#this is the only time i say we need a skip cutscene button

[travelerscompanion]

i love me some lore and story but whoever thought that making an insane multi part world quest that people have reported to be over 10 hours with no voice acting , i sleep. bye. i can't pay attention that long.

[employee052]

ozzies long-ass TSP ramble

For context, a few days ago i was in a thinky mood when i watched this video on Valve catwalks. it mentioned death of the author, and while ive heard of it, I didnt understand what it meant until after the video explained it. So i got thinking. the following was a series of messages I sent to my friends on a discord server im in (with the exception of the last part bc i just thought of it now even tho im sick) that i compiled for yall into sections so its easier to read. these are just my thoughts and could be totally wrong, i just wanted to share aksjdh :P (plus this is my second time im posting this so there might be some inconsistencies)

(ramble under the cut so yall dont get a massive wave of text on your dash)

"smth smth death of the author smth smth reviews smth smth interpretations smth smth skip button"

like idk if this was obvious to everyone else n im just finally getting it or not, but the skip button ending being about the narrator seeing the negative reviews causing him to create the button in order to appease them, which said reviews ended up making him believe he was being preachy and obnoxious and unfunny, but as a result, he ends up believing it and trying to appease those interpretations rather than be more confident of his dialogue and what it means to him(whatever he may believe) and ending up dying at the end bc of it being a kind of literal version a death of an author of sorts

---

im just thinking about how timekeeper/settings person/432/whatever is really only interested in the player, but not stanley himself. and if the narrator ends up dying (or decaying at least in my interpretation) during the skip button, could the same be said about stanley as a character as well?

like we never see stanleys model as us, we dont see his feet when we look down, and the only time we see him in game is either as a hand during the bucket escape pod ending, the mariella endings, and the not stanley ending. and the last two are cutscenes. for all we know, stanley could have died at some point during the skip button after the narrator did and we would never know bc we cant see him

but since 432's desk being at the end of the epilogue which happens post skip button ending, i would have said that was the first time we ever see him interact with the game internally rather than asking for the time. but i do remember someone suggesting that the timekeeper was the one who removed the door in the skip button in order to kill the narrator off and get stanley/the player away from him in order to talk more

with that thought in mind, that would mean TK had to kill stanley and the narrator off in order to be able to lead the game, push beyond the barriers of a narrator and character and just talk to the player, one on one

---

it makes me wonder if what the curator said in the museum ending holds more weight

like, she talks to the player as well. both she and TK talk to the player themselves instead of stanley the character. and when she says "When every path you can walk has been created for you long in advance, death becomes meaningless, making life the same. Do you see now? Do you see that Stanley was already dead from the moment he hit start?"

stanley's function is a character in the narrators story, a literary device to propel the game forward. the narrator makes the race track, and stanley drives. without the narrator where would stanley go or do, without stanley who would move the story along?

"Can you see? Can you see how much they need one another? No, perhaps not. Sometimes these things cannot be seen."

and yet, hes dead, just like the curator said. because no matter what, he's never going to be able to truly make his own decisions. the confusion ending lays out how all the endings are scripted despite what the narrator believes and acts, its all predetermined.

and in a sense, the narrators dead too. no matter what stanley tries to do to change the story, or the narrator changes to the game in order for stanley to react to, its been planned long in advance for the eventuality. every word, every event. and with stanley's deaths, it ends up just bringing them back to the beginning again, "What exactly did the Narrator think he was going to accomplish?" if they always come back to the same preplanned paths, to the illusion of free will, it doesnt matter regardless. death doesnt become a statement, it becomes an inconvenience.

"But listen to me, you can still save these two. You can stop the program before they both fail. Push escape, and press quit. There's no other way to beat this game. As long as you move forward, you'll be walking someone else's path. Stop now, and it'll be your only true choice."

The only way to save both Stanley and The Narrator is by not letting the story play out to begin with. To beat the game, which means to let the game end after you win.

and yet,

the end is never the end is never the end is never the end is never the end is never the end is neve-

In a game where there is no ending that stops the game in its entirety, where everything will keep on happening again and again and the end is never the end, the only way to beat it is to make a choice as yourself the player, not stanley the character.

because he doesnt get a choice, the narrator doesnt get a choice. they think they do, but they dont. the only way to beat the game is to not play it. (which makes sense given that there are achievements involving not playing the game in both the 2013 HD remaster and 2022 Ultra Deluxe)

both Stanley and The Narrator are two sides of the same coin that make up The Stanley Parable, and the only way to use the coin is to give it away.

maybe thats why the true ending of the game with credits and stuff like that, is the Not Stanley Ending.

You the player have successfully broken the fourth wall from the outside in, even though that ending was planned like all the others (ie, the game allowing you to disconect the phone), you break the illusion of being stanley the character, which the game ends up booting you out of stanley as it cant handle the "narrative contradiction".

maybe thats why the escape pod ending has the sign that reads "both the player and the narrator must be present in order to leave". its not stanley, its the player, us.

maybe thats why that ending is one of the most cruel. the only way to get there is to leave the narrator trapped in the boss' office. there's no way to get him to the escape pod. the end is never the end.

---

(this part was the new idea i just had today so this might not make sense i appologize)

going back to the beginning of this ramble about the death of the author and such. perhaps there is a way to get the narrator out.

with thoughts about interpretations and with he idea of the "death of the author", all of us have our own interpretations of the TSP characters. whether its design, or relationship wise, or characterization, or what have you. The Narrator in my head is different from you reading this, and that narrator is different from another persons perspective, and definitely our narrators are different to the one that lives in Davey Wreden's head, or Kevan Brighting, or anyone who has even heard of the stanley parable.

and that's not a bad thing! there can be many similarities to the characters that our interpretations share, some more common than others and some that make no sense at all, but for the most part we all have different interpretations of the characters.

I read a book called Book Simulator (The Reader's guide to not reading) by Chris Yee on stream once. The VOD is gone now. But I discovered the book because I heard the guy writing/the narrator of sorts for the book was written like the Stanley Parable Narrator.

It didnt help that Kevan brighting voiced over the commercial for it too askjdh

but back to the book. this will contain somewhat spoilers for it since it brings up a moment at the end of the book so feel free to stop here if you dont want to be spoiled

---

basically, in Book Simulator, Booksi (The book's instructional narrator on how to fake read at the start of the book) is arguing with The Narrator (no not ours, but the general narrator who speaks in the third person), however, its revealed by The Narrator that Booksi has a plan to take over the world by inhabiting more book simulators and distributing them across the world. But, the reader could kill off the booksi that they have in their hands that they are reading, to quote:

"Or was he the original Booksi? Maybe not. Maybe the original Booksi had been vanquished long ago, and the reader was now facing one of the many copies roaming the world. Both Booksi and the Narrator knew the answer to this question, but neither would reveal the truth."

---

Taking from Book Simulator the concept of multiple iterations of one character existing in different copies of the media they originate from, maybe in a way that's how the Narrator may die in the stanley parable, forever stuck to repeat the same endings with the illusion of free will, but he lives on somewhat for everyone that has seen or heard of him in any capacity.

this may sound a bit preachy (oh the irony) but bare with me:

The Original Narrator from The Stanley Parable is dead, dead in the sense that he and Stanley are stuck within the game, given the illusion of free choice, and unable to leave nor do anything to try and escape, is also alive in the sense that we the players perception of The Narrator lives on in our minds.

The Narrator from the game might be stuck, but the Narrator i see in my head, the one i designed and draw and think of is perfectly fine and alive as ever.

and the same goes with you and anyone else who has heard of the narrator. their interpretation is still unique and different to them even if it all comes from the same media. he may not be exactly the same as the original, but hes still there. and in a way, hes free.

(man typing this last segment down makes me feel like a gd priest, and/or someone talking abt the barbie movie akjdhkjasdh so sorry if doesnt make sense at all :P)

[emblemxeno]

Xenoblade 1 DE Main Story/Game Thoughts

Finished the main story! I didn't go full completion but I got full affinity for all areas and saw every Heart-to-Heart. More detailed thoughts-including spoilers-under the cut!

-For starters, DE is a great update to the original. Many QoL improvements trims the extra menu time down a lot (inventory management, art books, equipment/gems, etc.), especially swapping gems. Also hell yes to including the appearance feature from X, as someone who prefers the default outfits for everyone!

-Same applies to battle stuff and general gameplay. Quest tracking, gauges on things like Break and Topple, clearer status effects, chance arts being highlighted, even something as small as the scroll between Talent Arts/Running/Chain Attacks being more streamlined had many great returns on me not pressing the wrong thing.

-However... why did they not just go all the way with more changes? The two big ones that come to mind are trading and Colony 6 collecting. First, why can you not bulk trade? It is such a time sink having to constantly open the menu again and again. And since trading and skip travelling share a button, I clocked probably over a hundred instances of opening the damn map menu instead of trading since there's a second of cooldown before the option appears for the NPC again! It's an annoyance that is easily ignored once or twice, but absolutely brutal after the tenth time.

-Jumping ahead a bit, but I speak not just criticizing DE but XC1 as a whole. It's probably an unpopular opinion but I don't like the ongoing Colony 6 reconstruction sidequest. The first time I completed it-about half a decade ago I think-was magical! Seeing a ruined home blossom into a lively city due to my hard work was something I'll never forget as an RPG fan. But I don't have that kind of time on my hands anymore (or I simply have better management of time now that I don't stay up til 4 am playing video games anymore lol). Exploring Bionis and Mechonis is an undeniably wondrous and beautiful experience, but only when doing normal quests (well most of the normal quests) and progressing the story. Jogging around places trying to find each item is incredibly unfun and tedious. The big offenders are typically Ice Cabbages (luckily I got all the ones I need by playing through the Valak portion of the story), Rainbow Slugs (I spent an entire hour on the Fallen Arm ugh), and the Black Liver Beans. The last one was the breaking point, I can't stand the Bionis Interior and after an hour in there just trying to find one, I said fuck it and did the Time Attack trials to get them that way. It was just not... good! I don't like it a bit.

-Last thing on DE specifically, I found that the graphics are apparently controversial among fans? I'm understanding of the position, as there's definitely a charm that the original artstyle had, especially being on the Wii. But to me the original has more issues in its visuals than just being a different artstyle. Poor resolution, blocky models, souless faces when not in an important cutscene, absolutely diabolical pop-in. And some say that the original gave its characters more personality during cutscenes, which... I don't get whatsoever. Did we watch the same scenes, cuz it's very hard to distinguish emotion in the original, whereas DE has better mouth, eyebrow, and facial movements. Certain scenes may "look" more emotional in the original, but things get exaggerated all the time to compensate for poor resolution or graphics.

-Now on to the just XC1 in general! Holy fuck the main cast is better than I remember. Shulk, Fiora, and Melia were already my favorites, but honestly... Dunban is probably my absolute favorite out of all of them now. His story is just so succinct and he's just so cool and hot and kind and just ughhhhhh!

-Egil is still best villain in the game, no surprise. Revisiting this game honestly made it really fucking clear why I loved Dimitri from 3H so much cuz the two are so similar (to the point where you can pull line's from the game about Egil and put them in 3H). The others fair less well. Metal Face/Mumkhar is delightfully hammy and an amazing threat for the first half of the game, but is as deep as a puddle. Dickson and Lorithia I found I dislike even more, for the wrong reasons; they lack charisma, and it's noticeable in places where the game gets really anime in its hammy villainy, but they're written and played a bit too straight for it to come off as anything other than lackluster. Though at least Dickson has presence as Shulk's caretaker and the guy who everyone knows and respects; Lorithia though? Throw her away. Honestly if Yumea took her place and retained the bigotry against Homs it'd be much more entertaining IMO.

-Zanza himself is a definitive mixed bag. Were I ignorant to Klaus' entire story from XC2, I'd honestly write him off as a by-the-numbers arrogant (but secretly imperfect and prone to "human" folly) god figure that happens in many, many RPGS. But I can't dislike him because I do know the entire story, and Zanza being an utter dickwad is explained in great detail and makes sense. Honestly, he does work for the story that XC1 is telling without playing XC2 as well, but ehhh. I guess it's just really difficult to be the main villain after Egil does such great things in a limited time.

-Narrative is great, just as it was the first time I played. Highlights for me:

Singlemindedly fighting for revenge is destructive not just to your enemies, but to yourself and your friends. Ignorance and unwillingness to look beyond your own world or history means you may be hurting innocent people without realizing it. Chaining your life to the deaths of others rather than supporting the survivors is unhealthy and can lead you down a path of misery and disaster.

Ether is not just analogy for carbon/other base elements in our world. Philosophically it's analogous to light and fate as well. Shulk unlocks the Monado's powers when he stops treating it as a tool with functions, but rather as an extension of his will. He wills his wishes into his heart, and they are made manifest. He protects Reyn with Shield not cuz the Monado lets him, but because he desired it. Same with Sharla and Speed, and it's how Alvis taught him to unlock Purge. It's how he resists Apocrypha, and later gains Cyclone once the Apocrypha is destroyed. His will is so strong, it becomes resistant to Zanza's influence, hence why he starts suffering the more he learns of Mechonis' history. The truth being brought to light is painful internally and externally, as Zanza physically rejects anything that challenges how he sees the world. Shulk brings himself back to life, begins having visions without Zanza, and gains his own Monado-which looks purely made of ether and light-through pure willpower and the desire to create his own future.

Shulk's duality and inner turmoil when he realizes his yearning for revenge is destructive; Fiora's endless strength of heart when dealing with a machine body and carrying on Meyneth's wishes; Melia going through hell and back trying to find a balance between her sense of self and sense of duty (I imagine Future Connected is gonna touch on that more as well); Dunban grappling with his moniker of being a hero and mentoring the party despite being imperfect and lamenting his disability; Reyn's goal of being a protector developing into being a supporter once he becomes insecure over his strength and character compared to Shulk; Sharla trying to keep hold onto a sense of hope that her love is alive before coming to terms with the fact that she needs to cherish her life and love those within it; Riki just being the fucking best dad and friend in the world.

Having played XC2 and XC3 makes all these things even richer as well.

-Last but not least, gameplay:

-Most quests are good. Most. The generic quests weren't ever fun for me, and they cause significant bloat that could've been trimmed IMO. Especially since lots of quests ask you to kill monsters and collect items anyway.

-The method to get quests started though? Awful. I know that things like Community in Torna and Field Skills in XC2 are hated, but man I can't stand having to change the clock and track the damn NPCs in XC1. Especially since there are many areas separated between towns/villages and "wild" areas (Colony 6 and Bionis Leg, Frontier Village and Makna, Alcamoth and Eryth + Valak), it just makes things so drawn out. Going back and forth, changing time and all that, is a sour point on this game.

-Like I said a few weeks ago, the Xenoblade series as a whole is unmatched in gameplay story telling. Beautiful and large environments make curious exploration a treat, especially as you start getting pieces to puzzles that can get completed later. I payed a lot more attention to the High Entia and Giant related sidequests due to the fascinating lore, for example.

-The fights are great, if a bit centralizing. Shulk, due to Monado arts, is the best character to have in the party and is sorely missed when switched out. I have pretty standard opinions on the rest of the characters, so no need to speak on each individually. I will say though, holy fuck is the AI just as bad as I remember. Shulk wastes his Monado gauge, Sharla is terrible at using arts and always puts herself into cooldown, and Melia for the love of god, stop firing elementals as soon as you summon them you're made of tissue.

Topple locking is deffo the prime strategy, cuz there were fights I wouldn't otherwise have won were it not for it, and thankfully Reyn and Dunban have pretty good AI.

Two major gripes though. Spikes are a terrible mechanic, gross. Second, I hate that the enemy tags affect accuracy, it makes certain quests extremely brutal to complete without grinding. And I just hate having to fight tough/overlevelled enemies as a whole, it becomes routine and simple after a while.

As a whole, I like the gameplay still, but it feels very restrictive going back to it after seeing all the crazy tricks I could do in 2 and 3. And also auto-attack arts > timer arts forever and ever.

-Overall a very great experience getting to replay this game like this. Though more rough points than I remember, and with certain things that have not aged well whatsoever , XC1 is still a good game that I'm glad introduced me to this series. I'm taking a break before playing Future Connected.

[unearthlytwilight]

24E. oh boy we're really in it now

important: implied animal cruelty. if that makes you uncomfy, skip this one. if not, all aboard for part one of the fetch quest!

Eliwood and friends infiltrate Bern castle and... hide in a bush. I'm imagining a Scooby-Doo-esque head stack

Desmond tells her to go play, then gets pissed at Zephiel for being a loving brother. he accuses him of wanting to see Guinevere dead and tells him and Murdock to fuck off. classic Desmond *laugh track*

Sonia shows up and helpfully exposits on the Fire Emblem's location. nice. she senses someone but Desmond says "don't worry it's my kid", which is convenient. anyway, she leaves

Guinevere is upset that Zephiel is gone. Desmond, in a rare display of non-jackassery, offers to play with her, but she declines.

(one reason I love these GBA cutscenes is that the portraits move left/right across the screen easily, making them more dynamic. above, Desmond moves closer to Guinevere and she backs away from him. it reflects action in a way you just don't get with models)

anyway, Guinevere goes to find Zephiel and gives Desmond her baby fox to hold. I think we all know where this is going

Desmond does love his daughter, but it doesn't make him any better. usually you see "oh the villain has a loved one" as easy sympathy points, but not here. kinda refreshing

cut to the lords discussing how bad the situation is. they decide to bounce, and then we cut to Ninian and Nils outside. Ninian is worried because they've been in there for a while

you're a little late, Nils, they got their A last chapter. also, rare Ninian exclamation point

they get surprised by this lady, Vaida, who they can't sense because something something Nergal did it. she's looking for the two, and the lords catch up and call her a lackey. honestly hilarious

Vaida says nuh-uh and tells her troops to attack.

side note: there's a well-known exploit known as the "mine glitch", where if you close the game when a mine goes off and then input a series of buttons, you can control enemies. Vaida's spear is coded to give its wielder big stat buffs. guess what people do

the combat's not so bad. there are wyvern reinforcements near the shops in the top right, but otherwise it's definitely manageable

but before we get to that, Pent and Louise join! Pent gives us a Heaven seal, used to promote Hector or Lyn.

Eliwood, you gotta believe in yourself. do I have to come over there

pov: you're a castle guard and see this shit happening five feet away

apparently [tactician] is famous in Bern. nice little personal detail

Hector gets the promotion because he capped strength. Heath also caps strength. who even needs the Vaida spear

sage crit! Pent says there can only be one

(somewhere, Priscilla and Erk got their B. Priscilla gets jealous of Erk because his previous employer was a lady, but Erk is all "oh god no I hate her." meh. at least this one has characterization? 5/10)

the bottom-left village has a hammerne staff from ...Ursula. surprised? me, too. Sain I don't think she's girlfriend material

anyway! after 11 turns, Vaida decides she's had enough of this and peaces out. Eliwood and the gang follow her, courtesy of Lyn

Lyn and Hector really do have that sitcom frenemy relationship

next time: we spy on the spies and figure out really obtuse character select requirements!

[knght0wl]

just finished the game

botw and totk shouldve released together as a packaged deal to make it worth the total $70, like a chapter or part 1 and 2 kind of thing. i get making games takes time and you cant please everyone in the corporate world but still

gripes. annoyed you can’t find and wear gerudo vai clothes anymore, peeved they saved the data of your horses but not all your clothes, and the items you’d hung up on the walls of your hateno house (they honestly couldve just had bolson hold onto your stuff in storage for your newly bought house in totk). Ticked they didnt transfer over the data from your shiekah slate compendium to your purah pad, link should already know what all/most of the edible food stuffs, creature ingredients, and monster parts are if youve played botw on the same device.

something i hated but this extends to most japanese games: i wish we could skip cutscenes especially if they were the same animation x5. also didnt like the way they introduced the tutorials via shrines, mainly boring and sometimes frustrating. went into two of the temples not realizing i needed the characters to be there and say their dumb little comments before activating them. very handholdy and feels like theyre talking down to you, not trusting you to make the conclusions on your own/can’t pick up on where the designers are pointing to or where they want you to look or go

HATE HATE HATE how they made the dark skinned great fairy hypersexual that says innuendos constantly, double hate how some npcs have light lips that look a little too similar to jim crow art, its 2023, jesus fucking christ.

wish you could just summon the sage’s wills through a wheel or assigned buttons like in botw, having them out like that was clunky and the ai was not fun to work with especially the mecha and riju, turning em off is an option, and running around the same monsters all the time that riju and sidon can kill in 2 or 3 hits is also an option.

wish the depths were more spooky/scary or atleast darker in themes, more stuff to interact/look at, Something. skeletons laying around everywhere, gibdos even, maybe apparitions of the lost souls standing or laying around or in a fighting pose idk the entire place was pretty big but bland/lacked character. that can also be said for the sky islands too really.

storywise, it wouldve been cool to see past heroes and princesses coming together and teaching link and zelda stuff alongside rauru and sonia’s powers. wouldve been way more interesting to see the different heroes’ journeys and how they defeated their version of ganon/related event (that would then contribute to how to better defeat our ganon?) in times past, rather than the rehashed cutscenes with the powerstone holders or whatever getting decimated from each of their perspectives

the ganon fight cutscenes made me wish we were playing that game instead of running around looking for zelda. i did like the game, but only in the sense that i liked the artstyle, the ascend ability and the fact that the roads, strongholds, and towns feel a lot livelier. and i really liked the end fight with ganon, that was tense and fun (personalized opinion since i didnt have enough sundelion meals and was on 1 heart before the transition to the dragon fight); a major step up from botw’s ganon fight

[ghostlyhamburger]

Husband Plays Miraculous: Rise of the Sphinx

So we returned the Switch version and bought it on PS4. hopefully less buggy. So far it's. loading more quickly at least.

looks better, but textures are still shit

Infamous Mr. Pigeon. as if he's effective.

Okay the in game stuff actually looks better

random collectible goooo

Her dodge still sucks, but it feels better.

I did not think the games would be this drastic of a difference between them.

The reason this looks like a PS2 game is that it's just about as big as a PS2 game.

Oh there's a skip button! The game froze when I pressed the skip button.

Marinette's hair is so bright blue. it's the PS4 case blue.

Lila doesn't have teeth.

There's no Cataclysm surrounding his stick now.

oh wait yeah there is.

I do like the idea that they have here that they are changing the way Paris itself operates. It sells certain enemies as more powerful when there's drastic changes to Paris because now they are here. It also fits as a little platforming area and I do like that.

so they only clearly have one fucking song from the show to work with

This game is definitely a better version than the switch version. it's easier to put up with at least. But that still doesn't make it good.

[[we finished soundwave, getting us back to where we'd left off]]

You know what's strange? there's none of the powerups they formed an entire system around. the different color macarons could have been different powers unlocked, but nope

oh my god Chloe actually is an insta girl. that's expanded characterization.

I think you can buy concept art from the kwamis. It's higher quality than the cutscenes.

This is missing when Ladybug and Chat Noir are handling non supervillain issues. like a robber, or a kitten in a tree.

Wait can I get hit by a car

No

This version feels like Marinette's not running through molasses.

What the fuck is this bit? [[Marinette in trouble with Officer Roger]]

This is bullshit.

Okay no they are the most popular bakery they can pay a fine.

There's no proper shading here [in the overworld]. I think it's the lighting. It's better than the Switch version, but

Alyaaa what the fuck girl

"pretending I slurred him" what type of racist slur could Marinette say to a white man

Okay but Roger does actually abuse his position as a policeman, Hawkmoth is right here

Oh I'm floating

You can't check the scrapbook. because her dad is akumatized. and you can't talk to him.

Why isn't Sabine out here? is she being railed by Weredad right now?

Those mooks actually took multiple hits, holy shit

Why is it paper forms when he's Weredad? Wouldn't he be like Taxman?

[[We tried two player mode for a few moments. Chat Noir went ahead without Ladybug, who despawned immediately, and then respawned in the water, and died immediately. This kept happening. She was stuck in the water no matter what. Husband switched back to one player, was forced back to where Ladybug was, as Chat Noir. Went forward a while, switched to Ladybug, forced back to being in the water again. Literally could not move on. Ladybug appears to be stuck there for the ENTIRE LEVEL.]]

This doesn't feel like Notre Dame. unless we're on our way to Notre Dame.

I have to abandon. I need Ladybug to progress. The two player mode actively broke the game.

It loads me all the way back to THAT?? [[Weredad's akumatization]]

How do I check the friendship thing? [in the scrapbook.] But we can't get to the fucking scrapbook!

NEXT TIME: we're gonna go through the Weredad battle.

[talenlee]

Game Pile: Lunark

Lunark Gushing

Watch this video on YouTube

And there’s a thumbnail after the fold, and the script outline afterwards.

Lunark is a 2023 step-platformer from Canari Studios, a Montreal-based indie game company, Wayforward games, an America-based indie game publisher, and me! Well, not me directly, but I, and two thousand eight hundred and twenty three other people all pledged some money, around $28 a head, back in 2019. It raised $81,655 on the back of a promise of a pixel-art step puzzle platformer, with rotoscoped cutscenes, and that’s exactly what I got, exactly what it is.

Well, short script, guess I can knock off early.

Lunark’s excellent. I did back it on kickstarter, entirely based on the trailer, and because it reminded me of Flashback. I loved that game, and loved all the first third of it I ever played, and the weeks of time I spent playing that part of the game.

Flashback was a great game for its time and I don’t just mean that because videogames hadn’t invented machine guns yet. It was great because the whole game fit on a 3.5 inch floppy so if you saw it at a mate’s place you could zip it up and take your own copy home and maybe photocopy some copy protection (I think) or their copy was cracked (probably). In that time, a single floppy was a great size for a game. You weren’t logging onto the internet to download new games all the time, you were having these rare meetings of going around to a friend’s house or seeing someone you didn’t often see to broaden your network of available software, and in that space, Flashback was great.

Flashback was a game that unfolded. Setting aside the core mystery you were dropped into tabula rasa, it was a game whose mechanical system felt like it was immediately available, just there under your fingertips as you played it, but which you had to learn how to coax out with the right positions, the right timing, the right combinations of buttons. Learning how to play it meant getting to know how it worked through the plot itself, which, and I know I’m not alone in this, often meant restarting the whole game to see an early cutscene again because you didn’t see what it told you to do next because you pressed a button and accidentally skipped the cutscene wholly.

Flashback was a time abyss of a game with a big beating mystery at its heart compelling you to finish it and I never did and nobody I know ever did but we all agreed that it played really well and we liked it. It was cool and it looked amazing and we definitely liked it. Do you know how it ends? Nope. Nobody did. Why’d you stop? uh, there was that bit.

You can go and play the original Flashback in a number of places, including a gog remake that… may be fine, I don’t know, and honestly don’t really care. The stylisation filter they put on it looks like my attempting to hide photoshopped-out tattoos on pictures by making the whole image’s skin texture rubbery and shiny. That’s not even touching on the 3d remake which is, uhm, well, I was told if I can’t say anything nice and the company that made it is probably out of business now anyway, since the only other game they made was Amy.

[maybe a clip from the folding ideas speedrun of amy]

The thing with going back and playing these old DOS games is that you need some heavy nostalgia to stick with them or a deep and abiding interest in getting to the end for some other reason, like a self-assigned dedication to trying to play games every week to get through a sort of ‘game pile’ as it were. Most of them work fine, but also, they’re not very good at encouraging you to play them, some of them are really repetitive, their narratives and conclusions aren’t really very interesting, the logic can be positively absurd at times, but also, very importantly, most of them have awkward interfaces. Not bad, not a huge problem, but there’s a lot of game interface language that you marinate in right now that is kind of universalised by the right things succeeding and most people adopting them.

WASD movement, which is the standard for first person shooters, was not the default in DOOM. Nor was it the default in Quake, where you were expected to toggle strafing with the alt key. Sierra, one of the companies most renowned for point-and-click games of the generation, made point and click games for less than half their life, and even then, the model people assume is standard only lasted for about five years.

When you go back to play these old DOS-era games, you were very likely to find an interface designed by someone with some very specific ideas of what was natural and intuitive and often you couldn’t customise them at all. Some designers thought the most natural way to move left and right was with the O and P keys, and jump and duck with the Q and A keys.

I bring this up to you to underscore that Lunark, as a game, owes a lot of how it looks to this particular period of rotoscoped pixel art that we mostly tie to Flashback and Prince of Persia, but what it owes about how it plays and the story it tells is not about how Flashback plays, but rather, how I remember Flashback feeling.

I mean, okay, yes, you could just simplify that into ‘Flashback but it plays really well,’ and that’s a place to start. It’s not just ‘that thing you like, in a bigger cup,’ though. I like Lunark a lot, and I like it as its own thing, which is very important. Enjoying it though, had all these moments when I thought ‘oh, is this going to be like this thing, from other games,’ and the game has an almost perfect sense for when introducing that thing would piss me off, and routes around it, or, when it would be perfect and revels in it.

You know something a lot of step platformers don’t do well? Combat and boss battles. Know what Lunark does a surprisingly good job of? Yeah! I was surprised! The step platformer tends to be a game which makes a puzzle of movement, with really deliberate and fixed-animation movement to boot and how do you treat that kind of movement in combat (you know, when there’s immediate risk of harm)? It feels weird to say this, but Lunark has a number of boss fights that feel like they cracked the puzzle without complicating the interface, and it’s just, really? Quite good?

Lunark has boss battles! And they’re interesting and good and they don’t feel like they’re repeating the same basic pattern, nor do they feel like they overstay their welcome. It’s very honest, hey, this is a boss battle and all the bits of how it works are visible, and that honestly plays into the honesty of the rest of the game. There are sure some execution problems, the game doesn’t mislead you or lie to you. Even the narrative, which is about a main character trying to solve a mystery, is mostly a mystery because people are withholding information, not because you’re somehow wrong about something important.

It’s a game that feels classical and invigorated by deeply loving its source material. Where Flashback unfolded through stages to reveal a game that was pretty good, Lunark is every bit as good, with a better interface, and an equally solid narrative told through the same mix of short cutscenes and character dialogue and play experience as Flashback did. And the story isn’t complicated, or even particularly complex. What it is, is obtuse; for the most part, the sequence of events that make up the story, and its background, all follow a reasonably coherent, sensible set of choices, but because your character doesn’t know what’s going on.

Lunark is amazing, and part of why it’s amazing is because it feels like it loves Flashback enough to know how to do Flashback better. You can make things that are like the things you love, and just add some more care, and more love, and a big monster that huggs you and an opportunity to pat some animals. That’s pretty cool.

Check it out on PRESS.exe to see it with images and links!

#GamePile #Games

[applebandito]

100% Kingdom Hearts 1 (Day 1)

Current Targets: Speedster Unchanging Armor Undefeated My nostalgia got slapped in the taint the moment the remix for Simple and Clean played. Watching that opening cinematic was a bit emotional admittedly. It reminded me of the halcyon days of my late teens. Sat in front of the warm glow of a CRT television, soda cans stacked high, and buttocks firmly planted in a comfortable green chair.

Now I’m sat in front of a much larger television bought with adult money, a bottle of water near by because sometimes my tummy gets upset, and my buttocks planted in a rather comfortable modestly priced couch. My first venture into reminding myself of the controls had me also remembering that this game had relatively decent combat. I don’t remember bouncing off of enemies as often as I did, but it was a pleasant surprise to feel how responsive the controls were overall.

The camera, however, is another matter. I feel like this is the strongest enemy in the game as it waffles around trying to get me the best view of Sora’s inseam. It certainly was quite the formidable foe when I got to Destiny Island and decided to 3v1 the first few Final Fantasy characters that were introduced. I was able to win first try, however, but most likely because I am playing on easy and took multiple steroids before the fight.

I beat Riku 2-0 all while very convinced of a friend’s theory that this is the worlds most circuitous love triangle. Soon the Island was under attack by heartless and I got the one and only keyblade I’d be handling for this run. I also skipped all of the cutscenes since I’m attempting to speedrun. Most of the dialogue can be diluted down into friendship, hearts, friendship, darkness, smiling, darkness, hearts, friendship however.

Coming into Traverse Town and hearing the theme was another breath of fresh air.Seeing Cid, Leon, Yuffie, and Aerith was like coming home to old mates you hadn’t been around in ages. Goofy and Donald were there too. I quickly set them to do as little as possible when it involved items, and stripped them of their item privileges just to be double sure.

The gummi ship sequences are just as boring as I remember. Given I’m speedrunning, I also don’t wish to spend time making a ship. I’m sure I could make the one that’s recommended in the guide, but the tedium would probably kill me. Instead I just cruise along in the low rent Star Fox game, barely touching the thumbsticks and opting instead to have my left hand set to more important tasks like water and scratching. Meanwhile my right is on fire button duty.

I lazily made my way to Wonderland, plowing through many of the enemies there and mostly running past several. I forgot that the keyhole is deep within the doors throat so it felt a bit dirty locking this place up. Nevertheless I cleared the keyhole and soon set off to Deep Jungle.

I forgot how much I utterly abhor this place. Confusing layout, the vines sometimes don’t function right, but we get Brian Blessed and that’s fine by me. The boss gave me no trouble, nor did most of the enemies, but the amount of backtracking to areas and confusion left me taking more time than necessary to get out of here. Most of this being my fault as I’m not watching the cutscenes and googling a guide or looking up what to do next is a large ask with all this scratching to be done.

I finally sprang loose the of the jungle’s traps and found myself once again Traverse Town bound. I wouldn’t be stopping at the colesseum. That’s an optional bit and I’m a busy boy. Speaking to Cid, I discover he’s got a lot to say about gummi ships and Leon has a lot to say about holes.

So far, I can’t say if we’re on a good track for the run, but we’re under three hours, so I suppose we can count this a win. My lack of knowledge is certainly a hindrance, but I am confident I’ll be able to make it to the end. And so, we spring forward to Agrabah. Tomorrow. I need a nap.

Completed 3 of 56: The Rabbit Hole Member of the Tribe| Test Pilot

[satoshi-mochida]

Some thoughts on my last Gamefly rental, Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot.

*Though most people are familiar with DBZ, especially the three main Sagas in this game, given how often they’re played out in games, I’ll put a spoiler warning here just in case. Also, I didn’t try out the DLC stories, yet, so this will just be about the base PS4 game with it’s current updates. I may buy the game and try those out in the future. I also say a lot about the game.

The game spans from the Saiyan Saga to the end of the Buu Saga(not counting DLC). Pretty much every important scene is played through, though a few parts are skimmed over or skipped, like:

Goku traveling Snake Way, his brief fall into Hell, and training with King Kai(shown a bit and mentioned but not playable) 

Piccolo using Hellzone Grenade against Android 17(you can have him learn the move and do it yourself, though).

Future Trunks’ battle with Cell where he found out the speed-loss disadvantages of Super Saiyan Third Grade(that moment isn’t shown or mentioned, though he does still fight Cell in that form)

Vegito still attacking Super Buu after being turned into candy(which means we don’t get to see him beating Super Buu up as a high-speed jawbreaker). Also, Goku and Vegeta freeing everyone trapped inside Super Buu happens offscreen.

And possibly a few smaller moments. They aren’t too important in the long run, though, plus some were probably for better pacing or something.

There was some added stuff, too:

Several times, you’ll be able to meet, and occasionally do sidequests for, several older Dragon Ball characters, like Nam, Eighter and Launch.

A new fight for Goku against Kid Buu to end the main story before he launches the Super Spirit Bomb at him.

There's a fairly small amount of playable characters(who can also be put in a party as Support Members): 

Goku

Gohan

Vegeta

Piccolo

Future Trunks(Android/Cell Saga and Epilogue, only)

Gotenks(only in two battles against Super Buu)

Vegito(in one battle against Super Buu, which, considering how powerful Vegito is, is more of an epic beatdown than a fight)

And a few characters that are support only:

Krillin

Tien

Yamcha

Chiaotzu

Goten

Kid Trunks

Android 18

All characters, Main and Support Only, have a ‘Super Attack Skill Tree’ that you can use Z Orbs that you find/earn to give them new skills and attacks. What you can get increases based on the character’s level and story progress(example, you can’t get Super Saiyan 2 for Gohan until he unlocks it during the fight with Perfect Cell).

Throughout the game, you’ll collect ‘Soul Emblems’ to place onto several ‘Community Boards’ to increase various ingame bonuses, like more EXP or cooking benefits. You get Soul Emblems both from the main story and side quests. They can be leveled up with Gifts to increase the Community Level, giving more bonuses. This seems to be the best setup for all of the emblems that I found.

At campfires and at Goku’s House, you can make food from items/materials you have to give yourself a stat boost. And Chi-Chi can be asked to make the party Full Course Meals at her home, which also increase the Base Stats of whoever eats them.

A certain filler episode from the original series where Goku and Piccolo are forced to get a Driver's License also happens in this game(though unfortunately without the outfits they wore in said episode). After doing so, you unlock the ability to make cars and battle walkers from Bulma, as well as Time Attacks for both types of vehicles(which I didn’t do much of).

Like the first Budokai game, this one has story’s events shown in cutscenes, which the later ones just had them happen in dialogue to speed things along, probably. And they did a really good job of animated said scenes, matching the look and feel of the series VERY closely.

The flying also feels well done, and true to the series. Aside from flying normally, which is fairly slow, you can hit L3 to start flying faster, at the cost of your Ki slowly going down and not being able to sense Ki with R1. This is the best way to travel the the large maps. Goku and Gohan can also use the Flying Nimbus, though you can’t pick up items that you need to hit Circle while doing so. Also, ramming into weaker enemies while flying will defeat them instantly and give you EXP. It’s a bit hard to aim yourself at enemies correctly, sometimes, though. 

Going underwater functions the same as flying, except with an air meter to keep an eye on. If it runs out, you get kicked back above where you entered the water as the only penalty. Take a peek down under whatever bodies of water you find; there’s always stuff to see and collect, depending on the map, especially on maps with oceans.

You can also dash on the ground by hitting L3, and unlike when flying, you can still sense Ki while doing so. 

I feel like this game’s flying controls are about what it should feel like for a Superman game. Probably might need a few tweaks to fit more with that series, but this feels like a good base for that kind of game.

The game’s many maps are pretty large, with lots to see and explore, including towns, caves that you need to be a certain level to enter, materials to gather, fishing spots, and more. They include plenty of well known DBZ locations, insulting Kame House(and the ocean around it), West City and Capsule Corp., Korin’s Tower and Kami’s Lookout, and so on.

Floating around these maps are enemies you can fight. They grow in strength as you do/the story progresses. If you’re strong enough and are fast-flying when running into an enemy, you’ll defeat it and gain EXP right away.

Speaking of Korin’s Tower, you can eventually unlock the ability to grow Senzu Beans there, which fully heal you. Once they’re unlocked, they will gradually grow and can be collected from Korin, with a Senzu Bean icon appearing next to it on the World Map if there’s any available. He will hold up to 9 at once, so check back once in a while.

Fishing is pretty easy to do; just hit one of the face buttons(X, Triangle, Square and Circle) when the marker is in a marked area, then hot one again when the closing circle is within another marked circle(this might make more sense when you see it yourself). You’ll get items for cooking from fishing, and some sidequests need them, or just certain types of fish, to clear. An amusing detail when fishing is that Goku and Gohan, even when he’s a teenager, use a fake tail as a lure while Vegeta and Piccolo fish like normal people(I forgot to check and see what Future Trunks does, but probably the latter).

After clearing the Frieza Saga, you can collect the Dragon Balls on Earth during Intermissions. They give off a small orange slow when sensing for Ki, and you’ll hear a low humming sound when you’re close to one. You can get several different wishes from them, with three of them always being for Z Orbs, Zeni or Rare Material Items. Other wishes are reviving certain dead characters to fight them again, and can only be done once, unlike the three listed above. At first, you can only make 1 wish at a time, but as the game goes on, it gets upgraded to 2 then 3 wishes at once. After making a wish(s), you ‘ll need to wait 20 ingame minutes before the Dragon Balls can be found and used again. They seems to have a couple set locations on whatever map they end up on(two locations are west of Orange/Satan City, for example).

Speaking of Mr. Satan...I know that his actually Japanese stage name, but I always end up calling him Hercule due to hearing that for so many years(and just liking how that sounds better). Also, ‘Satan City’ just sounds really funny. XD

You probably won’t need to really grind in the base game; you should get enough experience from doing sidequests and story events to get by. Gohan especially; he ended up quite a few more levels than everyone else just from the story EXP alone, and his Unleashed Potential ‘form’ from Elder Kai makes him do quite a lot more damage. Also, gained experience is shared among all party members, even those not currently set to fight.

One of the sidequests you can do throughout the game is defeating ‘Villainous Enemies’, who are fairly strong, and are covered in a red aura. You should at least be at or around their level before fighting them, since you can’t run from fights in this game. It may be best to do them during Intermissions when you can select your party members, and bringing someone who can stun with Solar Flare(like Krillin), can be really helpful. 

In the epilogue/postgame, in addition to being able to play as Future Trunks(talk to him outside of Capsule Corp.), you can also use his time machine to redo Boss fights, and do any sidequests you may have missed.

The game’s opening has the old opening for the show, ‘Cha-La-Head-Cha-La”, and this is the first time I really listened to it. It’s really good, and kind of reminds me of the opening to Mystical Ninja Starring Goemon, too, for some reason.

There’s a few parts where there’s some nice attention to the series’ details:

At several story points when Saiyan characters are healed, like with Senzu Beans or the healing pod on Namek, they gain experience, while others, like Krillin, don’t get that bonus, which does make them, admittedly accurately, start lagging behind in strength.

If you use Ki Sense on Androids, and a certain researcher in Capsule Corp., you won’t see anything emitting from them.

If you have Piccolo and/or Android 18 in your party while eating a Full Course Meal from Chi-Chi, they won’t eat any of it. Saiyan characters(again, forgot to check Future Trunks) eat it ravenously(even Vegeta), while human party members eat normally.

Only Goku and Gohan can use the Flying Numbus.

These aren’t really important observations, but some events in the game made me think:

Did Piccolo destroying the Moon to stop Gohan’s Great Ape form have any effects on Earth? Or did nothing really happen?

How in the world did Supreme Kai and Babidi survive being so close to Majin Vegeta when he used Final Explosion while Piccolo and Krillin hightailed it out of there with Goten and Kid Trunks? 

I noticed a possible(intentional) goof at the end. In the cutscene after beating Kid Buu and going back to Kami’s Lookout to reunite with everyone, Dende is a kid again for some reason. Apparently, both the original anime and manga made this goof too, so maybe it’s a nod to that? It is kind of jarring, though. XD

A couple technical issues I found were that sometimes when loading a map, and in some battles later on, the game would hang for a couple seconds, and one time it crashed while it was loading into an area after traveling to another. Thank goodness for autosave. Also, be careful using the stronger version of Goku’s Spirit Bomb attacks; it caused major lag for me a couple times.

This ended up being one of my favorite DBZ games that I’ve played, close runners up including 

Budokai 3

Budokai Tenkaichi 2(mainly for just how many characters that one has, including most of the movies from around that time, outmatched by Budokai Tenkaichi 3, which I didn’t play)

Legacy of Goku 2(I didn’t get the chance to play Buu’s Fury back then)

Next game being sent is: Nitroplus Blasterz: Heroines Infinite Duel

[hecksupremechips]

I’m gonna have a nerdy rant about video games please excuse me (zero escape spoilers)

K so my fave game series I’ve become obsessed with is zero escape, aka a weird bullshit series where the fandom is both small and dead as shit. Yay. And I just finished the last game, zero time dilemma. I wasn’t initially gonna play this game just cuz I heard it was kinda bad, but the ending to vlr had me curious. Plus it had Junpei in it and, well, I think he’s neat :)

But aaaaaaa

Yeah it was bad. Ill go over the good things though. I thought the escape rooms were like challenging without being toooo challenging. They were a good medium between the 999 and vlr puzzles. I liked them. I also really liked the D team a lot. Luna was one of my favorite vlr characters so it’s kinda natural I liked Diana a lot too. I also thought Sigma and Phi were really good in this game. I wasn’t to crazy about either of them in the second game but like. They’re cute in this game. And even though they’re "getting together" situation was kinda iffy, I think Sigma and Diana were cute together. The only valid het couple in this series. I’m kinda indifferent about the whole twist where Phi is their daughter. I don’t hate it, and I think it was cool how it was foreshadowed in vlr, but I think it makes some dynamics weird. Personally, I think Sigma and Phi would have a better siblings relationship but eh

Now let’s get into the bad, even though there’s so much that I physically cannot go over all of it. Idk where to even start. First off, the art style and designs had like no heart. Like everyone has interesting designs (one might even say too interesting) in the first two games. In ztd though, everyone was boring as shit. Junpei went from cool Marty McFly trans king to emo middle schooler. HE WAS LITERALLY IN JUST A BLACK SHIRT AND BLACK JEANS GOD. I’m gonna save him for later though. I’m just disappointed. Also the art style was bleh. I thought it looked nice on the cover, and I was also really excited cuz I read that there were "animated cutscenes". Y’all. Ugh. The cutscenes ended up being like the whole game. I was just watching it all go by and I couldn’t skip any dialogue without accidentally skipping important stuff. Not only that, there was no heart in it at all. I’d argue that the 3D models looked better in this game than in vlr (I’m personally not into how they changed to 3D but that’s a rant for another day), but the models in vlr had GREAT emotions! They had zero emotion in this game. I hated it. Thankfully the voice actors were able to add emotion but damn

Next is the characters. Needle to say, I didn’t enjoy most of them. I liked everyone on D team, the end. First of all, freaking Carlos. Talk about boring. Like god maybe I would’ve liked his design if he wasn’t wearing the button up and also maybe wore like any other pants aaaa. Also like hm. He uh, sure liked his sister. In a concerning way. Like it wasn’t a super obviously bad thing but every time romance was mentioned he’d be like "I don’t need romance, I have my sister!" Do you see what I mean? It’s sketchy to me.

Then we got Eric 👺👺👺. I hated this guy. First off he’s like a ripoff of Kristoph from frozen, without the fun himbo personality. And the whole time he was thirsting after Mira which ughhhh. They were worse than Junpei and Akane in 999. Maybe I’m just too gay for this shit but ughh. Also it was a thing that was pretty well established thing that his father was abusive but like. It didn’t really...mean jack shit? Honestly nothing about Eric’s character mattered, he was pretty irrelevant. Also he was super super shitty to Sean who was literally a fucking child

Then Mira. How disappointing aaaagh. Like they were literally just like "oh here’s this chick that has committed murder, this isn’t relevant at all :)". Like damn they really just had her be completely unnecessary huh. It was super obvious to me that she was the one who killed Eric’s mom and I thought that would’ve come up but. It just didn’t. I was also curious about their relationship in general since it seemed like she only got with Eric so she could kill him. And god they could’ve at least done something like idk. Make her like Dio and break into the game to cuz trouble. Or she could’ve been zero. Maybe that’s lazy but it would have been better. But no they literally did nothing with her. There was a timeline where she brutally murdered Junpei just like, for no reason I guess??? Jesus

Sean and Akane were characters I’m just meh about. I didn’t hate Sean, but I didn’t really like him either. Akane was never really my gal in 999 in the first place so hm. I think she’s funny but she’s done some sketchy stuff and idk I’d probably like her better if the games weren’t always trying to put her with Junpei every five minutes

Then there was Junpei. Ughhhh. They were trying something but ughh. He was very emo and kinda douchey and I just wasn’t into him. Which is a massive shame cuz I liked him a lot in 999, and especially in vlr. Like all I can say is that it’s a real disappointment for me

Now onto plot holes and things that didn’t get covered that should have. As previously mentioned, they didn’t do anything with Mira at all. They also didn’t properly go over Sigma and Diana’s relationship that Sigma had vaguely talked about that happened in another timeline. Carlos’s sister was not important at all and they threw in some "she’s got the mind abilities" bullshit in without really doing anything with it. The timeline shit made my brain turn into goo aaaa. We dont get closure on how the pandemic was stopped, which was the reason I played this fucking game. We didn’t learn jack shit about the third nonary game. And then of course, there’s fucking DELTA

This filled me with so much rage y’all. The game was just like "oh yeah btw there was this random old man who was just there the ENTIRE TIME that never got acknowledged ever and he’s the big bad villain of the game. Not just that, he’s the founder of the crazy cult from vlr. AND he’s Diana and Sigmas kid!" Like wow you know I don’t think words can describe how bad that was. I think things would’ve been better if he just like wasn’t there yeah. Also I guess he’s supposed to be like, the player cuz he mind controls the characters into making certain choices. Ugh. IT WAS SO STUPID MAN. And I guess the only ONLY reason he made the second nonary game was to make sure he was born which is just eghhhmm. That is too messy for me. That’s some bad time bullshit. And weird reason but okay. God

There’s literally so much more I have to say but if I don’t I’m gonna pass out so I’m just gonna take a nap and die. Moral of the story is that I’m pissed a series I loved ended so shitty and don’t play this game unless you hate yourself. The end

[bltngames]

SAGE 2020: The Usual Suspects

Hi, folks! Back when I used to work at TSSZ a lot of people really enjoyed reading my articles where I’d talk about various games at the Sonic Amateur Games Expo (SAGE), and I’ve gotten more requests in the last month and a half to continue doing those types of articles than I think I’ve ever gotten about anything else I’ve ever done before. So, here we are!

But I also need to be real with you: there are a lot of games at SAGE. It was exhausting enough when there were 70, 80, or even 90 games. Heck, the one year I wrote about 85-something games by myself, I sort of felt like I was going to die. This year, there are over 220 games at SAGE. It is physically and emotionally impossible for me to talk about everything, and it may even be impossible for me to play everything. Things will fall through the cracks. Most things, probably. Though I am responsible for basically inventing SAGE 20 years ago, I am also a human. I have my limits, and I am sorry it has to be this way.

Structurally, we’re going to be doing things a little bit differently, and you should expect this to be a little fast and loose. Since I’m not talking about every single game on the show floor, articles are going to be broken up into types:

“Usual Suspects” will be for games that either appeared at previous SAGEs or that I’m at least aware of.

“Fan Games” should be obvious, and it’s whatever doesn’t fall under Usual Suspects.

“Indies” is the same deal, but for original games.

And finally, there will be a “Honorable Mentions” article for whatever random leftovers I don’t cover in the first three articles. Looking forward to me talking about your game, but I don’t mention it? Tell me about it and maybe it’ll end up here.

Without any more delay, let’s talk about those Usual Suspects...

Sonic GT

Sonic GT has always been kind of a difficult game to control, but usually it just took a little bit of getting used to. There was always a period of adjustment, where you had to learn the game’s quirks. But, over time, I feel like the game is also just getting… quirkier. Every time I come back to this, I slam head first into the Sonic GT’s learning curve, and it always feels just a little bit steeper. This is one of those games that tries to fit a lot of abilities into a tiny amount of buttons. It works, but it feels like you have to memorize an operator’s manual. It’s all about figuring out which button to hold when to get what state. But, man… when it clicks into place, it’s still kind of magic. And, at the very least, the levels have all been reworked to take better advantage of Sonic’s high-flying, death-defying acrobatics. You’ve just got to be willing to learn. The real downside of this new version is the inclusion of a proper story mode -- I don’t have anything against having cutscenes in your game or whatever, but for the purposes of reviewing these games, some ability to fast forward through the talking heads so I could get back to the gameplay would’ve been nice. You can skip ahead in cutscenes you’ve already watched, but that doesn’t help when it’s your first time through. Oh well. So it goes. (Update: in the process of getting this article posted, Sonic GT has been patched to make cutscenes always skippable.)

Project SXU (Sonic X-treme Unity)

Another year, another Sonic X-treme recreation. This one’s interesting because it seems to be the most “complete” yet, offering the four most famous levels: Jade Gully, Crystal Frost, Red Sands and Death Egg. Intentionally or unintentionally, this also seems to replicate quite a few quirks we’ve seen in Sonic X-treme’s controls in the videos that have been released of the in-development build. Which means that it, uh, kind of sucks to play. I realize that’s kind of rude, but I’m sort of allowed to say that. 15 years ago, I was basically the only person on the internet that cared what happened to Sonic X-treme, so... I started contacting developers, starting with the game's producer, Mike Wallis. He lead us to Chris Senn, and that broke the dam on information about this game. Now, I don’t claim ownership over everything that came out of this, I’m simply saying I was the one who got the ball rolling. I watched the mystery of Sonic X-treme slowly get uncovered with as much intent as one could possibly have. It is a fascinating piece of lost media, but as a game… well, I think it got canceled for a reason. SXU shows us a clear vision of that, with a game that’s disorienting to look at and hard to control. Heck, if you’re using a controller, you can’t even use the analog stick -- you have to use a d-pad, leading to controls that feel frustratingly twitchy. But that's true to the experience. I probably spent almost as long in this demo accidentally slipping into bottomless pits as I did exploring its levels. Again, this more or less feels accurate to what we’ve seen in videos, though I do think Sonic probably feels a little too sensitive, here. Regardless, it’s still absolutely fascinating.

“Sonic Infinity Engine” Games

I’m cheating a little bit, here. This is technically three entries, but it’s in “Usual Suspects” because there’s been Infinity Engine games at SAGE for a few years now. Listen, it’s my site, my rules, and we’re playing fast and loose, baby!

Adventure Pack 2

This claims to be a “pack” of multiple levels, but the one level I played went on for over 25 minutes without showing any signs of ending. The level is… well, it’s the kind of stuff we’ve seen at SAGE for years and years and years, a space previously occupied by SonicGDK and BlitzSonic before it, where somebody is clearly starting out learning 3D level design, has some prefab assets, and goes to town creating a huge, intricate environment… that doesn’t fit a Sonic game at all. Too many tight spaces, too much enemy spam, and too much labyrinthine pacing. This is “Sonic Visits Anor Londo,” and while it looks interesting visually, it’s easy to get lost, or worse, killed because something isn’t functioning right. Like a lot of Infinity Engine stuff, it’s a bit hit or miss.... And now, also cramped.

Infinity+ Colorful Combat

The primary goal of this seems to be to update the Infinity Engine with extra features, something that I think is pretty welcome. The Infinity Engine is okay, but it’s missing a little bit of polish that the original developer neglected to give it before abandoning the project. This helps tighten some of that stuff up, while also introducing Wisp powers and more playable characters. Some of the new characters could still use some work, yet, but given the project is still in active development, that’s pretty much a guarantee. This could end up being the defacto version of the Sonic Infinity Engine.

Sonic Reforge: Red Ridge (Blockout)

This is what’s called a “Grey Box.” Rather than build out a fully-detailed level, you get a rough estimate on how the stage will flow before you put all the graphics in. What’s here is okay, I guess, but the level loops back on itself in ways that can be kind of confusing. There are a few places where it’s not really clear where you’re supposed to go next, and I spent several minutes running in circles. I’m also not a huge fan of the changes to Infinity’s physics; jumping off of ramps is a key part of the Sonic experience, but there are several places here where that doesn’t work -- to get the height needed to progress, you just need to roll really fast. It works, but it doesn’t feel like the Sonic I’m familiar with.

Sonic World DX

I have a bit of history with this game. Or, well, with a different version of this game. I wasn’t kind to some of the original entries at SAGE many years ago, but over time, they’ve cleaned the game up and streamlined it a fair amount. Now we have the “DX” release, a further cleanup effort splintered off from the main project, but to be honest, I’m not entirely sure what’s different from the previous release. The main version of Sonic World supports an absolutely gargantuan amount of content, with 50 playable characters and at least that many levels. It was big, and weird, and impressive. This demo ships with three or four playable characters and eight stages. Beyond that, there’s not much else to say -- it’s still Sonic World, though this release doesn’t work right with my controller. It picks up the controller binds from the main version of Sonic World, correctly assuming I’m using a DualShock 4, but none of the buttons are correct. When it asks me to press the X button, I have to press Circle for it to properly register. Not only that, but the right stick camera control is completely broken. Switching to an Xbox controller fixes the camera issues, but now the face buttons have the opposite problem: when it asks me to press A to jump, I have to press X. Throws my whole vibe off, like wearing your shoes on the wrong feet. The menus are bizarre, too -- while adjusting the volume, you can’t push left or right to adjust the levels, you have to use controller face buttons for some reason. This whole thing feels like I stepped back in time to 2013 in a bad way.

Sonic Freedom

I feel like I’ve been waiting to see a major development from Sonic Freedom for half a decade at this point. The art considerations for this game are no joke, and I do not envy anyone trying to make a proper high-def 2D Sonic game that looks this good. But, well… it’s another year, and there’s not a lot here. It plays fine, I guess -- the controls are decent, at least. The problem is the level design. Does this level even end? I’m not sure. I know previous demos for Sonic Freedom have had more than one level, but the stage you start out in here is a confusing, empty labyrinth with respawning enemies and a finite number of rings. You climb up and up and up, but eventually I reached what felt like a dead end. Visually it will always look incredible, but I’m wondering if it’ll ever actually become a game at any point in the future.

BraSonic 20XX

Here’s a strange blast from the past I wasn’t expecting. BraSonic is an old fangame from probably more than a decade and a half ago. It was so long ago that I can’t even actually remember if I played the old version of the game or not, but I definitely remember the name. What really throws me for a loop playing the 20XX version now is how much it feels like a game from back in the early 2000’s. The artwork, the sound effects, the locations, all of it makes me feel like I’m 19 again. Thankfully, this doesn’t play like a fangame from 2004; physics seem pretty solid, level design flows pretty well, and it generally seems to be fun, weird, and most importantly, unique. There aren’t many fan games here at SAGE that open with their first boss fight being against Sonic the Hedgehog. If you find yourself getting burnt out from so many Sonic fan games feeling same-y, this could be a good change of pace.

Sonic Frenzy Adventure

Maybe it’s the fact that this is the 20th Anniversary of the Sonic Amateur Games Expo, but here’s another very old fangame coming back out of the woodwork for an enhanced modern re-release. This game was a mainstay of the mid-to-late 2000’s SAGE events, after which it disappeared before being finished. Well, maybe it was finished. Again, a lot of this stuff was so, so, so long ago that this poor old man’s memory just can’t recall it. Seeing Frenzy Adventure back warms my heart, though. It’s an old friend in what has proven to be a very challenging year. Admittedly, parts of it still feel a bit mid-2000’s, but I consider those charming quirks. Throwbacks to a simpler era. At the very least, controls have been improved, so it does play better than the old releases did. Good stuff. Glad to see you again, dude.

Sonic Speed Course

This was a game that turned up last year, but in the kerfuffle I didn’t get around to trying it, even though I really wanted to. This is clearly a game inspired by Kirby’s Dream Course, but instead of Nintendo’s pink puffball, we have Sonic and friends. Whereas Kirby gained abilities by bowling through enemies, this adapts a more traditional Sonic gameplay structure of item boxes filled with shields and other powerups. But here’s my deep dark secret: even though I love Kirby’s Dream Course in concept, there’s a part of me that feels an intense hatred for that game. I have distinct memories of renting Kirby’s Dream Course as a kid and getting really far into the game, but trying to play it as an adult I’m baffled at how difficult it is. The main problem I have is that every stroke you take subtracts from your health, meaning you can only hit the ball so many times before you just… die. This makes for a very, very steep learning curve that discourages play and experimentation. Every shot truly, deeply matters and eventually I find myself caught in a death spiral and staring at the game over screen. All of this is replicated in Sonic’s Speed Course, which, much like with Kirby, I find myself drawn to like a moth to the flame -- only to come away feeling dejected and like I’m just not good enough. For fans of Kirby’s Dream Course, this is undoubtedly good news, as this means Sonic Speed Course is faithful to the tone of that game. But I find myself wishing there was a practice mode or something that let me play these courses without the punitive health system, because I’m ready to love them.

Sonic: Triple Trouble 16-Bit

When you write about so many games at SAGE every year, things start to blur together... a lot. I seem to recall that Triple Trouble 16-Bit last year was good, but had room for improvement. Well, this year, this demo feels… really quite good. I’ll admit, I was a little skeptical about remaking this game. Sonic: Triple Trouble was among the first batch of Game Gear games I ever owned as a kid, and while I liked the game, in my adulthood, I feel like I’ve come to appreciate Sonic Chaos more. But so much has been added to this game that it’s really come into its own. It uses Triple Trouble more as a jumping off point to become something fresh and interesting, and on top of that, this demo is pretty polished. This game was kind of always on my radar, but it’s really turning into something special.

Battle Cross Fever

Every year, I download this game hoping for some kind of single player offering, and every year I’m let down. Battle Cross Fever is a fighting game that plays a lot like Smash Bros., but contains elements that pull it closer to traditional fighting games like Street Fighter. It’s the kind of game that can check with the server to make sure you’re playing the latest version, but doesn’t have true online multiplayer -- instead advertising that you should use a piece of screen sharing software like Parsec to accomplish online multiplayer. In their defense, the few times I’ve used Parsec, it’s basically been magic for how well it works. But I just want, like… anything that I can play by myself. Even if it’s just a super basic arcade mode with brain dead AI, anything is better than nothing. But, I suppose, I am an outlier. Judging by the horrific character select music I landed on, Battle Cross Fever has enough of a community that they could get fans to sing along to “Ghost Town” from Sonic Forces -- which is a fun idea, don’t get me wrong, but when you have loud voices over cheap microphones, well… I hope you aren’t wearing headphones like I was. Anyway, this game’s always seemed solid, but I’ve also never played it with another human being, so really, I’m speaking from the perspective of admiring the diverse roster and all of the fun arenas they’ve ported in. Maybe someday it’ll get some single player content.

I’ll be back with another article… uh, eventually. In truth, I was only going to feature five games here, but it ended up being ten, so we’ll see how many are in future articles when we get there!

[argentdandelion]

Dragon Blazers III

Kris calls Noelle and insists she skip school tomorrow, so she can play Dragon Blazers III with her father for the whole night.

“Noelle.”

“Wha—? Kris, it’s 3:00 AM….” Noelle squinted at the clock in the darkness, rubbing her eyes absent-mindedly.

“Skip school today. Go to your dad.” They sounded urgent. Telegraphic. Firm.

Noelle’s ears perked up. “What? Why?”

“Bring Dragon Blazers III.” She tensed. They spoke so abruptly…like it was a command.

“Kris?! Kris, what are you…?” Noelle frowned, and held the phone firmly against her ear in the darkness.

“Now!” At the other end, Kris sounded…strained, as if struggling against some immense weight. “Noelle, go!”

“Alright, Kris, I’ll—”

A monotone beep. Kris had hung up.

—

“Dad? Dad?” Noelle gently shook her father from his sleep.

Rudy opened his eyes, half-lidded with drowsiness. The lamp was on, beaming light into his face.

“Dear?” he asked. “Come on, Dad!” Noelle feigned annoyance, her ears flipped half-back. “We all know we’re deer monsters.” One of Noelle’s ears twitched, and she hastily sidestepped a table to turn the TV on.

Dimly, Rudy noticed the furniture setup was different from what he remembered. He glanced across the room: the flowers in the glass cover had been put on the small counter by the sink, leaving the angel doll a little askew in the crowded space. The small bedside table had been shoved away, next to a TV set into the wall. The Nontondo console was placed on top of it, its cables leading up to the TV Noelle was fiddling with now.

Emblazoned on the TV screen were the words “Dragon Blazers III”.

Noelle sat down on the chair beside the bed: yet another furniture rearrangement. Rudy yawned. How had he not woken up from all this noise and hustle…?

“I didn’t want to wake you up until I got the game set up. You..needed the rest.”

Rudy blinked and yawned again. “And why are you waking me up in the middle of the night?”

Noelle looked sheepish. “It’s…not technically the middle…it’s 3:20 AM.”

Just then Rudy noticed the bags under his daughter’s eyes, her messy hair, and the few crumbs stuck to the fuzz of her upper lips. Strange. She normally washes her face…must have been in quite a hurry.

Rudy raised an eyebrow. “Well, still late.”

The bedsheets wavered as he adjusted his legs, laboriously propping himself up more on the bed. Noelle looked at him with a frown. She then moved the tacky little chair closer to the bed, and cringed at the squeak. Noelle smiled, and handed her father the other controller.

She yelped. “Oh! Darn! It’s a single-player game!”

Noelle’s face fell, but Rudy only smiled. “That’s alright. I can always watch. You’re much better at these games than I am, anyway.”

—

“Are you always this grimy, or is this a special occasion?”

In the game, all the party members groaned. Noelle’s brow furrowed in mock exasperation.

“Gosh darn it, Shella.”

Rudy frowned at her. “Watch your mouth, young lady.”

The room broke into laughter. Rudy’s ears flailed out, and with a bug-eyed look Rudy coughed out the remains of a laugh trapped in his throat.

—

They had traveled deep into the dungeon in the bowels of the earth. Suddenly, the claustrophobic halls expanded into a greater room….

“A cutscene!”

Noelle perked her ears up and forward, leaning closer to the TV. She sat there for a few seconds, straining her ears, but the sound had been turned too low for that sweet, sweet cutscene music.

“Oh, darn. Wish I could hear the music.”

“Oh, Noelle, you can turn it up. I’m one of the only two patients here. And I’m sure it won’t bother the other guy.”

Noelle adjusting the hospital TV’s buttons the old-fashioned way—she couldn’t find the remote in time.

Atmospheric music ran through that quiet hospital room.

“You’ve plagued our land for too long! I will stop you!”

Rudy waited quietly. “You’re right. It is lovely music.”

Smiles filled their vision as they enjoyed the scene together.

A room away, a patient quietly fumed and flailed his limbs, ranting again. Muffled as it was through the sounds of battle, and laughter, and conversation, none heard him.

—

Swarms of Modiglettes tread towards them in the darkness .

Noelle tensed up with a little “eep”, and Rudy turned to his daughter’s terrified face. “What are you waitin’ for? Flamaga ‘em!”

Noelle shook off her fear…and decided to upgrade the spell to Flamaja, for good measure. The enemies soundly defeated (no kill was overkill for a Modiglette), the party cheered on the victory screen.

“Creepy! Just like that angel doll!”

“Heh, you think so?” Rudy said with relief. “I thought so myself—but didn’t say it!” Rudy glanced toward that faceless angel doll on the counter top, still a little askew after all those hours beside the flowers.

Rudy noticed, just then, the petals falling from the wilting bouquet…onto that letter enclosed within.

“Kris…they’re a good kid.”

“Earlier, they told me to come visit you.” Noelle replied offhand.

Noelle had never seen her father’s brows rise higher. “Well, that’s a reversal of the typical role. For how much you’ve said about them arriving late to class…I never thought they’d wake up so early.”

—

As Noelle defeated foe after foe, progressing on her journey, she spoke less and less. The same went for her father. He reclined in his bed, his head heavy.

Noelle said nothing. Maybe the video game was too engrossing, maybe she was pretending not to notice, maybe…

Noelle stiffened in her chair.

“Dad? You haven’t said anything in a while. Should I…should I say something?”

“Oh, you don’t have to narrate everything ,” her father said. “It’s not like you’re playing it for an Internet audience.”

“After all, video games can be…” Her father looked down before looking back at her. “a solitary activity.”

—

“THE END” , it said.

Noelle stared at the screen. “What happens next?” Noelle asked, her voice laden with tension.

The pause went on just a little too long.

“….Y’know…I like to think they all went home after beating the final boss, and enjoyed how everything went back to normal.”

Noelle looked down, then towards the window, away from him. Still, her body faced the screen, and her hands still clenched the controller.

“…I don’t think it went back to normal.” Noelle swallowed. “I don’t think it can really be normal. Even if the land is at peace again, they…still left their villages and their cities and traveled everywhere . They still fought lots and lots of bad guys, and learned so much. I…” Noelle paused, and her ears slowly flicked. “It must be weird. Going back home at Level 80, and not being scared of the Level 3 dire rats. Not even a little.”

“I suppose ‘normal’ was the wrong word. I suppose all they can hope for is…peace.” Rudy looked out into the distance, up towards the ceiling. “That it’s finally all done. All the danger, all the tension….it’s resolved.”

Rudy closed his eyes. His body moved, just a little, as he took a deep breath.

Noelle gently set the controller down. She stared out into the hospital window—the sky was getting lighter.

“Why couldn’t it last forever…?” she muttered to the air.

After a few moments, Rudy opened his mouth. “You know those phone games? I think Choco Smasher was one…what do you think about them?” Rudy looked at her from the corners of his eyes, still propped up on the bed’s headboard. He didn’t move his neck.

“They’re pointless. They keep going forever…any progress is just meaningless.” Confusion clouded Noelle’s eyes, and she looked away.

“I know you would’ve liked the game to last a little longer, but…I still think it was fun.” Noelle lifted herself up from the chair, carefully setting the controller down, and sat by her father’s side.

“It was nice to see how the characters unfolded, the effects their actions had on the world, and how, in the end, all their efforts mattered. They saved the world, just as they were trying to do. You can’t do that in Choco Smasher. It’s designed to be random. Meaningless. Endless.” Rudy looked forward and closed his eyes.

Then, suddenly, there was a weight on Noelle’s hands, and Noelle’s eyes went wide open.

Her father weakly squeezed Noelle’s hand, looking straight at her with a wan smile.

“It’s impossible for a game to mean anything if it never ends.”

—

It was a dim, quiet morning: the perfect time for a lazyhead like Kris to lounge about, doing nothing but enjoying life.

But they weren’t in bed. Not today.

Kris found Noelle standing by the window, light streaming past her silhouette in the early morning light. The curtains, not quite closed, billowed gently beside her shoulder blades, like the wings of an angel. Just a few motes of dust were caught in the sunbeam, floating behind her. Though Noelle and the curtains blocked the view now, Kris knew what it was like outside: a cloudless, blue November sky, crisp air, and gorgeous orange foliage. The sunrise had just finished: the day had only just begun. The day was building up to be perfect.

The bed felt empty.

The two of them stood, two islands in a quiet ocean. Kris stared at Noelle’s back for a few moments, watching the soft billowing of the curtains. There were a few tangles in her hair, normally so well-combed. In the distance, a bird chirped, probably on the building’s roof.

Finally, Kris’s voice bobbed up through that silence, that still ocean between them.

“Did finishing the game with your dad make you happy?”

Noelle tilted her head to the side a little in thought.

“No. Not…happy.” She spoke in a weak voice drained of tears. “I…I’m just less sad . It’s not something I’ll regret never getting to do.”

Noelle didn’t look away from the window. The moment carried on: her staring out into the world, Kris staring at her back, the curtains billowing, the birds chirping. Absently, Kris noticed the furniture had been rearranged. The quiet moment stretched out like a lazy morning: like reaching for a coffee, or reading the paper in a chair, or absently munching on breakfast as one enjoyed the gentle morning sun. Kris forgot what time it was, but it didn’t matter: it was those few minutes when nothing was urgent, when no one was rushing, when a person could sit or stand and just…be alive .

What did Noelle see, in one of the best views in all of Hometown? The houses below? The woods beyond?

“Thank you, Kris.” Noelle said quietly, as if something had just occurred to her.

Noelle’s ears floated up. A few seconds passed, and Noelle turned around.

“Kris, how did you know—”

But Kris was gone.

—

Everyone knew it was coming.

Kris stood stiffly in the doorway, a sense of unease building in their mind, in their body, in their feet. The sterile light of the hospital hallway coated the floor, but the room seemed to block the light from going any further than Kris’s feet. The room’s own lights were off, and closed gauze curtains muffled the late morning sun. The room still held those wilted flowers in the vase, even though several petals had fallen. Somehow, the place felt full of dust: memories, long gone.

At first, the room seemed unoccupied. Then, Kris caught a soft, high-pitched noise. Kris took an unsteady step, then another, into the still room. In the corner, far away, half-hidden behind the sink…was Noelle. She was sobbing, kneeling, and concealing her face under a waterfall of hair, her arms wrapped around her body. A thought occurred to Kris, unbidden, that her hair was beautiful: long, and blond, and finely combed, and increasingly stained with tears and snot.

Kris looked forward—just a glance—in the center of the room.

The bed felt empty.

Despite the furniture, despite the decorations, despite the two living, breathing people within it…the sheer emptiness of the room stretched on and on.

Kris swallowed, and took a step, and braced themselves. But nothing could fill the void. They swallowed again. But any comforting words they could say was, too, swallowed up in their throat… in their brain…by that void between them. Only one thing, one mundane little thing, bubbled up through Kris’s mind.

“…Noelle?” Kris called out softly.

Noelle tried to stifle a sob. “I never got…never got…” She paused a little too long, and when she spoke, it was quieter. “Never got to finish Dragon Blazers III with him.”

Kris lingered as Noelle sobbed, tucking herself even tighter into her own body. Her ears drooped. Her sobs soared. Her sounds of sorrow cut through the silence, the emptiness, but it seemed to instantly stitch itself back together whenever she paused for breath.

It was…endless.

Kris paused, tilting their head just a fraction of an inch.

“How long would it take to finish Dragon Blazers III?” It was a mundane inquiry. As if nothing was wrong. As if the air itself wasn’t empty, as if they didn’t fear they would drown in the silence.

Noelle sniffed. In a brittle voice, a voice that somehow crept out from her three shields against the room’s void, she said:

“…It’s…pretty big. About eight hours, I-I think.”

“If you could finish the game with your father, would you?”

“I would. I’d do anything for it.”

—

Kris lifted the blanket, and opened the cage, and shoved their SOUL back in.

[antiques-for-geeks]

Game Review: Beyond the Forbidden Forest

Cosmi / 1985 / C64

‘An archer took a stroll through the deep dark wood…’

With one eye firmly on Halloween, we’re going to review some games that used to make us breathe heavily, grasping our joysticks tightly in our sweaty palms…

Beyond the Forbidden Forest starts dramatically with flashes of lightning against a starlit sky. With every flash comes a crack of thunder from the C64’s SID sound chip, before the title of the game is revealed against the darkness. It’s obvious even at this point that the game's author, Paul Norman, was aiming for something much more cinematic than the average computer game of the era.

You start, alone, in an overgrown forest. You are an archer, sent to slay the dreaded Demogorgon, who legend says can only be killed by a golden arrow to the heart.

Your character occupies the middle of the screen. You can walk through the forest to the left and to the right. You can also walk into and out of the scene. Sometimes trees or bushes can obscure your view. There’s a primitive parallax scrolling effect so that the trees in the foreground move more quickly than those in the background, which could charitably be described as decent for the time.

There’s nowhere to actually ‘go’ in this game, and the forest isn’t there to be explored. You’re not really alone, you see. This forest is actually the scene of a desperate fight for survival.

The first creature you encounter is the scorpion. The scorpion will enter from the side of the screen and will rush straight at you. Like all this game's enemies, he gets his own special musical theme that plays during the encounter. This is where you run away! If he reaches your archer he’ll messily jab your organs out with his stinger, to the accompaniment of a kind of musical shrieking noise generated by the SID. Imagine something like a primitive version of the score that plays in Alfred Hitchcock's ‘Psycho’ when Janet Leigh gets stabbed in the shower. This game doesn’t pull any punches for its death scenes, that’s for sure.

It’s behind you!

Luckily your archer can defend himself with his bow. Hold down the fire button and you’ll stand in place, aiming around the scene. A grey indicator bar moves up and down showing the elevation of your shot. Simply let the fire button go again to let loose an arrow. As you might imagine, it’s hard to keep away from a scorpion who is intent on perforating your innards while also stopping to pepper it with arrows, but this retreat, aim and fire mechanic is all a part of the game’s charm.

Plug the scorpion a few times and you get presented with a golden arrow, which appears from a spinning orb after an overly long fanfare plays. These golden arrows are important; you need to collect at least 4 to progress to the next stage of the adventure, and they also act as your ‘lives’. Every time the archer is killed you lose half of the stash of golden arrows, until the game is over. You will get very tired of hearing the victory fanfare, I assure you.

The next foe you meet is a massive worm, who rises out of the ground at various places in the foreground and background. Let him rise too many times without hitting him and he’ll swallow you whole, reappearing to regurgitate the bow, along with a healthy fountain of archer blood.

After that is a giant mosquito, who darts around the sky. He only takes one hit, but is tricky to get a bead on. He’ll drink your juices like a milkshake if he gets a chance, leaving only a crumpled heap on the forest floor.

Last up is… some kind of demonic frog / crocodile thing… who’ll jump about unpredictably and will mash your body like a pub piano at closing time.

He’s hungry for your offal.

One nice touch is the way that the game shows the passage of time in the forest. The sun sets, and eventually night comes, with the colours of the trees and sky changing appropriately. The day to night cycle welded to the ability to move in and out of the scenery prompted Cosmi to market this game as having ‘OmniDimension 4D`. This was sadly typical of the shameless bullshit marketing departments would churn out in the 80’s.

Once these 4 different foes are defeated, it’s back to the scorpion again, in an effort to gather enough golden arrows for an assault on the caverns, which lie... beyond the forbidden forest. See? Although 4 arrows are technically enough to progress, you’ll want more than that to have a realistic shot at what comes next. To progress to the caverns, you have to to pause the game with F1 and then press F3. If you don’t do this the forest encounters repeat until you die or your patience runs out.

Once within the caverns you face off against 3 final foes.

The Bats: A group of bats flutter around the cave. One of them is a golden colour, and that’s the one you need to shoot. You only need one hit, but it’s flight is fast and unpredictable.

The Hydra: This four headed monstrosity fills the entire screen! Each head can shoot fire, and you’ve got to dodge about to land a hit on each one. Succeed and he’ll stop moving and turn to stone.

The Demogorgon: Squatting over a pit, this massive beast follows your movements with his head, shooting deadly bolts from his eyes that will disintegrate you instantly. Shoot him in his glowing heart to win the game and free the land from his evil!

I appear to have misplaced my skin.

Beyond the Forbidden Forest surely must be the most ‘‘Commodore 64ish’ game of all time.

Chunky blocky graphics? Very. Lots of muddy browns and muted greens? None muddier. Bone rattling soundtrack courtesy of the SID chip. All present here.

It was also creepy, atmospheric, and with all the sudden and violent deaths, really quite nasty… for a computer game of the 80’s at least.

Trivia

This is the sequel to ‘Forbidden Forest’, which is probably a bit better known and generally held in slightly higher regard (even by the game’s author). There was a third game in the series released in 2003 for Windows PC. It’s a third person 3D effort, which sadly looks pretty generic and uninteresting. There aren’t even any gory death scenes!

Playing it today

Only released on the C64, and copies are getting rarer. Easily emulated, but bear in mind that the function keys are important on this one.

Commentariat

Meat: This game could be the poster child for anyone who considers C64 graphics to be dull and unappealing, but behind the ugly front there’s a lot to admire here. The ‘gore’ is also hilarious! With the notable exception of the head chopping in Palace Software’s ‘Barbarian’, games of the era were very timid in their depictions of graphic violence. I guess this is about as close as we were going to get to a survival horror game in the 80’s...

Pop: I got this one on a magazine cover tape, and was immediately hooked on its strange atmosphere, shocks and gory death scenes. I was a latecomer to the C64, and by that point these graphics really looked like a dog’s dinner. Despite that I still found myself playing this game quite a bit. Aiming the bow at enemies in the foreground and background feels a little tricky initially, but it can be mastered. My main issue now is how long the player resurrection and golden arrow presentation scenes take. Skipping repetitive cutscenes was a luxury you were so rarely afforded in those days.

Sadly I never went ‘beyond’ the forest, because I didn’t have a clue that the keyboard was required to progress to the next stage of the game.

Score card

Presentation 8/10

Starting with the fantastic cinematic introduction screen, this is a game that goes the extra mile to involve the player in its world. There’s even a proper ending sequence with its own musical theme. The various versions of box artwork are all, however, distinctly amateurish.

Originality 8/10

Made before all games started to look and feel the same, this is obviously the work of a single individual. It doesn’t look, sound or play like any other game of the time… except perhaps for its own prequel.

Graphics 6/10

Undeniably ugly, blocky, untidy and muddy. Also somehow atmospheric and appealing. The screen filling hydra is a pretty impressive piece of work for the time. Gets an extra point for splashing the pixelated claret about.

Hookability 7/10

From the first moment the scorpion scuttles over and messes you up with its stabber you’ll either want to see what other horrible fates await you in the forest… or switch the computer off in disgust.

Sound 9/10

A series of memorable tunes, played by the C64’s SID chip in the style of a demented horror film organ. Though it’s somewhat crude, few soundtracks at the time were better suited to the on-screen action.

Lastability 7/10

It takes some time to get used to hitting the different foes with your arrows, but there are ultimately only 7 different types of enemy to face in this game. Despite that, it puts up a decent challenge, and you'll want to make it to the caverns to see what horrors are lurking in the darkness.

Overall 7/10

A game with plenty of quirks and flaws, which it overcomes by sheer force of personality.

[jobujabu]

I bought FF7 Remake and honestly I wish I could get my money back.

It's been a rather lackluster, monotonous, and overall boring af experience. I never played the original, but I had seen it played, and it looked like fun. I'd had my experience with turn based games before (Legend of the Dragoon is one of my favorite games of all as an example of many,) but this isn't.... turned based. People keep referring to it as a slash'em up, but it isn't even that?! It's two different systems in one whenever you have control of your character, so while you're in control of, let's say, Cloud, the enemies seem to be fighting on turn based mechanics. You run around hitting the attack button, and it's the same combo over.... and over.... and over.... But wait! Go into the different stance for more hard hitting attacks! But now you're just performing a new, repetitive combo, which doesn't actually feel like it does more damage, and then even better, your movement is slowed during, and for sure, the enemy can just run away from you. The consistency of enemies getting staggered by your attacks is enigmatic, like, sometimes they stagger (and mind you I'm not talking about the stagger bar, just in general,) and you can get in more hits, but other times they continue with their actions, and completely knock you on your ass, leaving you exposed to other similar enemies doing the same thing, and that's not evening including status affects like stuns. I was versus one of the early bosses who just continually spammed some rocket attack, like, every attack was this attack, and rng Satan had it out for me I guess, because omg I couldn't get up. Constantly trying to switch between Barrett and Cloud with pheonix downs and potions or cura, but why? Coz there'd only be another missile barrage to throw us around, do a ton of damage, and then rinse and repeat. Like, is there something I'm not getting?!? It's so frustrating! I got to a mission some little fuckin' kids had to hunt down some hedgehog lookin' lil' fucks, and omg! Same thing! 3v2, and one enemy constantly runs away from you and heals it's allies and has a ton of health, while the other two do some bouncing attack that stunts you, OR some missile attack that - guess what - knocks you over and does plenty of damage. Aerith is useless, in fact the AI of your party are useless, and I think it's because they use the turn based tactics while fighting in a non-classic battle. Like for real, I don't play kingdom hearts, but I've heard and seen enough to know how pissed people get at Donald and Goofy for not helping out in the slightest, but fuckin' Christ your teammates are dead weight too much of the time. I lost that battle with the hedgehogs. Lost because I was being bombarded by missiles that knocked me over while being pelted by a bouncing attack that staggered me all while trying to focus the healing tank of a bitch that keeps running away. It's not a hack 'n slash. It's a reminder that we can't have nice things. Ever.

Mind you, this is just the combat. JUST the combat. Because oh ho ho, the rest of the game..... Is not a game. It's not. It's a movie. The game itself is beautiful, so cool looking, they must have put a lot of work into making it look so good, and I gag, but WHAT THE FUCK IS HAPPENING?!?!? It is CUTSCENE after CUTSCENE after CUTSCENE of dribble! The main protagonists are freedom fighters battling against an evil corporation who are sucking the life from the planet for their own greed and power and they want to save the little man and the world they inhabit from anhiliation, but whaaaaat?!?!? I can't get into the story when we have to take five fucking steps and then STOP for another cutscene! Take five steps, oh a cutscene that easily could've been said WHILE WE ARE RUNNING! It just stops! It stops you! There's plenty you can skip, but then you're missing out on the modicum of information that has to do with the story, otherwise it's just mindless drivel disguised as character development, and some of it CAN'T BE SKIPPED!!! You have to sit through it! And then guess the fuck what sis?!?!? 5 MORE STEPS INTO ANOTHER FUCKING SCENE! Omg it drives me up the walls what am I playing? Am I playing anything?? It's a "playable" movie! It's a choose your own adventure goosebumps book, it's that one black mirror episode shit where you choose the path for the show to take, but like not even! Every👏 Fucking👏Step👏 Leads👏To another👏Scene👏To sit👏 And watch👏 And it's so👏 Fucking👏 Boring👏. Can't run to the next blip, gotta walk! Can't skip certain scenes, gotta watch! Best part is - switch to classic mode and the game playa for you at a reduced difficulty!!!! Wtf?!?!? I payed money for this! I paid for an experience and God damn it I wish I'd specified what kind of experience because holy shit, it is one, just not the one I wanted!

I needed to rant about this and here is the perfect place because no one comments on my shit so it feels somewhat safe to do so, but even then it doesn't matter. I'm sure I'd be told I'm just salty and need to get gud, I'm positive I'd be told I just don't understand the brilliance of it all and it just flew right over my myopic little brain like jets showing their appreciation for essential workers. And you know what? They'd be right, I'm sure there's plenty I just don't get or have overlooked, but for me, that's my point. The game looked like a fun experience full of cinematic marvels and thrilling, tactical gameplay, but by the time I actually have gotten to any of that I'm already tired from having reached that point galavanting through scene after scene after fucking scene of what could've been wrapped up and explained in just one instead of many. Oh look, I have to explore the bar and wait, have to play darts, oh look, walk outside and there's a group of people I gotta talk to, oh look, new town where Aerith is from, take five steps, yup, here's a scene, take five more steps here's an UNSKIPPABLE scene showing the damage we just did, oh look, five more steps and the restaurant guy wants to talk to Aerith, oh look, five more steps and a child wants to talk to her..... ABOUT NOTHING! Oh look, oh look, oh look!

Fucking no. Like, no. I'ma say it. I'ma just say it, it's a trash game, and I would not recommend spending your money on it, coz best part, it's not even the full fucking game. Go buy the original. It's a fraction of the price and it's the game in its entirety.

Just no.

[xb-squaredx]

Astral Chain Review: Popo’s Bizarre Adventure

Life can be funny sometimes; I started out 2019 hoping that I could play a certain PlatinumGames-developed Switch exclusive, and while I did eventually get such a thing, it wasn’t Bayonetta 3, but instead Astral Chain. The last time Nintendo and PlatinumGames worked together on a brand new IP we got The Wonderful 101, one of my favorite games of all time, so I was pretty pumped about Astral Chain from moment one. A game where you control Stands like Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure, but you’re a hot anime cop! The kinda game you didn’t know you needed! Now that it’s finally here I can definitely say with confidence that I really love…like half of this game.

C.O.P.S: ANIME EDITION

The world of Astral Chain is in a bad way. Set in a future with Earth on the brink of collapse, most of the planet has been corrupted by the Astral Plain, an alternate dimension. With the remnants of humanity confined to a man-made island, an elite police force, Neuron, investigates the invisible cause of the world-ending corruption, Chimeras. Armed with enslaved Chimeras of their own, Legions, Neuron fights back against Chimera attacks, all the while searching for a way to save the world before its too late. Players take the role of a newcomer to Neuron, rising up the ranks alongside their twin sibling, mastering their Legion as various villainous factions seem intent on bringing about the end of the world.

I’ll be blunt here: Astral Chain’s story is passable, but didn’t do much for me. It’s not exactly bad, but predictable and doesn’t really take many risks. The game has an anime aesthetic, and in many cases seems more content with paying homage to various sci-fi anime than telling a unique story, so I’d say it’s quite by-the-numbers. That’s certainly fine, but what really shines in most Platinum titles are their larger-than-life characters, and I find them lacking here. Most of Neuron gets the shaft as time goes on, with only a scant few characters getting much development. Maybe I’m a tad spoiled by the likes of Fire Emblem: Three Houses, but the fact that so little of the incidental dialogue is voiced also keeps most of the Neuron officers from sticking out to me. Some characters, like Hal, Marie and Kyle, DO stand out and are pretty great, but that’s about it.

Thankfully, everything else about the game’s presentation is stylish. From the UI to the enemy intro cutscenes, to the sound design and battle animations, Astral Chain is a delight for the eyes and ears. The futuristic setting allows from some sleek visuals, and the lighting and particle effects stand out among most Switch titles. I’d daresay that at times, Astral Chain is Platinum’s best looking game. This does come at the cost of performance though. The game is locked to mostly 30 FPS, though you’ll see some dips in some frantic moments, but not too often. Resolution can also dip in some instances too, the performance at its worst in bigger areas with tons of NPCs around, but most combat sections cut down on clutter and the performance remains solid when you need it, so it mostly works out. Music’s also pretty stellar, and completes the anime-aesthetics with legit opening and ending themes too. Looks can only do so much though, but Platinum is never one to get by purely on outward appearances.

CHAIN PAIN

Combat is where Platinum shines, and that’s definitely true for Astral Chain, though you do have to wait a lot longer than usual to get a good feel for what the game’s trying to do. The first few hours leave a pretty bad first-impression honestly, with lackluster combat options and clunky movement, but once the game shows it’s hand everything starts to really click. By the endgame you’re drowning in options, to the point where it would have been overwhelming if the game threw it all at you right at the start. Best to ease players into the game, but it’s risky to not start the game off on the right foot.

The defining feature of this game is controlling two characters at once, your officer and their Legion. At the start, your officer’s options are limited, and Legions mostly attack on their own, but over time you gain more Legions to swap between on-the-fly, as well as more manual actions you can perform alongside them. Sync Attacks, for one, require you to tap the Legion button at specific points after attacks, which will have the two of you team up for big damage. Your officer gains a shape shifting “X-Baton” weapon that can take a few different forms to vary up their own combat, but the five Legions you gain are your most important tools. Sword, Arrow, Arm, Beast and Axe; each Legion has their own uses in and out of combat and in many cases feel like extended nods to Platinum’s entire back-catalog. Sword can enter Raiden’s Blade Mode from Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance to cut enemies on a specific axis, or sever connections between specific doors or objects. Arrow can take out enemies from afar, or be brought in for an over-the-shoulder shooting experience right out of Vanquish. Arm is like an extended nod to Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure, pounding foes with a flurry of punches, as well as being able to pick up and throw objects. Beast is just Bladewolf from Revengeance, letting players ride atop it for mobility, and digging up items or following scents like a real dog. Lastly, Axe is a powerhouse that also grants players a powerful barrier that can protect them from various hazards. Certain enemies require specific Legions to take out, and with all five at the press of a button, things can get hectic, but in a good way and advanced players can do a lot with all of these tools.

Each Legion has their own skill tree that can grant them special moves or increase stats as well, and similar to the chip system from Nier: Automata, players can equip special passive skills onto each Legion, provided they have enough slots open for them. The chain connecting officer and Legion also comes into play too, being able to move the Legion freely and bind enemies up (bringing Wonderful 101’s Wonder Liner to mind), or send a charging enemy flying back with an Irish Whip straight out of wrestling. Legions can’t stay out forever though, their Sync Gauge slowly draining as they fight, huge chunks of it taken out if they get hit by attacks, but it recharges pretty quickly, especially if your officer stays aggressive. Compared to past Platinum titles, there’s a lot more emphasis on using items and having “builds” when going into fights too. Healing items alongside combat-oriented items like drones or shields are encouraged rather than penalized, as is the standard. There’s more I could go into, but this hopefully gives you an idea of how much is going on in this game’s combat. Comparing the first few hours to endgame is night and day, more so than almost any other Platinum title.

Generally, the combat is up to the Platinum standard, but unlike most games by the developer, there’s actually a LOT of gameplay that isn’t straight combat, making this Platinum’s most varied game yet…for better or for worse.

STYLISH BUSYWORK

Here’s where things get kinda tricky. On the one hand, it’s good for a game to have at least SOME variety, right? If a game is nonstop action, it risks becoming stale, so having some slower moments makes the bigger moments more impactful. It’s a question of pacing more than anything else, and unfortunately the pacing in Astral Chain leaves a LOT to be desired.

To say it as succinctly as I can, the levels in Astral Chain drag on far too long. A typical level in Platinum’s catalog is roughly 20 minutes, give or take a bit of backtracking or some story bits. In Astral Chain, a full level, or “File”, can take four to five hours by comparison, and when you lay it out like that, you realize there’s an awful lot of filler to sift through to get to the good stuff. You have investigation sequences that are laughably easy for one. Using discount Detective Vision from the Batman Arkham games, you “find” clues and then fill in the blanks to form a lead, but these sequences are impossible to fail. Solutions are highlighted and even if you come to the wrong conclusion, the game will just correct you and you’ll move on regardless. Then you have platforming sequences that are mostly fine, though hampered by being unable to use the camera most of the time (since the right stick can also manually control your Legion). At times, honest-to-God sidequests can be found that are usually not combat-focused, and we can throw in some awful motion-controlled minigames for good measure. On their own, these extra bits aren’t too bad, kinda boring in some respects but otherwise fine, however for someone who just wants to progress the story and get to the next fight, they become barriers you’re forced to contend with before you can get back to having fun.

Now, a lot of this stuff IS optional, but you’re heavily encouraged to do them all anyway. You get locked out of getting good end-of-File ranks if you avoid optional ranked missions, and you’re given rewards for all of this stuff anyway. They’re mostly cosmetic rewards, but the game still seems to expect you to engage with this “extra” content…to the point that it’s clearly not seen as extra but a part of the whole Astral Chain experience. If you stripped out the non-combat portions, that’s like 2/3s of the game gone and it feels kinda messed up to skip out on so much of it. Rather…maybe the game should have made a point of having this stuff be engaging to do in its own right.

MAKING THE GRADE

I want to stress that there’s a lot I liked about Astral Chain. There’s plenty of charm hidden throughout here, and the prospect of a Platinum game that strives to do MORE isn’t a bad one. I enjoyed having NPCs to talk to, larger areas to explore that weren’t just combat areas, and little touches like getting points for recycling or being unable to jaywalk were appreciated. One thing I never touched on was its ranking system, which seems more emblematic of the issues I had with the game. Rather than rewarding and ranking one’s own play, it awards high ranks more so for variety than anything else. It doesn’t matter how poorly you play (to a point), as long as you do a lot of different stuff it’ll all work out. Thus, the game threw a lot of stuff at the wall regardless of how hard it stuck, and as such there’s a number of great ideas mixed in with some really, really weird ones.

Astral Chain is in many ways an experimental game for Platinum. They seem to be trying to move away from niche action games and offer up more for the consumer, but in doing so I fear they might be diluting their games. I’ve been quite a bit more critical of this game than I expected to be, and in the end I’m more just bummed that I didn’t enjoy it more. This game is the directorial debut of Takahisa Taura, and I can practically feel the passion he had for this product; he likely loaded this game with a lot of things that he personally liked, and it’s clear everyone involved worked hard to deliver the best game they could. The results vary a bit, as we have crisp visuals and unique, deep combat mixed in with some plodding segments that seem thrown in for variety’s sake. Astral Chain is ambitious, but maybe this once Platinum bit off a bit more than they could chew. I’d also petition that this game is a victim of certain expectations of what I think a PlatinumGames title “should” be. It’s possible Taura felt pressured to put in aspects of Platinum’s past output and was afraid to go further and make this game truly something new. I’ll also wager that if Astral Chain is someone’s first Platinum game, they’ll be able to come in with a fresher perspective and might end up enjoying it more than a diehard fan like me. There’s a solid foundation here for any future titles though, and I think this game’s issues could be ironed out if given the chance. At its height, the combat really sells this game for me, and action fans will find a lot to love…but there’s a lot in here that might not scratch that particular itch. I wouldn’t quite call this game the weakest link in PlatinumGames’ chain at any rate, and I remain a fan of the company and their future output.

Shine on Platinum.

-B

[inikavulpixelreviews]

Let’s Talk About Pokemon - Gen 7 Retrospective

That's at least a little more sizable than the XY generation was. Granted we have some Alolan Forms to help inflate the numbers a bit. Sure, if you were to count Gen 6′s Mega Evolutions, Gen 7 would be the actual smallest Gen to date. But remember what I said last generation's recap with how Gamefreak seemed to be taking a “quality over quantity” approach for that generation? That mentality seems to be back in full force here. 'Cause we're looking at my second favorite Gen right behind Gen 5.

I did bring up that Gen 6 was my third favorite generation in terms of the new, numerical Pokemon introduced. What has Alola muscle over it is how it's crammed as much inventiveness into the designs as they could think. The starters, the Legendaries/Kinda-Legendary Ultra Beasts, even the common fodder Pokemon have a little more going on than their typical ilk. And even some of the more boring designs like Oranguru and Passimian have interesting battle mechanics by changing the way you can approach double battles entirely on their own.

That also seemed to be a focus this generation. Not all of course, but a lot of the new Pokemon seemed to be based on different gameplay interactions and having unique abilities or signature moves. Between Salandit's Corrosion to Minior's Shields Down to Mimikyu's Disguise to Toucannon's Beak Blast and to Toxipex's Baneful Bunker. They really tried taking a shot at making each Pokemon have something unique to bring to battles. They even essentially made a more tournament-rules friendly alternative to Arceus in Silvally.

But there's a little subject more contentious about Gen 7 than the Pokemon, of course. That being the games themselves, which feel like they got the fandom split. I like Sun and Moon, but even I'll admit Gamefreak's gotta try a little harder for Gen 8. All the inventive things they've tried from a gameplay perspective ultimately don't change much. The game still had an 8-mini-act structure just like the Gym games. HMs getting replaced with Ride Pokemon is nice, but is still the same mechanic with different dressing. The biggest changes in the usual story structure don't even matter that much, the biggest change feeling like you get to know the region's Legendary Pokemon from the very start in the form of Nebby. Otherwise, it's just A Little Bit Better Written Than Usual. Y'know, not that Pokemon games tend to be master classes in writing anyway, its only real competition there being Black and White's story. (And even then, Sun and Moon's in desperate need of a Skip Cutscene button.)

Then there’s the Let’s Go games, which I suppose are technically Gen 7 games. Those got even more divisive. Some love it, others hate it. I personally just find it boring as a rather dumbed down remake of the Kanto games, only really playing because it was an excuse to use Melmetal. There’s some neat things in there that I wouldn’t mind seeing implemented in the main series (namely overworld-wandering Pokemon and AVs replacing EVs.) Just please keep the very poorly implemented Go-imitating catch mechanics as far away from the main series as possible.

Pokemon’s also starting to get more competition recently as well. Other than Digimon of course. Ni No Kuni, eventually Tem Tem, of course, the rise of the mighty Yokai Watch, which to my understanding, has been wrecking Pokemon in terms of sale numbers in their home region. Each of them implementing monster-catching RPG mechanics in their own unique way. I can’t speak for Yokai Watch, but Ni No Kuni is a lot more like a traditional JRPG, with the monsters being familiars that still fight in battle, but the trainers themselves also participate in the battle as well! And Tem Tem, while very much like Pokemon, is giving it more of an MMO angle. While I’m not one to shout about how much Pokemon just NEEDS to make an MMO with ALL THE REGIONS already, I am interested in seeing where TemTem winds up. It IS a Kickstarter game that made way more than it asked for, but as we know from a certain Strong Numerical Value That Is One Less Than Ten, that’s no guarantee it’ll be amazing. But worth keeping an eye on. It still has the potential to be something Gamefreak’s gonna have to watch out for.

Whether I like these other games or not, I appreciate that they exist, because they mean that sooner or later Gamefreak's gonna have to get their ass in gear and do something about it. I'm really getting burnt out on a new Pokemon game coming out literally every year. What I've wanted more than ever is for Gamefreak to at least take a hiatus from the yearly releases to have the game that comes after said break to really kick it out of the park. I get that the Ultra games probably didn't take up much development time and from my understanding Let's Go was made by a whole different team, so those games coming out in the years between Sun and Moon and Sword and Shield might not have much bearing on the latter's quality, but still. Pokemon's not had a major mechanical update since they introduced Abilities in Gen 3. I just hope Gen 8 does something interesting or has some form of major mechanical overhaul. Not asking Pokemon battles to be in real time or anything. Just some new Super Forms and powerful one-off moves aren’t gonna cut it for me. After over 20 years of Pokemoning and on, what, year 8 of a new Pokemon game coming out every year? I'm a little bit fatigued.

...Okay, let's end this on a better note than that.

I AM still exciting to see what Gen 8 has to offer, and I hope they mean it when they say they're trying something different. And of course, I'm ALWAYS gonna be excited to see some more new Pokemon. Gens 5, 6, and 7 are proving they're nowhere close to being out of steam yet, and I can't wait to see more Gen 8 Pokemon come our way in the coming months.

Top 10 Favorites of Gen 7:

Dangit this is hard. So many to love! So many new super-duper-tippity-top favorites!! Shout outs to Palossand, Silvally, Salandit, Xurkitree, and Buzzwole. There's just too many good'ens!!!!

Bottom 10 Least Favorite of Gen 7:

Amazingly, the only Pokemon here I really “dislike” is Zeraora. The rest are just that cherry-picked handful of Alolan Pokemon I don't really care that much about. Hurray!

Bottom 10 Least Favorite Overall:

Almost got through with no new additions. Almost.

The Cutest:

God this Generation was good for Pokemon I just want to pick up and hug. Or in Mimikyu's case, get horrendously murdered by because I got a little too close to taking its rag off. And I'd still say “Thanks.”

The Coolest:

The Prettiest:

The Spookiest:

This gen was really good to scratch a Halloweeny itch. A BUNCH of cool new ghosts, complete with the eerie head leech Pokemon I never would’ve suspected would make it into Pokemon!

Most Creative:

Weirdest/Most Unique:

This section here could've been filled with Ultra Beasts alone if I really wanted to, haha.

Most Forgettable:

Magearna is here not necessarily because I think the design is forgettable, but gee wizz I keep thinking it's not a Gen 7 Pokemon.

Most Personality:

Here's a new section! Gen 7 had a lot of personality-based designs, so there was actually a fair bit of competition for a slot like this. Buzzwole and Bewear are just hilarious, and I'm still thoroughly impressed with Meltan. They managed to cram so much adorable personality into such a simple design. And I’ll eat my hat the day we get a Pokemon more smug than Salandit.

Most Under-Appreciated:

Poor Stakataka keeps getting dismissed because of its bad typing... not that I can blame anyone because Rock/Steel is easily the most boring of all the UB typings, especially when we had room to have a Ghostly duo between it and Blacephalon to have us our first Rock/Ghost type!

Most Long Overdue Concepts:

Seriously, how'd it take 7 generations to get a wolf and a mosquito? Let alone 6 generations to finally get a second MANTIS and traditional horse Pokemon?! As far as spooky Pokemon go, you'd think a shipwreck would be one of the easier and more obvious concepts to go after, even if the one we finally got didn't take the form I expected it to. And Araquanid's just here because a fully evolved BUG/WATER was a long time frickin coming.

Best Regional Variants:

At least I'm naming the category that way because Regional Variants better be a series mainstay from now on!! These are the Alolan Forms with the most fun alternate take on their original forms. And Vulpix and Ninetales are there because fox solidarity.

Best Ultra Beasts:

Again, I really hope Ultra Beasts won't be an Alola-Only thing. I want to avoid talking about Gen 8 spoilers to be considerate of anyone that wants to avoid those, but a certain image carved into the ground in a particular scene has me hoping Ultra Beasts might be returning. And that Xurkitree could have a big brother in the near future. There's hardly much basis because said carving could literally be anything, but. Please.

Anyway, I love the Ultra Beasts as a concept of extra-dimensional alien beings. Some sell the look of freaky aliens better, especially ones like Nihilego, Xurkitree, Kartana, and Celesteela. But nonetheless, these 6 are my favorites out of our roster. HOPEFULLY so far.

Pokemon That Should’ve Gotten Alolan Forms:

I tend to agree that limiting Alolan Forms to Gen 1 Pokemon only was a silly thing to do, but even minding that, I feel like there was crazy amounts of missed potential here. Seel and Dewgong just desperately need some fresh attention to stop being Pokemon’s more forgettable critters. While I suppose Lapras and Tentacruel are excusable given they’re sea dwellers regardless, I totally wouldn’t mind electric jellyfish versions of the Tentas, or even a Kracken-based form for the former. This was also MORE than an opportunity to redeem Dragonite with a more Dragonair-like variant. And some tropical jungle variations of Paras and Venonat would be neat. I’m just saying, a Venomoth turned into more of a Tropical Hawkmoth would’ve been killer.

And Parasect hurts the most. You’re telling you’re gonna have Parasect inhabit this jungle area along with another, brand new mushroom Pokemon. AND you’re gonna introduce the concept of Gen 1 Pokemon taking on new forms based on the new and radically different habitats in Alola. And you’re just NOT gonna place some glowing mushrooms on their backs, turn them pale white, and call them Bug/Fairy types?!?!?! Hello?!?!!??!?

...Oh, am I forgetting something?

Top 50 Favorites Overall:

...Surprise! Yeah, just sorta decided “why not?” This is our last Gen for the rest of the year, so let's end it on a “Look At All My Favorites!” type of a bang. Also because it pained me to see all these not make it to some sort of Top Favorites highlight. And of course, they might not be 100% consistent with scores or previous Top 10 favorites. I'm only a human with a finicky brain that is constantly changing how absolutely precisely I feel about every single one of these. 

And... that's it... that's every single Pokemon reviewed. Every single Gen Recapped. We've had lots of ups and downs and plenty of getting a little too excited about cartoon animals. Gen 8 is still a ways away, and even when it comes out, I'd like to wait a few months to let the new designs settle into my mind before I go writing opinion pieces on all of them. And of course, for official artwork to be out for everybody.

BUT I do have a handful of ways to pass the time until Gen 8 does come out... What's up next exactly? Well, we won't have to wait too long, thankfully...

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