it really could've been way more funny and exciting, but it has way too many moments of "isn't this sad/relatable???" shoved in your face and it just makes it feel, ironically, out of touch. fantastic UI and art direction/pixel art, and how the game plays with the music is really genius, but i can see this easily being the next overrated """""mental health analysis/commentary"""""" thing....

most fun thing about it is the genuine balancing act of every attribute as the game 'ends' early if most are maxed out, unlike other raising sims where maxing everything is the goal.

Spoilers in the review because who even cares anymore

Steins;Gate is one of the most successful mess ever written. It is a confused, overlong slog devoid of characters, pacing and meaning. A walking shadow, a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage and then is heard no more. It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.

It presents itself as a comedic, thriller-themed, sci-fi-ish slice of life piece about a group of wacky nerdy friends, as aware and believable in their roles as the big bang theory’s cast, which spends the first half of the game concluding nothing of relevance and the latter half of the game undoing the former. There is a significant attempt to deliver a message about the importance of free will in humanity, about our own limits, to face and accept the choices and consequences of our own free will and actions, establishing that we cannot have an ideal, easy, cotton-candy life because there is always a part of the world beyond our control, that we do have an impact on the world, and then the message is sent down the flush because we need an happy ending so here’s the resolution done off-screen for the main characters and believe in yourself, coincidence and improvisation will solve every conflict. Hours after reading through the misery of characters you are supposed to like, the game just gives you the comfortable solution that none of that matters, people will still be happy and you have to pretend those conflict never existed.

The protagonist, okabe, is a useless slab of wasted air, he fancies himself a science genius when he has no theoretical expertise aside from googling and reading stuff on Wikipedia and online boards, no technical skill, if it were not for the clear instructions others give him. Every major important concept in the story is introduced, theorized, discussed, solved and then engineered by someone else, he just uses them with barely knowing how any of those work. He also behaves like a daft twat for half of the game toward anyone, yet people still stick around him and act like he’s a dear friend despite being showered in his chauvinism, arrogance and terrible, terrible manners. When at the midpoint of the story he’s supposed to grow and start act like a caring individual, as said before he just undoes and forgets gradually every conflict his ‘friends’ have, and when he has to face the consequences of his actions, once again someone else hands him the deus ex machina, without him having to do any effort except crying and be sad about it for a bit. You aren’t even given the time to assimilate and feel the weight of the events, as you already expect a convenient solution to be on the way by that point.

The pacing is all over the place: many chapters that should be focused on progressing the story just digress and forget any sense of urgency despite time being the central idea of the story. A whole chapter is dedicated to having someone win a yu-gi-oh tournament, which isn’t even the main conflict of the arc’s protagonist, and then the real issue is presented and quickly dealt with in ten minutes before undoing it again and moving on to someone else’s life to ruin. This is gorilla-tier writing, how do you spend over half of your chapters’ length like this, with no editor to cut out the unnecessary bits, is beyond me.

The side cast is a mix of unfunny, clichéd anime tropes, with the major actors being a dumb happy-go-lucky girl whose major defining traits are being dumb and happy-go-lucky, a supposedly genius engineer and hacker constantly acting like a dangerous sexual molester, a psychotic super soldier so stupid she’d forget to eat or breath if you didn’t tell her to, another psychotic super soldier which should solve all the plot within minutes of playing start but there’s another idiot I guess, the genius tough but shy girl that should sound conflicted but actually has an emotional disorder and is just made fun of by everyone else, writer included. I didn’t even touch upon the token moe stereotype with no growth because, let’s face it, all the female characters can easily apply for the role.

The CGI and character design are hideous, poorly drawn, with terrible proportions and depth, weird colouring, unnatural and unhuman faces, body proportions and expressions (those eyes will hunt me in my sleep), that make the story seem like it takes place in alternate universe where everyone is the creature from the movie ‘the fly’. Credit where credit is due, the voice acting work and sound is pretty impressive, there are some really powerful tracks in the background music and most of the voice actors, from miyano mamoru to seki tomokazu, from tamura yukari to googling imai asami, each of them play their roles and the emotions they should convey very well.

That being said, even as a sound novel steins;gate is still overlong and riddled with dumb twists and nonsense to serve shock value rather than compelling, meaningful progression and satisfying conclusions based on its own terms, development and themes. If you want a visual novel dealing with sci-fi and thriller there’s plenty of dumb fun to be had with the nonary games, as bad as those can get, or just read chaos;child and experience the better sci;adv novel.

The moment I downloaded Wonderful Everyday, I realized that I’ve made a terrible mistake, as alongside the game’s installation folder there was a file that redirected to a website called “Fap for Fun”. Despite trying to deny its very essence, Subarashiki Hibi always felt like an erotic game first, and a drama story second. The themes that it tries to tackle such as lack of proper treatment and respect to mental illnesses, cult mentality and its propagation, and ironically, porn addiction, are hidden beneath a total of disheartening 17 explicit h-scenes, that are most of the time directly tied to the story, instead of “bonus scenes” that you can turn on and off in the menu.

The story is filled with moments that start off tackling a properly interesting theme or topic and then proceed to take a complete 180, becoming just another harmless predictable scene that vomits cliché hentai tropes. The appeal of subahibi comes from the fact that there are some genuinely great and creative segments of storytelling that could only ever be experienced in a visual novel format, but those precious moments are deep within a sea of ecchi mediocrity. You might be asking yourself, “how worth is this dive?”, and to properly answer that, and also why such a specific eroge gathered a cult following as a fourth eye opening provocative narrative, we first have to talk about how VN’s tend to implement this type of adult content (If you are sensitive to topics such as these, please sit this one out).

Lewdness has always been associated with visual novels, no matter where you look at it. Whether we’re judging possibly the first one ever released, or some other “classics” such as sex, and it’s perfectly named sequel, sex 2, and many other games mostly for the pc-98, these titles found a lot of success predominantly aiming towards a lonely straight male demographic. The inclusion of either full on explicit h-scenes or elements from dating sims, sometimes even both, was to be fully expected in this media’s infancy. Stories during this period sometimes avoided this topic altogether, however, that was a gamble not everyone decided to take, as the mere inclusion of some sexual content would likely increase for sure the number of people who would want to give your novel a shot. After some years, a weird symbiotic relation started to develop, as a lot of independent novels from the early 00’s tried to hook the viewer with promises of showing NSFW material, but made them keep wanting to read until the very end, due to the proper story that it was telling.

Tsukihime, for example, would not only work, but also be massively improved without every single despicable fetishized rape scene or dialogue mention. It’s very telling that in the 2021 remake of the novel, the studio behind it decided to pretend that all h-scenes didn’t happen and adapted the script to it, essentially turning the story into a proper cohesive shonen that doesn’t perform mental gymnastics to justify rape whenever possible, solidifying it as the definitive way to experience the novel. In a less extreme case, we can also take a glance at Higurashi, who early on put a lot of emphasis in long fetishized sequences that replicated staples from ecchi stories, but gradually stopped being as frequent, as the narrative started to find its footing, besides some occasional nods in bad taste from Ryukishi07. What makes Higurashi’s case interesting, is the fact that it’s the opposite approach from Subarashiki Hibi: The ecchi scenes contradicted one of the game’s themes about child protection, while in Wonderful Everyday, you'd see even more scenes depending in how essential to the theme the chapter was.

Through the years, visual novels started to gradually become more and more respected as a media in no small part due to works such as the previous ones mentioned. By slowly being freed from its private horny jail, a wave of new stories started being developed for other demographics, like straight women or non horny men, eventually attracting the attention of people outside of Japan. The late 00’s were marked by some novels being developed, translated, and appreciated by foreigners, which even saw some works from previous years such as Saya no Uta, Umineko and Fate/Stay Night gathering a considerable late cult-like following as classics.

Despite all that however, Subahibi opted to tackle themes strictly tied to pornography, and it still became relatively famous around the newer circle of VN’s that westerners appreciated. Direct comparisons to the infamous 'Boku no Pico' anime can be made, as both weren't the first nor best ones to tackle niche erotic themes in a media mostly seen at the time outside of Japan as "something for kids". Both of them ended up gathering attention due to the timing and difficulty of access to other products of the same medium during their respectable releases.

Written primarily aimed towards a straight male demographic and with the premise of showing gratuitous NSFW material, it has a completely pointless first chapter that lasts around 4 hours and is solely made as a symbiotic hook. After reading the novel to its full extent and revisiting the beginning chapter, I hoped to find a new meaning to what exactly happened, but it just left me feeling very disappointed. A pattern that you'll see from the novel that plays an important role in the chapter, is that there are plenty of useless name drops to a lot of other "intellectual media", that has little to do with the story. The only use for such is that it tries to show some validation to the reader to what they are reading, as in pretending it's an actual respectable story that just so happens to have a generic and forgettable anime art style.

This is your warning for spoilers now, if you’re still thinking about giving this one a shot, please do keep in mind that it’s somewhat long and tackles frail topics without proper respect.

The second chapter thankfully denies the eroge counterpart and goes for a more eerie atmosphere, showing the ascension of the typical nerd loser, Mamiya Takuji, as an actual God among men. This was a very surprising yet welcome change, and in hindsight I appreciate this chapter more, as it could have been the start of something great, however, it also has some of the shallowness the early chapter had, but in a different way. I didn’t care for the opening chapter at all but I always understood why they were acting in such a one dimensional porn-like way, meaning that even if the scene was just an excuse to show a panty shot, it would still make some sense narrative-wise. In the second one however, Yuki, the protagonist once again, and everyone else involved, acted in a way that felt like their actions were randomized. It mostly makes sense in the hours to come after the “twist” but that doesn’t help the fact that it’s just another 4 hours of infodump done wrong as Yuki only opts to delve deep in the subject of the underground forum and not answer some other key areas. Essential plot points such as Mamiya’s family, or the twins suddenly acting aggressive towards him, or pretty much everything relating to Zakuro, who was the most important part of the opening chapter, are put under a pretentious rug called "Don't think about it too much".

It’s really interesting seeing how she reaches to some logical conclusions while reading, but it’s similar to a game of Clue, where you’ll discover what happened and feel good about it, but in the end you were so unattached to the characters that you just accept Colonel Mustard probably just wanted to use that knife in the Hall. Things aren’t better for Mamiya’s side, as the only real segment of him showing some faint semblance of distinctive personality was in one of the most embarrassing written scenes I have ever seen in any visual novel.

Takuji’s pitiful speech, his spotlight moment, is one that can only truly be impressive for those that, to put it nicely, like to mention quotes or name drop philosophers without knowing what they stood for, which should say something about the shallowness of most VN’s as the scene is hailed as a sort of “redpill”. His discourse is plagued with small problems, but one of the most fundamental ones is that death became suppressed dogma in modern society, which doesn’t make sense if you also argue that philosophy fundamentally changed it’s key areas with time, and that religion is a type of philosophy, which is true by definition but doesn't give room for your point. If you are confused, it's like arguing how old movies embraced nationalism as a fundamental part of their stories and then argue that there is a conspiracy nowadays to have movies not embracing this pillar, without realizing that it was something related to the time period instead of the media, while also agreeing that movies changed fundamentally with time which leads to the development of a direct counter culture.

When called out by Yuki, who makes a flimsy and flawed argument for someone that reads Kant, about how he sees human lives, Takuji argues that it’s not charlatanism because “the only thing that matters is that he is right in the end”. All that was missing from this scene was a Big Bang Theory laugh track to finish it off: the amazing manifest that ends with the argument “I’m the chad and you’re soyjack”. The point of the scene, as pointed out by a friend, is to display that Takuji is wrong, as he even hits a girl in the class and talks about how people attribute others as being crazy when they don’t understand, which internally forced the author into writing others as the dumbest human beings possible, even making the history teacher respond to Mamiya with “I don’t know” when asked what part of what he said was wrong. In retrospect I partially agree with my friend’s take, but I think the framing and the fact that he was shown to posses godlike powers makes me think that they wanted to sneak in some truths in his arguments to justify him being in the wrong by just making him unnecessarily aggressive and rude, like how Marvel wrote Black Panther’s villain, Killmonger, in the 2018 movie.

Third chapter is all about Takuji’s point of view, which makes the second chapter nearly useless and redundant, as his point of view is far more interesting and makes Yuki’s actions feel more humane as she doesn’t seem like your typical dumb yet top notch detective. This is THE CHAPTER for h-scenes, featuring a lot of gratuitous sexual violence that are handled very poorly, hitting nearly every slot in the kink bingo: rape, feminization, bdsm, more rape, futanari, public humiliation, more rape again, torture, dismemberment, and of course, even more rape. The unlikely underdog story from rape victim to serial rapist is just flat out disrespectful and ends up helping me prove my point that there isn’t a single piece of media that benefited from flat out showing rape scenes instead of making them simply implied. After enduring an entire sequence in which Takuji is abused in every way possible, and knowing what happened in the previous chapter, and how he treated Zakuro to this games most gratuitous sex scene ever, all that I could think was how he would do everything the same if he was in their places but much worse, to which latter parts of the VN proved me right. I hope everyone will agree with me on this one when I say this is the most ill-mannered way to write a story on the subject.

Chapter 4 is all about an abuse victim who starts seeing visions of God telling her to kill herself as revenge, to which the game shows that it was the right thing to do in later chapters. No further comments.

Jabberwocky onwards, is when the story finally compensates for you enduring the hot steamy garbage from before. It’s a chapter about Mamiya’s most hated bully, Yuuki Tomosane, the only actually good character in the story. Tomosane’s chapter is fascinating, it pulls the rug and explains the twist that he and Yuki were personalities developed by Takuji, they all lived in the same house, and the twins didn’t actually exist as individuals. The framing is also top notch, making you know what risks he’s taking even if you think you know how it’s going to end. Mind blowing after mind blowing scene shows a new perspective I didn’t thought was possible from the story, which made this chapter, excluding the massively homophobic comments, a blast to read. The sequel chapters, Which Dreamed It and Jabberwocky 2, are also really welcome additions to the story, although not as jaw dropping, that expand the narrative in meaningful ways that have the unfortunate consequence of making Mamiya’s torturous life feel “justified”.

2 / 3 of Subahibi is dedicated for making the reader as tortured as the girls in the story, which tries to make up for the last 1 / 3 which gives the feeling that you’ve conquered the narrative, taking a stance against what was stablished early on. That’s a really interesting concept, however, it was one that was done better in a novel that you might have heard about: The House in Fata Morgana. Written in a way that’s more mature, gracious, and made to scare easily impressionable VN fans, it deals with dark themes as well, but with a proper respect for the situation in which the characters find themselves in. The also really competent sequel, A Requiem for Innocence, talks about similar themes from Subahibi which are it’s main justification for shoving garbage eroge topes, having the characters live in a brothel and dealing with an oppressive threat that haunts their frail psychology. Their themes are obviously not comparable on a 1 to 1 basis, however even if it's lowest points, one shows the other that you don’t have to treat every female character as pawns that merely exist to fuck when a male character so desires.

Main point is, what Wonderful Everyday does well, is done better in other visual novels, and what it does wrong, could only be done poorly here. Unless you really like the sensation of scavenging through hours of garbage to find gold that doesn't shine as bright as others given for free, maybe this one is not for you. If you still really want to know how this mess feels, I guess there’s no saving, since the premise is interesting nonetheless.

There is an undeniable value in early 10’s VN culture with Subahibi that made it stand out, however its vile and disrespectful approach to sensitive topics were a problem even when it launched, and it gets more outdated by the year as visual novels get more sophisticated, denying its origins as a media that started with a game in which you undress a minor for fun, and starting to develop more on the lines of being an interactive story. After multiple warnings by different people telling me to stop reading it, I endured through the end of Subarashiki Hibi hoping to find something that was clearly never meant to be there, as alongside the game’s installation folder there was a file that redirected to a website called “Fap for Fun”.

The true reveal of Metal Gear Solid 2 is not that we play as Raiden instead of Solid Snake - it's that the antagonist of the game does not exist. It's pulling back the curtain to find that the man behind it died a century ago. The most powerful nation on Earth is essentially an algorithm with a mind of its own, akin to a runaway train that everyone "in charge" pretends they are responsible for. There is no individual you get to blame. Not the politicians, not the CEOs of major corporations. Not even the current or former presidents of the United States have any idea of what's really going on. The algorithm will replace these people the second they stop being useful. In my opinion it's a much better conception of "the system" than what you see in most conspiracy fiction: a small, shadowy cabal of people pulling the strings from behind the scenes. The reality is that all of the powerful people we blame are just the ones who managed to latch on to the algorithm of capitalism and milk it for all they can. There is no grand design, nobody is in control, everyone responsible for setting this system into motion is long dead. Which is why Otacon says the Patriots "have been dead for 100 years".

Every choice you (and Raiden) make perpetuates this status quo, and every radical political cause (like Snake and Otacon's 'Philanthropy') is effortlessly co-opted by it. MGS2 conveys this idea in a way that only a video game could: By playing as Raiden, you are forced to directly confront the futility of any resistance. You can approach MGS2 in a million different ways with an expansive arsenal of tools, getting no kills or alerts and discovering every secret in the Big Shell, or do the exact opposite. But the end result is always the same: You kill Solidus, the only threat to the Patriots, after they explicitly tell you it's exactly what they want. If you opt out entirely and "turn the game console off" you're still doing something you were ordered to do. Even if you choose not to play, you lose to the Patriots. MGS2 places you in the position of the post-information age, digital subject: Imbued with detailed knowledge of every single way you are being oppressed and exploited, you still choose to follow orders. You are so overwhelmed by information, some true, some false, that is causes a kind of exasperated compliance.

This is simultaneously a commentary on the nature of video game stories as an immutable, pre-programmed series of events not as different from film narratives as we like to think; Any "choice" is always an illusion, whether it's in Metal Gear Solid or a Telltale game. Any game that sets out to fulfill the concept of "player freedom" in its story will always fail. Video games stories are (at their best) about interactivity, not choice. They let you play out a pre-ordained role and do some improvisation, not write the story. Kojima understands this, and it's why he borrows so much from film. It's also why the criticism that his games are too much like movies is kind of pointless; he's just recognizing the inherent similarities of the two mediums.

On a less meta level, this lack of free will in MGS2 underscores the reality that capitalism, American empire, the very norms and values of American society, whatever the antagonist of the game is - cannot be destroyed from within. It is a system that has achieved self-awareness. Any possible attempt to destroy it has already been anticipated with an infinite number of contingencies. Emma Emmerich gave her life to destroy the GW AI and it was just replaced with a backup. The battle has already been lost, and it was decided by a microscopic processor in a fraction of a second. Solidus (a perfect stand-in for the kind of right-wing populist we wouldn't see for awhile in 2001) was the only person in power trying to oppose the Patriots, but his fatal mistake was believing that the Patriots were essentially a deep state globalist cabal, rather than the nigh omnipresent force they really are (they aren't really a "they", but an "it"). Like Snake said, "the Patriots are a kind of ongoing fiction". But even the legendary Solid Snake, the archetypal hero who opposes the system with clear-eyed determination, is completely dumbfounded after the credits roll.

And that's because this enemy is simply beyond the abilities of one man, even if that man is a Snake. It can just create its own soldier to surpass Solid(us) Snake and even mass-produce them, and your actions throughout the game prove it. No tactical espionage action can defeat what is essentially an idea - one that has infiltrated the furthest depths of the human soul. The only hope lies on a society-wide level: An alternative has to be built by everyone from the ground up, through finding what is true and meaningful in life and passing it on to the next generation. Slowly, generation by generation, an alternative capable of opposing the great algorithm can be built. And it has to be one that people can have faith in, in a spiritual sense.

But the encroachment of the internet into our lives is making this less and less feasible. By replacing the traditional nuclear-armed metal gear with Arsenal Gear, an AI that controls the internet, Kojima is essentially framing the internet itself as a threat equal to or greater than that of nuclear weapons. It is an instrument of human separation much more powerful than the splitting of an atom. The quote at the beginning of Raiden's chapter tying computers and nuclear weapons together bolsters this interpretation.

The digital age has turned human life into a scrambled mess that is impossible to parse. We create entirely idiosyncratic, patchwork realities for ourselves by finding various "truths" through our own individual exploration of the internet and jury-rigging them together. We relate to each other less and less, and mental illness is widespread. This overload of information makes us increasingly neurotic, isolated, and unable to determine truth from fiction. The collective human mind is being broken (or at least pounded into a new shape) against the collective neuroses of the internet, and nobody knows what to do about it. We're all alone right now, each of us left with the isolating task of finding our own truth amidst the cacophony. Even the algorithm fears for our future, yet it's still the only entity with a solution: Censorship. Make the noise stop. Honestly, has anyone thought of a better idea?

Hammered the entire Bit.Trip series in release order (sans the Runner sequels) the night before Christmas, I have no idea what brought me to thinking this made any sense. My scores for each of the games may not be positively glowing - I just didn't find them all too enjoyable - but you can colour me VERY surprised by how much of a journey the series takes you on.
I had no idea at all that there is a canon to these games, essentially outlining Commander Video's conception, life, death and ascension. There's something a little corny about that on paper, that's the "emotional 2009-2011 indie game story" shorthand, but it's wonderfully obfuscated here by being told almost entirely through wordless gameplay.
Despite the Pong-like bookends at the start and end of the series, each entry plays very differently, but are always a little abrasively difficult. VOID was my favourite, it was a great Katamari-like arcadey concept where you have to be very cognisant of your greed and impulse control.

Left my ass cooked and crooked. Easy to let complaints of the rigidity of RPGmaker ATB combat and exploration fall to the wayside when the game's narrative doesn't miss a beat. OFF has a lot of unique ideas, and it tells them confidently with fantastic dialogue, surreal environments and an all around sense of style. For a game that paddles in the abstract so obscenely, the conclusion still manages to expertly close the book and leave the player with exactly what they need. Thanks for the stone in the gut.

This review will be mostly partial to the Level 50 (2.X) content that existed before the first Heavensward expansion dropped.

I completed Shadowbringers on release, and went into FFXIV hibernation until the Endwalker trailer got a few friends interested in giving the game a whirl. Eagerly jumped at the opportunity to make a new character on a preferred server, if only to see what impact the long-coming quality of life alterations had on the base game content.

As long as they pick the 'preferred server', newcomers receive a hefty exp bonus that I'd say nearly destroys any need even to do an unimportant sidequest or levelling duty finder. By the time the credits rolled, I already had two classes at level 50, which slaps hard. Considerable alterations were more recently made to the overall length of the 2.X quests - removing something like 18% of main story quests, and heavily abbreviating the ones that remain and adding the ability to use flying mounts in the old zones.

This all sounds really boring and granular, but honestly, it goes a long way into shortening what I'd essentially call the absolute worst content the game has to offer.
In general, it's not until you hit level 50 for your class' toolset will finally feel something close to 'fullness', allowing the player nigh-constant engagement with skill rotations and cooldowns.
It's also not until the post-credits content where the story gets promoted above... boilerplate? Characters become more clearly defined, and the story takes a turn into a fairly convincing political drama. That isn't to say admirable themes of growing into a legend while bringing the world together to heal the wounds caused by the calamity aren't present from the start, but I'm getting ahead of myself.

The base game is A Realm Unseasoned, but I find it all worth the effort. Not only is the writing fun in a quaint enough way, but the foundation for great things to come has been made a whole lot more painless to trudge through. I don't envy the FFXIV team's task of adding ever more floors to the monolithic retrofitted nightmareskyscraper that is the game's life structure. The first content you see is the oldest and most naive, and you just have to be patient enough to watch the game grow into something spectacular as you progress through the MSQ. One thing I find particularly impressive is how well the game eases players in with evenly spaced tutorials and tools you have to play to unlock. Far too many live-service games in rotation nowadays do a terrible job at teaching the player anything in a way that isn't intensely overwhelming.

An open world soulslike game, with a horse companion that can double jump, in a diverse open world written by George R.R Martin, where you can climb every mountain, sounds like a concept an unfunny gamer would come up with to post in 9gag. The post in question, would be called “The most EPIC souls game of all time”, and it would manage to get 32 upvotes and, a single comment saying “Why not at trending, sir?”, by a username with the ever so infamous Ugandan Knuckles as their profile pic.

Elden Ring is in fact a real game that was released just the other day, and made me and many others simply addicted to it, even if it feels unfinished and straight up broken sometimes. The foundation and feel of Elden Ring are so absurdly strong and well made that even when fighting the same optional boss with 3 attacks for the 4th time, or spending 10 minutes looking for invisible walls in a place that you will never go back to, or just wandering with your horse for 5 minutes looking for something cool besides a bunch of weak enemies scattered in the overworld to grab my attention, I never actually felt bored. To properly explain how they achieved this secret formula, which we’ll be seeing more in the future for sure, we have to talk about how and why they decided for a more open world approach.

“Nintendo hire this man” was a comment made by an anonymous on July 6, 2018, in a 4chan thread dedicated to mocking pseudo photorealistic renders and HD mods of Nintendo characters. The expression became iconic mostly for sounding like something an overly enthusiastic Nintendo fan would say, hoping that the company would change their usual conservative game and visual design approach for a more modern and intricate one, similar to what the majority of triple A’s were doing for years until that point. These feelings have existed before, but were never as prevalent, like with those "This will be x graphics in 2013" memes who mocked people who thought Nintendo would eventually invest more in the hardware side of the consoles during the Wii and Wii U gens, in order to produce more exuberant graphics. The term started to be later used to make fun of fan projects that implemented that lifelike aesthetic, and eventually moved on for even those that didn’t.

3D open world games exploded in popularity in the late 00’s, which drove fans to take their own unique take on some Nintendo franchises that didn’t get the proper treatment. The Zelda franchise was the company’s closest shot at it, as games up until that point were almost ideally open world, however you always had to do certain stuff in a specific order, similarly to a progression in a metroidvania title, which surely fulfilled the need of exploration for some, but many others still asked for a progression system around that instead of it being relegated to just side content. The idea of an ideally open world with Mario, Metroid, and most noticeably Pokémon, became the targets of multiple concepts, fan games, hacks, and even tech demos that tried to break the usual design conventions, mostly focusing around player freedom and diverse replayability.

One title that was famous during the fangaming period although not influencing much on the topic, was Demon Souls. Released in 2009, this PlayStation 3 classic uses what might resemble to be a chapter structure at first, however, utilizes inner-connectivity between places in a more similar structure of a crossroad, as in the player can choose to which road they will delve into, with subsequent paths leading for more areas in the same road. You could and sometimes should, go back to the point of origin and follow a different base direction than before while still not finishing the one you started, as those roads never connected to each other. It might not be as much of an open field when compared to previous Zelda games like Wind Waker or Ocarina of Time, but the branching paths gave a lot more progression flexibility and expression that Nintendo titles lacked.

Released 2 years after the game that ironically had one of the most “soulless” remakes of all time, Dark Souls requires no introduction at this point. The game allowed the player to go to a variety of areas early on, with somewhat contrasting levels of difficulty to the point that the path you chose was entirely up to you, eventually becoming a question of how much are you willing to challenge yourself. The intricacy of Dark Souls connectivity became a major selling point, as areas were tightly attached to each other, giving this atmospheric sensation that made the world feel more vivid. The way in which you’d reach some places like Valley of Drakes or Darkwood Basin depended entirely on what trajectory you wanted to follow this time.

Although that might seem as a definitive and unquestionable upgrade, the clarity in where you can and can’t go can be infuriating at times, as well as the frustrations of wandering aimlessly. However, just the knowledge in the back of your head that you could travel the entire map without the use of a fast travel system, a necessary mechanic utilized by games with this caliber, like The Legend of Zelda for example, ended up adding a lot to the atmosphere, as those games rarely ever went for such a pragmatic approach in most areas.

One sector that I think most will agree was a direct improvement however, was the fact that the areas in Dark Souls gave you, sometimes, multiple options in reaching their destination. Sure, some places like the Catacombs and Anor Londo may have one definitive manner in reaching their destination, but other locations like Blighttown or Darkwood Garden offer a multitude of inner ways, the first offering a variety of inner places to run from the chaotic domain, and the latter just being so open with different enemies scattered around, to the point that if you are aware of their placement, you could avoid every single encounter.

Sequels also came for the “Soulsborne” franchise, with Dark Souls 2 attempting something similar to Demon Souls, this time with an area, funnily enough, actually called crossroads. There were sections that lead to some other ones, like Huntsman’s Copse or Doors of Pharros, but most areas lead to places that mostly didn’t go anywhere beyond themselves, the only exception being Lost Bastille that could be accessed by 2 different ways, but it’s likely only there for show. Bloodborne came one year later and tried to improve and streamline a bit of it’s Dark Souls inheritance, expanding it's connected pathing while also not forcing the player to venture through the entire map as much, having almost half of its areas being completely optional.

Despite taking inspiration from different philosophies, both of these titles decided to keep the approach of having multiple ways available to walk in a designated section, with their own unique ideals of course. Bloodborne improved the previously somewhat used shortcuts, unlocking ladders and elevators in areas like Cathedral Ward or Forbidden Woods felt like making genuine progress not only by unlocking new areas, but also by connecting them, creating your own crossroads of some sort. Dark Souls 2 tried a more pragmatic approach, with levels requiring you to pass through the completely opposite directions to obtain one specific item or perform some sort of task, so that you can go back and advance normally, which leads to levels giving a weirdly retro vibe, as they seem similar to unlocking puzzles in old point and click video games.

Dark Souls 3 tried a more streamlined approach aimed towards beginners of the series with an overall universal balance, which gives an extremely simplified feeling that the navigation built throughout the years received a direct and undisputable downgrade. However, despite only having 3 branching points that lead to non connected places with 2 standalone optional ones, the areas themselves are made to be more open ended, like Smoldering Lake that gave you a multitude of options and allowing you to fight the boss without the need for exploration, and my favorite area in the series: Grand Archives. This late game section allows you to unlock different layers of elevators and stairs, while still using the bonfire in the bottom floor, giving a feeling of grandeur and conquering whenever you return to where you started, eventually reaching its top, from which you can still see the arduous path you took.

With the Launch of Sekiro a couple of years later, From Software decided to just improve in what they had with Dark Souls 3, improving in its highs with layers of verticality being available with the use of a grappling hook, but also adopting its lows as they just borrowed the same map philosophy. Another deliberate choice that may explain why they went for a more linear approach is the fact that the game was made to feel more cinematic, with beautiful sequences that are way more in-your-face about their magnitude, like the fight against Giant Serpents or Divine Dragon, a story told directly that everyone would be able to follow, and a complete overhaul in sound design and music genre to feel more authentic with the aesthetic.

Eventually, as the years would tell, gamers who leaned toward soulslike games would rather have freedom than gameplay balance. In conclusion, they appreciated having places being connected, and an option to neglect the use of fast travel as the definitive way of progressing, and approaching areas in multiple ways. Few people knew however, that being developed while Sekiro was midway through production, was a title that instead of trying to revolutionize their approach to combat, would attempt something even more daring.

Breath of the Wild, released in 2017, was the culmination of every knowledge that Nintendo gathered through the years, directly addressing the crowd that wished for a more exploratory experience, having only a somewhat intended first path that the game suggests you to give you a feeling of what’s to come, while still being just suggested. Whenever possible with modern design conventions, Nintendo would simplify it, gamify it, and make it look more distinct to the player, which we still appreciate and feel the impact years later. There are some elements that can be attributed as a souls influence, mostly with parry focused combat or the Lynels, but when asked about it, the series director Hidetaka Miyazaki, stated in an interview to Glixel that his game series weren’t even comparable to the sheer magnitude of Hidemaro Fujibayashi’s masterpiece, and claimed that any resemblance was just the Zelda franchise setting the footprints for 3D action games once again. We know for a fact that Elden Ring started development in the same year Breath of the Wild was released, which means that there is a chance that the following sentence might have been said:

“ From Software, Hire this Man “ - Hidetaka Miyazaki, regarding George R.R. Martin.

The answer to how to design areas allowing for more player freedom and expression while still being accessible for newer players became clear after taking a glance in Zelda’s first sandbox world: conurbation with path suggestion. From the very start of the game you have access in theory to 8 out of 11 areas without ever needing to fight a boss, however, for most players the number will be reduced to 5, as it requires advance knowledge in the game’s pathing. Besides rewarding players for mastering the game’s routes, which is good in its own right, the replayability of Elden Ring became by nature absurdly higher than those of previous titles, and allows players from every skill level to have a blast navigating in whichever choice they see fit.

For convenience purposes, the suggested path for a usual non turbulent progression in the map is displayed by arrows pointing in the map towards the next “recommended one”. As a treat for those who want a challenge or a change of pace, the game gives you plenty of ways to go other areas, like for example, reaching one of the game’s hardest areas by following the first road displayed in your map in a direction that’s opposite of the arrow in the bonfire pointing at. The areas have a clear and distinct cut between them, best exemplified in places like Caelid, which is neighbor of the starting area, that display a red crimson sky the moment you step in, showing that the following path will lead to suffering while also taunting you to give it a shot at its misery.

Just like Breath of the Wild, Elden Ring has a gigantic map full of curious locations, begging for you to find them, explore them to the maximum, and repeat the process with other ones. Instead of having an insane amount of shrines as the game's small dungeons, Miyazaki opted for fewer locations that feel more complete and fully realized, sometimes even having connections to other similar places like with the underground cave system. One of my favorite examples, without spoiling it, is what happens with Sifora Well after some specific pseudo-optional boss is defeated, genuinely some mind blowing exploration.

A proper jump button was also finally added this time, which made the very idea of leaping a tool that gives you more to work with while exploring and fighting, instead of a frustrating mechanic only ever used in brief and janky platforming sections. The area's verticality also increased dramatically, which can be perfectly seen in the game’s very first castle area, Stormveil castle. I’ve spent 2 hours in this castle, exploring the best I could as it took me a considerable time to realize I could jump higher to reach some areas that could only be accessed if you were playing Sekiro. There could be more, but I ended up finding 4 ways to reach the castle’s final area, where the inevitably oppressive boss fight awaited me. One of those routes can be accessed by walking normally throughout the area, other will require you to walk the same path but perform a platforming section that wouldn’t have been able to in previous titles, one will require you to take a completely different road that you can unlock with the use of an elevator in the middle of the first route, and the final one can be accessed by doing somewhat of a NPC side quest available the moment you reach the castle’s entrance.

Another thing important to mention is the overwhelmingly positive reception Elden Ring received when the foundation of how they would allow their areas for navigation was made public knowledge, obtaining 2 awards in the infamous yet sometimes adequate Game Awards, being the “Most Anticipated Game of the Year” in both 2020 and 2021. Elden Ring can be seen more clearly nowadays as a passion project from a director that grew up being inspired by Zelda Games, receiving another blessing in a time of need and arguably surpassing what he was inspired from. Under no other context, would a writer as prestigious as George R.R. Martin be invited to assist with a fantasy setting world building, his specialty, particularly after the devastating backlash from the adaptation of his most notorious work, Game of Thrones.

And now that we have finally established how we reached this point in approaching areas, and allowing the player to carve their own path, how’s the game beyond that?

Idk I think it's pretty good :)

This game's really good. You don't need me to tell you that. Anyway I wanna talk about something more tangentially related now.

So there's been this weird movement in the zoomer parts of our culture that goes by a lot of names. Weirdcore. Dreamcore. Nostalgiacore. Internetcore. Traumacore? Bunch of dumb names for what's essentially the same thing. It's a certain visual and auditory aesthetic thats supposed to evoke a general feeling of wistful nostalgia. I first became aware of this because of the weird resurgences of a bunch of indie acts that were relevant 10 years ago suddenly making a weird resurgence. I can safely say I would not have predicted zoomers getting really into shit like Roar, Crystal Castles, Nero's Day at Disneyland, Blank Banshee, Life Without Buildings, fucking Goreshit. All these random bands who peaked in relevance a decade ago all of a sudden are showing up on all your art hoe former-tumblr playlists along with Jack Stauber and Lemon Demon (and also spefically Falling Down from the Undertale OST, that song really captivates these people)

I mention this because somehow the Yume Nikki ost has been caught up in this entire "movement". Those feeling depressed for the first time zoomers sure do enjoy commenting weird stuff about how this song makes them want to "lay down in an open field in the rain" on the comments of the Snow World music in between whatever the fuck else they do all day. Go on TikTok, I guess? At first I was gonna call it mildly annoying, but the more I see this stuff the more I'm weirdly captivated by it. It's like watching a bunch of sea monkeys. Like a more earnest version of the amazing cultural touchstone that was Simpsonwave (Not the first time the zoomers cared about blank banshee, ho ho).

Anyway, I don't really know what I'm getting at here. Something something youth something something back in my day something gatekeep. I can't really say any of this really reflects back on yume nikki, since I'm almost certain the weirdcore zoomers aren't actually playing it, but I guess it's cool this game still lives on in our current cultural zeitgeist, even if it has to be through Youtube playlists made by people who misuse the word "liminal" all the time.

<0zym4ndias> i am 0zym4ndias
<0zym4ndias> king of kings
<0zym4ndias> look upon my gear, ye mighty, and despair

(0zym4ndias last seen online 5475 days ago)

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Both Final Fantasy XI Online and Final Fantasy XIV Online have an early quest involving the player character being assigned the role of a diplomat by your home city-state, and traveling to the other two city-states to see what's going on there. In XIV, this is an easy task that you can accomplish in under half an hour, as cutscene-based airship rides bridge the vast gaps in seconds. Despite the calamity it suffered 5 years before A Realm Reborn begins, the city-states of Eorzea recovered with a zeal befitting their colonial natures, rebuilding their fortunes atop the well-worn foundations of civilizations past - Allag, Ampador, and Vana'diel.

Vana'diel, XI's setting, has no such luck. Its world is comprised almost entirely of large desolate wastelands, still feeling utterly devastated by the war that occurred 20 years prior in its backstory. And there aren't any convenient airships waiting to take you across that vast distance to the other city-states. You can't even get a mount until you reach Jueno, the farthest and most dangerous of the initial city-states to reach. If you want to complete your mission, you're just gonna have to walk.

And walk.

And walk.

And walk.

Vana'diel is a hostile land, but only partially because of the monsters. Yes, those critters can and will ruin you if you venture far outside the cities alone, so you'll need some helping hands to survive out there, but more hostile than that are the obscenely vast distances that, even if you know exactly where you're going (there are almost no directions to anywhere) can lead to multi-hour treks just to get from one town to another. But your most dangerous foe, especially in 2021, is the user interface.

The thing is, in some ways, I kind of love it. The bleeps and bloops and lo-fi menus are so evocative of a particular time and place online, a vibe only surpassed by the immaculate PlayOnline launcher, a pre-Web 2.0 vision of online community that is sometimes what I genuinely wish the entire internet looked and sounded like.

But it's also a nightmare. Maps are uniformly terrible, with barely anything marked on it and no indication of how to reach far-off places. If you ask the person who tells you to serve as an emissary to the other nations how to actually get to them, he will tell you to fuck off and go work it out yourself. This is what the game is like to play after nearly two decades of patches to make it slightly more convenient and accessible. And it's still as frictional as a porcupine.

The thing is though, there is a method to this madness. Or, at least, there was.

Wild though it may be to think about now, looking at this game where you can't even jump, but XI was a forward-thinking game for the time. It was the last FF game series original director Hironobu Sakaguchi worked on in any meaningful capacity, and while the man has been known to puff up his own myth a bit, there does seem to be an agreement that many of the most unique elements of the game's design come from Sakaguchi and game director Koichi Ishii's desire to make players feel individually small and powerless, but powerful and meaningful when together, to organically forge from the players the kinds of bonds and parties of the offline Final Fantasies. The game even had multinational servers, unlike the region-based systems of modern MMOs, where players could play together no matter where in the world they came from, enabled by a to-this-day genuinely innovative auto-translation system that allows players to type key phrase that will be automatically translated into another player's client language, bridging the gap between languages just like Final Fantasy XIV's cutscenes bridge the gaps between it's locations. Much of the game's design was designed to force players into meaningful interaction and cooperation, because without others, you could not survive Vana'diel.

Don't know where to go? Ask someone for directions, or better yet, pay for a higher-level player to escort you to where you need to go! How do you unlock the Dragoon job? Ask a Dragoon! Need to get to the bottom of a mine filled with monsters that you have no hope of defeating alone? Find like-minded allies who also need a boar ass from the bottom of said mine, and venture forth!

Vana'diel is a hostile world because the design of the game is hostile, acting as a dark shadow looming around you and the other players, pushing you together to fight against it. The Shadow Lord may be the ostensible villain of the plot but the antagonist is the game itself, pushing back at you to push you together.

It's an engine for frustration more than anything else. By many accounts, this hostility engendered genuine camaraderie back in the day but it also alienated as many as it enthralled, and in the contemporary iteration of the game, it has been drained of its purpose. Painstakingly detailed guides on multiple wikis telling you exactly where to go and when and exactly how to optimally navigate the obtuse web of systems that had players thinking that hugging walls could aggro every enemy in an instance in 2002 remove the need to actually interact with players meaningfully in the game world, which is just as well because almost everyone you encounter is a level 99 demigod that shall not deign to engage a lowly mortal like you lest they interrupt the busy AFKing schedule they've been committed to for the past 19 years. The thing that makes the game playable in 2021, the Trust system, is also the thing that obliterates much of the design of the game, as in an instant you can summon a party of highly competent NPCs who will effectively allow you to solo all but the most difficult of encounters. In a game where almost every facet of its design is built around getting you to interact with others, Trusts and Wiki guides allow you to sidestep vast swathes of the game design, leaving only a strangely lonely and austere game experience whilst also keeping its places and people accessible to a modern audience who never experienced the game's prime.

If you aren't here for the (genuinely immaculate) vibes, then you're probably here for the story, and while I can only account for the base game story, it isn't much to write home about. It's steeped in an even more intense strain of the Fantasy Racism tropes that accounts for the least palatable sections of XIV's story, to the point that it would almost be avant-garde, the way the Bastok nation storyline has you working unquestioningly for a cartoonishly evil state that openly uses slave labor, to defeat the embodiment of rage and anger felt by those exploited by them: a being called, uh, the Shadow Lord. But it doesn't really put the work in to make it interesting. By many accounts Rise of the Zilart, the first expansion, picks up immediately where the base game left off and recontextualizes events to make things much less uncomfortably racist, but due to the games frankly bizarre attitude towards difficulty scaling, Zilart is so difficult that most guides encourage you to complete almost all the expansions that came after Zilart before you tackle the thing that resolves most of the threads hanging from the story that propelled - well, gently nudged - me through the first 50 levels, and I'm a long way off from all of that. Despite the systems of Final Fantasy XI being neutered to allow players to access the story, the base story lacks almost all bite without them. I'm sure defeating The Shadow Lord was an immense mechanical accomplishment given meaning by accomplishing it with your friends in 2002. But now? It barely registers.

Still, there are moments of true beauty where the magic of this game somehow manages to shine through. Once you have your wiki open on the other screen, and a band of unwaveringly faithful NPC trusts, you can set forth on your quest. Going from Bastok to Windhurst as I did, the first leg of your journey will end in the seaside town of Selbina in the Valkurum Wastes, from which you must take a ship across the sea to the town of Mhaura. Maybe here, the game will use a cutscene like XIV? No, of course not. Buying a ticket, you are brought to a little gated area to wait for the ship (a potentially 10-15 minute wait) just like real public transport. Then you get on the boat, wait for it to set off, and then you can climb up onto the deck to enjoy a low-res version of the world and it's landmarks roll past you, while a beautiful track plays that belies this game's history as a product of the remarkable Chrono Cross team (https://youtu.be/jaKmkoy1r7o). This whole process takes a long time, and it can take over half an hour to reach Mhaura from Selbina. And there isn't really anything to do on the way but talk to your fellow passengers. And before you think I'm about to launch into a boomer rant about how we all used to talk to each other before our headphones and ipods and playstation ps and zunes, the beautiful trick of all this is in what happens halfway through the voyage.

On my trip from Selbina to Mhaura, another ship, without warning, pulled up alongside ours, and a band of undead pirates lept aboard. Barely managing to fight off one, I couldn't hope to face the entire band on my own, and retreated below decks, waiting for them to give up and move on. But instantly, in my head, I saw a story unfold. Of a whole group of players, each of whom came to the boat on their own, suddenly having to band together to beat back the pirates. This whole boat ride, all it's length and waiting, is an engine designed to organically facilitate a genuine fantasy story beat, of individual adventurers on their own banding together - maybe even becoming friends - to defeat a foe they did not expect. It was honestly kind of beautiful to imagine.

But it was just imagination. I can see how the design of this area could facilitate that story, for sure. I'm sure it happened, in the past. Maybe it forged genuine friendships that transcended the world of Vana'diel, or maybe the impromptu alliance disbanded as they disembarked, and went their separate ways, never to see each other again. But there isn't room for either now. There's just me, watched over by my silent NPC allies, enjoying the wonderful music and beautiful vibes as I imagine what may, once upon a time, have been.

Is Final Fantasy XI a good game? I don't know. I can't know. It's not here. I'll play to see the stories, sure - Rise of the Zilart, in particular, has my attention for seeming to share a lot of ideas with Shadowbringers - but the actual play experience that the systems of this game were designed to create has not been preserved. Final Fantasy XI, as it exists now, is a museum. A (lightly) guided tour through its impossibly vast, crushingly empty world, everything within a memorial to the experiences its systems were designed to facilitate, now gone and beyond our ability to revive, no matter how powerful our healing magic is. There's something kind of beautiful and wonderful about what Final Fantasy XI tried to do. But that game is gone. All that's left is its headstone, and those that left in its wake, some continuing to visit and remember, and most leaving it far, far behind them.

So for my 1000th review, I chose what I consider to be the most important brazilian game of all time. The mere existence of Unsighted is a miracle in itself, being made by 2 latinas trans women with a short budget is nothing short of impressive, considering it’s quality not only in the gameplay but also in the sprite artwork, music, and so on. How did possibly the greatest achievement in brazilian game developing history become so unknown nationally? To properly answer this question, we first have to analyze the gaming scene in Brazil.

Despite being the 3rd largest country in number of active "gamers", Brazil has a surprisingly small game development scene due to a lot of harsh factors. Hardware and Software prices tend to be too high, the government gives very little incentive in developing technological careers, and both of these have only gotten worse in the last few years by the dystopian combination that is Bolsonaro, crypto bros and Covid-19 working together. Also worth mentioning, is that a lot of programmers and artists who are into game design, straight up just leave the country whenever possible, seeking better life conditions.

Currently the most noticeable games in the minds of the average brazilian gamer, are not the likes of Dandara, Chroma Squad, Momodora or Sludge Life, who even if they don’t make your cup of tea, had a lot of effort and love put into it. The most usual names you’ll hear are the cheap ones that were made to be bad, hoping that you either play them or buy them for your friends as a joke. Kandidatos, Ultra Miner Adventures, Zueirama, and the ever infamous Bad Rats, are probably the ones that get the most recognition.

The ironic praise and fetishization of trashy national media has always existed throughout the entire world, however, I think that the extent in which it happens in Brazil is absurd, especially considering it started off as a counter movement in direct response to the enforced nationalism by government endorsed media during the dictatorship years and the “Brazil: Love it or Leave it” mentality. For decades, our most watched movie genre were softcore porn movies called “pornochanchadas”, that benefited the state by suppressing other types of movies that didn't support the regime, in perhaps the weirdest panis et circenses case I can think of.

The good neighbor policy, enforced by the american government at the time, only directly affected Rio and São Paulo as they were portrayed as the definitive tropical paradise for other first world nations to exploit. Culturally wise, the majority of the country was abandoned, which meant that the imposed nationalism had to come from within every single state, creating a sense of animosity from others, as they were perceived more as enemies than neighbors. Xenophobia became ingrained in our culture, which meant that the idea of being born in a specific state became more important than being born in Brazil itself. Mocking the idea of being brazilian while hyper valorizing your own cities had unfortunate lasting effects even after the dictatorship was dissolved.

Although the respect for other states has gotten better in the last 10 years, the disdain for the government has only ever increased as we’re facing our worst political decade yet, ranging from multiple extensive corruption scandals to a forced government takeover publicized as a democratic impeachment. However, what I think is the series of events that perfectly encapsulates our political scene, happened when our current president, Jair Bolsonaro, denied covid for 2 months after it was declared a worldwide pandemic, only to accept it’s mere existence months later by contracting it himself, only to deny it again weeks later as he was cured, claiming that his “past as an athlete wouldn’t let him die by a simple fever”.

More than 600.000 lives were lost due to covid, a number elevated by Bolsonaro’s actions and denialism. 3 ministers of health were fired during the height of the pandemic, because any measurement that went against his agenda that Covid was nothing special, resulted in them being dismissed. While most nations were trying to buy and distribute vaccines, he denied 11 deals until april 2021, with common names such as Pfizer, Covax, and even the vaccine being developed in the national territory by the Butantan institute, deemed as untrustworthy. He tried to push a chloroquine agenda, claiming it to be the true cure to covid, which to no one's surprise proved to be ineffective even before he made his announcements. Couple of months and many deaths later, Bolsonaro would end up, surprisingly, accepting a vaccine deal, which turned out later that he only actually accepted as there was embezzlement involved.

Amongst our presidential wrongdoings, the indie gaming scene flourished around the world, and although it didn’t thrive as much in Brazil, it had an impact nonetheless. Developing codes, creating digital art, publicizing media, have only gotten easier as time goes on, despite creating the unfortunate consequence that it’s more scattered around the net as ever, making so that the mere chance of a spotlight is to be considered a miracle for the average indie dev. In the last 2 years, the gaming scene was severely hit by Covid-19, however, that didn’t affect small studios a lot, especially when the amount of people working on them is as small as 2 in Unsighted’s case.

Still here after the overly simplified history lesson? Good, let’s actually talk about the game now.

The easy way to explain Unsighted to someone is that it’s a mix of Hyper Light Drifter fast paced combat alongside the limitations of a punishing stamina bar, with a metroid map progression. I’m NOT calling this game a metroidvania because it has nothing to do with the usual 2D combat, however if you think metroidvanias are more of a “feel” with progression based items with pseudo open world games, I won’t stop you. The constant back and forth of experimenting with your new upgrades is one of gaming’s greatest sensations when done right, now imagine doing that in a punishing time limit. Sounds stressful when you can’t progress in your own way? Good, that’s the main idea behind Unsighted.

After finishing the tutorial, you’ll notice that everytime you go to a new room, a small text appears in the middle of the screen telling you how much time you have left until you become an unsighted yourself, a walking android with no thought beyond primal instincts hard coded in their metallic soul. The game tries to calm you down by explaining that you can give yourself and your friends more time, with an item called Meteor Dust, which you can find by exploring, however you’ll quickly realize that giving 1 day’s worth of time is not very impactful when a day ingame happens in less than 40 minutes. You may also share them to increase your “friendship meter” to get unique rewards, which is the opposite of what anyone would do in that situation: Embracing a decaying materialism in a world that needs only solidarity.

By accepting the loot social aspect more than the emotional one, you can in theory, save more people than before, since you’ll be increasing your combat capabilities which results in you resolving the game’s conflict faster, which means you’ll be bringing salvation to even more individuals. This could also be my half assed coping mechanism that I ended up developing after letting 2 characters that were really special to the main character die, both meeting their fate because although I tried really, I ended up failing, but chose to move once again. As we all have to do sometimes.

Gear Village is one of the most comfortable hubs I have seen in gaming, facing fierce competition against Majula from Dark Souls 2 and Rosalina’s ship from Mario Galaxy. Not only it has a plethora of charming characters wandering around, but also it looks like a place I could live in, if I travel enough to the south. The androids are all visually distinct and offer different essential functions from one another, like upgrading your items, selling useful stuff, or giving you hints on where to go next.

Exploration is not obtuse in the slightest, since there’s a clear indicator in what you can and can’t do, and early on you don’t even have to get key items in a set order, so it becomes a question in how you want to approach the game. The best weapon, until the very last dungeon, and some gadgets that allow you to completely bypass some puzzles to get powerful items early on, can be obtained after the very 1st dungeon if you’ve been exploring. It’s only after a long while, that you’ll have to progress in the way the game wants you to, which is honestly pretty well executed, because it ends up coinciding, for the average player at least, to a certain “event” in the cathedral which I’ll explain later.

Fighting also feels amazing, mobility is key in this game and it feels wonderful running around. By allowing the players to never take damage by missing platforming sections, even if you have to “respawn” again, it encourages a riskier and more fun approach to both combat and puzzles. Parrying is both smooth and responsive, and also if you land it gracefully with precise timing, it restores your stamina bar fully, making it so that if you take the effort to master it, you’ll be rewarded by never having to back down from a fight. There’s also a colossal weapon arsenal to choose from, including swords, pistols, axes, shotguns, dual wielding weapons, flamethrowers, and even grappling hooks.

Well, I’m gonna get into spoilers now, so if that’s what you wanted to see from this review, have a good one, and make sure to give this game a shot, it’s worth it.

Eventually, while exploring, you’ll receive some notifications about some npc’s who have less than 24 hours remaining. The feeble, the fragile and the old ones fall victim first, however soon you’ll start to notice that the character that teaches you how to parry better and is known as the village’s chief, is also one of the first ones. And that’s when it clicked with me, that this curse comes for everyone, independent of who you are, what you’ve done, and even if you have a “past as an athlete”. While not directly being a covid metaphor, the way Unsighted handles the story, themes, and the mechanics around time being a currency, are inherently something that could only happen in our current political and social scene.

One important thing I purposefully didn’t mention until now, is that during the entire game you’ll be accompanied by a small pixie called Iris, who doesn’t exactly have much time in her hands. She greatly helps you, not only navigate and solve puzzles, but also by being your only source of actually “leveling up”. In this game, the only progression you’ll get, besides equipping discardable gears with single uses and buying expensive items to improve your healing at the cost of time, is increasing your chip slots, which might give you more health, defense, damage, stamina, etc. The fact that the only fixed progression you’ll get is tied to a npc low in time is astonishing, because it forces you to sacrifice precious time with her. Due to the nature of video games we usually don’t end up thinking much about our sidekicks, but Unsighted makes sure you know how much she’s sacrificing for you and asks you to at least keep it mutual. If you intentionally or not, let her go unsighted, your journey is not only going to be a lot lonelier, but also immensely harder, because you took her feelings, dreams, and maybe even existence, for granted.

A certain event happens when your character has less than 100 hours: she is contacted by an entity in the cathedral. There, you’ll meet a powerful person who talks like an old friend of yours that wants to “help you”, by giving you an accursed power: You can take hours away from your friends and give them to yourself. Although this might sound like a relief for some, the idea of killing your friends for your own benefit is nothing but sickening, and it doesn’t help that every single one of them was written in the story to be a good willed android, trying to survive while helping others. This is the only place in the game in which Iris won’t accompany you, as she feels a malevolent presence nearby, which means that you’re the judge, jury and executioner of yourself while in there.

You can by all means challenge her to an absurdly hard secret boss fight that will give you 10 dusts, however it not only takes a lot of effort, but also gives a reward that doesn’t benefit you as much. By working with the current dystopian system, you can guarantee yourself a safe future in this cruel world, as it’s easy to live at the cost of others, specially when your job is to be selective to who has the rights to live, however, even challenging them, won’t help as much unfortunately, as the entire fundamental aspect of being an unsighted won’t change by dethroning a single individual within a intrinsically corrupt order. There is a secret ending that requires you to beat the self proclaimed angel, however I won’t get into details because I’d have to explain a lot more elements in the story, but to summarize: You can’t vote your way into revolution, fight for what you believe in.

So now to properly answer the question: Why is Unsighted so special, even when not considering the gameplay? In an interview for Screenrant in October 2021, the devs Tiani Pixel and Fernanda Dias answered the following question “...Could you talk about what gaming was like when you were younger, and compare it to what's happening now?...” made by Leo Faierman.

“One big thing here in Brazil, and it kind of ties in with some of the discussion that has been going around lately, is with piracy. Because, for example, in the city that I lived throughout my childhood, you could never find an original game to buy. Like, it wasn't even an option. I'll be honest with you: I never saw an original PS2 game in my life, and it's common for all Brazilians. Like, I even doubt that those exist, because there was never an original game being sold here in Brazil. However, this came with a lot of positives. English is not our native language, so we received pirated games from all over the world, so there's a lot of Japanese games that are famous here that a lot of people in the US don't know, and kind of ended up being inspirations here for game designers in Brazil.”

Transforming and adapting cultures from around the world is how Brazil became Brazil. Independent if it were the natives, or the portuguese in the 15th century, or the spanish a couple years later, or the dutchman in the 16th century, or the germans and the italians in the following years, or the japanese in the 19th century, or the many other that I forgot to mention: We are in the end, a mixture of cultures from around the world, trying our best. The cultural difference between some states in Brazil is higher than the ones from entire european countries, and yet we’re all stuck in the same tropical paradise. In the end Brazil was molded by those who were molded by Brazil, therefore making something made in Brazil only possible if it was made in Brazil.

We had a lot of games in the past that captured the brazilian essence, like 171 or Tcheco in the Castle of Lucio, however those were projects made in mind to be enjoyed by mostly brazilians. We’ve also had games that tried their best to abandoned that convention, accepting their own existence as a product meant to be mostly enjoyed for those that aren’t from Brazil, but seen as the same foreign product for those that are, like Heavy Bullets or Spark. Unsighted is the first project that not only doesn’t follow that convention, but also actively tries to display such ethos for those that weren’t born here or the ones that do but fail to recognize it.

Unsighted is a game made by 2 trans women fighting not only to survive in one of the most transphobic countries there are, but also to make a project that will never get mainstream attention. Unsighted tells the story of those that struggle, for those that don’t care. Unsighted is the essence of a story forever doomed to be praised yet not seen by many. Unsighted to me, is the most important brazilian game of all time.