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Ys IX: Monstrum Nox (2019)

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Today I'm Gonna Play: Ys VIII: Lacrimosa of DANA

The only Ys game I've played so far is IX: Monstrum Nox, and I've heard lots of praise for VIII. I've been putting it off but had some folks recommend the game to me which finally pushed me to play it.

What seems to be a staple in Ys seems to be what this series is really good at. Fast-paced combat with barely any input lag, a bunch of monsters to beat up to your liking, and a range of (somewhat flashy) skills you can use to wipe the floor. I think it works great for people that are into beat em' ups and hack and slash. Both titles focus on exploration as well, but the difference between IX and VIII is that the latter is more of an open world, with a castaway island setting where the cast has to survive and discover the mysteries behind the Isle of Seiren. On paper, this sounds really exciting and it does seem to have success on practice. But personally, this has not worked out for me. The map is by no means massive to the likes of a triple A title like GTA, but I don't think small open worlds work either. Much of the map feels repetitive with it having a sprinkle of resources to find for crafting or side quests, maybe a specific area or two that could be designated as a landmark, which is really just for completionist purposes and nothing else (I think it would've served as a good way to use fast travel, since they're landmarks), and a BUNCH of monsters littered about. I'm fine with fighting them as that's the main aspect of combat, but I felt that this quickly started to get stale compared to IX. My biggest gripe with the map is its design, which can thankfully be remedied via the options menu. By default, the minimap has a dynamic compass feature that moves as your character moves and rotates. If you're not good at reading directions like me, this makes traversing extremely frustrating and you'll end up running around in circles wondering how to get to another area. I nearly wanted to quit the game until I found out you could set the compass to static, making it much more easy for me to progress. But even then, I could notice its minimap system is a little lacking compared to IX, which to me has now become the gold standard of navigating in JRPGs. But I can't blame the game since this is a previous title.

The story is intriguing, as it follows a classic formula of being in an undiscovered location filled with mystery, most notably about an entire civilization as well as creatures roaming about. It's perfect for those who love adventure which is what Ys is all about. It does have a couple hiccups though where there was a sudden tonal shift that didn't really add much to the overall story. Some parts about the reason of conflict/plot in the game didn't feel persuasive enough for me to support what the cast was fighting for. But as usual, Ys' endings leave a bittersweet feeling in my heart whenever I finish them. I can't seem to connect with the characters much in this title compared to IX, they seem to be a little more tropey (such as having a tsundere, or a pompous noble that gets barely any repercussions from others for the trouble they cause) although they do show some growth as the game progresses. There was also a weird part that suddenly introduced a murder mystery subplot, which I felt was unnecessary. It didn't really add much to the game other than just get rid of some characters that hinders the exploration part of the gampeplay. The character designs also seem to be really odd apart from a few. One would think (apart from Adol who does get a costume change) that characters may want to change clothes while being castaway to something more suitable for the situation and climate, but the game instead focuses on making their clothes fit their background/personality instead. This would be good as an introduction, but a wardrobe change wouldn't hurt, I think. A good example of a simple change could be from Persona 3 Reload, where the main cast now has access to outfits that look battle ready instead of fighting off Shadows in just their school uniform.

There are a couple aspects that I really do like about the game. One is notably the music. I've heard good things about Sunshine Coastline and it definitely doesn't miss! What I also love is the main theme of the game. It's been a really long time where a main theme impresses me from the first listen without some nostalgia factor being attached to it. Each track really fits the mood of what's going on; calming you in this mysterious yet serene island, or pumping you up to get into fighting off enemies. The second thing I like are the render images in the skills menu, showing everyone's serious faces with a dynamic pose gets me fired up when I equip new skills, It sets a nice example of UX in action.

Overall, I feel a little sad that I can't experience the joy that other players feel when they praise this title. But then again, I seem to like titles like IX which people seem to dislike, so it's interesting to see how opinions can differ. I'm glad to have given this a shot anyway, and wouldn't discourage anyone from trying it out. Heck, you might end up loving it.

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Today I'm Gonna Play: Persona 3 Reload

Phew, this took a pretty long time to complete! This was one of the many awaited games of this year that I've wanted to play, and I've finally completed it today! This isn't my first time playing P3, but since I only have experience with Portable, that's the only version I can compare it to when I talk about P3R.

I'm probably in the minority that liked Tartarus in the original versions. The randomly generated dungeons and amount of them didn't bother me at all. Each floor felt it had a short and even length to explore, and the shuffle cards encouraged me to fight every single enemy (or Shadow) that appeared. Reload definitely improves on a couple aspects in that the floors look more appealing in terms of design, and are also varied per set/block that you traverse through. In addition to that, there's even additional dungeons for more challenge or encounters that spice up climbing through these floors. Despite that, I kind of felt myself getting pretty bored about 20-30 hours in the game grinding through them. I'm not sure if it's because I've been playing Persona games the past 6+ months that I'm starting to hit a fatigue, or if there's something I don't like about this revamped design. In the end, I had to switch to playing Peaceful to just get through the game. One thing I do miss and wish were in more RPGs that do dungeon formats was being able to split your party to search the floors. This made clearing them much more faster, and also helped with leveling up too. Although I think leveling in Reload is a lot more lenient, and there's a new scouting feature instead where you send 1 party member to move up a floor in advance, which is probably why they removed splitting. But this occurs randomly rather than something you can do by choice, and is mostly for item collection.

In terms of non-combat or the social aspect, I definitely liked seeing familiar and new faces, yet also didn't like them at the same time. Seeing them fully voiced in a 3D environment compared to P3P is like night and day and makes it much more immersive! Being able to see their stories as these characters struggle and change really pays off well when you finish the game. Compared to Persona 4 where I loved how tight-knit the main cast was, I couldn't really get into the social links individually (but I loved the detail of many of them being acquainted with one another). With Reload's theme of Death, it beautifully illustrates how death can be both literal and metaphorical, and how people can overcome or accept it, while looking forward to a better tomorrow. That being said, some social links definitely felt infuriating to go through, which made it hard to sympathize with those characters. 4 on the other hand at least made them bearable at most (except two that I really disliked). One really neat aspect that Reload added were link episodes with male characters and even antagonists to flesh them out more, as well as activities with the main cast. Not only were they enjoyable and added more characterization, they still provide gameplay benefits just as much as the regular social links do, so they didn't feel like a waste of time.

This is probably a nitpick but one thing I'd REALLY like to see improved upon in future titles (or maybe I'll change my mind with 5 Royal) is to allow for more time to socialize. For a game about time management, they're really brutal with how often can you hang out considering the amount of holidays, exams, and even time skips that block your progress. It makes this one unique aspect of this series so stressful to go through if you want to max all social links, unless you use a guide and follow it strictly. Fortunately, multiple playthroughs do solve this apparently as these stats can carry over. But personally, to think about going through a second playthrough when I've technically played this entry 2 and a half times, it can get really exhausting.

Apart from gameplay, the best highlight for me is the UI. Portable's UI is one of my favourite (if not my most) in all video games. I love how minimalistic yet stylish it is. Reload completely revamps it by using a water motif as a reference to the sea of souls, while also propping the protagonist. It never gets tiring to look at!

A mixed opinion I have is about the music. The new music is always great, which I think only P3 has been able to pull off compared to the others regardless of version(for e.g. I'm not a fan of Shadow World and whatever 5 Royal's opening and battle theme are). But the old singer is definitely someone that is hard to replace. Although she performs amazingly in the new songs, and I have come to accept some of the remixes; She carries a sense of monotony compared to a relaxed yet somewhat carefree style that the old singer had. Maybe monotony fits with how the protagonist is, but this is just preference.

Overall, I think this remake was made with a lot of hard work and passion, trying to bring fresh ideas yet being faithful to the original version of 3. Although I felt tired of playing it at some point and started rushing, I'm still glad I had the opportunity to go through this journey one more time. I think it's going to take a lot longer now to check out Persona 5 Royal, but I will be looking forward to Episode Aigis this year!

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Today I'm Gonna Play: Before Your Eyes

This video came up on my recommended and I checked a few minutes of it. I love games that make use of unconventional controls so I checked it out.

I won't go too much into the story to avoid spoiling, but it's quite straightforward and emotional that I was bawling by the end of it. A couple of the themes shown really hit close to home. But it also made me smile, or get surprised, so it wasn't all sad!

The neat part is how well the gameplay ties in with the narrative. The game works best if you have a webcam, as it tracks when you blink which helps progress the story. Sadly, as much I appreciate the experimentation of this mechanic, it's also a bit clunky and often thought I was blinking when I wasn't, making me skip a few parts at times. The game does have a calibration feature by pressing spacebar, which sometimes helps and sometimes doesn't do much. If you don't want to use a webcam, you can still play the game as it would detect mouse clicks instead. Other than that, it does use mouse clicks in general for some bits as well as tracking the game camera to areas where you have to blink. It's pretty neat!

Overall, this was a really touching game and one I would remember for a long time. If you don't have a webcam but want to use it, you can use DroidCam for smartphones and PC to use your smartphone as a camera instead. I recommend trying it out with a webcam at least once!

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Today I'm Gonna Play: A Short Hike

There was this video essay by Razbuten I came across long ago that mentioned this game (link). I did hear good things of it as well, so I thought to try it!

This game was a lot more open than I expected, watching a video about it was one thing, but actually playing it was another. Even though the game is set in a specific area of a mountain with signage posted across the site, there's actually a bunch of different ways you can go about to your destination. It also managed to do something that only a few games have done to me (such as GTA V and RDR 2), which was to get distracted by my main objective and take detours, finding treasure or meeting folks, which unlock a plethora of features and minigames that you can do at anytime. I love the socialization bits and getting to do things together with them. It genuinely felt like a cozy living world that won't go anywhere. It encourages you to think and grow with your skills to face challenges, which seemed like a theme in the game.

Overall, this is really enjoyable. It scratches an itch with the social aspects that some cozy games couldn't give me, and it's great to play as a low stress game too!

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Today I'm Gonna Play: Paranormasight: The Seven Mysteries of Honjo

I did see mentions of this on social media and the art style caught my eye, but upon checking the genre tags on Steam as well as other descriptions, I was disappointed to find out that it's a horror game because I'm horrible at handling it. Despite that I've been hearing good things about it as time passed, and I do tend to use this blog as a way to write about games I play and how I feel about them, I thought it would be good to face my fears for once and just try it out.

So unfortunately, there are a lot of jumpscares in the game. Even with regular dialogue moments where characters just pop out of nowhere with no sense of transition. So I often get startled because of that, and found it a bit annoying. I'm not sure if it was done on purpose or not to spook the player. However, the jumpscares in this game are not the worst things I've seen, so I've been able to sleep easy.

But aside from that, the presentation is pretty top notch. There's a blend of using realistic backgrounds with watercolour like effects, grain, and chromatic abberation really sell it as a horror TV spectacle, which I think is what the game is going for. Gen Kobayashi is one of my favourite artists thanks to The World Ends With You and I love how the characters look distinct from one another. It's kind of making other, usual anime designs look same-y in comparison.

Another nice feature of the game is its gameplay. Because it's so unique and not so unique at the same time, that is to say... there are no gimmicks or novel puzzles of the sort like you'd see in other popular adventure games like DanganRonpa or Zero Escape. It's just your mouse (or controller) and your brain. There aren't many ''gameplay'' aspects in this, and I don't really want to explain without spoiling but when it does, it does them in an immersive manner due to its presentation. Some very surprising parts involved using the menu in order to progress. But if you typically like games that have more puzzle elements, then this won't be the game, as apart from these it's mostly choice-based.

I don't have any real drawbacks to mention due to my lack of experience in horror games. Personally, even for a visual novel/adventure game, I find it to be a bit too wordy when it comes to having to check lots of files to ensure you're choosing the right answer. It felt quite overwhelming especially as more information gets added on over time. This could also be because I'm not really into occult and paranormal stuff. A few tiny tidbits that were mentioned about art piqued my interest, but that's about it. I even managed to guess some twists due to experience from other games, so the story to me is not so unique.

Overall, this was an interesting game to try out, even though the premise is not my cup of tea. Still, I would be more interested in seeing future works from the writer (Takanari Ishiyama) if he chooses to do non-horror settings.

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Today I'm Gonna Play: Littlewood

I came across this game when looking for something cozy and casual to get into. I'm also not too into farming sims which a lot of cozy games are saturated with, so I thought to see what this game has to offer.

The premise is a little interesting as you play as a hero who saved the world but has amnesia. Your town is wrecked so you're tasked to rebuild it as you meet new folks who eventually come to live in the town.

The gameplay scratches a combination of things I wanted from other cozy games. You get to place buildings (as well as some interiors for houses) and pretty much any object whereever you like, as well as do a little terraforming. The freedom of creating a perfect town is a nice idea for those that want creative freedom, but not for those that prefer randomly generated lands which would come across as more ''natural''. Aside from building, you can also collect bugs, chop wood, break minerals, fish and collect weeds, farm, etc.. It's very much akin to Animal Crossing: New Horizons in particular. Aside from towns, you can also go looking for resources around other areas in the region to get rarer items, with slight combat mechanics from what I've seen. It adds a nice variety from just staying in town.

However, I'm seeing a couple flaws it carries from what New Horizons also seems to have as far as I know. The townspeople you meet are pretty much mostly friendly with you and are quirky at best, but not much depth going on (understandably for a solo dev made game). They do have backgrounds however and mention how the hero (player) interacted with them in the past which is nice. Sometimes you will see tidbits of conversation with other NPCs but this is rare from what I've played so far. The customization for the town is also limited, such as all structures being front facing (think Pokémon games, such as from gen 1-3) and cannot be rotated. The overall game also seems to act like a lite-version of what other games focus on with more depth (e.g. Stardew Valley or older Animal Crossing games). But maybe that is the intention, which is okay.

Overall, Littlewood is nice to play in times where you just want to turn your brain off and chill. It's not something I can see playing for longer periods compared to other games, but it is nice to see a game that touches upon its mechanics on a surface level. It could be fun for players that want to play something without putting too much thinking or effort, zero stress. And despite it feeling like a -lite, I actually prefer playing this over anything else in the genre.

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Today I'm Gonna Play: Love and Deepspace

I came across this video a couple months ago of a really high poly guy and thought it was CGI made by someone talented. Turns out it was an upcoming otome game for mobile?! I replaced my phone recently so this was a good time to look forward to trying something with high-end graphics for this platform.

My experience with Otome games isn't much. I've played those dating sims that a few friends were very into back in school on DeviantArt, notably by Zeiva and Pacthesis. This was my entry to the Visual Novel (VN) genre, but I didn't understand the appeal of of liking 2D guys. Fast forward and I've also played a couple otome VNs on mobile and dabbled slightly on PC and even though I find a few interesting love interests based on appearance and personality, I STILL didn't get the appeal, until I finally played Mystic Messenger two years ago and got my heart shattered and was rejected by my love interest lol. This idea of having a social messaging format with calls for a mobile game is one of the most creative things I've seen for both the VN genre as a whole as well as the mobile platform. I don't know if any other VNs have done something like this before.

What Love and Deepspace does, is basically take that same format and iterate upon it with its worldbuilding. But it doesn't stop there. The real selling points of this game is that it uses very high quality 3D models akin to Final Fantasy CGs and also have real-time action combat. This seemed like a combo I never thought would exist, but I'm sure as hell glad to see it. Apart from chatting and calls using your own created avatar, it includes other features such as micro blogs which are Twitter-esque, so you can like and comment on the other characters' posts, and sometimes make your own. There are interaction features with the love interest, by being able to touch him, ask him things, and even things like listening to heartbeats or blowing on him using your mic?? It's another level of immersiveness! Minigames also exist which add to the story, such as claw machines (which are actually not to rigged compared to real life), playing cards, taking photos, and mini stories or audio that you can obtain from gacha.

The gacha aspect is not related to obtaining your love interest like in other gachas, but rather it's unlocking additional content about them, such as the mini stories. These stories tend to look like casual hangouts or even romantic dates. I'm not sure if there are any intimate scenes or not so far.

The story is not bad, I'm intruiged by the lore and the overall world as I like futuristic settings. There's a lot of info dump in documents and such that you typically see in gachas or RPGs, but this is one of the few times where I actually read through them. And surprisingly, the protagonist (you) is actually a lot more competent than expected!

The only issue I have is that the way the story is presented makes the characters look like they don't know each other yet and are distant, which is fine. But the romance parts you unlock through gacha or other features of the game seem more affectionate so it feels quite disjointed. It makes me feel confused on how I can piece these moments together.

Another nitpick although minor is that the daily stamina that you can obtain through login times don't seem to sync up in local time, so I'm assuming it's based on China's time zone instead. I've mostly been on this game during the evenings which make me miss both of them. It's a bit of a weird decision for international players.

I've also seen comments online about the lack of a male character or other gender options. I also agree that this would be nice to have. But I also acknowledge that this game is primarily aimed towards women (therefore an otome game), and since it's a Chinese game, I'm not sure if they would allow any type of BL in it. This could cause a bit of disinterest for international players. The only option I can see is to provide a larger variety of options for the current female avatar (which is also a complaint even amongst women playing the game), which could also have the avatar look a little more masculine presenting, etc. This could be a slight workaround towards any censorship laws while also allowing for more diversity. Plus technically speaking, the advantage of shorter hair or buzz cuts etc. would also mean less complex hair rigging (like with long hair) so it may be easier to animate and handle.

Overall, this game has huge potential that could transform romance/otome games for mobile like Mystic Messenger if all goes well. This will be another mobile game I'll keep playing!

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Today I'm Gonna Play: Inside

I got Limbo and Inside from the Epic Games giveaways long ago, and tried Limbo for the first time during the pandemic. I didn't try it prior because of its horror-like aesthetic and I don't deal with horror well, but I ended up loving it. I decided to wait to play Inside when I felt like it, which has now finally happened.

Because of its open-ended ness, there's not too much for me to say, nor do I want to give an interpretation because that's the beauty of games like this where it may mean something unique to everyone. The production value for this title has really been upped. Even though it has a different aesthetic to Limbo, there's something very clean about the visuals. But it's an eerie kind of clean with how the game is set up. The atmosphere feels a lot more naturally tense compared to Limbo with its puzzles and deaths. Speaking of puzzles, Inside does them in a way that fits the narrative and environment very cleanly, making a nice use of silhouettes and lighting which is impressive! To an extent, they also feel easier to do because of that.

I don't have any cons to say so far, as I don't have any real qualms about the game other than wishing there was an actual soundtrack like Limbo. The only thing I can say is that I do need to be in a more relaxed headspace to tackle this game. Despite the easier puzzles compared to its predecessor, some parts really stress me out which I don't want to deal with after a long day. So depending on one's mood, this is either great to play in a single evening, or it's better to have your sessions spaced out. But this is definitely worth playing if you enjoyed Limbo.

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Today I'm Gonna Play: Mafia II (Original version)

Almost a decade ago I had a period where I was addicted to Grand Theft Auto's formula for some reason. I played IV but didn't have the proper specs to play V, so I looked for similar games. The Mafia series came up and 2 was the latest at the time, so I got it. It definitely fit the bill although at some point I ended up rage quitting early on. This time I've decided to revisit and finish it.

Because this series gets compared to GTA a lot, I had the impression that this would be GTA-levels of open world. In a way, it is. You can drive around, buy clothes, eat at places etc. But the game is divided into chapters because it places story first. There's not much to explore in the city as it is to just get from one place to another. It's not really a bad thing, as other games have done something similar such as No More Heroes (Although I think that game implemented it in a strange way and wouldn't be worse off if it removed the open world). I wouldn't say that the world is boring either for the most part, the first half of the game really sets a nice ambience despite being set in the 40s during World War II. Driving in the freezing cold with the radio on made me feel a type of nostalgia for a time I never lived in. I love it when games do that. The second half shows a revitilization of the States post-war, with the country going through advancements and a time of peace, which is pretty great too.

The gameplay has a bit of variety going on, unlike GTA's usual methods of ''go to location > shoot people > go to location". Although this is present here, there are a number of stealth segments that condemn violence, mundane tasks that regular people would realistically do, and escorts (which is also present in GTA). It's nice to see this kind of formula be done in a different way. Do I prefer it over GTA? I can't say. Maybe with the right budget and polish this could be more interesting. I don't consume a lot of gangster or mafia media, nor do I know too much about their culture and history, so I don't have any suggestions or improvements, other than wondering if there is a game or series that really tries to be accurate and takes upon the opinions of people that actually live the lifestyle, like the Yakuza series for example.

The story is alright. It's a bit more serious and cast is somewhat interesting, mostly the protagonist Vito and his friend Joe. They really remind me of Niko and Roman from GTA IV. War veterans that end up in the US and are helped by someone close who's a bit of a goof, except Joe is way more likely to stand up for himself and make a good living. It even follows the structure of starting from the bottom and climbing the ladder to the top, which I think is the standard formula for this type of story. If I recall correctly, Scarface and The Godfather also have a similar structure.

As for cons, the controls feel quite clunky in the two most important aspects of the core gameplay: Shooting, and driving. Shooting is a lot better if you use keyboard and mouse, but it's not great on controller. I prefer to play most games on controller these days for better sitting posture and playing too close to the screen. But driving is quite bad in both modes. It seems like open-world games have a hard time figuring out the handling part of driving a vehicle. It's like I'm slipping on soap every time I turn. It doesn't help that I end up accidentally bumping into a car which puts me on a chase if the police is nearby. Other culprits that had this issue were games like Watch_Dogs and Cyberpunk. GTA on the other hand is a hit or miss but has managed to grapple with it fairly with IV and V. Games should really prioritize handling if driving is a major aspect of transportation, otherwise it's a huge frustration.

Additionally, sprinting is a nightmare. Not due to poor controls but rather the camera itself which shakes a lot when you run. I'm not sure if this mechanic has been playtested much but even as someone that doesn't really get motion sickness (I can play the Mirror's Edge games without the reticle) but this made me feel woozy every time I used it. There's no way to turn it off, and unfortunately nobody has made a mod of it either. So my only choices was to just look at the minimap or away from the screen to get to where I want to go.

Another frustrating aspect is that the game has no autosave or even manual save. Rather, it has sparse checkpoint saves that are at least guaranteed to occur after a finished chapter. This is frustrating if I have other commitments I need to get to in real life but cannot drop the game, but luckily I've strategized my time well, plus the game's chapters are typically short too. But I still don't like the idea of not having frequent saves, or at least checkpoint saves.

Some of the dialogue is also a bit iffy, although this is wholly subjective. A number of what's depicted and said towards minorities would not be tolerated today. There are a few instances where a game may use hateful language to depict a historical time, such as Red Dead Redemption 2, and this may be the case here too since it's set in an older time period. But I think it was done a bit excessively, as it gave me the impression that the game really liked to make use of slurs a lot, especially towards one ethnic group due to their presence in the story. RDR 2 on the other hand, did use slurs too but it was done sparingly, and also had a number of characters highly discourage hateful behaviour just to be safe. As much as telling an authentic story is important, video games are more interactive as a medium and can therefore be more influential (especially with how people can be online), so it is something to be a little careful of. I also noticed that the collectibles, which involved nude magazine pictures were more for satisfying typically masculine desires. But regardless, I understand that this game was made in a different time, and it's interesting to see fictional media do different takes on social issues which may conflict with my values from time to time. The developers also seem to acknowledge this as a warning message is apparently displayed in the Definitive Edition.

Overall, this game is nice to go through for those interested in gangs in fiction, or want a shorter and more story focused version of GTA. The frustrating gameplay make me hesitant to try any other entry of the series, but maybe I might change my mind in the future.

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Openings that I think age very well

Kingdom Hearts II (2005)

Persona 4 (2008)

Final Fantasy XIII (2009)

Sonic Unleashed (2008)

Need for Speed - Hot Pursuit 2 (2002)

Black Rock Shooter: The Game (2011)

Borderlands (2009)

Fable II (2008)

World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King (2008)

Darkstalkers 3/Vampire Savior: The Lord of Vampire (1997)

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Today I'm Gonna Play: Spider-Man Remastered (PC)

This is a game I've been wanting to play for a good while. Spider-Man's (will shorten to SM or Spidey as I write) my favourite superhero (but I can't call myself an expert about him, I'm still casual in comparison), but anyway I finally got my hands on it!

It's been a long time since I've played any Spidey game. I've tried a couple, such as The Amazing Spider-Man (TASM) for Android, TASM 2 on PC, Web of Shadows, Edge of Time, and the PSP port of SM2. I may revisit one of these games in the future to compare with Insomniac's version, as my memory with most of these games are a bit muddy.

But if there's one thing that really stands out, is the traversal. I don't think I recall ever playing a SM game that has this much of fluidity. It's realistic where the webs actually stick to surfaces and not the sky, and there's a great use of momentum to build up speed and keep it going. I can see why I heard good things about this part.

There's a great amount of detail put into the city of New York apart from just swinging around and going to story markers. You do have lots of collectibles to get which helps upgrade skills, suits, or gadgets (which is a really neat system that's been in other titles too), and there's always some crime fighting time to keep your hands busy. It does make the city feel alive, and it also made me realize just how busy and exhausting being a superhero must be. There's also some neat features like taking pictures of landmarks, or being able to interact with the citizens, which I really loved!

One unexpected but interesting thing was that I wasn't expecting the gameplay to have variety. Most games, if not all from what I remember, just let you play as Spidey himself, and maybe sometimes as Peter. But this one does both, AND more! Although you can only play as one superhero, the others either offer puzzles or mostly stealth missions to take on, which really put me at the edge of my seat. I've developed an attachment to these characters so them being in danger really got me concerned for them!

Onto cons, I can only say that the game relies way too much on collectibles in terms of game content. Although they offer different game modes, they tend to be too similar to the random crime events that occur, like going on a chase, or aiming your camera towards something. It would be nice to add more variety, or decrease the amount of collectible challenges going on. For those that love collecting, this game is a gold mine. To me, it's quite overwhelming and same-ish. Maybe adding some choices like Web of Shadows, or doing smaller tasks that a superhero would do (like, I dunno... maybe something is about to fall on a random citizen) would add to the realism of the game rather than fighting crime all the time, similar to what Spider-Man 2 for the PS2 did with pizza deliveries, interestingly enough. Open world games like this could reference Rockstar's games such as GTA V and Red Dead Redemption 2 on how to create a living world (that does not have to be big, because size shouldn't be an indicator of quality).

Apart from that, I did encounter some bugs where an enemy would get stuck and the button prompt wouldn't appear, or some QTEs wouldn't register, and this forced me to restart the mission. It was quite annoying but fortunately, it occurred just a handful of times.

Overall, I greatly enjoyed playing this, and would even consider it to be one of my all time favourites! I'll be taking my time with the DLC, and I'm looking forward to when I can play Miles Morales!

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Dragon Quest 3 (Enix, 1996)

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Today I'm Gonna Play: Mega Man X: Command Mission (Gamecube ver.)

My first introduction to the Mega Man series wasn't from the games but rather one of the anime series: NT Warrior. I remember thinking the character designs looked really cool, and I loved sci-fi/robotic characters at the time too. (Robotboy on Cartoon Network anyone?) I did get into a few games on the GBA and PSP but I sucked badly. So I thought, if I can't get into one of their mainline games, maybe I can try a spin-off? (Apart from Battle Network) And that's how I found this. Never thought they had a proper turn based RPG so I thought to check it out and emulate it.

Right off the bat, I want to commend the character designs. I always felt like that was the series' strong point, but everyone looks great here. Zero is my favourite character in the entire franchise but this is one of the few times where X looks amazing, and maybe even moreso than Zero himself. I just cannot stop staring at his model with awe, it's just SO cool with the red and yellow accents, the use of sharp yet rounded shapes, and this red energy scarf emitting from his back. Another character's design I love is Marino. I usually don't pay much attention to the female characters (although Ciel, and some renditions of Roll are very pretty and cute!), but I'm absolutely in love with Marino's design where a female character looks cool for once. I think the only other character I can think of is Aile from Mega Man ZX, which I haven't played yet. If Marino appears in other games I would totally love to play them!

Overall gameplay loop is simple. Get into random encounters and go through doors or elevators to proceed, fight a boss and repeat. But I have to say that this game now has my favourite RPG combat system, beating Final Fantasy X. That's because it has similar features, such as being able to switch your party members at any time, as well as showing your turns. There are also some elements of the weapons and sub weapons having different attributes although they have stats too, so you can switch around a bit. Although the game doesn't have a nodal system like the sphere grid in FFX, it has something called a Force Metal which are kind of like stat boosters, except you can only hold a couple of them, and some party members can have even more limited slots, for some reason. The reason that this system is my favourite is that it has what I like about FFX, but also doesn't use a menu like traditional JRPGs to input your commands, and instead has 4 simple button presses: Attack, 2 smaller attacks using the sub-weapon, an ultimate attack powered by a gauge, and a menu shortcut to access items or to defend and flee. This makes the usual turn-based combat go a lot faster than having to wait for the animations to play out and repeat.

The music is also pretty catchy for the most part. Lots of electronic beats that still hold up to today. The ending song is also really neat yet very eerie too, which was very unexpected.

The story is alright. I'm not knowledgeable about Mega Man lore in general, but from my understanding there's a group of bad guys that were after mining sources of Force Metal and it's up to X and the others to track them down. Not a lot of groundbreaking narratives going on although it had some interesting twists, but it's okay enough to just follow along with it without focusing on it too much, even though it won't be something I would remember in the future.

I do have some drawbacks though. Since it's an old game and an RPG too, it suffers from random encounters or more specifically TOO many random encounters. Some segments had puzzle sections and I could take two steps and get an encounter! Understandably, this feature existed for technical reasons at the time. But if a game were to release today with random encounters included for any reason (such as the Pokémon franchise), it's crucial to keep a balance on the encounter rate because too much of it frustratingly breaks the flow of the game. I had to take multiple breaks from playing just from getting exhausted with the amount of enemies I was encountering. What's worse, is that the EXP rate is so low that it makes grinding an absolute pain to go through.

The level designs aren't too great either. Because the game mostly uses corridors to navigate, a lot of it is just going straight with some occasional turns. The second half tries to include some puzzles and a lot of backtracking, but the map design felt a bit awkward to navigate around. I mostly had an issue with 1 chapter, but the rest were okay to go through. I think it's hard to make corridor style levels interesting, save one game from what little I've played which was Persona 5 Royal (It is something I'll properly play in the future). A mix of puzzles, exploration, and not making areas too narrow would do well.

Overall, I think this game has a lot of potential that's being held down by its own weaknesses and can definitely be improved upon if it were to get a sequel, or at least a remaster to be ported to modern consoles.

[todayimgonnaplay]

So apparently the pro-Tetris scene is exploding right now because a 13 year old nerd just reached the game's true killscreen for the first time ever