the order thing, if you choose to play P3P (or the original/FES for whatever reason), I'd start here, but if you want to play Reload, I'd play it either last or just before P5 Royal.

Moving on, Persona 4: Golden and Persona 5: Royal are both the definitive editions of their respective games. They're remakes of the originals with a lot of added content, and unlike Persona 3, there's no reason to play the older versions over these. Notably their themes/vibes are kinda opposite of each other (big city world-scale societal rebellion versus small rural town murder mystery), I wouldn't say either story is better or worse, they're not really comparable and more a matter of personal taste.

As for the stories, admittedly if you've read my posts, you've essentially already been spoiled on the identity of the killers, but honestly it's still worth experiencing the story, there's multiple big plot twists before and after the reveals regarding Akechi/Adachi.

I would play Persona 5 Royal last, largely because it's widely considered the best entry to the series and is by far the longest. However if you only intend to play one game, it should definitely be P5 Royal. The only real flaw to P5 is it's much easier than previous games.

From here, there's a few more spinoff games, whether or not you want to play them really just depends on if you enjoy the genre. There's a bit of lore in some of them but nothing critical.

Dancing All Night/Starlight/Moonlight - dancing rhythm games

Arena Ultimax - fighting game, acts as an epilogue to P3&4

Persona Q 1&2

These are Nintendo DS spinoffs with chibi style art. I haven't played these and admittedly don't know much about them, I think they're dungeon crawler genre? It's popular for the aspect of which it involves the characters of the different main games, so you get to see them interact with each other.

The downside is that these games are oddly expensive, I think because there weren't too many copies. I intend to get them eventually.

Persona 5 Tactica/Strikers:

These are P5 spinoffs that put the cast in alternate stories, strikers is the closest to a true sequel from my understanding, tactica is more of a dungeon-crawler. I didn't get them because Akechi isn't in strikers and is just minor dlc for tactica.

The Phantom X

This is upcoming I believe, it's going to be a mobile game with a new cast.

The TL;DR of my advice:

- Play P2 only if you're into vintage gaming

- Play P1 only if you're REALLY into vintage gaming

- Play Persona 3 Portable if you really value the female protagonist/male character romance experience, otherwise play Persona 3 Reload

- If you play the original Persona 3, FES, or P3 Portable: start with that, then P4 Golden, then P5 Royal

- If you play Persona 3 Reload: play P4 Golden FIRST, then both P5 Royal and P3 Reload in either order.

- Play the spinoffs just based on what type of games you like, if any.

[autopotion]

*These are not official groupings, just mine.

EARLY (1987-1993)

Mainline games released: I, II, III, IV, V.

Other notable releases: the Legend series, Mystic Quest

Established the formula & series mainstays--job classes, summons, chocobos & moogles, etc.

These games were relatively simple at first, but soon became trailblazers for epic storytelling in RPGs--especially IV (or initially II in North America).

Pixel guys.

Mostly known by their many (many, many) remasters and remakes.

Modern audiences might find their stories rote and their gameplay unnecessarily difficult, but they still enjoy a tiny, vocal fanbase.

GOLDEN (1994-2001)

Mainline games released: VI**, VII, VIII, IX, X.

Other notable releases: Tactics, Chocobo's Mystery Dungeon, Anthology, Chronicles

With the formula established & with the more powerful hardware of fifth- (and later sixth-) generation consoles, FF pushed boundaries and graphical limitations to produce their most ambitious games (and marketing campaigns) yet. You might say they succeeded, for better or worse; Final Fantasy VII is generally considered to be the very first AAA video game.

The era that the majority of the FF fanbase on the Internet is most nostalgic for, a fact that might inspire either your own misty-eyed recollection of the good ol' days, or an overwhelming desire to snap the rose-tinted glasses. Or both.

Saw the first of many (many, many) ports across different systems--in part to give English-speaking audiences access to the early games they missed, but also as blatant cash-grabs.

Modern audiences who have no nostalgia for this era often voice that they find stylized 3D polygons much more difficult to acclimate to than the pixel guys.

**FFVI could arguably fall under the early era. If I'd made this poll fifteen years ago, when the division of fans between VI and VII was much more stark, that's where I would have put it. However, this poll is also about how modern audiences tend to think about their favorite FF games, and FFVI enjoys a nostalgic fanbase on par with those of the other games of the golden era. Search for it on any "best FF games of all time" list and you'll see what I mean.

COMPILATION (2002-2008)

Mainline games released: XI, XII.

Other notable releases: Crystal Chronicles, X-2, Compilation of FFVII (Before Crisis, Crisis Core, Dirge of Cerberus, etc.), FFXII: Revenant Wings, the Tactics Advance series & the War of the Lions remake of the original Tactics, the DS remakes of III & IV, the first Dissidia. (Also of note, though not directly beneath the FF umbrella, was the introduction of Kingdom Hearts.)

The era of sequels, remakes, remasters, crossovers, and extended universes, shepherded by the Square Enix merger. Only two mainline games were released in this period, and the one that was not an MMO was an entry in the newly-formed "Ivalice Alliance" (contrary to the desires of one of XII's principal developers, Yasumi Matsuno, who left the project before it was finished).

While of course we've seen plenty of sequels & remakes since, this era went all-in on expanding Final Fantasy to the behemoth it is now. FFVII, its golden child, was showered with prequels and sequels. Crossovers were all the rage. Even games that were not strictly "Final Fantasy" games were retroactively roped into one of the existing canon masses, i.e. Vagrant Story into the Ivalice Alliance.

This was also the boom of handhelds, like the PSP and the beloved DS. Mainline games were saved for the heavyweight home consoles, while other titles were dispersed across the smaller systems.

Very few "new" worlds with no preexisting ties to the other games (outside of the shared banner of Final Fantasy) were created in this time, XI and Crystal Chronicles being the few exceptions.

If you enjoyed seeing the games you loved from the 90s getting more content, this era was a delight. If you'd rather the original entries were left alone, it was a painful sign of things to come.

EXPERIMENTAL (2009-2015)

Mainline games released: XIII, XIV (twice)

Other notable releases: XIII-2 & Lightning Returns, Type-0 (also a member of XIII's Fabula Nova Crystallis series), Dissidia 012, the Theatrhythm series, the first expansion for XIV (Heavensward), Record Keeper, Brave Exvius

FF's darkest era. XIII was the first time FF tried something new since XI--brand new world, female protagonist, fresh spin on the old ATB formula--and it fell just short of catastrophic. XIII and its sequels were not well-received (though whether this negative backlash was "deserved" is another story). The game that would later become XV was originally intended to be Versus XIII, an entry in Fabula Nova Crystallis. Between XIII's poor reception and Versus XIII's fraught development, this didn't happen.

The initial release of XIV, on the other hand, was catastrophic. It was so bad that the entire thing had to be rebooted.

The good news is XIV's reboot, A Realm Reborn, did so well that XIV is widely considered one of the best MMOs of all time. The reboot is also one of the earliest examples of video game "rehabilitation," in that a dramatic change or update to the original game transforms a negative experience into a positive one, and thus scrapes back the good will of the player. (No Man's Sky is a non-FF example.)

The virulent criticism of XIII has softened over the years, and it enjoys a small, dedicated fanbase.

You started to see FF dip into mobile games at this point, too.

MODERN (2016-2023)

Mainline games released: XV, XVI

Other notable releases: World of Final Fantasy, Final Fantasy XII: The Zodiac Age, Dissidia NT, Dissidia Opera Omnia, Final Fantasy VII Remake, the pixel remasters of I-VI, Stranger of Paradise: Final Fantasy Reunion, Crisis Core: Reunion, a slew of expansions for XIV

The long-anticipated release of XV heralded a new age (as well as a movie and an anime). In contrast to XIII, XV was very popular, and put FF back on the map. People loved the boys' road trip.

XIV is still going strong. I don't play MMOs but I'm happy for them.

The remakes & remasters are back, and looking more realistic than ever (if you're into that sort of thing). Look at how many individual pores you can see on your old favorites' faces! The most successful of these is the Final Fantasy VII Remake, which is not a remake as much as it's a conversation with the original game, a move that both drew in a new audience and softened (some of) the diehard og-VII fans who disliked the rest of the Compilation.

Stranger of Paradise is an odd duck attempting to evoke the uncanny valley weirdness of the PS3 era. YMMV on if it worked.

The modern FF games step further out of the boundaries of what an FF game is, dropping ATB combat in favor of real-time action that's all the rage these days. In a first, XVI doesn't have any party members. For the folks who've grown tired of ATB and crave the fast-paced action of the modern day, XVI was a hit (though, I've heard, it failed to deliver on the story).

The endless conversation about whether FF ought to be evolving this far outside of its "formula" (whatever one believes that to be) might feel tired to the average FF fan. But, going forward, it's worth talking about the ways in which FF has neglected to evolve, or even gone backwards: such as the dev team of XV stating that the inclusion of women would cause their core bros to act unnaturally, thus why there are no female party members in the game, or the dev team of XVI deliberately not including a diverse cast because their fantasy game is inspired by medieval Europe.

Tell me which era you voted for in the tags, and what your personal favorite FF game is!

[centrally-unplanned]

I feel like making a “Top 5 Media of the Year” post is like extremely redundant if you follow me, its going to be really obvious what is on there. Still, ranking things is fun and is good to reflect on them, in particular why they ‘stuck’ with me and what makes them last as opposed to fun-at-the-time so here goes:

Perfect Tides

Definitely the most well-crafted ‘narrative’ of the year for me. As a game its eh, but you essentially ignore that and its very easy to do so. I been ruminating a lot on temporality this year; the sort of stripping-away of the idea of one having a future that ones grows to as opposed to a sequential present. The idea of ‘growth’ being more of a story we write for ourselves. And additionally I have always had a passion for stories about contingency and specificity, the ways technology, locale and circumstances shape people in not-so-obvious ways. 

Perfect Tides is never settled on one thing but those two themes permeate every part of its narrative. Mara is obsessed with changing herself, getting out of the ‘rut’ of her life, but has almost no agency in that regard. She changes, massively so, but never due to her plans coming to fruition. There are these moments where she introspects, and she is smart so it seems right, but - while never confirmed to be so explicitly - are just wrong on reflection, in the battle between her identity & and her outside reality, reality proves stronger.

And the ways she tries to fight against her circumstances are so adorably 2000′s. Writing on fanfic webforums, ‘dating’ someone via IM (and it falling apart from it being transposed outside of that medium), living on an outskirt suburbia island to the metropole of the rest of your social circle, there is so much in there. In the end the bildungsroman story of a teen growing up is dime a dozen, these stories can’t survive on the universality. Perfect Tides marries the universality to a specificity that changes it enough to make it new.

Bocchi the Rock

I have said a lot about Bocchi and why it works so I won’t repeat myself on that front. Instead to situate its lasting impact on me I think I can instead focus on the kind of anime I have been watching. I have picked up a lot (by no means all) of the older ‘classics’ over the past 5 or so years, and I was absolutely soul-sniped by the 90′s ~mindfuck~ era of anime. I am always secretly hunting for more of that, but you really aren’t going to find any of that in modern shows; Sonny Boy is the closest I have seen and its a forced comparion for sure (still a great show, would recommend). The Evangelion era is so over not even an Evangelion remake could recapture it.

The modern era instead has other strengths that you need to see on its own terms - new themes, new styles, new approaches. Slice of life is one of them, K-On! was the first ‘great’ entry into the genre that utilizes the modern lexicon, and there have been more and more hits along that front over time. Anime - and the people who watch it - has a more comfortable relationship with its otaku identity, replacing existential dilemma with celebratory depiction. 90′s animation experimentalism was immense but also limited by the tools of the day; modern animation technology allows an easy integration of styles and techniques that was out or reach 20 years ago. 

Bocchi for me is the crest of a wave of modern trendlines in anime’s capabilities and thematics. It perfects so much of what slice of life does while shedding its tired tropes; ruthlessly depicts a real-if-exaggerated otaku struggle but through the modern comedic, happy lens; and puts animation-as-a-tool to work communicating those feelings in the most inventive ways posible. Hell, the design process itself is radically accessible! I follow the creative team on twitter who were live-posting production photos, scene reactions, everything you could imagine. The media mix was intense. It is, in a certain sense, the most modern anime I have seen. It crystalized its own ‘genre’ that I want to see more of.

Sing Yesterday For Me

This year was a big year for manga for me, a journey I am hoping to deepen going forward. Sing Yesterday For Me was on my list for a while due to the anime adaptation from 2020, which I...hated? But due to all the really polished balls it kept dropping, I could see the potential, moody characters struggling with love & life in period-piece 2000′s Tokyo, lots of my boxes checked there.

The manga drops many of these same balls (less for sure), this is not a ‘great’ work. Instead why it has stuck with me is that is a showcase in the strengths of aesthetics & realism. Kei Toume’s art is just so absolutely my jam; the way she draws eyes with enhanced roundness and detail; the way the hair is all messy textures and sharp lines; the fact that in the middle of this serious manga will be splash images of little fashion showcases or photobooth printouts or something. She does this in all of her works too, she has types - I have been reading two of her other manga, Rocky Princess and Karakida-ke no Koshogurashi, and her aesthetic archetypes absolutely show up again in both. 

I enjoyed Sing Yesterday for Me’s story but what I remember most are these individual panels that are just Art to me, and its something that manga does on its own terms that I have been growing to appreciate more and more as I read more and more (Chainsaw Man stands out in this regard as well). Its a reason to read manga specifically as its own genre. Maybe the story won’t be amazing, but it can be in service of those panels, a necessary component to making them shine, and its worth it for that.

Astrophyics - Hope Left Me+

Astroyphics is a synthwave/darkwave composer who got their start doing remixes, lots of anime & 80′s stuff, which all rocks and I highly recommend. This is the year they started branching out into their own original compositions in a way that I think succeeded - it was a rougher journey, some of their early works lack life, but the later stuff - Hope Left Me, Cute Tragedies - are some of my favourite of the genre in how they blend being ‘noisescape’ with having melodic elements or motiffs that still stand out.

And they are a media mix pioneer in how much work they put into video elements for the songs, album covers, and other things - Hope Left Me has a visual novel it is attached to! Which you can play as a standalone game (this worked ~fine) or partly experience as a visual album for listening to the music (which is amazing). I love that someone who started out making Serial Experiments Lain covers is working so well in the medium of “music as its permitted to be by the internet”. Its something I want more and more over time, music that exists beyond the notes and instead is in conversation with the rest of the media apparatus it is so inexorably embedded in, and Astrophysics owns that reality. They are 50% of the reason I am a Hatsune Miku stan nowadays (first t-shirt recently acquired!) - the other 50% of the reason being...

Hazel - Why Did We Like Elfen Lied? 

Hazel’s Why Did We Like Elfen Lied? lives rent-free in my mind. Its the perfect question for me, not about ‘anime as anime’ but ‘anime as societal product’, about how watchers viewed it, cared about it, repackaged it, communicated it, the works. “What does this piece of media being loved say about those who love it” is the root question over which every other media discussion I ever have rests, the Unified Field Theorem of media analysis. And Elfen Lied is the *perfect* target for this question - it fucking sucks! It is an awful show, and in Japan no one cared. But in 2004 everyone in the west loved it. It was a show begging for an explanation.

Hazel nails it, and she does so through her subjectivity. She was the patient zero for the Elfen Lied experience as an emo goth edgy teen girl for its release; the way she jumps back and forth between the anime’s actual content, the way what it offered was passed around anime & goth subcultures, and the wider concerns those communities had in 2000′s America, is completely realized due to its combination of analysis and autobiography. And Hazel excels as a filmmaker along this same lens - her editing style is a tower of niche references to iconography, media, and music from the era, she composes her own songs which she uses for key moments, its a “by kids for kids  by scene nerds for scene nerds” approach that epotimizes the strength of YouTube as a medium.

Hazel will not continue to be my favourite YouTuber - I will absolutely still be a fan, but she has her own questions she cares about that don’t align with mine, and the way she is evolving as a creator is not my own path. She has many other good videos and I highly recommend looking through all her works. But Why Did We Like Elfen Lied will last beyond that for me as an influence of the kind of thing I myself want to make (and probably never will, oh well!).

[h-worksrambles]

What your favourite Xeno series game says about you

Xenogears: The elder statespeople of the fandom, you’ve been around since the franchise’s inception. You first played Xenogears as an impressionable teen in the 90′s and thought it was the greatest story you’d ever experienced despite not knowing what in god’s name was going on for most of the runtime (I’ll bet Evangelion is favourite anime too, huh?). Now that you’re an adult with the frame of reference and critical analysis skills to find the substance behind all the weirdness, you love it even more. Disc Two was really not that bad, guys. Part of you wants a remake, but you’re also terrified of how it could get screwed up. You have a visceral hatred of modern day Square-Enix.

Xenosaga Episode One: As far as you’re concerned, the writing took a step down since Soraya Saga stopped being involved in the series. You’ve dug deep into the behind the scenes history of the franchise and so you know that this was the entry in the trilogy that Tetsuya Takahashi and Soraya Saga had the most input on. As such, this game represents to you more than anything what Xenosaga could have been. You have likely read Perfect Works cover to cover multiple times and have written novel length fanfics in your head about what sort of things would have happened in the full six-part story. You’re always very meticulous about checking your email.  Xenosaga Episode Two: You tend to avoid internet discourse because you’re so tired of people in the fandom dunking on your fave. You like the battle system more than Episode One because at least the attack animations aren’t thirty seconds long this time. You never fail to remind Xenoblade players that this game did the break system first. THE SECOND MILTIA THEME SLAPS, YOU TROGLODYTES! Jr. is probably your favourite party member and you loved watching him take centre stage and digging into his backstory. You maintain that Albedo is the greatest villain in this entire franchise and you’re probably right. Xenosaga Episode Three: You know this trilogy was cut short, but you were still super impressed with how well this game wrapped it up. You maintain that Yuki Kajiura deserves to be brought up more when discussing the franchise’s music. Godsibb is straight up a better version of Zanza the Divine and you will die on that hill. You either love Shion or absolutely despise her, there’s no middle ground here. But those of you split on Shion can put your differences aside to give a much deserved ‘screw you’ to Kevin Winnicott. You will probably keel over in joy if KOS-MOS gets into Smash, so you make do with sobbbing into your copy of Project X Zone. Xenoblade Chronicles: The zoomer equivalent to the Xenogears fans. Whether you were around for Operation Rainfall, or hopped on later, this was your first Xeno game, and while you certainly like or even love the rest of the series, none of them quite hit for you like this does. The sense of scope never fails to impress you, even on replays and you can’t help but spin the camera all around as you play. You appreciate the ways the sequels have built on this game, but think this entry’s gameplay is still a blast. You still find using the vision system to turn the tables on a tough fight super satisfying. You love the world and story of this game and frequently watch streams or reactions because you can’t get enough of people losing their minds over the plot twists. People assume that you think Melia is best girl but you laugh because you know the greatness of the Heropon transcends all petty waifu or husbando wars. You’re also probably the most meme-y sector on the fandom and have binge watched Theaggyu’s videos god knows how many times.  Xenoblade Chronicles X: switchportswitchportswitchportswitchport.... You are one of the poor saps who still owns a Wii U in 2022, and given how the Switch has pretty much lifted its library whole sale, this game is probably the sole reason why at this point. Well that and the eShop. It kills you that this game so rarely comes up alongside the likes of Breath of the Wild or Witcher 3 in discussions of the best open worlds in video games. You’re something of a power gamer and you love to push the class system to its absolute limit to decimate bosses. You watch 1 minute solo videos of Telethia the Endbringer and have to resist the urge to drool. Truthfully, you don’t really try to defend the story from its criticism by the rest of the fans, because the writing in the side quests is where it’s at! You have an instant violent reaction to potatoes. You feel for the Xenosaga fans but you also kind of resent them because at least they got two sequels to their unfinished story. Xenoblade Chronicles 2: The Xeno series has ALWAYS BEEN ANIME so SHUT UP! Unlike the X fans who have just been kind of doing their thing in the corner, you’ve been caught in the crossfire of the 1 vs 2 wars for a while now and you’re frankly sick of it. This is your favourite combat of the series by far, and you have put a shedload of time into the DLC challenges. You adore the characters and wish people didn’t get so hung up on some of the goofier designs. When one of your friends tries the game for the first tile, you always send them Chuggaaconroy’s guide video. Still, for all the fandom debacle, one thing you share with the Xenoblade 1 fans is your love of memes. You might even say you...don’t forget them. When Pyra and Mythra came to Smash, you were there in the battlegrounds of Twitter to maintain that they were a great addition. You can never watch the ending without crying. The most likely fans to read/write fanfiction.  Torna the Golden Country: You may not have entirely loved Xenoblade 2, or at least had some major gripes with it. But this prequel fixed pretty much any issue  you have with that game while retaining what you liked. You’ve always felt the past Xeno games were kind of bloated and love that this can give you a substantial experience in 20 hours, instead of having to wait 20 hours for the game to fully open up for you. When people say X or 2 have the best combat, you laugh in Vanguard Switching. Lora is a treasure and did nothing wrong in her whole life. Jin and Mythra are some of the best characters in the series and so help you, you will call down Siren on whoever says otherwise. Whenever you hear the word ‘community’, you freeze up on the spot. I said that 2 fans always cry at the ending, but honestly this ending reduces you fits of sobbing that put them to shame. Xenoblade Chronicles 3: You need to let me into your house and use your time machine RIGHT NOW.  

[gascon-en-exil]

Is it possible that there just happens to be valid things to criticize about FE7, genealogy, and even tellius? His criticism of Kaga was that he can't write women. Are you going to defend what FE4 did with Deirdre?

There's a difference between criticizing a game and using that criticism to attack other fans and claim that your own fave is vastly better.

Every FE has issues with writing women, with Tellius being the one setting that's generally agreed to do the best (or least bad) in that regard. Kaga's biggest problems with writing women is that they're either underwritten, like Deirdre and Julia, or subject to gender-specific violence in a way that's only slightly more complicated than the boilerplate 80s/early 90s save-the-princess video game plot. I'd still take those issues over how Houses writes many of its women, which includes

specific fetishes that come off as annoying or pointless if you're not into them (Bernadetta, Kronya)

worldbuilding elements (ex. Ingrid, Hanneman's sister) that are either never fully explored or else flattened out into a general problem with Crests and not that these are in fact examples of entirely mundane misogyny given a bit of additional flavor with the fantasy element

using female characters as rarely-seen plot devices/exposition dumps (Rhea in both games) or denying them agency in key moments in exchange for something cutesy (Edelgard in SB's endgame) or to avoid placing responsibility on them (Edelgard in AG's endgame)

as long as we're including Hopes, adding in a new character whose existence amounts to one extended lesbian joke - one that wears thin even faster than FE10's Heather because Monica has much more screentime

a self-insert fixation that compromises every character but hits the female lead the hardest because her romance with you - that is, you the player - is baked into the story...which is doubly irritating if you're not into women

and for that matter the existence of gender-variable Avatars with identical scripts, which can't have any gender-specific traits (except in gameplay, ironically) because they're simultaneously both.

Many of those are also issues that crop up in the other modern FE games, on account of that whole writing-for-Heroes-whales thing (and while we're at it, isn't that game an absolute mess when it comes to writing women?). To quote a mutual, Deirdre might have the personality of a wet sack of flour, but at least that can be expanded upon or improved in supplementary material or in remakes, and comes with the marginal excuse that you couldn't really point to many female video game characters in 1996 that were written much better. I'd still take that over the off-putting player pandering silliness that drags down so many modern female characters in this series.

FE16 is still very much of a piece with the rest of the franchise, warts and all, and pretending otherwise just to bully other fans who might have other favorite games is just asking to have your opinions disregarded.

[skysometric]

why, thank you for asking! i've been thinking it through for the last few days, i just wanted to make sure my answer was all written and ready to go first. all... checks notes... 4,000 words of it.

ICYMI, last week i sent asks to a bunch of my friends with a simple question: "what's your favorite game you played this year?" as i hoped, y'all gave a bunch of EXCELLENT answers, all of which i reblogged on my side blog @autumatically! (if you didn't get an ask like this and you want to join in, ping me – i sent too many asks to keep track of and i probably just forgot to send one your way!)

of course i wanted to answer this myself, but i wanted to write about more than just one game! and when i sat down to write, i just kept going, and going, and going...

so we're splitting this up! every day this week, i'll be counting down my top 5 games that i played in 2023. not all of these are games that i've streamed, and only one of them has shown up on anyone else's lists so far, so i'm really excited to reminisce and share my experiences this year 💖

maybe you'll even find a new game to try out? i'm certainly really excited to dig through y'alls lists and try some of the ones i missed out on this year!

to kick things off, let's start with:

Honorable Mentions

two games came out this year that i would probably put in my top 5, no competition. so why didn't i? because i didn't actually play them!

see, as much as i love to play video games, oftentimes i also like to watch them just as much. this has always been great for games that i never intended to play in the first place, like the Final Fantasies and Fortnites of our day… but lately it's also let me take turns with my partner on who plays which new releases.

in fact, for both of the games i'm about to list, i watched my partner play them in full and i've watched no less than two separate people stream them as well. which means, with all that oversaturation, it's probably gonna be a while before i play them myself…

either way! here's my top two games that i didn't play in 2023.

Pizza Tower

this one likely needs no introduction! Wario Land 4 is one of my favorite games of all time, and the way Pizza Tower extends those basic concepts is a masterclass of game design. the moveset is perfectly geared toward accessible speed tech, the level layouts are top notch, the different forms are unique and funny, the art style is GORGEOUS, the combo system adds incredible replay value and pushes the player to their limits…

honestly the only thing stopping me from playing this right now is that the levels are too fresh in my mind, and i'd like a little time to let those memories fade before i dive back in and experience everything in a wave of nostalgia. seeing so much of the game already was totally worth it, though – i had the distinct pleasure of watching my partner learn how to P Rank most of the levels, and the simple joy of watching her build up her skills is one of my standout memories of 2023. proud of you, love!

god, Pizza Tower is a perfect slice of video game. i can't WAIT to play it myself!

Super Mario RPG

as a young kid, i always wanted a physical copy of this game. i could never justify it, though, because i already owned it on Wii Virtual Console, and it was one of the more expensive SNES games i had my eye on… a whole $40 in 2007 money! fast forward to the modern day, and not only do i no longer have easy access to that old Wii copy, but a physical cart now goes for like $90???

blessedly, along comes the Switch remake. i still can't believe this exists – it's a perfect remake in every way, shape, and form! the sprite-based animations are lovingly recreated, the battle system is rebalanced in fun ways, and the music is PERFECTLY re-arranged. even the dialog, which i expected to be completely retranslated… it's smoothed over, but mostly unchanged! the original game's unabashed weirdness and charm is fully intact, and i did NOT expect that out of modern Nintendo.

this is one that i didn't mind watching others play; Super Mario RPG is all about the vibe, and this remake captures that vibe perfectly. i'm excited to play it myself once it's had time to settle! but, for now, i'm perfectly content just vibing with others~

[the-iron-shoulder]

SMRPG REMAKE POST-GAME SPOILERS

don’t click on the Read More unless you’ve already done ALL the post-game bosses

Omfg Culex is EVERYTHING I WANTED and MANY THINGS I DIDN’T KNOW I WANTED

Before the game came out, I was suuuper curious how they’d handle Culex (and his music). I saw the main options as “leave everything EXACTLY like the original,” “full orchestral remake,” and “modern FF boss song.” I was delighted and charmed by the fact that they used option #1, to the point that his aspect ratio is all squashed and weird, lol 😆

And like, obviously there was going to be a rematch and it would be the true finale of the game, we all knew that, but… somehow, in my heart of hearts, I genuinely did not see it coming that they would bring in option #2 for the rematch! It was an absolutely phenomenal one-two punch to my sensibilities and I could not be happier with it 😄😄 Also the whole joke lampshading the 2D/3D thing was very amusing to me.

The rematch is a hella fun fight, too! I beat it on my second try and took 39 rounds, which I think is probably not bad considering that I didn’t use the most broken items (like the Safety Ring), I didn’t have any Party Bracers or Party Energizers, and I wasn’t optimizing for speed.

also, god, they just nailed the aesthetics. He is SUCH a Final Fantasy asshole in his animations, in his moveset, in his fucking countdown, all of it. Absolutely 15/10 flawless showing.

And the music!! I mean, FF4 Battle 2 (which of course is what Fight Against Culex literally is, that’s the whole joke) is a really special song for me anyway, since it’s probably the song that made Kid Me realize that boss fight music is something incredibly wonderful, way back in the early 90s. And considering that to this very day, I’m obsessed with good boss fight music, that’s meaningful to me. This is a Very Good remaster of an incredible song and I was absolutely not disappointed 😁

[pilvimarja]

What are some of your favorite video games?

I've been gaming since the early 90s and I'm kind of passionate about video games, so this is going to be long! :D I think my current #1 favorite and most replayed game is Alien Isolation. It's a sequel to the first Alien movie where you play as Ripley's daughter Amanda, and it does an incredible job capturing the look and overall atmosphere of the movie. Also one of the scariest and hardest games I've ever played and one of the few games where I've achieved the Platinum Trophy, which I'm really proud of.

Another game I'm constantly playing since 2020 is The Long Dark. It's a survival game set in a remote island in Canada during a harsh winter and your aim is to, well, stay alive. It's not an easy game, but there's something incredibly meditative and calming about sitting by a cosy fire and listening to the blizzard outside. Another survival game I love is the first Subnautica. I still don't know if that game cured my thalassaphobia or if it made it worse...

I also love the Final Fantasy series. I've been playing it since FF7 and look forward to owning a PS5 so I can play the new one. FF8 was actually my first fandom and the fandom that taught me all about shipping and OTPs.

Another game series I like is Assassin's Creed. The Ezio trilogy has an amazing story and a protagonist and I really wish they'd remake it for current gen consoles. I also love AC Black Flag and AC Odyssey, and the protagonists Edward and Kassandra are among my favorite game protagonists ever. AC Valhalla is not much of an AC game, but it's an incredible Viking/Norse mythology simulator.

Red Dead Redemption 2 is a game that left a lasting impact on me and has the best written and acted game protagonist ever, in my opinion, but it's also a game that I don't think I'll ever be able to replay all the way to the end.

I was more into the Silent Hill franchise back when the SH vs RE internet battles were at their peak, and I still love the first three SH games, but I've really fallen in love with the Resident Evil franchise in recent years. The original games were always a little too challenging and frustrating for me with their tank controls and intense inventory management, but I've loved every modern RE game since RE7.

Another game I've replayed countless times is the first BioShock. The story is incredible (avoid spoilers if you can!) and it has one of the most beautiful and atmospheric game worlds ever created. I also like the two sequels, but nothing beats the underwater city of Rapture from the first game.

Days Gone is my favorite post-apocalyptic zombie game, along with the Last of Us games. Horizon Zero Dawn and the sequel are both excellent and I'm actually planning to replay them this winter.

This has already gotten super long, but I want to end this with a shoutout to the original Medal of Honor and Spyro games, which used to be some of my favorite PS1 era games, the Monkey Island franchise and other old-school LucasArts games, Far Cry 5, the Uncharted trilogy, the Mass Effect trilogy and the Dishonored trilogy and Prey, which is from the same studio as Dishonored. And the new Tomb Raider trilogy and the modern era Wolfenstein games are also a lot of fun!