#so the tutorial stuff and the cutscenes give me time to catch up. also it's still fun to see these guys run around

[b4kuch1n]

Your swsh art always makes me want to replay the game because i love it and its my favorite pokemon game and every time i play another pokemon game i think of it how i miss certain elements from swsh. Then i boot up the game and im once again caught in the 1 hour 40 minutes hand held intro and im like ah- now i remember why i have been playing other pokemon games instead of this one. Happy (late?) birthday!

you don't want to listen to hop? you don't want to hear him teach you about type matchups? you don't wanna let him cheer u on...? 🥺 waa....?

[jaybug-jabbers]

Bug Run 9: Fruitful Battles

Hello, all! I’m back again with a bug run for Scarlet/Violet. Gosh. We’ve reached Generation 9 already. Sure makes you feel old, doesn’t it? That’s a lot of pokemon generations.

Because this gen is all about the open world and freedom of choice, the game opens up quite a bit in terms of the ways we can go about playing it. But because this is a challenge run, I’m going to stick with the same rules I’ve always had for these runs:

1.) The team must be bug types only. (Any bugs new to this gen must be included on the team.)

2.) No using items during battle. (Hold items such as berries are allowed)

3.) No over-levelling. (This rule is a bit harder to follow in this gen but I am going to do my absolute best to challenge gyms and bosses when my levels are around the same levels as theirs)

I am also going to add a fourth rule for this particular generation:

4.) No terastallizing unless it’s Terastallize Bug Type!

That may seem a bit harsh, but this run is all about proving that bug types can beat the game. If we terastallize to remove our Bug type at any point, we’re not really winning on the merits of bugs, are we? 

Anyway, it’s time to dive in and see how the early game treats us in the wide world of Paldea!

In this gen, as with all pokemon games, we are forced to have our first battle with our starters. But after that, we are free to ditch the starter and catch our first wild-caught beauties, who we shall treat as our true starters for this game. Our rival Nemona leads us to Baby’s First Pokemon Route and we are set free to catch stuff.

Fortunately for us, Nemona gave us a lot of balls, because I'm gonna be picky. I wanted to choose pokemon with good natures. I also wanted the proper Abilities. I spent around half an hour or so hunting and catching things until I found the lucky chosen ones: an Adamant Tarountula (Increase Attack, Decrease Sp Attack) which I named Lollipop and a Timid Scatterbug (Increase Speed, Decrease Attack) with Compound Eyes, which I named Pixel. Nemona was perhaps getting bored waiting for me, but we finally moved on with our tour of Paldea; we had a lot of sight-seeing to do. Which included a random angsty teen giving me a gigantic dragon motorbike. Look, I know this run is about the bugs, but I need to show you a photo of my son anyway. I love him more than anything and will protect him with my life.

Now, the first hour of this game is sort of a giant tutorial + cutscenes/story, so there are not a lot of challenges early on, other than the occasional Youngster with a Houndour. However, there is one tricky battle we must pass before moving the rest of the game forward, and it comes when you’re about to enter the gates to Paldea’s largest city-- Nemona steps in and wants a quick second battle. And she has a few surprises to throw your way; a second member to her team already, and a surprise Terastallization to boot. 

Because I chose Fuecoco as my starter, Nemona’s starter was Sprigatito, and that one wasn’t really a problem. The trouble was her Pawmi, which only knew Thunder Shock and was boosted with sparkle power. After levelling my team up to 9 and equipping them with Oran berries, it still was not quite enough to survive. I wasn’t sure what to do, because I scoured the area and picked up all the TMs I could, but my team could use none of them. I didn’t have a lot of options so early on. However, I finally discovered a solution while fooling around. I could make a TM that was actually relevent to my team: Struggle Bug. My Tarountula already knew the move, but my Spewpa normally would need to wait for level 12 and its final evolution to acquire it naturally. By teaching it early, it was the bit of edge that I needed. With a string shot and a bunch of Struggle Bugs, which thankfully decreased Pawmi’s special attack, my team managed to squeak by.

After that, there’s our first run-in with Team Star, but that was not anything noteworthy. And then we complete Act One. Before Act Two, which is the game proper, I buy some cute clothes and pick up a Silver Powder for Lollipop, and then they let me lose on the world.

I choose to start West. Immediately I run into more bugs and add them to my team, a Kricketot and a female Combee. I name them Vyn and Ruby. My Spewpa evolved into Vivillon as well. Our first gym, the bug gym, is destroyed without breaking a sweat. It was actually pretty pitiful. It makes me sad when these games make the bug gyms so easy, because I know bugs can put up a proper fight when you do things right. Alas, Katy is added to the list of weak bug users. Still, I admit seeing all the people in that town enjoying the company of bug pokemon is absolutely adorable. Also, Katy’s character design’s pretty cute too.

The next gym is a grass gym, so to no one’s surprise, this one’s not exactly difficult for us either. Kricketune’s powered-up Fury Cutter mowed his team down with ease.

After the first two gyms being such a cakewalk, I hold out hope that the first Titan, a Rock type, will present a challenge. Alas . . . Klawf falls to Vivillon’s Struggle Bugs anyway. Did he even have a rock move? A single rock would have obliterated my Vivillon, but it never came. 

In Cortondo, the bug town, there’s a child who wants me to trade a Flabébé for his Snom. I thought I was being all smart by taking note of this and deciding to hunt down a Flabébé right away. This was a very time-consuming and difficult quest for me, because it was hard to read the Pokedex map indicating where they spawned, and then traveling to that location and searching the area. Nothing was showing up so I looked up where I could buy a meal that would give me a boosted Fairy Encounter power, then tracked all the way back to search some more, and still couldn’t find it. I was about to give up when finally I see a little Floette in the corner of my eye. So I capture it and then I need to breed it, so I go catch another fairy to breed it and then have a picnic and wait for the egg, and then hatch the egg, and then go trade it . . .

Then I decide I don’t like the Snom’s nickname so I need to breed the Snom I received, and that takes MORE work, because they won’t breed and I need to find a meal with Egg Power 2, which is in a town very far away, but finally I succeed and I am happy with my little Snom. “Good thing I noticed this trade! It must be the only way to get Snom in this game,” I think to myself.

. . . we’re not gonna talk about it ok, just pretend I was right

ANYWAY, during all that madness I also caught a Nymble for our team (named Hunter) and did a little work fighting some trainers. Then I decided to head for the first of the Team Star bosses-- Giacomo. Since he was a Dark type user, once again I did not expect much of a challenge here. However, it actually took some work. My team at the moment was still mostly unevolved, except for Vivillon, Spidops and Kricketune. Spidops takes time to truly hit his stride, though, so in the early game, Vivillon and Kricketune really were the MVPs. Pixel took care of the Pawniard (the Defiant boosts were annoying, but we coped) and then Vyn was bulky enough to have plenty of time to power his Fury Cutter up. (Oddly, the Revavroom is unaffected by Sing for some reason) This is how the team fared after the fight:

(please ignore the fact that my character looks like she just stepped in dog doo)

That was enough adventuring for one day! Tune in for the next chapter soon.

[bryan360]

My YCCTEAM's Wireless Switch Pro Controller - Part 16/Final (Career Mode racing in Asphalt 9: Legends)

What's up guys? Welcome back to be at another YCCTEAM Controller topic review share, but guess what? This will be the final video post that I've been waiting for a long time or in case a year half and months since the beginning of revealing my controller back in 🎃October 3rd, 2020. Even though it needed takes time to make sure to correct in details such as doing comparison from my other controllers, testing its buttons, battery charging to battery life results, and pretty much else I've been gone through in months. However, there is one more topic review post that I'm bringing to an end as of my decision; especially when if I'll be doing other topic reviews to my new items soon.

For today's post though, I decided to merge two videos as originally gotten both recordings from last week I've been saving. It's something that I should've done from my past video postings while I'm in YCCTEAM Controller topic reviews, but nevertheless it was alright when I'm getting used to. Anyways, I'm back to try out my final testing as you expected while I'm at Asphalt 9: Legends again. This time I'll turn up the notch by doing real racing with other opponents in career mode and both of the control settings to use after from doing tutorial last month.

Here it is as I'm in track based on San Franciso; the same place I've already cleared its first challenge back in January 18th, 2020. Link Here

I also did the second challenge during part 3 of my Asphalt 9: Legend’s career progress to remember. Link Here #2

However for this topic review post to share, I wanted to go back its first challenge to race through like I did in last year, but showing off my YCCTEAM Controller again and using the same car of Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution; as I previously used on few challenges or just one during my career progress from last year. I'm giving some upgrades along the way, but hoping I can show it during my contining Asphalt 9: Legend's progress soon. Let's get into it as It'll be the final topic review post for my controller.

During two of my recording videos being merged, I'm using my controller to show as I'm racing through San Francisco track against other racers like I previously did in January 2020....two times to be exact when I used both different control settings from manual to gyro like last time when I'm showing off during tutorial mode last month.

It's gonna be different to see which settings I can used for my career mode in progress; despite being obvious it had to be manual settings with pressing buttons for acceleration, brake, and nitro boost. I'm just making this as I'll go along when using both settings once again. I'll even bring the results after crossing the finish line for the races end and how much did I do in time. If I can remember my first one back in Janaury 2020 was 00:43.366 or 43 minutes and 366 seconds while during its first challenge I gotten. Here's my last year's screenshot in high quality to get a better look.

Just wondering how it can compared to my other two racing results during this recording. Well I'll tell ya this is gonna be interesting and hoping to my closest friends to see as well.

On first half until 1:22, I'm doing my first racing through San Franciso track in title "City Dash" where I needed to reach the goal from other opponents they'll trying to catch on me. I did good while using my YCCTEAM Controller in manual setting with the steering analog stick and some tricks like jumping on ramps. However, I was bumping into things while I'm trying to press the left button for brake and drifts, but other times was performing the 360 move at opponents for no strange reason that I'm trying to get knockdowns. ^^* (at least I did have one knockdown on first half, though) Anyways while continuing my race, I made it to a finish line at the end from doing turns, jumping into ramps like two times, and some bumping into walls that I'm trying my best to dodge those. So my racing time results was unexpected since January 2020 is the very first one I've gotten while I'm in manual. Instead, my new racing time results change to 00:44.647 or 44 minutes and 647 seconds while I'm in manual settings a second time as before. I was so close that it should've been much lesser than that if I could make some room in obstacle or something. Nevertheless, it was of really was while doing my YCCTEAM Controller post to share, but at least it was a good first half.

As for the second half though, I'm switched up to gyro control when using my controller to move left and right. During another racing track through San Francisco, I've gotten into somewhat good start as well when using my controller to move my car and the buttons for acceleration, brake/drift, etc while reaching the racing goal again. That being said however as I'm still working on some "errors" while having to race against opponents. Mostly though was while perform my ramp jump, I've almost getting crash into the wall just before landing on the road by luck. It happens at 02:14 to 02:18, but man that it was still lucky or otherwise would've been ruin if I'll start all over again. I tried to steer to get away from and some others that I've keep bump into to get knockdowns at opponents. Nevertheless, it was not bad second half to make while moving my controller in gyro settings; just wanted to work on its sensitivity of adjust along the way. How's my racing time results during it though was really unexpected is 00:43.334 or 43 minutes and 334 seconds to compared on others. (January. 18th, 2020's and September. 8th, 2021's in two recordings merged) Let's just say in other words, the gyro setting I did during second half takes the top spot here by surprise. Maybe because I putting nitro boost for its speed just to catch up at opponents before reaching the finish line? Or simply put on fate to see how do well in gyro settings I've been practicing; like last time when you've see me during my past topic review post while I'm in tutorial mode. Either way, it was pretty not bad to know how I managed to get there during second half recording I gotten; after checking the racing time results changes to 43 minutes and 334 seconds.

My thoughts and a final conclusion for this topic

Just like from last month when using my YCCTEAM Controller for tutorial test, I did really well for this one when I'm in career mode racing through San Francisco. After doing two settings both manual and gyro motion was another review test to see how which would I prefer to use when I can continuing on my career mode in progress and another for hoping there's normal race mode to unlock. I had missteps along the way; including the one during second half where I was almost crashed into the building's wall until I safely landed. Nevertheless, they're both alright when I'm taking my time off to see what racing results I have in both. Unexpected for gyro motion controls having to recognized that it compared from what I did in Janaury 18th, 2020 when clearing its first challenge at 43 minutes and 366 seconds. However for manual settings like I did before that was so close to match; as it underperformed at 44 minutes and 647 seconds. Thought I could handing well like last time if needed, but guessing I've miss calculating a little. So that's means gyro motion setting won? Doesn't matter though as they're both good tests while using my YCCTEAM Controller to show; just like last month when I'm cleared through tutorial mode. However, I'll be closing this topic review to an end after long time of giving details, comparison to other of my controllers, batteries, and more I gone through so far.

🐰🖌Maxwell: Yeah. We've been waiting for after year and the half when he did his best of reviewing this alternative controller to work on his Nintendo Switch system. If I could remember, there are good ones to choose from other past posts; like when he did on Super Smash Bros match with Mario against Banjo & Kazooie.

🐰👊💥May: There's more than that, Maxwell. Like doing his button test it works alright; especially knowing fits well then previously use his Joy-Cons when it had the R button stop working and of course drifting. Hoping it won't effect his YCCTEAM Controller anytime soon.

🦊⚽️Sam: You said it. At least rest assured when it comes to making his topic review, the YCCTEAM Controller had a good run with its battery life, the design to make as a similar Switch Pro Controller, and impressive feedback or response when playing those games in manual or gyro motion setting in Asphalt 9: Legends for example.

Thanks, Sam. I think I can give this a positive thumbs up 👍🏼 for how I using my YCCTEAM Controller to my Nintendo Switch system. Except some minor cons like when turning the rumble features on to my controller that it keep on rumbling through Super Mario Odyessy's cutscenes.

🐰🖌Maxwell: Or another one when you trying to turn on your Nintendo Switch system with your pro controller's home button, but doesn't work it right unlike your used Joy-Cons for some reason.

Yeah, that too. I'm fine to turn on my Switch system manually anyways, but would like that if the developers ever updated my controller so it can be easy to press the home button to activate my system just as easily. Someday, but not today I guess. Anyways, hope you guys and my closest friends to check out my lastest YCCTEAM Controller topic review to share and to my final conclusion after giving my thoughts about from year and half ago. I'm hoping to take it rest and continuing on other stuff like I'm promised to bring my own Super Mario 3D All-Star progress to share for example. I had too much things to get through that I nearly forgotten. Sorry if it happens. 😔

There's one more thing, though. If you finded interests about getting the YCCTEAM Controller like I have, then maybe you can check out at other online stores such as Amazon.com. it cost $25.99 or $26.00 in price which it can affordable if you called that in different way. I even check through search to see its there and it was still available as I link to this one. Link Here

Not sure if it'll work on other countries, but I would like to see when my P-Pal managed to get those in other online stores he could find, but just saying. 😅

Previous Posts for my YCCTEAM’s Pro Controller Topic:

Wireless Switch Pro Controller for Nintendo Switch/Switch Lite (Part 1) - Link Here #1

My YCCTEAM’s Wireless Switch Pro Controller for Nintendo Switch/Switch Lite Unboxing (Part 2) - Link Here #2

My YCCTEAM’s Wireless Switch Pro Controller for Nintendo Switch/Switch Lite Comparison with my Xbox One (Part 3) - Link Here #3

My YCCTEAM’s Wireless Switch Pro Controller for Nintendo Switch/Switch Lite Comparison with my Nintendo Switch’s Joy-Cons (Part 4) - Link Here #4

Testing Buttons (Part 5) - Link Here #5

Rumble Feature Testing (Part 6) - Link Here #6

Battery Charging Test (Part 7) - Link Here #7

Playtime Battery Life Results (Part 8) - Link Here #8

Gyro and Motion Controls 1st Half (Part 9) - Link Here #9

Gyro and Motion Controls 2nd Half (Part 9.5) - Link Here #10

Playtime through Super Mario 3D All-Stars game in Super Mario 64 #1 - Link Here #11

Playtime through Super Mario 3D All-Stars game in Super Mario 64 #2 - Link Here #12

Playtime through Super Smash Bros Ultimate #1 - Link Here #13

Playtime through Super Smash Bros Ultimate #2 - Link Here #14

Tutorial through Asphalt 9: Legends #1 - Link Here #15 Tutorial through Asphalt 9: Legends #2 - Link Here #16

[bearpillowmonster]

KH: MOM Review (Gameplay)

Every Kingdom Hearts game feels different. It's always innovating and always adding new types of gameplay. This is no exception. Rhythm minigames are no stranger to the Kingdom Hearts series but a whole game based on it is new.

I don't play a lot of rhythm games but I have played the infamous Atlantica section in Kingdom Hearts 2 as well as the Symphony of Sorcery in Dream Drop Distance and the Ice Cream Beat of Birth By Sleep, Guitar Hero and I'll even throw in the Honeybee Inn rhythm game in FFVII Remake. Out of all of those, Atlantica has been my favorite, that's right, I actually didn't mind it.

Now this system is entirely different than any of those, at least to me. It's definitely the most complex though but just hold on because I know how the word 'complex' can be triggering for a game, I just mean in comparison to the others is all. It's not a DDR right, left, up or down. So without further ado...(Nonspoiler for this part, it’s just gameplay)

This game begins with a stage. You're thrown into it without any notice, there were things that I didn't grasp until near the end of the stage, luckily it doesn't count towards a score yet, and after it is the tutorial but that's just the opening so if you're clueless and want to be prepared, I would say to try out the demo, I didn't even realize how much it helped me until I played the actual game. 

I wanted to say at just how friendly this game is to newcomers, it's literally all laid out for you. Nomura came out with HD remasters and collections of the previous games then a recap of the franchise on YouTube then put it IN Kingdom Hearts 3 and people still complained because they don't know the story and are too lazy to play the other games. Now Nomura's packed it all into one whole game to sum it up, explained from the perspective of Kairi herself so that you're still entertained while catching up. If there was ever an easy path to get into Kingdom Hearts, this is the answer. If I hear complaining about it from this point forward, I will be pissed. Now, as you can see, I didn't make it to story yet but that's not entirely what I'm talking about. All the buttons and functions are the same as a regular game, you basically have it all but the different keyblades (well you can collect them but not use them because they're cards). You can play as casually as you want, a song here and there. There are even options for a shuffle and sort function if you want to just jump to track selection but you'll need to unlock them individually in World Tour first. This may sound complicated but that's where the clean and accessible the menu comes in, I have to give props for that.

You're on a set track, it runs on its own, does its own thing except when you're gliding which is just moving left and right to collect notes. You use the normal KH abilities to your advantage because some enemies will be high in the air so you need to jump and slash at the same time but you can't just button mash any more, there's timing involved now. Once you get used to the gameplay, it's quite enjoyable, you may even get a song that you hit every note, my first one was 'Another Side', the first try too, I didn't hit all excellent though.

How do party members work? Well let's say you have Sora, Donald, and Goofy in a party. You have 3 buttons you can press to attack, Sora's the only one that can jump and the only one that can use the reaction commands so you need to pay attention to all three because there could be enemies on the floor and in the sky at the same time. The one thing I will say is a little bit of a complaint and that's that it doesn't tell you which buttons to press except on specific stages, it just has the symbols, I guess that's what makes it more combat oriented but it's definitely different and a little bit harder. But I guess it gets to be muscle memory, after a while. If you already know the themes, it gets easier for you to manage because you focus more on what you hear and less on what you see, that's how I started getting better with timing. I experimented with pretty much everything I could think of so I tried it with low volume and found that I missed a whole lot more because I couldn't hear it, which might be obvious because it's a rhythm game, but it just goes to show how important sound is. I even tried using headphones, I suppose that's up to you, it definitely made the music clearer but my performance was about the same. 

What do songs net you other than progress? Well you get materials. Also similar to KHUX, you get crafting materials except these ones you can use for potions and stuff, I did a potionless run because I didn’t feel the need (but I also didn’t do it all proud either) but I used a few summons and item boosts just for fun. You can also craft cards, which are really just for looks to see in the Museum after you finish one of the memory dives (which I'll get into) but the way you get the cards, grinds my gears because it's gacha, you craft them and it's a surprise what you're going to get...so it's essentially a loot box that you don't pay money for?? What the-

(notice how it says KH2 or Days at the bottom, you don’t even know. Of course I have Writhing Shards rn but that’s because I beat the game and didn’t open a whole lot of keyblade cards but the memory and scene ones are the annoying ones for me)

You don't even have to "finish" the song, just get it most of the way before you die then you'll still get credit and still get a ranking, just no exp. Now, there are also stars, stars are from 'missions' for each stage, if you play KHUX, it’s kind of like how it says “get this amount of Lux” or “use this type of medal” or “don’t use continue” so most stars are just “get this many points” and you need to collect enough stars to get to the next area. With that, so long as you have enough stars, you don’t “have” to play every stage, just like regular Kingdom Hearts and skipping worlds, I did though, just for sport, except Let it Go, just for spite. I could see plenty of fans going after those A+++ Proud Performer 3-Star rankings, I can't wait to see the hype it generates, same with the co-op.  

They went all out when they didn't have to. The Museum is where everything is collected, so all the cards you collect and craft. You can also just play the song on its own without gameplay through the Museum, so if you want headphones to just chill, it's really nice. You can also play the cutscenes and memory dives on their own without the gameplay. There are "feats" or missions such as finishing a certain number of songs, like Nook Miles or the ones they had in Re:Mind. You can collect profile pictures for your co-op or versus account, mine is Simba (even though I don’t really use it). But the co-op can get pretty intense as you can “sabotage” each other, which seems similar to a Smash or Mario Kart match, adding that much more to the gameplay.

A few more complaints, one is that certain enemies from a stage, (say, the Wyverns) won't have the same attacks as the other stages, sometimes they'll have it so that you jump to hit them and sometimes they'll just have them take a normal hit without the jump so you can't memorize what each enemy requires (there are too many to really do that anyway). The other thing is more just opinion based, particular enemies such as Large Bodies tend to carry a weight so you need to hit them more than once even if its just one enemy. How it does this is that you hit it and then the enemy gets knocked back as your next note so you hit them again. There were definitely times where I struggled because I knew I was hitting the buttons but nothing was happening, I would guess timing was the problem in some of those cases but the indicators can be difficult to keep track of because it has to be “just right”. I think even just a line on the floor to tell when you’re supposed to hit would be a major help but in a way, I feel like that’s on purpose. Also, in the Museum, you can view all the cards EXCEPT the Keyblades which is pretty shotty if you ask me, what's the point in grinding to get my favorite Rumbling Rose, if I can't even look at it properly?

(also new names for some keyblades (this is a zoom-in))

There will be a lot of things happening at once which can be daunting, I do appreciate that they included the easy, standard, and proud modes though. Keep in mind, each of those are used for individual songs, not playthroughs so if you want to change, go ahead, at least as far as World Tour goes. On top of that, there are different modes that also gauge at how good you are (to use on the track selection). There's the basic mode which I already explained, then there's the one button mode which should be self explanatory, and then there's the performer mode which is quite a lot to put on your plate all at once because on top of normal gameplay, you're adding new buttons and things in the middle of your attacks, I would probably only recommend that after you've got a decent amount of experience because I tried it day 1 and it seems like you would need a good understanding of the game and to be on the same wavelength before even attempting it. You can view a playthrough of each stage called a "demo" which is the little play symbol button next to the "play" button, it shows you how you should be playing to get an A+++ rank and giving you a heads up of what's to come, all excellent all the time. On top of that, when I was playing Xenoblade, one thing I proposed was flicking the analog stick in a certain direction for each move, that’s present here in the form of bosses and memory dives but if you want it to, you can go into the menu to enable it for regular gameplay. You'll find out if you want it on the very first stage, again, I would only recommend it after a lot of experience.

Your characters level up but it mainly just has to do with HP so you don’t die so easily but at the same time, you have potions so I don’t see much of a point for normal gameplay. All three of the party members only have one health bar, so leveling does come in handy for the bosses. However, I don't understand how each party member has a different level, maybe it's just based on the amount of notes you hit with that character but it's kind of weird because I don't think it matters. Even on the team selection part of the play screen, it has one compilitive level so why would they be different on the menu?

For bosses, you only encounter a few. If it were me, I would've made one per game but it is what it is. You don't worry about jumping anymore, it's just holding the attack button down instead and the amount of "dodge" notes that you hit will work in your defense whenever the boss attacks. Once the dodge section is over, it actually tells you how you did with the dodging section. The first time I ever did it, it said "Oh No." it has a sense of humor, it took me a while to nail those ones you hold down which is odd because I rock the gliding sections most of the time. 

There's only one more type of gameplay type I can think of, memory dives. It's similar to a boss but you're flying and there's a scene playing in the background, also some of the directional notes will have doubles, so you need to point the analog stick in different directions which is as difficult as can be because you have to use BOTH analog sticks (took me forever just to figure that out). You 'mainly' gain the memory dives from crafting which is a bit odd but you unlock the recipes and items as you go through World Tour and then play them separately in Track Selection, until you get to KH3 at least. 

Keep in mind that I played the demo on both PS4 and Switch and compared the two, my performance was about the same, though I will say this. With Switch, you can take it on the go and just do a few levels here and there as well as remove the joy-cons. The thing about that is that I feel the need to shake the joy-cons but there's no function that uses that in the game, I really wish there was though. And those directional ‘slide’ notes have to be way easier on PlayStation because the analog sticks are right next to each other.

[tinypigeonlord]

Don’t mind me, just have had a lot of thoughts on the new Pokemon game so imma write them down. There’s been a lot of posts and videos on what people wanna see or don’t wanna see in the new game too and I wanna give my own two cents to no one in particular.

So first of all graphics. I hear a lot of shit on that. Personally I don’t really have all that many expectations? Like yeah it’s gonna be a Switch game, the quality could possibly be better than we’ve seen. But also did people look over that ‘game footage not final’? Things may still improve and be further optimized. More than that, I love the artstyle atleast? Everything looks so colorful and vibrant and alive and goooood ;w; It sure got my attention. I can’t wait to see all the new areas on my big tv <3

Pokemon popping up and roaming vs random encounters: On one hand I love how lively everything looks with pokemon showing up in the overworld, on the other hand I love the random encounters? I personally liked hunting down specific pokemon, not knowing what I would encounter. I feel like this is also more fun when you’re doing a Nuzlocke; You can’t ‘cheat’ and select a pokemon from those that are currently roaming with random encounters. Aside from that, people mentioned that the roaming aspect made areas look more vacant instead because a lot of open space is needed for bigger pokemon roaming. And finally, it makes the surprise way more fun if a shiny shows up in a random encounter, instead of roaming between the rest of the ‘mon?

Pokemon following you/walking with you: PLS PLS PLS bring this back and expand on it, for all pokemon. Also the option to select which partymember you want to walk with. That was one thing that bummed me out in HeartGold/SoulSilver. If I wanted to walk with my fave, I also needed to have it in the front of the party and throw it out in battle, even in areas where it was at a disadvantage due to type or level. And sometimes I had a pokemon in front for the sake of progression but I didnt necessarily want to walk with it, but there was no option to turn walking off in HG/SS. I believe they did add these options in Let’s Go Pikachu/Eevee, but I havent played these games so I don’t know for sure what the options are. I kinda also want to have the option to pick whether I will walk with a ride pokemon or actually ride it? Like, it was hella cool that you could ride arcanine, persian, haunter or snorlax, etc. But what if I wanted it to just follow me? :/ What I also want back is the national dex once you completed the main story. Let most of the pokemon which first appear be gen 8, and after you beat the main game, pokemon from other generations show up more and you can catch new pokemon that were previously unavailable. I hated how in SuMo, I couldnt see a pokemon’s national dex number, and couldnt get any data on it if it wasnt native to Alola. 

Also this is gonna sound surprising coming from a shiny hunter, but I want the shiny charm to be a reward for filling the entire national dex again (minus mythicals/events), and make the shiny rate 1/8192 again instead of 1/4091. As much as I love my shinies, I kinda feel like they’re becoming a really common thing and way too easy to obtain? I do like there being methods to find shinies easier, such as Masuda breeding, chain-fishing, SOS-chaining, etc, but make it atleast a little bit harder than it currently is, to make all that effort worth it.

Compatibility with pokebank/the 3DS titles!! I want to transfer all my precious bbies I caught over the years to come join me in the next adventure. That would make it even more awesome if walking pokemon also returns; I can walk with my faves then, not just the pokemon available in Sword/Shield. Also Cloud compatibility. I know Nintendo is afraid of people abusing Cloud to edit save files and I can see them not adding cloud for Pokemon to prevent peeps from somehow cloning or editing pokemons, but on the other hand... Right now, I have ALL my rare, valuable pokemon stored on a Ultra Sun cartridge. Every super rare shiny legendary I spent MONTHS on to encounter, every event pokemon from events that will never happen again, and every pokemon that has nostalgic value to me. If that game cartridge breaks, they’re all gone. If Cloud storage would be a thing for pokemon, I’d have a lot less anxiety about gathering all my babies on a single game with the risk of losing ALL OF THEM. Besides, I pay for online service and cloud, and thusfar havent been able to use the feature for my games :/

And definitely compatibility with pro controller. I really do not like the feel of the joycons, nor the pokeball plus, especially not after playing for a few hours, so I’m really hoping we’ll be able to use the pro controller. Considering we seem to be getting the old battle system back instead of Let’s Go’s, I don’t see why they shouldn’t add pro controller compatibility. Besides, I spent a lot of money on this thing, lemme use it >:v

Customization. The new trainers look absolutely adorable, but being able to make your trainer fit your style more is still great and makes things more personal. On one hand I’d love even more options for customization than in SuMo, on the other hand I fear I will never even get anywhere cause I’ll be spending hours mixing and matching outfits :’D I am not at all fashionable irl, but my characters in games have to look tip top. Most importantly, I want gender-neutral stuff!! As in, the option to wear clothes or hairstyles regardless of the gender you picked at the beginning. Give me a girl and the female pronouns, but the option to get the haircut that the boys get and that flannel he wears. For example.

Minigames! Not everyone is a fan of them, but personally I love things like Contests, PokeAthlon, the Underground, Missions in the Festival Plaza, etc. Especially multiplayer stuff. Give me other stuff to do besides battling. And on that note give me fun multiplayer features; besides trading and battling! The feature where you can call for another trainer in Let’s Go seemed fun to me. Being able to connect with other players and joining them in your game to do stuff together. Like how you can invite people to your town in Animal Crossing, go to the island and take on island challenges from Tortimer.

Story-wise, it would be great to have a big long story, also post-game, which doesn’t end too soon, but with the option to skip cutscenes if you so please, and more importantly, have the freedom to also explore. In Sun/Moon, you were constantly forced to go to a very specific location, everything else was blocked, and you had a cutscene every new area. Like, it was all very linear. I love the older games in that regard, where there is a story, but you figure out yourself how to progress without NPCs constantly telling you where to go and what to do. I always have this issue where after I’m done with the story, I’m kind of... lost on what to do next, so personally I love a long story to keep me busy. Give me a serious threat for the antagonists. Team Skull was lovely and I enjoyed their antics, but I want to feel like I’m saving the Galar region or even bigger, rather than just stomping on some bullies, PETA (Plasma) or fashion disasters (Flare). Also gimme an asshole rival. Lately we’ve had a bunch of precious bbies who must be protected, now bring back a rival who deserves an asswhooping and had it coming. :v As for the new gyms with gym masters instead of leaders, I have no opinion yet. I like the good ol’ themed gyms, I liked the trials. The arena thing looks pretty neat thusfar, but there’s not enough info yet for me to have much of an opinion now. I heard a rumor that this game will also have missions you can do to earn rewards & brownie points, and that would be really cool. I always really love missions in RPGs. I’m just hoping that there will be like, a combination of one-time missions AND daily missions so you don’t run out of things to do eventually after completing a whole list.

I’m also hoping that any potential mythical pokemon will come in the form of missions. The whole serial codes giveaways suck. Just entering a code for some random delivery man to appear in the pokemon center, just casually handing you a super rare mythical pokemon like it’s nothing is just bs. Give me new story, sidequests or missions DLC for a mythical pokemon instead. Like Celebi in Crystal + HG/SS, Mew in Emerald, Shaymin and Darkrai in Platinum, and then expand the missions even more. Pokemon Ranger actually did this really well; you had to go on a mission involving the pokemon before you got it.

Finally, maybe a difficulty setting. People always complain that the games are too easy and that you have to use self-imposed rules such as Nuzlockes to make it remotely challenging. Maybe add a normal or easy mode for young kids just getting into the games, including tutorials such as the trainer school so they can get used to how everything works. Make a harder setting for veterans who like the games to have some challenge but are still in it for the story, and a Very Hard/Ultimate mode for competitive players who know every in and out of the game and are looking for a challenge where you really have to balance your team out and know what you’re doing to progress, and for people who can’t care less about the story elements of the games.

[doubleddenden]

I'm just gonna list what I think gen 8 needs or can improve on based on shit from the past or just my own perspective

Timed battles. Maybe as an option, but I do dig the idea behind the stationary battles in Let's Go. Maybe 5 seconds to pick a move? 5 minutes to finish a fight? I dig it.

Speaking of stationary fights, I feel like people would have less issue with Let's Go if perhaps they just made all wild battles normal, then the capture mechanic remains the same as Go but you can manually activate it at any point or kill your target. I can get behind that. Whatever status it has before capture mode has a modifier that works in your favor, and maybe you have a limited time to catch it?

Overworld encounters do need to stay. It certainly would make encountering that one 5% rare pokemon a bit easier, imo.

I was never really a fan of following pokemon but I can dig riding them or having smaller ones on your shoulder.

Skippable cutscenes

Skippable tutorials

Keep pokeride or whatever let's go has

Add a function to attract certain pokemon/increase the odds of them appearing via the cry function in a pokedex

Improved ability capsules that just let you swap to hidden abilities too. Idc if its expensive I'll handle that.

A nature modifier: maybe a specific npc that can modify temperament? I know is that I spent a whole lot of points teaching my Charizard Thunder Punch only to learn he had an attack hindering nature.

Early shiny charm? Idk man I have no interest in completing the pokedex, it's too much effort. Just let me win it at a battle facility or post game.

Regional variants but for non kantonians

Honestly an entire dex without kanto might be a breath of fresh air coming off the heels of X and Y, SM/USUM and Let's Go. Either that or no natural kanto variations.

Super customization that let's you adjust height, weight, face, have anime hair or even facial hair, color wheels for hair and eyes, like it doesn't have to be dark souls deep but at this point I want the choice to look older. Also like way more clothing choices. Long coats? Boots? I'd love an eyepatch too. And of course fingerless gloves. Throw in gymleader's clothes or clothes belonging to past trainers, all with their own color wheels too.

Age ambiguous characters or characters hinted to be older again

An improved Battle Royale. Way improved. Keep the old way as a mode I guess? But either way redirect an attack at a fainted target at a target on the field, even at random. My version would make it an all out brawl until only one remains.the other players can leave at that point.

Difficulty mode. Easy, normal, or hard. Simple stuff. Lower levels or hike them up, I dont like nuzlockes so it should be standard for a hard mode available from the get go at this point, a mode you can change at will via options

Personally I'd like the ability to customize our pokemon a bit, if not just see the item I equip it with. If we're talking full on, maybe scar makeup or spiked or curled fur. Maybe anime shades for squirtle and the like.

Maybe not necessarily open world but a branching path? City 1 allows you to go to city 2 a, 2 b, and those let you go to 3 a, 3 b, 3 c, so on and so forth until you just decide what towns you haven't been to yet. There's potential for the story to change slightly or remain the same but have different gym orders or even a different gym challenge altogether.

Either something new or integrate totems with gyms too. Maybe as a story check point? Like yay you beat the first three gyms, time to go fight totem Machoke or something before you fight gym four and five, totem, six seven, totem, eight, victory road, totem, elite 4

Keep the interesting characters and keep them dorky, but maybe make it more about the player this time around

I dont give two shits what Nintendo says about your rivals needing to be friendly, I want a douchebag rival I enjoy destroying and ruining his dreams that can give me a challenge, or at least a strong rival with a personality like Hugh that's more of the respectful rivalry rather than HAHA YOU BEAT ME AGAIN BUDDY.

You can give us a nice rival too in conjunction with the douchebag, just make sure they aren't pushovers and can actually fight.

This shouldn't need to be said, but 100+ new pokemon without reliance on past pokemon. Add a few that can evolve if you want, but the total new pokemon should be at least 150+ to make up for lack of new ones the last two gens. No, variations or megas do not count towards this number but they are welcome.

Chance to change music on the fly or in battles.

The bad guys are just dicks from the get go that get worse as you progress. Make me want to stop them instead of join them.

Please. Please a special item to evolve pokemon that need to be traded. I have no nearby friends and certainly none with switches, let alone anyone in public to trade with. It can be expensive.

Keep the throwing poses but let's take it further with customizable expressions.

Keep the champion defense system but add an option into just fight some of these guys outside the e4.

Pokepelago. Keep

Refresh. Keep

Bring back PSS

Integrate a multiplayer online experience where you'll find random trainers in the field, but don't allow more than ten to an area to prevent over crowding.

Co op in lgpe sounds cute as is but improve it further by also allowing co op with another player and their team. Increase battle difficulty if so, of course.

Integrate the bean system but replace it with berries. Smack the tree to collect a bunch.

Quest markers

Keep and expand side quests

Battle frontier that you actually explore. Think of emerald but better. Imagine maybe region sized or smaller if you wish.

More post game episodes, these are tight af

Make the ui faster. Think of the transition from slow 4th to fast 5th gen. Yes please.

HGSS style safari AND XY friend Safari.

Ways to get the other starters in the wild maybe?

Purchasable mega stones at reasonable prices

Give us another lady professor I've had it with hot heartthrob dudes

That's about all I got for now

[bubonickitten]

I’m loving Ultra Sun/Ultra Moon. The plotline diverges enough from Sun/Moon to still be novel imo, and I’m loving the added character development for Lillie and Hau, who (along with Gladion) are probably my favorite characters in SM/USUM. I love getting more exposition regarding Ultra Space and Ultra Beasts. I wasn’t sure if I’d like the Mantine surfing minigame, but once I got the hang of it, it was fun, and definitely worth it to get that Surfing Pikachu. And the Ultra Wormhole thing is one of the most fun post-game activities yet, especially considering all the possible Legendary encounters. 

BUT three things could make it better right off the bat:

- Please, Gamefreak, let me skip cutscenes, I’m literally begging you. I love doing back-to-back playthroughs - one of my favorite things is breeding perfect IV and (if I’m lucky) shiny Pokemon to use on my next playthrough - but SM and USUM have so many long cutscenes compared to past games, and they’re truly enjoyable cutscenes, but after three playthroughs I’m just like let’s go let’s go let’s go. Same w/ tutorials - I know it’s sort of standard for Pokemon games to have those mini-tutorials and detours to introduce you to new features and stuff, but with each new game that comes out, there are SO MANY more new features and there’s much more area to explore than, say, Gen 1 and 2, and I love that, but the first few hours of gameplay can feel really faltering when I get stopped every ten steps for a tutorial or tour of an area or w/e. Again, it’s nothing new for a Pokemon game, but I think there’s just a lot more of it now since there’s just... so much more going on in the newer games. Like, in Gen 1, it was “here’s how you catch a Pokemon, here’s a Pokemart, here’s a Pokemon Center, bye”; in the newest games, it’s all of those PLUS “here’s how to use Festival Plaza, here’s how to use the PokeFinder, here’s where you buy clothes or change your hair, let’s take a detour to get malasadas, come over here and check out this thing, OH and here’s a photo club...” SM/USUM feels even bulkier than ORAS and XY in that way.  It’s cute the first time around, and very valuable for people playing a Pokemon game for the first time, but when I’ve already done several playthroughs, it can really drag on for too long. It feels like there’s this huge uphill battle I have to trudge up every time I start a new game. 

- PLEASE MAKE CLOTHES GENDER-NEUTRAL OH MY GOODNESS. I’m playing a female avatar right now and I desperately want that cool shiny-Houndoom-with-glasses tank or that neat post-game Kommo-o armor outfit, but they’re gender-locked. And I just completed my Pokedex and got a Shiny Charm and I was surprised that we also get a new outfit, which is a Nurse outfit, but I was reading that male avatars get a karate gi, and I would much rather have a gi than a nurse outfit. Likewise, there are some really cute clothes for female avatars that it would be cool for male avatars to have access to. 

- I do a lot of Wonder Trade and GTS trading. Like I mentioned above, I do a lot of Pokemon breeding looking for shinies or perfect IVs, which means I tend to have boxes and boxes full of the same lvl 1 Pokemon, and I think it’s fun to put them all up on Wonder Trade and hopefully give someone a pleasant surprise when they get an uncommon Pokemon with some nice IVs. BUT - and I’ve mentioned this in past games that have the GTS as well - I would love to be able to not only search the GTS for Pokemon I want, but Pokemon that other people are looking for. When I have multiples of the same Pokemon and I want more variety in my PC boxes, I can head over to Wonder Trade, but what would be even more fun is if I could go on GTS and find people who are specifically looking for something that I have, and trade with them to help them get what they want. Also, a way to somehow communicate with someone when initiating a direct trade with them would be cool. I haven’t tried it in USUM yet but I’m assuming it’s the same as SM - you can see each other’s PC boxes and stuff, but it’s really guess-and-check when it comes to figuring out what the other person wants. I feel like I’m trying to telepathically communicate with them: ‘No, no, not that one... two over to the right, how about that one? Ok they haven’t moved their cursor in awhile, maybe they want me to show them something else... but I have no idea what they want.’ It’d probably be easier if we had some pre-programmed responses we could give - stuff like “I like what you’re showing me”, “I want to see something else”, or even “top row, [number] from the left” or being able to specify a particular Pokemon like you can in the GTS. 

[apatheticaria]

my spoilery thoughts on the last of us part ii

i apologize in advance for this super long post that you have to scroll past because i don’t know how to do the “keep reading” option thing

the only reason i’m writing this out is because i’m literally going insane from not being able to talk about my feelings for this game to anyone since no one i know actually cares lmao so this is mainly just for myself and anyone who wants to read this

the intro:

as i played through this game, i also watched a few playthroughs up until the point where i stopped to take a break. this was a game i couldn’t binge just because it’s so heavy and intense and sometimes you just gotta step away and take a breather

one of the playthroughs i followed along with was jacksepticeye’s and at the end he gave his review of the game like he normally does. i didn’t completely agree with everything he said, but for the most part i thought what he said lined up pretty well with my own opinion.

in particular, one thing that stood out to me was when he said that the introduction to this game shouldn’t have been Joel talking to Tommy about what he did at the end of the first game, but rather the whole flashback of Ellie’s birthday at the museum. then at “one” during the countdown to liftoff, the screen should’ve went black and fast forwarded to four-years-older Ellie opening her eyes in her home in Jackson (idk if i’m explaining this well, but Jack’s editor, Robin, edits this together and really sold it to me. if you wanna see it, go to the last part of Jack’s playthrough and look for it towards the last 30 minutes). i think this would have given us the time i think we all needed with Joel before he died and all the following flashbacks would be more focused on how/why Joel and Ellie’s relationship turned so distant - or hostile on Ellie’s part - and could’ve helped the pacing a bit.

Joel’s death:

potentially an unpopular opinion? but i actually like how Joel died. or uh lemme rephrase, i like the way they wrote his death. in this world of violence, hate, and brutality (actually doesn’t sound too off from our world but ahem moving on), i think the way he died was realistic, especially since he doomed all of humanity by saving Ellie in Part I. it just makes a lot of sense that someone would go after him and hunt him down

from the moment Abby and Owen stood over Jackson from the cliff, i was thinking: well theyre gonna kill Joel and since we’re gonna probably be playing as this girl for some (emphasis on some) of the game, they’re gonna go hard on the grey area of perspective in terms of revenge. which i was super on board with, but we’ll get back to that

when this game was first advertised, i didn’t know how i felt about a revenge story. it’s been told so many times and i’m never as hell-bent on revenge as much as the character is because it never feels warranted enough. that is, until i saw Joel die. watching Ellie pinned to the floor with a perfect view of his body, his face, beat to shit as she screams and begs for Abby to stop? haha that’s fucked Naughty Dog, thanks. but i do appreciate that they were able to make me just as mad as Ellie because of just how brutal his death was and how much i care, cared, about that character. no story has ever made me so incredibly enraged to the point i was with the main character full-stop to just destroy the perpetrator and take revenge. that’s why i think the way Joel dies is perfectly done. the fact that that cutscene is so horrible to watch for so many reasons just proves that it does it’s job.

Ellie’s half:

i actually don’t have too much to say about Ellie’s half of the story. this was what i both expected and wanted from the game, the whole game. while i can’t say i was having “fun”, because this isn’t really a fun game to play, you know what i mean when i say that this part was fun to play and follow.

side note: Naughty Dog’s improvement of your NPC buddy is so good, Dina and Jesse were both actually helpful, still not perfect, but also they’re not supposed to do all the work for you. i think the added layer that they could also get caught/seen and alert the enemy was completely unexpected and such a good addition to the gameplay (ofc this goes for Lev as well).

throughout the whole story, there’s kinda a problem with the pacing, and i know i’m not the first person to say that. however, i think the only big pacing issue i had with Ellie’s perspective was that kinda weird attempt of an open world map that they did with the gates. it felt a little unnecessary since i, and most other people, are playing for the story, not an open world with various side quest-like things. i missed the guitar cutscene with Ellie playing the guitar and singing to Dina (which kinda sucks, but i obviously just watched it after) because i just wanted to get back to the story rather than explore a large area. it was an attempt at something different so i won’t fault the game for that too much, but also stay in your lane lol so that section was a bit of a miss for me personally. i really liked the rest of it though, it had me engaged the whole time

Abby’s half:

ok. i have a lot to say about this half of the game since this is where most the problems occur.

first, let me preface this by saying that i don’t hate Abby. as i said, from the very beginning i knew she was going to have a, not justifiable, but an understandable reason for murdering Joel and that the game was going to be about seeing two sides to the same story. except, at the same time, i came here for Ellie, so why am i playing as this heterosexual? im mostly kidding. but fr i didn’t need the entire half of the game trying to get me to sympathize with Abby. i really didn’t need the message to be so spelt out for me, i got it from the moment i realized she was going to kill a favorite character.

i think my main gripe with the way they told this story is the way they formatted it. this story has all the elements to be amazing, but the execution just lacked the...finesse? idk if that’s the right word.

rather than splitting up the game into two halves, they could/should have integrated Abby’s story into Ellie’s so that when we cut from Abby holding the gun at Ellie in the theater to suddenly Abby as a young girl, it won’t feel so jarring when we have to start all over again with the upgrades and the timeline.

i really liked how we switched between them in the very beginning so why couldn’t that have just continued? in a book with multiple povs, the author often switches back and forth between every or every few chapters. you never see a book that starts with one perspective, then at the climax you have to start all over again from the other. at least, i’ve never seen this in any books i’ve read and i’ve read a lot ngl

maybe they forced us to stick with Abby for so long because if we’re forced to play as her, then we’re forced to get invested into her story. while this makes sense, it also really degraded at my enthusiasm for the game. it took me so long to just give up on the idea that we would be going back to Ellie relatively soon and when i did actually realize that was what was happening i was really disappointed.

instead of separating their stories, i would’ve liked to have Abby maybe one step behind Ellie the whole time so that while we play we’re just anticipating when Abby will finally catch up and it builds to this whole thing. instead, when we actually got to the point where everything was supposed to go down, we’re hit with whiplash and back to the very beginning with tutorials?? like did they just expect us to forget how to play since we switched characters?

i’m thinking, after Ellie and Dina jump over the barbed wire that explodes and Ellie’s knocked out, we could have switched over to Abby waking up in the WLF stadium. after Abby sneaks out of the stadium and you have that interaction with Jordan where he mentions Leah at the tv station, then we go back to Ellie waking up and tied to the table and we see Ellie kill Jordan.

after this i think Abby should have met Lev and Yara way sooner because i barely even remember what happened before Abby was caught by the seraphites it was so boring. so she gets caught by the seraphites AFTER we meet them through Ellie being shot through the shoulder (i still want to get all the first impressions of new stuff with Ellie because then it still makes her feel like the main character) and we meet the siblings and blahblahblah.

as a follow up, after Ellie kills Nora, which by the way, Ellie’s facial expressions are just so good with the red light while she’s just beating Nora to death? wow that entire interaction was so well done. anyway, after Ellie kills Nora, and Ellie gets back to the theater and the scene ends with her and Dina hugging, then we would switch to that whole section with Abby and Lev traveling to the hospital to get the meds and it would be cool if on her way in, Nora helps Abby and then on her way out, we run into a door we have trouble opening so we push and when it opens, Nora’s beaten up body is right there.

you get the gist. Abby’s story was barely intertwined with Ellie’s until the very end where she finds Owen and Mel dead. she doesn’t know that literally everyone else, except Leah, is dead too. i feel like that would’ve made the impact of Abby and Ellie’s fight at the theater more effective. affective? whatever i’m not an english nerd

i also think we should have gotten the flashback with Abby’s dad a little later when we’re expected to understand her character a bit more.

overall, i’m not mad about getting Abby’s side of the story, but i am mad that the way it was told felt so disconnected from Ellie. we could still get that whole arc of Abby going to the island to get Lev, she can still get her own story apart from Ellie, but she needed to have more of a interaction with Ellie’s actions.

Abby vs. Ellie, Abby’s pov:

i absolutely hate this fight. i really hate the way it was written and the way it happened. i get that the game is trying to give us Abby’s perspective and to show that in her point of view, Ellie is the villain in this story.

except, AGAIN, i don’t need this spoon fed to me!!! i KNOW that the world isn’t black and white and that people’s perspectives are different, but also? i don’t really care. both characters have gone through shit and both have done shitty things. neither of them are innocent, no one in this world is innocent (hence why i really dislike Mel, but that’s not really relevant), so it really comes down to which character you value more. in my - and most other people’s - case, it’s Ellie. i know the whole point of this fight is to make the player uncomfortable, but i wasn’t just uncomfortable, it made me legitimately start to dislike this game (spoiler for the end of this stupid-long review: i don’t completely dislike it)

the game really emphasizes that this is Abby’s story as much as it is Ellie’s and i get that, but this fight did not need to happen the way it did and the game didn’t need to be even longer after this. a lot of people say that we played from Abby’s perspective because Ellie would have killed Abby and that would be that (and she did, by the way, i relished watching Ellie get her revenge because while i don’t hate Abby, it was still so satisfying even if that wasn’t how the game wanted me to play). however however however, Abby wouldn’t have showed mercy either. she was absolutely going to kill Ellie if Dina hadn’t intervened then she was going to kill Dina if Lev hadn’t intervened.

here’s how i wouldve wanted it to go: we go back to Ellie’s perspective once Abby has the gun pointed at Ellie in the lobby and during their fight, Ellie would get the upper hand because she has weapons and shit (let’s be honest, Ellie would not win in hand-to-hand combat with fully-healthy Abby, we saw that first hand). Lev would try to jump in, but then Dina would disarm him and prevent him from escaping her grasp. then eventually Ellie would have the barrel of the shotgun pointed at Abby’s face and she would hear Lev tell her to please stop don’t kill her and Ellie would listen because the same exact thing happened to her (we could get a short flashback or something for more emotions, idk). so instead of killing Abby, Ellie would knock her out and her and Dina would leave and Lev would run to Abby’s unconscious body. this would end that cycle of revenge and because Abby has something more important to her than revenge (Lev), they would move on.

the ending:

if the game went how i just imagined, we probably wouldn’t get an ending that’s as depressing and open ended as it is, but i’m sure Neil and his team could figure something out, such as Ellie still has to deal with PTSD and Tommy’s really pissed at them and Ellie still looses her two fingers. so we get that little domestic sequence and the PTSD flashback and Tommy coming with his eye missing and showing the map. he leaves and when Ellie is about to leave in the middle of the night, Dina convinces her this time to stay and the next day Ellie tries to play the guitar one last time before giving up since she doesn’t have her fingers (i still want that last heartbreaking flashback, that one fucked me up i love it) and she goes out to leave it somewhere in the woods with it all ending with her walking away from the guitar that Joel gave her to symbolize her letting him go. idk man something like that, still not that open ended, but i’m just talking out of my ass rn

anyway that’s not how it went so we’ll stick to reality.

an open ending isn’t supposed to be unsatisfying, because that’s what this ending was. Part I does an open ending perfectly as we still get closure even though we don’t know exactly how things go afterwards (until now obviously).

after playing from Abby’s perspective for so goddamn long, it was weird to play as Ellie again, even while it was also a relief, and that makes me really sad. in the end, i did feel bad for Abby when she was literally left to starve and “hang” (but again i didn’t need 15+ hours in order to feel basic sympathy).

from the way they wrote the story, i knew Ellie wasn’t going to let it go and she was going to leave Dina and JJ. it made sense and i don’t think it was out of character for her, but the fact they did that in the first place and that Abby was the one to let go first? Abby got her revenge, she killed Joel, but Ellie never got that closure so of course she was going to go after Abby.

in the very end, Ellie is left with no one and Abby still has Lev and a group of fireflies to run to. Ellie’s biggest fear was being alone as she said in the first game, but that’s exactly what she’s left with. yeah life is unfair and i do like that the consequences feel real in this story, but i don’t think Ellie deserved to be done so damn dirty while Abby is living her best life. sure all of Abby’s friends were murdered because of Ellie and Dina leaving is Ellie’s own fault and i don’t blame Dina, but i mean we have no idea what happens to Ellie after this, where she goes. it at least feels like she’s on the road to eventually being relatively okay, as okay as you can be in this world.

i can’t completely articulate how i feel about this ending, even after three days having finished playing. all i do know is that while it’s realistic how Ellie’s story ended, i would’ve liked for Abby to get the same treatment. for her to not actually find the fireflies through the radio and escape from the Rattlers only to have no where to go so that, just like Ellie, revenge cost her everything and we don’t know where she went after.

maybe because Abby’s story was pretty much wrapped up and Ellie’s wasn’t, they’re planning for a trilogy, but i guess we’ll see.

the tldr;

this game has all the elements it needed to be amazing overall imo, i just wish they were all utilized Better. the reason it’s so hard to figure out how i feel about this game is because it has so much potential that just never came through and i’m really jealous of all the people who were blown away by this story. it’s still a good game though, but a 7/10 seems too high and 6/10 seems to low. ig it’s a 6.5/10 for me.

thanks for reading if you made it this far

[shadowlink720]

FE: Birthright Randomised Chapters 5 and 6

(aka ‘Felicia’s throwing shade at everyone, please stop her’)

Time to get into Birthright and hopefully not break the gaaaaaame >:3

Time to get right into it with a cutscene with me mum talking about a fancy chair and all that yadda yadda convenient Conquest plot point all that stuff to regain true form and mind and stuffffffff

ayy it’s Ryoma! :D

..... oh my Farore

He’s a butler, oK THEN- At least it.... looks like a butler I can’t really tell- Yeah he’s a butler what were the chances, right?

it’s so weird that he’s not calling Corrin his sister lmao;;;;

ayyy there are the royal sibliings! (including Felicia)

oh man are u ready to see Felicia being salty to Corrin? I’m not-

Takumi as Hinoka is great b/c of how much nicer he is to Corrin now ahahahh Oh hey! Kagero’s there too!

holy hylia

The salt begins >:3cccccc

She’s so cute I’mma Die aahhhh

There they all gooooo

.... ya know what? I’m perfectly ok with Butler!Ryoma then again I just love formal attire like tailcoats also please stop yelling Ryoma, use ur inside voice

off to the castle tooowwwwnn! with so many people wearing kitsune masks and that woman with her potatoooes We’re gonna see a lot of Kagero in this randomiser, so that’s super neat

I could get used to it, I like Kagero :D oh man here comes Felicia with that shade again

Ya know, Felicia; your voiceline of ‘It’s my pleasure’ really begs to differ about you not trusting me

Felicia! Don’t be mean to Kagero! >:c

Well gee, thanks Felicia o<o I’m sorry I’m taking so many pictures of Felicia’s dialogue because it’s just so great honestly her as Takumi is just so out of character but in a way that I love-

Yeah, she should go spend some time with the Ice Tribe and learn to chill like Flora :’D I love these Hoshidan siblings ashdauihdiausd

cutsceeeeeeene mysterious hooded person is lurkin’ and schemin’ exploooosioooooon

Nooo, mum! oAo ok but the voice acting is pretty darn good in this cutscene, just saying-

Dragon time! >:D

Hey, Felicia; Flora’s back in Nohr so she can’t hear ya-

time to properly start the chapter! >:D ah yeah, Wyrmslayers for the obligatory bonus damage tutoriaaaals

hey we can see Mozu and Kagero’s stats now!

Let’s start with Mozu

ok so she’s an Apothecary, pretty neat her personal skill is Countercurse which is actually pretty neat, it makes an attacker who uses magic against Mozu suffer half the damage they dealt :V of course that’s only useful with magic users, who would probably go for other units who can’t retaliate or smth ANYWAY C rank in bows :o pretty sweeeeet base stats are pretty low (she is level one tho) but she’s got a lot of strength :V I’ve never really used Apothecary units much, since the only one you can get without capturing one is Midori hahah;; (growth rates: HP - 40, Str - 50, Mag - 55, Skill - 20, Spd - 50, Lck - 35, Def - 30, Res - 30, basically really darn mcfreaking good)

anyway let’s have a look at Kagero!

ooOOOoo Hunter’s Knife :o that’ll be usefuuuul

She has Playthings as a personal, which means adjacent enemies take 5 hp damage at the start of the Player Phase; niiiice (it could be useful when paired with Jakob’s Pragmatic too :o) and she also has Wary Fighter, preventing either side from performing followups :V not... all that great b/c she has amazing speed and would double most people I’d think but we can remove it later if need be also YO LOOK AT HER SKILL AND SPEED WOW-- she has pretty bad strength.... and a lot of other stats aren’t great either, but that’s ok! :O I’m beginning to think that C rank in weapons isn’t randomised or smth-- (growth rates: HP - 40, Str - 60, Mag - 25, Skill - 15, Spd - 25, Lck - 30, Def - 55, Res - 60)

aaanyway let’s goooo

Azura still showing up as a Swordmaster lol I’m gonna keep everyone together because there still isn’t any healers, only 6 vulneraries between us and I don’t think Corrin can trade when she’s a Feral Dragon heck

wait nvm, we can still trade with her

Kagero, you aren’t a songstress; you can’t sing to let people move again- also Saizo isn’t here yet ausdaiusdauh

Oh man, Azura’s not gonna take shit from anyone .... kick their ass, Azura >:V both of them missed, ok

level up for Corrin!

Pretty decent :V

still misses all around from Azura and the hooded persooon

and a level up for Rinkaaaah (who kicked one of the Mercenaries’ asses w/ Mozu)

pretty deceeeent, I wonder what her growths are :V

anyway, we gooooo

ooh hey a dodge from Azura and she managed to hit the hooded person :D and again! :D ohh, nvm, they’ve hit her now misses all round again

...Seal Defence from Rinkah is really good when following up with Kagero because of her shit strength--

ok but have I mentioned I love Spear Fighters? because I do, one reason being that their animations are cool :V

yikes, there goes Azura oAo she got quite a good bit of the mystery person’s health down tho (i keep calling them mysterious person b/c spoilers for Revelation, if memory serves, so uhh.... yeah)

yIKES no one seems to be able to hit this guy (0 damage AND low hits rates aihifiudfsudh) except for Corrin uahfiuhds but I wanted to give it to another person to get them more exp >:V fine then

welp, they dead .... as much as they can be, at least lMAO

more cutsceeenes oh hey, Azura; I thought you had retreated :V aaaand i’m back to being a hooman and ANOTHER CUTSCENE this time the lowkey disturbing cutscene hey at least they didn’t show Sumeragi probably getting his throat slit open with that huge ass axe o<o;;;;;

Well, you’re awfully forgiving, aren’t you Kagero? :V

aaaand erryone’s ded

Azura being all ‘oh yeah, this is what the Nohri-asses do, so uhh.... yeah King Ganon- GARON set up the whole thing lmao’ AZURA, SAYING GARON MASTERMINDED THE WHOLE THING IS NO LAUGHING MATTER--

oh boi here comes Felicia I’msorry ;;A;;

I said I’m SORR Y (Felicia saying Takumi’s lines are pure gold, tbh)

Leave Kagero alo n e--

Yeah, you said it, Takumi :’’D i’m taking so many pictures of this cutscene lol;; here comes Ryomaaaaa

it’s so weird seeing him call Mikoto ‘Queen Mikoto’ and not ‘Mother’ lol

oh yeah, we need another sword after we lost Ganglari when it... exploded :’D so time to get the Yato! :D (or as I like to call it; ‘The Chainsaw’ b/c of the Omega Yato-) it would have been cool if all of the royal siblings had special weapons, tbh; like why did they brothers get the special treatment? >:V

Oh hey! I think Felicia’s a Sky Knight! So she has a chance of wealing the Fujin Yumi as a Kinshi Knight! :U

dang it, Felicia--

oh yeah, Corrin’s just not paying attention lmao;;;

welp, here comes the Nohrians oh man

I... I don’t even have anything to say to this it’s just Azura couldn’t have been randomised into a better person-

ah yeah, obligatory cutscene to give Corrin the dragonstone yadda yadda lol, Kagero did the animation of catching the Yato, except now it’s a Dragonstone the sound played and everything hahah

Time for Chapter 6, awwww yeeeaaaahh! >:3c

ah yes, vanilla Nohrians ‘why are you invading hoshido bro???’ all that stuff

If Takumi actually accepted you being his sibling in the early game lol

cutsceeeeeeene that makes little sense out of conteeeeext because ryoma, hinoka and sakura aren’t actually supposed to be heeeeeere

time to choose!

hah, there’s absolutely no message for saying that there is no Conquest data on the system I never want to play Conquest again anyway lol-

time to DEFEND HOSHIDO AND MY HOSHIBROS

hah, lyrics for the song ayyy //finger guns

oh yeah, Xander throwing a temper tantrum and all that ‘And Father will forgive you, I know it.’ yeah, actually he wants me to Suffer if I go there, bruh XANDER GDI YOU KNOW THAT HE’S MESSED UP MAN, YOU’VE NOTICED THE CHANGE IN HIM- ya said that your siblings are at least just as important as the people of Nohr >:V

well, Corrin’s Dead Here comes Azuraaaaa

And boi is she Ready to Fite

It seems like none of the Hoshibros have any chill lol and she had a fitting voiceline of ‘I’m gonna BREAK you!’ as well holy heck

time to start the chapter- AYYY it’s Kaze! :D

.... Felicia you had a 90% chance to hit that guy HOW COULD YOU MISS, YOU HAD THE FUJIN YUMI--

anyway, level up for Jakob instead

auhfiudhfsdud I should be happy given his poor HP and Skill growths tho ayyy he learned Nobility >:D

rest in pieces, Bohrther

Ayyy Kagero levelled up!

I’ll look at her growth rates after and add them in when I was looking at her stats and stuff- ayy she learned Locktouch!

welp, Xander’s dead again HAH, it’s showing Ryoma, Hinoka and Takumi instead of Azura, Takumi and Felicia hah

Kagero, I’m pretty sure the correct grammar is ‘Azura and I’ but w/e lmao ‘I know this is the right choice’ what if I told you that you could refuse to pick a side, Corrin-

time for the intro that we’ve seen before :’D and here’s Lilith!

.... why is Jakob showing up and not Kaze, lol

HAH Obligatory SECOND explanation of the astral plane ya know, just in case you forgot and a tutorial on how to place things and stuff geh-

it’s still Jakob that’s up at the top lol right time to fix up this mess and make it more organised because blech- let’s ALSO change our hair since we’re now officially playing Birthright :’D

.... heck it, I know I wanted to keep the symbolism of the change of hair length for Revelation but

I just really like the short hair :’’’D

anyway, I think this has been going on for long enough so I should stop here hahah;;;

I’m still having so much fun with thiiis, and next time we get to see who Silas is as well as who Mozu’s retainers are! ouo

[jamesnelsonart]

Pokemon Let's Go play this game before Smash Ultimate comes out

Did you guys hear about Pokemon Go? It was really popular. It still is, actually. It will probably never get back to that point it was at when it launched and you saw groups of people playing it, but the audience has remained huge and consistent. I’m guessing GameFreak saw this success and realized they should probably do something with it. And that’s how we got Pokemon Let’s Go: Pikachu and Eevee, a reimagining of Pokemon Yellow Version which features connectivity with the popular phone game.

When these two games were announced, there was a divisive response. A lot of people were hoping for a REALLY new Pokemon title with new Pokemon, not a remake of Kanto, a region that itself has already been remade on the GBA. To top it off, wild battles are replaced by Pokemon Go-style capture sequences, abilities are gone, and you only get the original 151 Pokemon to play with. This announcement was seen as a big step back. But what this criticism fails to take into account is the fact that GameFreak has stated that a brand new core title is coming out next year, so the Let’s Go games aren’t replacing anything. If anything, these should grow the audience by introducing the casual Pokemon Go players to a simplified version of the battle system with the original 151 Pokemon so as not to overwhelm them. If they enjoy it, they may swim into deeper waters and buy the core titles. It makes sense. So… judging the games on their own merits, are they good?

I should say these games are clearly aimed for the younger fans. Pikachu and Evee have improved stats that make them quite strong. Pikachu is basically a sweeper with strong attacks and nice coverage while Eevee has kind of mediocre stats but the greatest movepool in the universe. Both of these starters can efficiently steamroll the entire game by themselves so little babies will enjoy this game a ton. You can tell this game was made for the super young as some of the puzzles from the gen1 games are simplified greatly. Also, you can now feed your pokemon stat-enhancing candies that can seriously boost their stats so even if your favorite Pokemon is something with poor stats like Lickitung or Onix, with enough investment you can still ride through single player using those ones if you wanna use your faves so this is great for casual players. Having your Pokemon follow you is cool too, you can even ride on some of them. If you want any kind of challenge, you’d best look elsewhere unless you’re interested in playing against your friends, because that’s the only challenge that can be found here. Even the small amount of postgame stuff is easy, unless you wanna fight the master trainers, but that’s more monotonous than hard. You might think you’re a winner if you beat all these people but the only winner will be the ravages of time after you fought someone with a level 70 Metapod and now you’re both using struggle because the battle actually took that long. You only gotta beat six of these guys to fight Red and you don’t get money or exp for beating him so… who cares lol. So from reading this you can probably tell that this game didn’t cater to my tastes but that doesn’t make it bad, in fact I think there’s a lot to learn from this installment.

Let me get this out of the way first: I really enjoyed Sun and Moon and all that they brought to the table. Alolan forms are cool, HMs are gone, the new Pokemon were well-received (though there were not a lot of them), z-moves are a nice addition that gave battles an unexpected twist, the story was great, playthroughs have some challenging opponents to face, and it was easier than ever to build a competitive team. After all this time some faults become apparent, however. Those games had constant cutscenes disrupting the flow for minor events, a limited selection of wild Pokemon for the adventure, and way too many tutorials that you were forced to watch. Pokemon Let’s Go might be a spin-off, but it seems clear it worked to address previous faults with the core titles. I actually wouldn’t mind seeing a lot of these changes implemented into the main series. You begin your adventure almost immediately and get to go on your way and start catching Pokemon. There are only a few cutscenes here and there and they are mainly reserved for encountering strong legendaries like Mewtwo, so they’re fine and inoffensive. I thought I would hate the fact that wild battles are gone but the more I thought about it the more I realized how obsolete wild battles have becoming in Pokemon games. You really have no chance of losing these things and if things actually manage to get risky you can always just run away. Plus if you’re interested in competitive play then captured Pokemon are often inferior to those hatched from eggs… a sad state for a game series about “catching them all”. In a recent interview Junichi Masuda complained that players just hatch eggs to get the Pokemon they wanted these days and that he wanted to bring things back to focus on catching. I think it’s safe to say he succeeded on this front. Capturing is fun and simple enough, and if you catch a ton of the same Pokemon in a row, its stats will be mostly-perfect. I would love if this wild encounter method were to be brought over to the main games. There are also some nice quality-of-life changes to make it easier to get the perfect Pokemon. Bottle Caps are easier to get to increase your stats, you can pay a lady in Celadon City to make every Pokemon you encounter have a specific nature for the day, and you can combo-catch Chansey to easily level your Pokemon up to their maximum levels to hyper train them. These are all nice. You know what isn’t nice? The strange lack of control customization. If you’re playing handheld you gotta use gyro aiming, so playing in a car is not really a thing you can do all the time. If you’re playing with the joycon the motion detector can be imprecise, making it a pain to catch Pokemon that move around. It’s kind of a pain that there’s no traditional control scheme for catching. It’s kind of strange that a game designed for mass appeal doesn’t have these basic customization features.

Speaking of mass appeal, this game has a pretty interesting way of getting casual players into competitive teambuilding by including a couple of basic battle features but keeping it limited so as not to surprise players or present too much that might turn people off to the experience. Only the original 151 Pokemon are available, along with Mega Evolutions, the Alolan forms and the new Pokemon Meltan, who evolves into Melmetal. This makes sense, as dark, steel, and fairy types didn’t exist during gen1 so the Alolan forms help to bring in more type diversity. That being said, I don’t think anyone would have objected to including the new evolved later forms of the original Pokemon to the game. Onix, Tangela, Scyther, Lickitung, Magmar, Electabuzz, Rhydon, Seadra, Porygon, Eevee, Poliwhirl, Slowpoke, Gloom, Golbat, and Chansey all got new evolutions as the games went on, and including them would’ve given us more type diversity and better Pokemon, but oh well. Abilities are gone in order to keep things simple so no one gets an unpleasant surprise when they try to attack Weezing with Earthquake. Hold Items are out as well. Movepools are also altered to keep things understandable so type matchups should proceed as a newcomer would expect them to. For example, sending an electric type out against Gyarados is usually not a great idea, as Gyarados will use Dragon Dance to outspeed it and beat it with Earthquake. But now Dragon Dance isn’t in these games, making matchups proceed in a more expected fashion. Weather is also gone, and a couple of recovery moves like Slack Off, Moonlight, and Synthesis are nowhere to be found, so Pokemon may be forced to rely on Rest without Sleep Talk. In a baffling move, Stealth Rock is a TM and Rapid Spin and Defog aren’t in the game. What the fuck, GameFreak. The move Teleport is actually useful now, it’s a negative-priority move that lets you switch Pokemon, it’s great for switching in something frail that can’t take a hit. Let’s hope they put that in the next core title. Most of this is only noteworthy for fighting other players, you will be too powerful to even need strategy for the single player, largely due to your starter and the capture system’s huge experience point rewards.

The capture system allows you to rack up a ton of experience points. Also, trainers in Let’s Go have small teams of unevolved Pokemon, so they do not do much to trouble the player. So how would you merge the capture system into a core title? Well, for starters give trainers bigger teams and have the CPUs execute real battle strategies against the player. This idea would make fights more memorable and also serve to teach the player about making their own strategies. Boom, you’d have a real game there. Let’s Go is mainly for casual players but I hope they don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater here, a lot of the new ideas presented are really good, and the game IS fun, but it lacks staying power. Imagine how much better the capture mechanic will be paired with a more… substantial game.

[inkwatch-blog]

Twilight Princess: A Game Stuck in Time

(AN: The following is an unproduced script for a proposed video series called BKLG (pronounced Backlog), which I unfortunately had to put on hold for the time being. It has been slightly modified to read as an article, but the writing below is perhaps a bit more conversational than it otherwise would be.)

Allow me a bold statement upfront: The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess would not exist as it does today without a demo reel shown at Nintendo’s defunct trade show Spaceworld. At Spaceworld 2000, a demo reel for the upcoming Gamecube was shown to attendees to represent the graphical power of Nintendo’s new console. Twelve seconds of an unannounced Zelda game were shown and the fanbase lost it’s collective mind. IGN wrote a five paragraph essay about the clip, writing, “There's far too much detail to believe that Nintendo would scrap the models and make new ones. So, we think it's safe to say the new Link will look a lot like this. Overall, we're very happy with his new immaculate hero look.” Right.

IGN might’ve lost their minds, but behind the scenes, director Eiji Aonuma wasn’t pleased; in fact, he actually hated the design. A decade later, he told IGN it wasn’t the game he wanted to make at all. To him, it wasn’t Zelda.

So a year later, at Spaceworld 2001, Nintendo announced The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker. The internet revolted. This wasn’t their Zelda, they said. This was Cel-da. This was kid stuff. Where was their mature, grounded take on the series? I do wonder if that sounds like any other fanbase out there today.

Wind Waker was released in North America in 2003 to critical praise. Wikipedia has it listed on twenty-three separate Best Of lists. The HD re-release on the Wii U only gained the game further acclaim. The visuals have stood the test of the time, aging far better than similar games released around the same era.

But all of that didn’t matter. To fans, the cartoonish visuals meant the game was meant for children. As a follow up to Ocarina, its sales were disappointing, selling less than half of what the first 3D Zelda had sold. Nintendo directly attributed this slump to the reaction of fans in North America after the graphics were first shown in 2001. So, despite accidentally announcing in 2004 that an upcoming GameCube Zelda game had the working title of The Wind Waker 2, Aonuma became concerned that the game wouldn’t sell well in North America. After the game was announced at E3 2004, Shigeru Miyamoto told IGN that the art style of the new Zelda adventure was created to fulfill that customer demand created six years before Twilight Princess was even released.

So why spend a massive amount of time detailing the history of a decade old game? Because in a lot of ways, The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess and its HD remake, feel beholden to the demand of its fan base in a way not a lot of Zelda games are. Despite the preceding two games in the series, Wind Waker and Majora’s Mask, featuring spectacularly different play styles, Twilight Princess feels like a reimagining of 1998’s Ocarina of Time, and while this doesn’t make Twilight Princess a bad game by any means, it certainly makes it feel more derivative than any adventure game starring the Hero of Time deserves to feel.

So, in the honor of Zelda, let’s divide this into two needlessly convoluted timelines. There’s also one where I die while writing this, and it never comes out, so if you’re reading this now, please assume you aren’t in this timeline.

One.

Twilight Princess is a good game doing weird things.

Yeah, really, it is. All the fun of Zelda, right there, baked into it. It’s got some dark, goofy undertones and the game is weird as hell. The wolf segments are mostly fun, especially once you gain the freedom to turn into a wolf whenever you please. The characters are all really memorable in a way that I think is underplayed when people talk about Zelda. The Snow Yeti couple who are secretly possessed. Zant is a weird Twilight villain who is being played by Ganondorf. Colin’s storyline of overcoming the bullying and taunting of the rest of his friends makes him my favorite of the four children by far. And Midna is the best - the best - Zelda assistant ever. That’s a really low bar to clear, sorry Navi and Fi, and Tatl. Y’all can buzz off, because Midna has you beat for days. She is excellent, and never really a bother, even when she tells you something you already know.

The swordfighting in this game, particularly when fighting the Darknuts throughout the last chunk of the game, feels spectacular. I’m assuming this is less true with waggle controls on the Wii, but playing through the HD remake felt pretty spectacular. Some of the dungeon design is the best in the series - Snowpeak, for all its flaws and played out ice block puzzles, is perfectly built, and the Temple of Time’s reversal after the miniboss felt really refreshing. It also, and I cannot overstate this enough, had my favorite minigame in all of Zelda: snowboarding.

That’s not to say Twilight Princess is a perfect game. There’s plenty to nitpick - the puzzles don’t feel like puzzles! Why are half of the puzzles just shooting objects on a wall with an item! Why aren’t there more snowboarding levels! Why do half the items have almost no use outside the dungeon! Why aren’t there more snowboarding levels! Why can’t I ride the Spinner everywhere! Why aren’t there more snowboarding levels!

So instead of nitpicking on small things like, why aren’t there more snowboarding levels, let me go ahead and lay out the biggest flaw in this game, the one that everyone probably saw coming before you even clicked on this article: the opening.

Here’s how the opening tutorial for 1992’s The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past plays out: There’s a short cutscene before you gain control of Link. You leave bed and you grab the Lamp from the nearby chest. The guards don’t let you into the castle, so you head around to the right and you move a bush to let yourself into the dungeon of the castle. Your uncle, who has been defeated, gives you a sword and shield. Then you begin your journey through the first dungeon of the game, Hyrule Castle.

Cool. Easy. Done. Now here’s the opening tutorial for Twilight Princess: You talk to Rusl, you watch a cutscene, you run to the Ordon Spring, you talk to Ilia, you get Epona, you run through Ordon, you get to the ranch, you herd some goats in what is one of my least favorite mini-games in all of Zelda, you run back to Ordon, you talk to the kids, you talk to Uli, who can’t give you the fishing rod because she lost her cradle, then you talk to Jaggle, you summon a hawk, you shoot the hawk at a monkey, you bring the cradle back to Uli, and you get the fishing rod. From there, you go fishing, you catch a fish for the cat, you watch the cat run around town and back into the shop, where you can now get a free bottle. If you haven’t already, you run around collecting rupees until you reach the magical number of 30, in which you buy the slingshot and you show the children that you’ve bought it. Now you can re-enter your house and, would you look at that, the sword is there. The kids teach you how to use a sword. Then the kids chase a monkey into the woods. So, you summon Epona, you get the lantern, and you enter the North Faron woods on your quest to find Talo. You make your way through the woods in what is sort of similar to a dungeon, you free Talo and the monkey using your sword, and Rusl thanks you for saving Talo. Then you herd more goats - 20 this time, thanks Fado. Ilia claims that you hurt Epona or something, and she steals your horse. She’s also locked you out of the spring where she’s hidden Epona, so you sneak into the spring in a crawlspace, which triggers a cutscene, and boom, you’re a wolf stuck in prison.Technically, the wolf section is also a bit of a tutorial, but I think the point’s been made.

The opening of this game is terrible. It slows progress in the game down to a crawl right when the game should be trying to get you to sink yourself in. It takes hours to complete, and even longer if you haven’t played the game before and don’t know what you’re doing. And, in some ways, it’s indicative of a larger problem in the more modern era of Zelda games - not trusting the player to figure the game out on their own.

A quick note on the other divisive aspect of this game: tear collecting. I won’t comment much on it because it’s been talked to death and, to me, the tutorial is far more problematic in terms of game structure, but the tears fetch quest isn’t a whole lot of fun. At best, it’s inoffensive; at worst, it’s boring and yet another way to get players to put the controller down before the game reaches its second half. The HD remaster fixes the quest somewhat, lowering the required tear count from 16 to 12. It’s still cumbersome, but ending 25 percent sooner helps alleviate the negative feeling each section leaves on the player.

Two.

Twilight Princess is a good game unable to move beyond its past and its fanbase.

Majora’s Mask was released to critical acclaim, but it sold about half of Ocarina’s numbers two years earlier. Perhaps, Nintendo probably thought at the time, this had to do not with the quality of the game or what the fanbase wanted, but the required usage of the Expansion Pak and the impending launch of the GameCube.

As mentioned earlier, it was Wind Waker’s sales that scared the creative team into redirecting their efforts from a sequel to Wind Waker to an entirely new game with a new, more realistic design.

But Wind Waker’s struggles didn’t just change the art design of the new game. It ensured that the next Zelda game would be more like Ocarina of Time than both Wind Waker and Majora’s Mask, a direct sequel, ever would.

And they did it. Twilight Princess, more than any other game in the series, plays like a reimagining of a former game, in this case, Ocarina of Time. Especially in the first half of the game, both play out in incredibly similar ways, from your humble beginnings in a small village to your travels to Hyrule Castle, to the similarly themed opening dungeons, to your new companion following you around, offering advice. Majora’s Mask was a game that took chances, shook the Zelda formula up in ways no one had seen since Zelda II. Wind Waker stayed more true to the classic Zelda road, while still thinking up new ideas, from its presentation to its high seas setting. Twilight Princess is a good, safe game, seemingly designed to make sure that everyone who owned a copy of Ocarina of Time and had seen the Spaceworld 2000 demo would no longer feel disappointed about the cartoon stylings of Wind Waker.

And it worked. That feeling of nostalgia for Ocarina, combined with the success of the Wii, ensured the game would become the best-selling title in Zelda’s history, assuming you don’t include the 3DS remake of Ocarina into Ocarina’s N64 sales.

Of course, unlike Ocarina, nostalgia for Twilight Princess hasn’t fared quite as well. The game received an HD remaster in 2016, both as a 30th anniversary celebration of the series and as a pseudo-apology from Nintendo for delaying Breath of the Wild to 2017 in order to simultaneously release on the Wii U and the Switch. The HD remaster of Twilight Princess sold a little more than a million copies globally, a similar number to 2015’s forgotten spin-off, TriForce Heroes.

It took nearly another decade to get Nintendo to take more chances on changing up the Zelda formula. Ignoring the portable titles for a moment, 2011’s Twilight Princess follow up, Skyward Sword, was critically acclaimed at launch, but has, for the most part, been largely forgotten about in the five-plus years since its release. Skyward Sword often appears near the bottom of best-Zelda lists, and often doesn’t appear at all when the list is limited to ten games. That game has similar flaws to Twilight Princess, with a drawn out opening section and frustrating collect-a-thons like the music note section late into the game.

All of this is to say, I think we’re about to entire a new era of Zelda, or at least, a return to classic, pre-Ocarina of Time adventuring. Next week’s Breath of the Wild promises an open world with plenty to explore. The opening of the game seems to draw from the original and from Link to the Past far more than from Twilight Princess or Skyward Sword. What we’re looking at isn’t the end of Zelda, but the first of a new chapter.