moschidae
Mystias Izakaya is a game i am unlikely to finish due to its large amount of content, but i feel satisfied with what i have played enough to write something up on it.
This game takes place in the touhou universe, where you play as Mystia running a travelling restaurant that stretches to various environments from several different mainline games. The core gameplay loop is managing your time to strategically purchase various ingredients and learn recipes in order to appeal to the guests at whatever area you are setting up in. In the second phase of the night, you focus mainly on cooking and waitressing until the end of the day where you get paid.
This loop certainly has a very addictive feeling to it, during my first few hours i really didnt want to put it down. It has the same appeal as certain flash cafe management games i played in my youth and i feel like it carried that feeling well throughout my playtime. There was something about the simplicity of what you had to do and the seemingly endless possibilities for improvement that motivated me to continue playing, for a while.
However i feel like it gets stale after a time. You hit a limit long, long before the story ends. Nights become challenging and very long, tiring. It starts feeling like something of an endless chore to get through.
The art is nice and leaves little room to be creepy but the story and writing in general is a huge miss. Im quite certain it is not a fault of the localization team, but there are several references to online popular culture that just completely take you out of it and makes you feel like youre playing a game made by weirdos, which you probably are at this point. In one line of inquiry Chen calls someone a NEET. An otaku NEET? something to do with NEETs but definitely very embarassing. There was an entire questline dedicated to giving a youkai a picture of Meiling's... "thicc" thighs. I also see recently there is dlc where Mystia is dressed up as Jotaro from jojo. So you can see why this game has become a problem for me.
Obviously the characters suffer from the same fate they do in other fan projects which is that theyre disgustingly one dimensional, completely overtaken by a fanon element and they will run that element into the ground. I dont like much seeing touhou done so dirty when this game and normal touhou are essentially two different beasts. I feel like it does little for the characters though it has so much emphasis on it, and it feels disgraceful somewhat. Marisa likes mushrooms! Meiling is lazy shes sooo lazy she sleeps all day Patchouli likes books and hates everyone else Remilia is a vampire Rumia darkness Sayori is sleepy blah blah blah.
The brevity of your encounters with characters is what makes the people in touhou shine the most, as well as their phsyical appearance and more importantly: their bullet patterns. When one of those things has already been established and you remove the other, youre missing a lot of nuance that comes with the rest of the elements. So its flat and completely cookie cutter characters. I feel like this game has a vast misunderstanding of the world of mainline touhou, and even if its irrelevant right now i also dont like the injection of men into the game. Touhou is special for that reason and its strange to revoke that reason with various nameless customers and villagers and whatnot. Who cares?
The dialogue is definitely the games largest flaw as well as how it protrays Gensokyo, but without that the gameplay feels somewhat meaningless and it all falls in on itself. For a good 30 hours its still quite fun to play and i will have good memories of it as it was gifted to me by a friend for my birthday. Im very happy i even got to play this at all and my friends definitely made my last birthday the best one ive ever had, so i feel somewhat bad about not liking the way it went, but its on the devs for talking about Hong Meiling's thighs so much. Pick it up if you like management games but do not expect a touhou fangame that lives up to actual touhou, for once.
This game takes place in the touhou universe, where you play as Mystia running a travelling restaurant that stretches to various environments from several different mainline games. The core gameplay loop is managing your time to strategically purchase various ingredients and learn recipes in order to appeal to the guests at whatever area you are setting up in. In the second phase of the night, you focus mainly on cooking and waitressing until the end of the day where you get paid.
This loop certainly has a very addictive feeling to it, during my first few hours i really didnt want to put it down. It has the same appeal as certain flash cafe management games i played in my youth and i feel like it carried that feeling well throughout my playtime. There was something about the simplicity of what you had to do and the seemingly endless possibilities for improvement that motivated me to continue playing, for a while.
However i feel like it gets stale after a time. You hit a limit long, long before the story ends. Nights become challenging and very long, tiring. It starts feeling like something of an endless chore to get through.
The art is nice and leaves little room to be creepy but the story and writing in general is a huge miss. Im quite certain it is not a fault of the localization team, but there are several references to online popular culture that just completely take you out of it and makes you feel like youre playing a game made by weirdos, which you probably are at this point. In one line of inquiry Chen calls someone a NEET. An otaku NEET? something to do with NEETs but definitely very embarassing. There was an entire questline dedicated to giving a youkai a picture of Meiling's... "thicc" thighs. I also see recently there is dlc where Mystia is dressed up as Jotaro from jojo. So you can see why this game has become a problem for me.
Obviously the characters suffer from the same fate they do in other fan projects which is that theyre disgustingly one dimensional, completely overtaken by a fanon element and they will run that element into the ground. I dont like much seeing touhou done so dirty when this game and normal touhou are essentially two different beasts. I feel like it does little for the characters though it has so much emphasis on it, and it feels disgraceful somewhat. Marisa likes mushrooms! Meiling is lazy shes sooo lazy she sleeps all day Patchouli likes books and hates everyone else Remilia is a vampire Rumia darkness Sayori is sleepy blah blah blah.
The brevity of your encounters with characters is what makes the people in touhou shine the most, as well as their phsyical appearance and more importantly: their bullet patterns. When one of those things has already been established and you remove the other, youre missing a lot of nuance that comes with the rest of the elements. So its flat and completely cookie cutter characters. I feel like this game has a vast misunderstanding of the world of mainline touhou, and even if its irrelevant right now i also dont like the injection of men into the game. Touhou is special for that reason and its strange to revoke that reason with various nameless customers and villagers and whatnot. Who cares?
The dialogue is definitely the games largest flaw as well as how it protrays Gensokyo, but without that the gameplay feels somewhat meaningless and it all falls in on itself. For a good 30 hours its still quite fun to play and i will have good memories of it as it was gifted to me by a friend for my birthday. Im very happy i even got to play this at all and my friends definitely made my last birthday the best one ive ever had, so i feel somewhat bad about not liking the way it went, but its on the devs for talking about Hong Meiling's thighs so much. Pick it up if you like management games but do not expect a touhou fangame that lives up to actual touhou, for once.
Forget it, forget the panda thing! We dont want to be a panda!
We are Us. The King is the King.
We finally just realized that We are nothing without Katamari Damacy.
The King of All Cosmos exists to make sure that everyone has
a nice, happy time.
In the early 2000s Katamari Damacy creator Keita Takahashi was propositioned to direct another game. Believing that the industry relied too much on sequels that limited employee creativity, he was initinally very opposed, but agreed upon learning that the project would continue with or without his presence. Contradictory to Bandai Namco's demands, what would come out of this was a deeply loving and moving game; foreign to the industry.
Named We Love Katamari, the game is set upon completing requests from fictional fans. A self-aware response to the outpouring of love from players of the original Katamari Damacy, this game takes a very different route from its predecessor. Aware of its presence as a game in the world, the King himself struggles between moving on and making people happy. Despite the beliefs Keita has on sequels, this format of a game could have never been done as an original project, and in itself was a wholly unique concept.
Despite the circumstances of its creation, in the end i am more than glad that everything in this game came to be. There is nothing Keita touches that isnt made with love and care. Its not really possible for me to describe my attachment, or even put into words everything i like about this game, but there are so few creations in the medium that feel so loving. There are few games that come together completely like Katamari does, and there are few games that are directly a realized product of someones imagination. It is like looking into a world without the gaming industry's marketing and restraints, but i would be lying if i said this is what meant the most to me, as an artistic accomplishment.
No, of course my favorite thing is the King. The King feels altered from his debut in Katamari Damacy, becoming reflective of himself and less harsh on the Prince. I have never had a father, but i do remember sitting in front of my tv years ago listening to the King talk about his pompadour, about how youth is embarassing..but it is more than important to live it. And i started tearing up a little, because was something so foreign that i would have never heard otherwise. But it made me very determined to continue rolling, i wanted to make the best katamari so the King would be proud of me. And it felt very good when he was. Learning about the Kings childhood, about his father and the sadness of his youth, this all felt very real and endearing in contrast to the silliness of the game. There is a deep purpose and melancholy embedded in the game, but it also feels like a hopeful thing. The King is not simply a character from a game, especially here in WLK. He does not serve an archtype, but rather comes directly from Keita and his team with the self-aware nature of things. Which is why his lessons and thoughts feel much more real, much more touching. Yes, there are few games in this world that open doors for people, but We Love Katamari is certainly one of them. I am happy it exists, i do love katamari.
I dont have to speak on the fun of the levels and how funny the cousins act, because that is a given. As a remaster, the heightened graphics are beautiful. But it makes me sad seeing the extra stuff that is added in. It sticks out like a sore thumb, it wasnt really necessary. And its not Keita who made it, obviously. Despite the HD graphics i might prefer this less than the original due to the prominence of the extra levels. I am still happy to be able to play this game again though, as i wouldnt of been able to otherwise. The best version of playing WLK might be the original with some sort of graphical mod. Getting the prettiest katamari experience with none of Namco's deflated levels.
Katamari Damacy makes me feel loved. it shows me happiness and child-like simplicity. There is not a thing in the game that does not make me smile. Maybe it is best to move on, but its fun to come back to every now and then. A very comfortable home for me!
Its important to think ahead, but not as important as being in the moment.
Okay! Lets keep making the katamari even bigger!
Lets do it!
(This review is specifically for co-op in ds1r)
The only time i have ever managed to play online in a dark souls game before obtaining a steamdeck was on the switch version of ds1. Needless to say, i went in with a pretty poor opinion of it since the switch's middling internet connection did little for pvp, as every interaction was basically someone teleporting behind you and ending you with a backstab. I actually believe some of the weird, aggressive pvpheads played the switch version purposely for this reason, because the experience i had there was a hundred times worst than just playing it normally on steam.
I had a shockingly fun time playing co-op with hilda here. It was pretty seamless and we were able to do most things together, even if i would sometimes rather not look at hilda's new, hit character "Smelly Elmo". I dont think i ever got too mad at an invader, and they werent doing weird shit like running away and wasting our time. No one had a bad name or anything either, and i even had a pretty high rate of winning pvp encounters. It might of also been to my advantage that no one wanted to get near Smelly but i will take what i can get.
As i grow older i am starting to become disillusioned with fromsoft's work in general, though. Every idea Miyazaki has just seems to be taken from either Beserk or Ghibli and its kind of deflating to look at something and go "oh..ash lake is just the toxic forest from nausicaa". There is also quite a bit that is genuinely unfair in terms of the design, youll likely run into a lot of little things that add up over the course of the game. Like for me, i chose the lifehunt scythe as my main weapon... no matter how much you level up, your character moves like they can barely hold it. They use the scythe like a pickaxe....its very strange. Its also supposed to do massive bleed damage to enemies as well as build up your own meter as a tradeoff, but 90% of bosses are immune to bleed and players have such high resistance that it just doesnt matter. It also makes dps battles like the four kings borderline impossible as every three hits you take damage.
I also chose to do a miracle build, specifically wanting to use gywndolins spell. I spent a long time grinding ears to get it, only to find out that my weird pickaxe is just simply too special to be buffed with spells. Ok then, i wanted to use bountiful sunlight to help hilda during pvp. I put 36 points into faith- which nothing else even comes close to requiring by the way- only to find out yet again that you cant actually use it unless youre in gywnevere's covenant? Despite the game giving it to you like a normal spell, and never stating as such? Shit like that just deflates your excitement for the game and makes it feel clunky
Doesnt help that the remaster just sucks. They added nothing and fixed nothing, not even being able to warp to any bonfire or having an extra slot for essential/summoning rings. Ds1 ng+ is also horrible, for some reason. The damage enemies do to you is insane. Those stupid little crystal bow idiots were taking out 80% of my level 140 ass somehow. It makes playing with others absurd as one of you is likely to die from some stupid shit like that, and the game sends the summoned all the way back to the bonfire as if they died in their game so thats another time waster there.
I spent a long time complaining about the game and not talking about co-op but i think thats all i have to say. I would like to thank smelly elmo for taking a break eating wood chips to play with me. It was fun attempting to cut off kalameet's tail for 3 hours. Miyazaki is a bit of a hack.
The only time i have ever managed to play online in a dark souls game before obtaining a steamdeck was on the switch version of ds1. Needless to say, i went in with a pretty poor opinion of it since the switch's middling internet connection did little for pvp, as every interaction was basically someone teleporting behind you and ending you with a backstab. I actually believe some of the weird, aggressive pvpheads played the switch version purposely for this reason, because the experience i had there was a hundred times worst than just playing it normally on steam.
I had a shockingly fun time playing co-op with hilda here. It was pretty seamless and we were able to do most things together, even if i would sometimes rather not look at hilda's new, hit character "Smelly Elmo". I dont think i ever got too mad at an invader, and they werent doing weird shit like running away and wasting our time. No one had a bad name or anything either, and i even had a pretty high rate of winning pvp encounters. It might of also been to my advantage that no one wanted to get near Smelly but i will take what i can get.
As i grow older i am starting to become disillusioned with fromsoft's work in general, though. Every idea Miyazaki has just seems to be taken from either Beserk or Ghibli and its kind of deflating to look at something and go "oh..ash lake is just the toxic forest from nausicaa". There is also quite a bit that is genuinely unfair in terms of the design, youll likely run into a lot of little things that add up over the course of the game. Like for me, i chose the lifehunt scythe as my main weapon... no matter how much you level up, your character moves like they can barely hold it. They use the scythe like a pickaxe....its very strange. Its also supposed to do massive bleed damage to enemies as well as build up your own meter as a tradeoff, but 90% of bosses are immune to bleed and players have such high resistance that it just doesnt matter. It also makes dps battles like the four kings borderline impossible as every three hits you take damage.
I also chose to do a miracle build, specifically wanting to use gywndolins spell. I spent a long time grinding ears to get it, only to find out that my weird pickaxe is just simply too special to be buffed with spells. Ok then, i wanted to use bountiful sunlight to help hilda during pvp. I put 36 points into faith- which nothing else even comes close to requiring by the way- only to find out yet again that you cant actually use it unless youre in gywnevere's covenant? Despite the game giving it to you like a normal spell, and never stating as such? Shit like that just deflates your excitement for the game and makes it feel clunky
Doesnt help that the remaster just sucks. They added nothing and fixed nothing, not even being able to warp to any bonfire or having an extra slot for essential/summoning rings. Ds1 ng+ is also horrible, for some reason. The damage enemies do to you is insane. Those stupid little crystal bow idiots were taking out 80% of my level 140 ass somehow. It makes playing with others absurd as one of you is likely to die from some stupid shit like that, and the game sends the summoned all the way back to the bonfire as if they died in their game so thats another time waster there.
I spent a long time complaining about the game and not talking about co-op but i think thats all i have to say. I would like to thank smelly elmo for taking a break eating wood chips to play with me. It was fun attempting to cut off kalameet's tail for 3 hours. Miyazaki is a bit of a hack.
2020
The Hylem-xylem hotly resists a Hyelm-xylem
A very surreal and artistically grounded experience, there is very little bad you can say about Hylics 2. This is the kind of game you grieve finishing, for its short length Hylics impresses a lot on the audience with its evocative dialogue and scenery. There are very few games that manage to fully utalize the medium as well as Hylics does, the art is inseparable from the game and the game feels inseperable from the world built around it. It is the kind of thing that is clearly made with love and is wholly one of a kind.
Other than the obvious things Hylics is known for like its clay animation and the fantastic music, i was very happy with the amount of options the game had to prevent you from struggling or becoming annoyed. Nothing lasts longer than it has to, and for an rpg that is very important. Minigames like the lil' wayne sections had various difficulty modes, and enemy encounters are a once-time thing with no respawning foes. Fights are visually engaging and you are always finding new techniques (as long as you explore) so battles dont ever feel dull, and the game is so short that the player will likely always feel like theyre progressing, there is no need for grinding or anything like that.
The one issue Hylics 2 has is sometimes, it lacks direction. There is very little hand-holding, which fits the game well, but i found myself lost a few times trying to find the Sage's coins and especially during that first person dungeon-crawling segment. There are also a few areas that arent really obvious you're supposed to interact with, or lead to a new part of the game. I think tutorials wouldnt really mesh well with how Hylics functions, but some more visual cues would of been welcome.
Hylics 2 is a once in a lifetime game that doesnt seem to get as much admiration as it should. Looking at it, if it seems like it would appeal to you then i would absolutely recommend going for it as youre never going to see something else similar to this again.
Giiiibbbbyyyyyyyyyyyy.....
A very surreal and artistically grounded experience, there is very little bad you can say about Hylics 2. This is the kind of game you grieve finishing, for its short length Hylics impresses a lot on the audience with its evocative dialogue and scenery. There are very few games that manage to fully utalize the medium as well as Hylics does, the art is inseparable from the game and the game feels inseperable from the world built around it. It is the kind of thing that is clearly made with love and is wholly one of a kind.
Other than the obvious things Hylics is known for like its clay animation and the fantastic music, i was very happy with the amount of options the game had to prevent you from struggling or becoming annoyed. Nothing lasts longer than it has to, and for an rpg that is very important. Minigames like the lil' wayne sections had various difficulty modes, and enemy encounters are a once-time thing with no respawning foes. Fights are visually engaging and you are always finding new techniques (as long as you explore) so battles dont ever feel dull, and the game is so short that the player will likely always feel like theyre progressing, there is no need for grinding or anything like that.
The one issue Hylics 2 has is sometimes, it lacks direction. There is very little hand-holding, which fits the game well, but i found myself lost a few times trying to find the Sage's coins and especially during that first person dungeon-crawling segment. There are also a few areas that arent really obvious you're supposed to interact with, or lead to a new part of the game. I think tutorials wouldnt really mesh well with how Hylics functions, but some more visual cues would of been welcome.
Hylics 2 is a once in a lifetime game that doesnt seem to get as much admiration as it should. Looking at it, if it seems like it would appeal to you then i would absolutely recommend going for it as youre never going to see something else similar to this again.
Giiiibbbbyyyyyyyyyyyy.....
I played ds2 originally in 2017, so a lot of my memories from it were very blurry and incomplete. From my original playthrough i can honestly attest to not enjoying a single second of it. However, the general consensus seems to have changed, and suddenly this is the best game ever made. I decided to replay it with an open mind to see if theres something i potentially missed.
No, i was right. This game feels bad. Character creation is extremely limiting with basic things like hair, and im pretty sure they gender-locked certain options so if i wanted short hair i just had to roll with the anime Ellen Degeneres look.
Dark souls 2 has a very bland sense of style, ive always thought that every single thing from this game felt extremely generic. What if hollows just looked like basic zombies? What if the fire keeper looked like she got her outfit straight from Party City? The giants are the most iconic thing from this game, and they still were almost just bland, basic trolls you could see anywhere. The design is bad, there is no solid or unique sense of a look. The only thing i can say is that the environments look nice and have color, which is something actual dark souls lacks.
Alright, so i thought, this isnt a good dark souls game. But maybe it could be fun as its own thing.
No. The gameplay still feels utterly wretched. Its been a long time since ive controlled something so awful. Everything about it just feels wrong... the design philosophy of this game just feels like "hey, this aint your MOM'S dark souls!!!! You only get ONE flask!!"
I could play dark souls with one flask, but not this one. Why does it take so, so long to drink. What are life gems, why would you not just give me more flasks. Why are there so many random items that are just variants of an already existing item. Why does my character move like shes walking through mud. Everything takes so long, nothing feels smooth to do. In fact, the only things that feel nice are the things that arent really important, like climbing a latter and jumping. Combat feels equally as bad. Everything feels like its a joke at the players expense, for example why can i break chests if it just destroys whatevers in it? What purpose does that have other than to deny me a reward? Why does dying reduce my health pool when ive already been punished for failing? Nothing here feels natural or good to play, or worth my time.
I didnt even get to the first boss this time around, i got to a room that killed me immediately with javelins upon entering and i turned off the game. I refunded it for dark souls 1, and to be honest i really just do not get why people like this game so much other than the fact that they know its bad and they just want to say the opposite. Dark souls 2 does not feel good at all to play.
Shoutout to smelly joe...
No, i was right. This game feels bad. Character creation is extremely limiting with basic things like hair, and im pretty sure they gender-locked certain options so if i wanted short hair i just had to roll with the anime Ellen Degeneres look.
Dark souls 2 has a very bland sense of style, ive always thought that every single thing from this game felt extremely generic. What if hollows just looked like basic zombies? What if the fire keeper looked like she got her outfit straight from Party City? The giants are the most iconic thing from this game, and they still were almost just bland, basic trolls you could see anywhere. The design is bad, there is no solid or unique sense of a look. The only thing i can say is that the environments look nice and have color, which is something actual dark souls lacks.
Alright, so i thought, this isnt a good dark souls game. But maybe it could be fun as its own thing.
No. The gameplay still feels utterly wretched. Its been a long time since ive controlled something so awful. Everything about it just feels wrong... the design philosophy of this game just feels like "hey, this aint your MOM'S dark souls!!!! You only get ONE flask!!"
I could play dark souls with one flask, but not this one. Why does it take so, so long to drink. What are life gems, why would you not just give me more flasks. Why are there so many random items that are just variants of an already existing item. Why does my character move like shes walking through mud. Everything takes so long, nothing feels smooth to do. In fact, the only things that feel nice are the things that arent really important, like climbing a latter and jumping. Combat feels equally as bad. Everything feels like its a joke at the players expense, for example why can i break chests if it just destroys whatevers in it? What purpose does that have other than to deny me a reward? Why does dying reduce my health pool when ive already been punished for failing? Nothing here feels natural or good to play, or worth my time.
I didnt even get to the first boss this time around, i got to a room that killed me immediately with javelins upon entering and i turned off the game. I refunded it for dark souls 1, and to be honest i really just do not get why people like this game so much other than the fact that they know its bad and they just want to say the opposite. Dark souls 2 does not feel good at all to play.
Shoutout to smelly joe...
2013
While i really liked the first 3 hours of this game with its immediate freedom and very appealing combat system, the rest of it immediately collpases in on itself and becomes disgustingly unfun.
Go into this dark ass labyrinth and fight enemies way too strong for you. Find a random seed and somehow know that you have to eat it to progress the game. Dont fight that werewolf bat cause if you dont have a SPECIFIC sword you have to get by eating a seed then leaving then finding Reah then talking to Reah then giving Reah her harmonica then going to two trees and watching a cutscene, then youre fucked. Go back into the awful mines that's layout is akin to a 4 year old's art class project and fight the bat with the 3 frames of vulnerability.
Hoorah.... the mines are now over. Now i can have fun?!?!??
Wrong. Go to zepik village and run around in circles and talk to feena then leave then come back and talk to feena then leave then do 3 backflips then recieve a psychic premonition that you should probably ask grandma to read those random ass books youve been lugging around all game then leave then come back then feena should be there and THEN you will be told you can enter darm tower
And darm tower is where the game goes to rot and die. Awful layout. You have to find specific gear sets in order to progress, which are pretty much impossible to locate in this horrible labyrinth. No walk-through can help you here. Im stuck on this floating head boss that no one has ever had a problem with apparently cause i cant find any help. I do no damage. Im assuming i need a special sword 100 floors down from where i am that i need to backtrack to get, but i dont want to.
A shame because this was really free of all the issues i had with 80s-90s games but then it all fell off as soon as the mines happened. Hopefully ys 2 is better, for now i quit.
Go into this dark ass labyrinth and fight enemies way too strong for you. Find a random seed and somehow know that you have to eat it to progress the game. Dont fight that werewolf bat cause if you dont have a SPECIFIC sword you have to get by eating a seed then leaving then finding Reah then talking to Reah then giving Reah her harmonica then going to two trees and watching a cutscene, then youre fucked. Go back into the awful mines that's layout is akin to a 4 year old's art class project and fight the bat with the 3 frames of vulnerability.
Hoorah.... the mines are now over. Now i can have fun?!?!??
Wrong. Go to zepik village and run around in circles and talk to feena then leave then come back and talk to feena then leave then do 3 backflips then recieve a psychic premonition that you should probably ask grandma to read those random ass books youve been lugging around all game then leave then come back then feena should be there and THEN you will be told you can enter darm tower
And darm tower is where the game goes to rot and die. Awful layout. You have to find specific gear sets in order to progress, which are pretty much impossible to locate in this horrible labyrinth. No walk-through can help you here. Im stuck on this floating head boss that no one has ever had a problem with apparently cause i cant find any help. I do no damage. Im assuming i need a special sword 100 floors down from where i am that i need to backtrack to get, but i dont want to.
A shame because this was really free of all the issues i had with 80s-90s games but then it all fell off as soon as the mines happened. Hopefully ys 2 is better, for now i quit.
2019
Wattam is a very sweet game made by the director of Katamari Damacy, Keita Takahashi. Like his previous works it is a very silly experience overflowing with love for people with a tinge of melancholy. There is a very kind and philosophical undertone to Takahashi's games that I have always admired, and Wattam is not really any different in that regard. His games are as fun as they are human and i had a very good time playing through the story of this funny box-shaped mayor.
The game itself has a lot of problems on steam specifically though.... im playing on a steamdeck and the storybook cutscenes just kept skipping themselves for some reason. Others reported frequent crashing, which never happened to me but the framerate became pretty bad at some points.
The way the game controls isnt the best too.... you choose your character with a cursor that moves in 3D space, and as there are about 80 people you can choose to be, you end up struggling to pick out the one you want. Things also feel quite clunky and floaty in a way that becomes a hindrance when you need to do something. Moving ships between islands also feels clunky and i dread doing it sometimes.
The save system saves per chapter, which is a shame because if you dont fully complete a segment and have to leave, you'll be required to do everything all over again. I had two glitches which required me to restart and redo my progress which always sucks the air out of an experience.
But i still wish more people would play this game... i love all the wattams with their different abilities and personalities. Theres even different descriptions for each individual character so a lot of love went into making everyone feel happy and alive. Which character you play as also determines what the music sounds like; the soundtrack is fantastic and the dynamic music seems like it took a long time to create.
This game is really fun and heartwarming, so i would recommend it to anyone looking for a short silly time... but dont expect to get all the steam achievements, theyre a little bit much.... kaboom.
The game itself has a lot of problems on steam specifically though.... im playing on a steamdeck and the storybook cutscenes just kept skipping themselves for some reason. Others reported frequent crashing, which never happened to me but the framerate became pretty bad at some points.
The way the game controls isnt the best too.... you choose your character with a cursor that moves in 3D space, and as there are about 80 people you can choose to be, you end up struggling to pick out the one you want. Things also feel quite clunky and floaty in a way that becomes a hindrance when you need to do something. Moving ships between islands also feels clunky and i dread doing it sometimes.
The save system saves per chapter, which is a shame because if you dont fully complete a segment and have to leave, you'll be required to do everything all over again. I had two glitches which required me to restart and redo my progress which always sucks the air out of an experience.
But i still wish more people would play this game... i love all the wattams with their different abilities and personalities. Theres even different descriptions for each individual character so a lot of love went into making everyone feel happy and alive. Which character you play as also determines what the music sounds like; the soundtrack is fantastic and the dynamic music seems like it took a long time to create.
This game is really fun and heartwarming, so i would recommend it to anyone looking for a short silly time... but dont expect to get all the steam achievements, theyre a little bit much.... kaboom.
2016
(This review is specifically for playing this game in multiplayer/co-op)
Dark souls 3 is one of my favorite games of all time, and playing through it solo is a very engaging experince. Same cannot be said about its online mode.
I dont know why this game gets a lot of traffic for online specifically. I played through this run with my good friend Hilda and, while i did have a fantastic time playing with her, its very obvious that this game is not really meant to be played with anyone. Bosses feel unsatisfying most of the time, as its attention is split between you and the other player, and it never feels like the game handles 2 competent players together well. The areas outside that however are all fun and games, and i wish there were levels specifically made for playing with a friend in mind cause it was a blast.
Till you get invaded. Everyone already knows this but what is wrong with dark souls players? Why're they so mean and needlessly aggressive? Hilda makes everything entertaining but even her classic and iconic Frogger build couldnt get us out of some of these encounters. I think we met 3 whole players who were nice to us throughout the run but the rest had a stick up their ass for no reason. One guy was pretending to be Hitler and another guy, aptly named "you suck", invaded maybe 3000 times and proceeded to kill us with a glicthed gael crossbow. Even normal encounters take forever because i do shit damage and everyone else has rigged themselves out to kill anything that moves in one hit. Not my idea of fun when im playing with someone.
This is my first time playing ds3 online so i guess im just kind of confused why everyone loves the multiplayer so much, cause dueling is maybe the worst experince in the world and the game doesnt bend enough for it to be a seemless co-op experience.
Ill never forget Frogger's sacrifice.... killing Midir all by herself for me...naked, high heels, boobs OUT, greatsword in hand..... what would dark souls do without such an idol.
Dark souls 3 is one of my favorite games of all time, and playing through it solo is a very engaging experince. Same cannot be said about its online mode.
I dont know why this game gets a lot of traffic for online specifically. I played through this run with my good friend Hilda and, while i did have a fantastic time playing with her, its very obvious that this game is not really meant to be played with anyone. Bosses feel unsatisfying most of the time, as its attention is split between you and the other player, and it never feels like the game handles 2 competent players together well. The areas outside that however are all fun and games, and i wish there were levels specifically made for playing with a friend in mind cause it was a blast.
Till you get invaded. Everyone already knows this but what is wrong with dark souls players? Why're they so mean and needlessly aggressive? Hilda makes everything entertaining but even her classic and iconic Frogger build couldnt get us out of some of these encounters. I think we met 3 whole players who were nice to us throughout the run but the rest had a stick up their ass for no reason. One guy was pretending to be Hitler and another guy, aptly named "you suck", invaded maybe 3000 times and proceeded to kill us with a glicthed gael crossbow. Even normal encounters take forever because i do shit damage and everyone else has rigged themselves out to kill anything that moves in one hit. Not my idea of fun when im playing with someone.
This is my first time playing ds3 online so i guess im just kind of confused why everyone loves the multiplayer so much, cause dueling is maybe the worst experince in the world and the game doesnt bend enough for it to be a seemless co-op experience.
Ill never forget Frogger's sacrifice.... killing Midir all by herself for me...naked, high heels, boobs OUT, greatsword in hand..... what would dark souls do without such an idol.
Pocket Mirror is a game I have been following since its release in 2016. My first exposure to it was watching a walk-through online, so when this remake was announced i was very excited to experience such a beautiful rpg maker game for myself, with a new shiny coat of paint on it to boot. So that is why, despite my desperate attempts to like this game, i am very sad to announce that Pocket Mirror was so painful to go through that i walked away from it with a tension headache and leg tremors.
My compliments first: the visual art of this game and its environments are for sure some of the best out of its genre. The pixel art is gorgeous, the portrait work is very beautiful, detailed, and distinct. The way they tell their story through the world around it, and the many set pieces used in this game are very, very impressive and striking to witness. The atmosphere is also really heavy and i found myself a bit frightened at times. Ive been into rpgmaker games since i was in the 6th grade or so, and i recognized a few artists who have been making art for the genre for a while, like the one who does drawings for the play cutscenes. You can tell this game was made with a lot of love and detail, and i would like to consider it a celebration of rpgmaker games as a whole, but i just cant.
I dont even know where to start.... ok, mechanically, this game feels awful. Menus are so, so slow, running and walking feel delayed and weird, worse of all though is that there are no autosaves and you must watch a 7-10? second long cutscene every time you die. The creators were really inspired by The Witch's House so they felt like the player should die a lot, more on that later. But the difference between PM and Witch's House is that one of them is 5-7 hours long and the other one can be beaten in 40 minutes. It is so deeply frustrating.
In terms of gameplay this game also does poorly. Im hyperventilating thinking of all the scenarios i can describe here. I dont know how to explain... ive never ever played an rpgmaker with such batshit, baffling solutions to their puzzles, especially a professional remake of one like this. Like most games from its genre, Pocket Mirror relies a lot on puzzles to get from one area to the next, and to tell a story. Thankfully its not as boring as just finding keys to doors, but i would honestly prefer that over what this game does. This game has an awfully hard time communicating what it wants, there are many puzzle solutions that lie within really confusingly written poems or riddles, that go on for what feels like 12 stanzas. I have fantastic reading comprehension but even i couldnt even fathom what the game was asking me there, in all situations. Here is one example where a pumpkin wanted me to solve a riddle or else he'd kill me, not word for word but close enough:
"A woman baked 5 pies and left them on the windowsill to cool. She then left to get packaging for the pies. While she was gone, a robber came and stole 2 of the pies, and then a dog came and ate 1. When the woman came home, she was gutted to see what had happened. How many pies were saved on that day?"
The answer.... should be 2. It should be. I cant comprehend how it wasnt 2 and why it wasnt 2. The actual answer was 5, i dont know why. And as i said, every time you die you have to navigate through a very slow menu and that death animation and theres no autosaves. So it gets really old really fast. I never knew what to do in this game.
Another example of something that happened: there was a chase scene in the game (great for when your main character controls like a tank) that i just could not figure out. You go down running from the threat and enter a long corridor, to the left are enemies, you run to the right and theres more enemies. Theres open cages but your main character cant go in them, even though it really looks like you can. You die because they sandwich you on both sides. Theres also a room you can go down into with more enemies, you can then go back up to the corridor and duke the original foes in there. But it doesnt matter because they spawn more enemies in the corridor and you die. No matter what i did i died. I couldnt understand what the hell i was supposed to do, and i was very very upset. The answer for some unknown reason, you have to go left, stop. Then run right. Then go left. Sometimes this does not trigger the event, because i did that the first time and if you hesitate i suppose you just lose. Im not sure how the player was supposed to know that and i genuinely am baffled at most of these decisions. Dying in this game is absolutely nothing, has nothing to do with skill or reflexes. Its just a waste of time and very frustrating.
The story is a big part of this game, and while the premise interested me a lot, the writing is incredibly repetitive and poor. Nothing anyone ever says means anything. When you think a character should stop talking, they go on for 3 more boxes. Like i said, it gets very old very fast. Before discussing the general story i would like to make a note that our protagonist here is the most insufferable piece of shit little girl ive ever seen, i can not STAND her. She only gets a hint of a personality towards the very end of the game where she finally manages to stand up for herself in any way. I would rather play as any other character than her, and i dont like the ideals the game shows coming from her. She barely says a single sentence that isnt "im sorry" or "thank you" or "no!!!i just-" specifically, shes always saying that. She never means anything and shes ALWAYS sorry. Shes always suppressing her feelings and putting others ahead of her even though shes in a crazy fucking wonderland with no memories. She apologizes when people are mean to her. She wants to help everyone and is always fine and is so polite and self sacrificing to an absolutely unhealthy measure. She has no spine, shes constantly cut off and never gets to finish her sentences or explain herself. She doesnt think for herself and has no real commentary on her thoughts past that shes confused. She has absolutely no autonomy in her situation and never seems to develop in any way. Conversations with her go like this:
Harpae: ohh my girl why did you run off
???: im sorry harpae
Harpae: i dont want to hear any excuses!
???: im sorry, i just-
Harpae: no, i understand.
???: i didnt mean to say it like that! I just-
Harpae: enough !!!!
???: ......
Harpae: .....
Harpae: oh... im sorry.....
???: no im sorry.... thank you harpae... im sorry
Word for word that conversation happens at least 16 times when youre in the Harpae chapter.
That was a bit longer than a note on the protag, but its fine. Like i said the story has a good premise, feels very mysterious and makes you want to understand. I like the way everything isnt directly shown but for christs sake, they never tell you anything. The characters almost never have any meaningful conversation. And those endings are an absolute disgrace, if you go out of your way to get the best ending it literally doesnt tell you jack shit or give you any closure at all. If you miss one regalia fuck you, play the whole game over.
Spoiler alert! The main character has multiple personality disorder, which according to the fandom page for this game actually doesnt exist anymore and its now dissociative identity disorder which i think is actually a separate thing from mpd but im not going to trust knowledge from the Pocket Mirror wiki page anyways. She has multiple personalities but.... this is also separate from another plot point, which is that her mom sold her to a demon. I have no idea how these two plots are supposed to come together and they never really do, just that the protag should make peace with herself and that there's also a weird boy devil who made a fake version of the protag for... some reason and shes also the final act of the game for.... another reason. Enjel (mirrored protag) is far more interesting than our mc in every way, so i would gladly replace her any day. Apparently the protag is actually 20 and is also in an insane asylum in the real world. I do not enjoy the way they depicted mental illness in this game, despite the compelling mystery. Theres a lot to say about it but i dont really like the concept that she has 3 distinct personalities that are easily separable from her as a person, and obviously how none of it ties into anything really at the end because the protag never gains any development from meeting them. She also did NOT seem abused enough to develop 3 whole entire personalities, thats just an insane thing to happen to someone who's dad yells and throws things sometimes. She also has a brother that looks like the demon from the game but thats just... not elaborated on.
Final notes: this game has offputting and vaugely offensive jokes in it that arent enough for me to scorn it openly but are still very weird. One line from an adult man to the child protag went something like "do i know you?"
???: "no. I dont think so...."
"Awh thats a shame, because i would totally carve your pumpkin"
Dont know what thats supposed to mean. Another conversation from a character named Fleta to a pumpkin went like this:
Pumpkin: im so sick of everyone confusing me for a pumpkin all the time!
Fleta: but you are a pumpkin...
Pumpkin: no im not! I actually identify as a member of the royal blue(?) community!
I forget the word he said exactly but the joke doesnt even make sense because royal blue(?) Is a species of squash anyways, and therefore a pumpkin. Things like these made me feel immensely uncomfortable.
I dont know how to close this out as i am a bit exhausted from the experience. If you read all of this, then thank you. If you didnt then its okay. I really wish i liked this game more as it was a gift but the amount of aggressions against the player was just so devastating. I need to take ibuprofen now, bye bye
My compliments first: the visual art of this game and its environments are for sure some of the best out of its genre. The pixel art is gorgeous, the portrait work is very beautiful, detailed, and distinct. The way they tell their story through the world around it, and the many set pieces used in this game are very, very impressive and striking to witness. The atmosphere is also really heavy and i found myself a bit frightened at times. Ive been into rpgmaker games since i was in the 6th grade or so, and i recognized a few artists who have been making art for the genre for a while, like the one who does drawings for the play cutscenes. You can tell this game was made with a lot of love and detail, and i would like to consider it a celebration of rpgmaker games as a whole, but i just cant.
I dont even know where to start.... ok, mechanically, this game feels awful. Menus are so, so slow, running and walking feel delayed and weird, worse of all though is that there are no autosaves and you must watch a 7-10? second long cutscene every time you die. The creators were really inspired by The Witch's House so they felt like the player should die a lot, more on that later. But the difference between PM and Witch's House is that one of them is 5-7 hours long and the other one can be beaten in 40 minutes. It is so deeply frustrating.
In terms of gameplay this game also does poorly. Im hyperventilating thinking of all the scenarios i can describe here. I dont know how to explain... ive never ever played an rpgmaker with such batshit, baffling solutions to their puzzles, especially a professional remake of one like this. Like most games from its genre, Pocket Mirror relies a lot on puzzles to get from one area to the next, and to tell a story. Thankfully its not as boring as just finding keys to doors, but i would honestly prefer that over what this game does. This game has an awfully hard time communicating what it wants, there are many puzzle solutions that lie within really confusingly written poems or riddles, that go on for what feels like 12 stanzas. I have fantastic reading comprehension but even i couldnt even fathom what the game was asking me there, in all situations. Here is one example where a pumpkin wanted me to solve a riddle or else he'd kill me, not word for word but close enough:
"A woman baked 5 pies and left them on the windowsill to cool. She then left to get packaging for the pies. While she was gone, a robber came and stole 2 of the pies, and then a dog came and ate 1. When the woman came home, she was gutted to see what had happened. How many pies were saved on that day?"
The answer.... should be 2. It should be. I cant comprehend how it wasnt 2 and why it wasnt 2. The actual answer was 5, i dont know why. And as i said, every time you die you have to navigate through a very slow menu and that death animation and theres no autosaves. So it gets really old really fast. I never knew what to do in this game.
Another example of something that happened: there was a chase scene in the game (great for when your main character controls like a tank) that i just could not figure out. You go down running from the threat and enter a long corridor, to the left are enemies, you run to the right and theres more enemies. Theres open cages but your main character cant go in them, even though it really looks like you can. You die because they sandwich you on both sides. Theres also a room you can go down into with more enemies, you can then go back up to the corridor and duke the original foes in there. But it doesnt matter because they spawn more enemies in the corridor and you die. No matter what i did i died. I couldnt understand what the hell i was supposed to do, and i was very very upset. The answer for some unknown reason, you have to go left, stop. Then run right. Then go left. Sometimes this does not trigger the event, because i did that the first time and if you hesitate i suppose you just lose. Im not sure how the player was supposed to know that and i genuinely am baffled at most of these decisions. Dying in this game is absolutely nothing, has nothing to do with skill or reflexes. Its just a waste of time and very frustrating.
The story is a big part of this game, and while the premise interested me a lot, the writing is incredibly repetitive and poor. Nothing anyone ever says means anything. When you think a character should stop talking, they go on for 3 more boxes. Like i said, it gets very old very fast. Before discussing the general story i would like to make a note that our protagonist here is the most insufferable piece of shit little girl ive ever seen, i can not STAND her. She only gets a hint of a personality towards the very end of the game where she finally manages to stand up for herself in any way. I would rather play as any other character than her, and i dont like the ideals the game shows coming from her. She barely says a single sentence that isnt "im sorry" or "thank you" or "no!!!i just-" specifically, shes always saying that. She never means anything and shes ALWAYS sorry. Shes always suppressing her feelings and putting others ahead of her even though shes in a crazy fucking wonderland with no memories. She apologizes when people are mean to her. She wants to help everyone and is always fine and is so polite and self sacrificing to an absolutely unhealthy measure. She has no spine, shes constantly cut off and never gets to finish her sentences or explain herself. She doesnt think for herself and has no real commentary on her thoughts past that shes confused. She has absolutely no autonomy in her situation and never seems to develop in any way. Conversations with her go like this:
Harpae: ohh my girl why did you run off
???: im sorry harpae
Harpae: i dont want to hear any excuses!
???: im sorry, i just-
Harpae: no, i understand.
???: i didnt mean to say it like that! I just-
Harpae: enough !!!!
???: ......
Harpae: .....
Harpae: oh... im sorry.....
???: no im sorry.... thank you harpae... im sorry
Word for word that conversation happens at least 16 times when youre in the Harpae chapter.
That was a bit longer than a note on the protag, but its fine. Like i said the story has a good premise, feels very mysterious and makes you want to understand. I like the way everything isnt directly shown but for christs sake, they never tell you anything. The characters almost never have any meaningful conversation. And those endings are an absolute disgrace, if you go out of your way to get the best ending it literally doesnt tell you jack shit or give you any closure at all. If you miss one regalia fuck you, play the whole game over.
Spoiler alert! The main character has multiple personality disorder, which according to the fandom page for this game actually doesnt exist anymore and its now dissociative identity disorder which i think is actually a separate thing from mpd but im not going to trust knowledge from the Pocket Mirror wiki page anyways. She has multiple personalities but.... this is also separate from another plot point, which is that her mom sold her to a demon. I have no idea how these two plots are supposed to come together and they never really do, just that the protag should make peace with herself and that there's also a weird boy devil who made a fake version of the protag for... some reason and shes also the final act of the game for.... another reason. Enjel (mirrored protag) is far more interesting than our mc in every way, so i would gladly replace her any day. Apparently the protag is actually 20 and is also in an insane asylum in the real world. I do not enjoy the way they depicted mental illness in this game, despite the compelling mystery. Theres a lot to say about it but i dont really like the concept that she has 3 distinct personalities that are easily separable from her as a person, and obviously how none of it ties into anything really at the end because the protag never gains any development from meeting them. She also did NOT seem abused enough to develop 3 whole entire personalities, thats just an insane thing to happen to someone who's dad yells and throws things sometimes. She also has a brother that looks like the demon from the game but thats just... not elaborated on.
Final notes: this game has offputting and vaugely offensive jokes in it that arent enough for me to scorn it openly but are still very weird. One line from an adult man to the child protag went something like "do i know you?"
???: "no. I dont think so...."
"Awh thats a shame, because i would totally carve your pumpkin"
Dont know what thats supposed to mean. Another conversation from a character named Fleta to a pumpkin went like this:
Pumpkin: im so sick of everyone confusing me for a pumpkin all the time!
Fleta: but you are a pumpkin...
Pumpkin: no im not! I actually identify as a member of the royal blue(?) community!
I forget the word he said exactly but the joke doesnt even make sense because royal blue(?) Is a species of squash anyways, and therefore a pumpkin. Things like these made me feel immensely uncomfortable.
I dont know how to close this out as i am a bit exhausted from the experience. If you read all of this, then thank you. If you didnt then its okay. I really wish i liked this game more as it was a gift but the amount of aggressions against the player was just so devastating. I need to take ibuprofen now, bye bye
2022
Im not quite done with Dinkum by any means, but at 50 hours in I think I have enough experience to write about my time with this game.
Dinkum is probably the best modern farming sim out there. It does a lot to improve on the typical formula and it adds so much that im not sure id want to go back to any of the others. Almost everything in this game feels completely unique and is tied together in a very satisfying way, its a very distinct gameplay loop that you cant really find anywhere else.
For starters, Dinkum is just really fun to run around in. I love how the physics work so much, almost everything is interactable and its enjoyable to just go around jumping on things. The visuals are gorgeous and i especially love the way the crops and plants look, its a very solid style. It feels really cathartic to have a game that's a good time to just exist in. Dinkum has a lot of realism to it but never enough to damage the fun, more like it seems very accurate to Australia and its ecosystem. It also has a lot of surprises like any good farming sim should, learning how to play Dinkum blind in particular was really cool... no other game of the same genre ive played really functions like this one. 50 hours in and theres still a ton i havent discovered, for an early access game its really impressive.
It also has some of the best multiplayer ive ever seen in a farming game, compared to something like Stardew Valley it definitely takes the cake here. Youre constantly progressing your stats through a series of points which track things you do, like mining and all that jazz, so it never feels like youre wasting your time building up someone elses island. Your relationship with the villagers also stays consistent throughout anyones game, which gives the player a reason to interact with them outside their own world. You can pretty much pick up anything and you can even use tools you dont yet have a license to obtain, the only thing you cant do is set deeds and make permanent changes to the town. And like i said, everything is interactable and that includes other players, im a huge fan of jumping on my friend's head and doing a stupid little dance as they progress through a cutscene. There is a lot of teamwork involved in multiplayer so, to me anyway, the workload never feels unbalanced and its just a really good game to go through with someone else.
Dinkum doesnt really have too many substantial issues, but there are a lot of little bugs. Most of them are just funny but there are a few times ive had to quit my game for one reason or another. The late game also feels a bit patchy in what you can do, theres still people i have to move in but waiting for them takes a long time and finding something to do in the meantime is a bit rough. This game isnt even a year old though, and its already had two major updates which makes me think Dinkum is gonna get quite big as the time goes by.
Ive been having a lot of fun with this game, its only 20 usd so i absolutely encourage anyone to try it out if they can, especially if you have someone else you can play along with. Theres dingos and pleeps and dinks and doinks, what more can you want from a game..?
Dinkum is probably the best modern farming sim out there. It does a lot to improve on the typical formula and it adds so much that im not sure id want to go back to any of the others. Almost everything in this game feels completely unique and is tied together in a very satisfying way, its a very distinct gameplay loop that you cant really find anywhere else.
For starters, Dinkum is just really fun to run around in. I love how the physics work so much, almost everything is interactable and its enjoyable to just go around jumping on things. The visuals are gorgeous and i especially love the way the crops and plants look, its a very solid style. It feels really cathartic to have a game that's a good time to just exist in. Dinkum has a lot of realism to it but never enough to damage the fun, more like it seems very accurate to Australia and its ecosystem. It also has a lot of surprises like any good farming sim should, learning how to play Dinkum blind in particular was really cool... no other game of the same genre ive played really functions like this one. 50 hours in and theres still a ton i havent discovered, for an early access game its really impressive.
It also has some of the best multiplayer ive ever seen in a farming game, compared to something like Stardew Valley it definitely takes the cake here. Youre constantly progressing your stats through a series of points which track things you do, like mining and all that jazz, so it never feels like youre wasting your time building up someone elses island. Your relationship with the villagers also stays consistent throughout anyones game, which gives the player a reason to interact with them outside their own world. You can pretty much pick up anything and you can even use tools you dont yet have a license to obtain, the only thing you cant do is set deeds and make permanent changes to the town. And like i said, everything is interactable and that includes other players, im a huge fan of jumping on my friend's head and doing a stupid little dance as they progress through a cutscene. There is a lot of teamwork involved in multiplayer so, to me anyway, the workload never feels unbalanced and its just a really good game to go through with someone else.
Dinkum doesnt really have too many substantial issues, but there are a lot of little bugs. Most of them are just funny but there are a few times ive had to quit my game for one reason or another. The late game also feels a bit patchy in what you can do, theres still people i have to move in but waiting for them takes a long time and finding something to do in the meantime is a bit rough. This game isnt even a year old though, and its already had two major updates which makes me think Dinkum is gonna get quite big as the time goes by.
Ive been having a lot of fun with this game, its only 20 usd so i absolutely encourage anyone to try it out if they can, especially if you have someone else you can play along with. Theres dingos and pleeps and dinks and doinks, what more can you want from a game..?
2001
Magical Vacation is a very obscure rpg that drew me in due to it being created by the same folks who made Legend of Mana, one of my favorite games. Brownie Brown's creations usually tend to be on the more emotional side, an experience that seems to struggle against its rpg aspects with a desire to build a world and reach out with a story that connects. Sadly, this game does not have an offical english release... there is a very shoddy fan translation that is missing a few lines and comes off rather stilted, but im grateful for its existence so i could experience Magical Vacation in some capacity.
The beginning moments of this game stuck out to me the most in the 20 hours or so i was playing. I started MV a few months ago so im a bit shoddy on the details, but immediately the game impressed upon me a very bittersweet atmosphere with some of the most gorgeous pixel art the gba has ever seen. The game starts off as an almost coming-of-age story, surrounded by your fellow students listening to their troubles and desires for the future. Hearing school gossip and myths, there is a very warm and familiar feeling within the group of students, as if everyone was well acquainted and has been for years. The professor pulls you all to the (magic) bus to send you and your class on a (magical) vacation, which is required as a practical skills exercise that determines if you pass the grade. There is a sense of comedy to the dialogue and the sprite-work that i havent really seen in any gba games ive played, maybe minus Mario & Luigi. The character artist from LoM returns as well, so the designs are very unique and distinct from any other game ive ever seen.
I kind of wish the vacation with your classmates lasted a bit longer, for its not too long before youre attacked by very weird looking monsters and a bunch of your friends are dragged to another world in a very traumatic fashion, and you must look for them.
Unlike most rpgs, this game allows you to have 6 party members and has... 24 elements, i believe? It sounds like it'd be a wreck but i found the fighting to be very fun, however the downside is of course everything takes very, very long to do. It suffers from problems of its time, like there being a rough sense of direction, battles being very unbalanced and taking up a lot of time, and of course.... random encounters.
There are many good conversations with other characters throughout the course of the game, but they start stretching few and far between, and the fan translation starts letting me down as well with entire lines being absent or just gibberish.
I desperately want this game to be remastered and brought to the west, there are few games that deserve it as much as Magical Vacation does with its unique way of storytelling and combat. Unfortunately i did have to put this down because of how grating the random encounters became, and the lack of dialouge, but maybe ill return to it again one day. Until then, i encourage anyone who likes old rpgs to give it a go, if you dont mind the grind then i believe it is very much worth your time.
The beginning moments of this game stuck out to me the most in the 20 hours or so i was playing. I started MV a few months ago so im a bit shoddy on the details, but immediately the game impressed upon me a very bittersweet atmosphere with some of the most gorgeous pixel art the gba has ever seen. The game starts off as an almost coming-of-age story, surrounded by your fellow students listening to their troubles and desires for the future. Hearing school gossip and myths, there is a very warm and familiar feeling within the group of students, as if everyone was well acquainted and has been for years. The professor pulls you all to the (magic) bus to send you and your class on a (magical) vacation, which is required as a practical skills exercise that determines if you pass the grade. There is a sense of comedy to the dialogue and the sprite-work that i havent really seen in any gba games ive played, maybe minus Mario & Luigi. The character artist from LoM returns as well, so the designs are very unique and distinct from any other game ive ever seen.
I kind of wish the vacation with your classmates lasted a bit longer, for its not too long before youre attacked by very weird looking monsters and a bunch of your friends are dragged to another world in a very traumatic fashion, and you must look for them.
Unlike most rpgs, this game allows you to have 6 party members and has... 24 elements, i believe? It sounds like it'd be a wreck but i found the fighting to be very fun, however the downside is of course everything takes very, very long to do. It suffers from problems of its time, like there being a rough sense of direction, battles being very unbalanced and taking up a lot of time, and of course.... random encounters.
There are many good conversations with other characters throughout the course of the game, but they start stretching few and far between, and the fan translation starts letting me down as well with entire lines being absent or just gibberish.
I desperately want this game to be remastered and brought to the west, there are few games that deserve it as much as Magical Vacation does with its unique way of storytelling and combat. Unfortunately i did have to put this down because of how grating the random encounters became, and the lack of dialouge, but maybe ill return to it again one day. Until then, i encourage anyone who likes old rpgs to give it a go, if you dont mind the grind then i believe it is very much worth your time.
The original Oneshot is a game I've been following since its release in 2014, and it has been quite a pleasure watching a game develop so much through the love of its creator. This is a very beautiful game that beckons feelings of grief in me without delving into any intense subject matter at all. It is a very personal and special experience to walk Niko through the game and grow to care about them, and after all these years there is nothing impeding the fondness I have of this game and it's world. Sometimes the puzzles could be a bit obtuse, but it isn't something a quick look at a walk-through wouldn't fix.
The World Machine edition is the best way to play this game, in my opinion. The immersion of playing Oneshot on an actual PC is important too, but I really enjoyed the simulated computer and felt as if it was just as cool as playing it on its native hardware.
The only reason this game isn't 5 stars however is the solstice ending. No spoilers, I think the core concept is good... but I cant help but feel like it could of been done differently. It started drifting into tropes, and some of the dialogue felt dated which wasn't really a concern in the base Oneshot. I also felt like the ending of the game originally was very good, when solstice tries to elaborate on it, it does it in a way that feels like it deflates the air out of what the story had going for it to begin with. It's still more Oneshot, and after all these years I get to see the best possible outcome, I just wish it was more nuanced like the main portion of your time with the game.
Regardless of that, Oneshot is still a very special game that I could suggest to absolutely anyone. The artwork and music are still just as nostalgic as they were in 2014, and you can tell that the people who made the game put their souls onto it. A comforting short little experience that'll stick out in my mind forever.
The World Machine edition is the best way to play this game, in my opinion. The immersion of playing Oneshot on an actual PC is important too, but I really enjoyed the simulated computer and felt as if it was just as cool as playing it on its native hardware.
The only reason this game isn't 5 stars however is the solstice ending. No spoilers, I think the core concept is good... but I cant help but feel like it could of been done differently. It started drifting into tropes, and some of the dialogue felt dated which wasn't really a concern in the base Oneshot. I also felt like the ending of the game originally was very good, when solstice tries to elaborate on it, it does it in a way that feels like it deflates the air out of what the story had going for it to begin with. It's still more Oneshot, and after all these years I get to see the best possible outcome, I just wish it was more nuanced like the main portion of your time with the game.
Regardless of that, Oneshot is still a very special game that I could suggest to absolutely anyone. The artwork and music are still just as nostalgic as they were in 2014, and you can tell that the people who made the game put their souls onto it. A comforting short little experience that'll stick out in my mind forever.
Melon Journey: Bittersweet Memories is a game that is very good at being what it wants to be, and it should be scored a bit higher but what I've learned from this is that I really am not the target audience for these types of experiences
There is undeniably a lot of love put into this game, the music for one is very well made and there are an impressive amount of tracks, some of which were only used for a screen or two but sounded good nonetheless. The visuals are also very pleasing, despite the limited pixel artstyle and color pallete they still somehow managed to make every character distinct and recognizable.
This game is heavily inspired by Earthbound and I think it's probably one of the games that does it best, the witty dialouge very much captured the same feelings as I would have playing Mother.
While not as bad as something like Lil Gator Game for me, there is just something about the unrelatability of the characters that doesn't really connect with me. While in Gator Game it was more of the dialogue, here I couldn't really stand the relationships a lot of characters had with each other. More particularly the ones with romantic undertones, but the cutesy atmosphere just wasn't pleasant to watch.
Undeniably though, this game runs bad on switch. It crashed 3 times for me- losing a significant amount of progress since this game doesn't autosave, and it would frequently stutter when saving and speaking with an NPC. it's short enough that it isn't that big of a bummer, but since there's no way to advance text really fast or skip cutscenes, it still hurts the game quite badly.
There is undeniably a lot of love put into this game, the music for one is very well made and there are an impressive amount of tracks, some of which were only used for a screen or two but sounded good nonetheless. The visuals are also very pleasing, despite the limited pixel artstyle and color pallete they still somehow managed to make every character distinct and recognizable.
This game is heavily inspired by Earthbound and I think it's probably one of the games that does it best, the witty dialouge very much captured the same feelings as I would have playing Mother.
While not as bad as something like Lil Gator Game for me, there is just something about the unrelatability of the characters that doesn't really connect with me. While in Gator Game it was more of the dialogue, here I couldn't really stand the relationships a lot of characters had with each other. More particularly the ones with romantic undertones, but the cutesy atmosphere just wasn't pleasant to watch.
Undeniably though, this game runs bad on switch. It crashed 3 times for me- losing a significant amount of progress since this game doesn't autosave, and it would frequently stutter when saving and speaking with an NPC. it's short enough that it isn't that big of a bummer, but since there's no way to advance text really fast or skip cutscenes, it still hurts the game quite badly.
2023
Octopath Traveller 2 is remarkable in the sense that I've never seen a game that went so far out of its way to sabotage itself to no apparent benefit. The improved strength of character of the cast and the addictive gameplay fall way to the astoundingly bad story decisions and almost mean-spirited nature of the messages this game is trying to project. I haven't finished a single storyline- but I am 35 hours in and I am so incredibly tired of every single character. I will talk about the game itself and then give a quick overview of how the game handled each traveller's story.
The gameplay itself is as great as ever, it's incredibly fun and a fantastic modernization of typical jrpg combat. For most of the game, battles feel quick and satisfying, and the break mechanic is an entertaining strategy to play around. I love the additions of the dual-story chapters, which help to make your cast feel like friends and build their character. The game is still visually gorgeous, in fact my favorite parts of playing Octopath have been exploring all the various areas and just taking in how beautiful everything looks. It feels like you're wandering around a little diorama set.. like you're on a real adventure. That's easily my favorite thing in this game... which is sad, considering Octopath 2 refuses to let you skip or turn off random encounters. There's a skill or two that reduces the rate, but it's still really annoying when you just want to go for a walk, listening to the calming music but every 3 seconds you're forced into a battle. Escape is not guaranteed, which makes matters worse.
I also said that the gameplay is fun at first, but towards the end of your party's storyline it gets harder and harder to raise your level. I hate grinding, and you apparently have to grind a lot- I'm level 40 and every final boss has a recommended level of 45... but you should be comfortably above this because the final bosses of this game are an absolute disgrace. I've only done Throne's and Agnea's but they are frustrating. Agnea's takes forever and it's split into two parts, and your opponent can steal your party members? Two of them? She stole Hikari who I made into an absolute powerhouse, so I basically just lost in a way that didn't feel to be my fault, with 30 minutes of my time out the window. It's so demoralizing and to be honest, makes me feel like quitting.
But I could power through it if the story was good. It started strong but slowly snowballed into being just utterly irredeemable in my eyes. I will go character by character and dissect each story, but first let me say that I can really, really, really feel the Shinzo Abe influence in this game. The biggest fault Octopath 2 has for me is this: every character is somehow connected to a parent or is doing what they're doing for a parent. By everyone, I mean it even extends to NPCs. There is even a very morbid underlying message to the way this game conveys parenthood. The children in this game are treated as an extension of their parents, no exceptions. Your mom is a dancer? You want to be a dancer. Your dad is a baker? You're a baker. There are no bad families in this game.... in the characters eyes. Because even when a mother WHIPS AND BEATS children en masse, and raises them to be assassins, she still deserves forgiveness because she was nice a few times and she's your mother! I can not overlook this philosophy the game is insistent on pushing onto the player. And that extends to the forgiveness part too, someone could kidnap a child, drug her, tell her ailing mother she should just drop dead so he can capitalize on the town... but it's OK! He had everyone's best interest in mind, murder is bad and we should forgive him!
I will go into more issues on it this next segment but you can feel the old conservative Japanese man blood flowing through this game, and it's a real shame. It's obsession with procreation and their visions on autonomy turns this game into something of a disgrace to read through. Octopath 2 has really amazing female NPCs but unfortunately all that progress is reduced by the inherent misogyny this game presents.
Now onto the character plot break downs:
Hikari:
Of noble birth, Hikari wants to free his country from the oppressive rule of his brother and become a king that ushers in an era without bloodshed. A pretty basic tale... I actually like the character of Hikari a lot, but if you know anything about history, his entire story is impossible to take seriously. First off, his evil brother... this goes for all villains in this game, but they are cartoonishly wicked. With no depth at all, he wants to rule because he desires the world to be his. He also wants to call for every lowborn in his country to be executed. What? Even soldiers pick on the poor folk, but aren't soldiers barely above peasants if we are going off patriarchy? Even the most tyrannical of kings ushered in debt-wiping "clean slates" because they KNEW their kingdom rode on the back of the farmers and the slaves that built their buildings. You're just going to have a kingdom with only an upper-class? Who is going to do your work?? Everyone seems to go along with this without thinking and it's impossible to even give a shit when everyone's dancing around, showing off how evil they are. Hikari himself has a major flaw, which is that his "cursed blood" is just embarrassing to watch and I'd never say this about anything. It sucks. I will not get into the fact that Hikari wants a kingdom of equality... but still strives to be a king, and doesn't seem to have an interest in actually changing the hierarchy of their social classes.
Agnea:
The best story in the game by far, warm-hearted and Agnea is just fun to watch. It is still plagued by the fact that apparently no one in this world is capable of doing anything without their parent doing it first, but I enjoyed watching her grow as a person with her new friends, and I love Giselle.
Throne:
Her adventure started out so good, ended up so bad. I... have no words for her final chapter... just revolting. I thought Throne would be a character that broke the weird parent thing this game had going on, because her metaphorical parents were the ones keeping her chained, but apparently even abuse is not enough to warrant hating someone. Her big reveal basically crushed anything she had going for her- relying on her heritage yet again more than her personal accomplishments. And that final boss? Had nothing to do with Throne's story, nothing! It was so revolting and misogynistic. And not to mention unfun to fight.
Castti:
My starting character and one I generally liked... till everyone started calling her "mother hen" cause she's an apothecary, though that's her job. Her big reveal too was not written with much care. I haven't done her last chapter but I can't imagine how it can get worse. Spoilers- this game really said to me that even the man who randomly decided to massacre untold amounts of people deserves forgiveness. Is he supposed to be mentally ill? Because that is some poor writing. A healer spontaneously turned bad because "life is suffering so I'll just kill everyone to free them" is so childish.
Ochette:
This character is unforgivable. Where do I begin? To start with, she is a race of humanoid beast that is very, very clearly inspired by island indigenous people. Already off to a bad start, but of course they talk in broken English. Ok. Do you not get it yet? Apparently not because there's human colonists that liken them to "dogs who can barely speak" and wants to take their territory. I could maybe, maybe see any of this as something in good faith but they couldn't even do any research into indigenous societies at all. Not in the way they are socially organized, not in the way they treat people, not in their philosophies, not even something as simple as what- if any- economy do they have. Ochette, the saying of your tribe is "the weak are meat for the string to eat?" and if that's not all, you're a hunter that feels as if they have direct control over the 'balance' of the forest. And of course, she can hear the trees and all that shit. You have to TRADE meat with the shopkeeper, instead of just giving them coin, somehow even going more out of their way to be ignorant. I don't know if anyone told them this, but the concept of money and exchange doesn't persist in every society from every time and place ever. I could go on, but this character just spits in the face of native peoples. A native character would of been interesting! In fact, Haanit from the first game might of been a better example than this girl.
Temenos:
An interesting character with a humorous and alright storyline, held back by the fact that the mystery present in his path is not strong, therefore making the investigation segments come off as stupid. I'm only halfway through with him so I hope this doesn't end badly like the others
Partitio:
He is blatantly stated to be capitalist that wants to end poverty.... through capitalism. I don't know what to say to that.
Lion Guy:
Haven't even started him though I am not really interested, at this point.
I truly do not know why the first Octopath got so much backlash. It had some flaws, but unlike this game it was very simple and did not go out of its way to seemingly destroy what is a very good base premise for no real reason. How the stories are now all connected in 2 does not matter to me, because the way they are connected is really insulting and ruins the quality of each characters tale. I want to have fun with this game so badly, but each time I try to appreciate something, for one reason or another, it gets in my way. I love Octopath and I see the ways in which this game shines, but it is so dulled by its final acts.
It was between this game and a hitachi magic wand and I think I chose wrong. Thank you so much for reading!
The gameplay itself is as great as ever, it's incredibly fun and a fantastic modernization of typical jrpg combat. For most of the game, battles feel quick and satisfying, and the break mechanic is an entertaining strategy to play around. I love the additions of the dual-story chapters, which help to make your cast feel like friends and build their character. The game is still visually gorgeous, in fact my favorite parts of playing Octopath have been exploring all the various areas and just taking in how beautiful everything looks. It feels like you're wandering around a little diorama set.. like you're on a real adventure. That's easily my favorite thing in this game... which is sad, considering Octopath 2 refuses to let you skip or turn off random encounters. There's a skill or two that reduces the rate, but it's still really annoying when you just want to go for a walk, listening to the calming music but every 3 seconds you're forced into a battle. Escape is not guaranteed, which makes matters worse.
I also said that the gameplay is fun at first, but towards the end of your party's storyline it gets harder and harder to raise your level. I hate grinding, and you apparently have to grind a lot- I'm level 40 and every final boss has a recommended level of 45... but you should be comfortably above this because the final bosses of this game are an absolute disgrace. I've only done Throne's and Agnea's but they are frustrating. Agnea's takes forever and it's split into two parts, and your opponent can steal your party members? Two of them? She stole Hikari who I made into an absolute powerhouse, so I basically just lost in a way that didn't feel to be my fault, with 30 minutes of my time out the window. It's so demoralizing and to be honest, makes me feel like quitting.
But I could power through it if the story was good. It started strong but slowly snowballed into being just utterly irredeemable in my eyes. I will go character by character and dissect each story, but first let me say that I can really, really, really feel the Shinzo Abe influence in this game. The biggest fault Octopath 2 has for me is this: every character is somehow connected to a parent or is doing what they're doing for a parent. By everyone, I mean it even extends to NPCs. There is even a very morbid underlying message to the way this game conveys parenthood. The children in this game are treated as an extension of their parents, no exceptions. Your mom is a dancer? You want to be a dancer. Your dad is a baker? You're a baker. There are no bad families in this game.... in the characters eyes. Because even when a mother WHIPS AND BEATS children en masse, and raises them to be assassins, she still deserves forgiveness because she was nice a few times and she's your mother! I can not overlook this philosophy the game is insistent on pushing onto the player. And that extends to the forgiveness part too, someone could kidnap a child, drug her, tell her ailing mother she should just drop dead so he can capitalize on the town... but it's OK! He had everyone's best interest in mind, murder is bad and we should forgive him!
I will go into more issues on it this next segment but you can feel the old conservative Japanese man blood flowing through this game, and it's a real shame. It's obsession with procreation and their visions on autonomy turns this game into something of a disgrace to read through. Octopath 2 has really amazing female NPCs but unfortunately all that progress is reduced by the inherent misogyny this game presents.
Now onto the character plot break downs:
Hikari:
Of noble birth, Hikari wants to free his country from the oppressive rule of his brother and become a king that ushers in an era without bloodshed. A pretty basic tale... I actually like the character of Hikari a lot, but if you know anything about history, his entire story is impossible to take seriously. First off, his evil brother... this goes for all villains in this game, but they are cartoonishly wicked. With no depth at all, he wants to rule because he desires the world to be his. He also wants to call for every lowborn in his country to be executed. What? Even soldiers pick on the poor folk, but aren't soldiers barely above peasants if we are going off patriarchy? Even the most tyrannical of kings ushered in debt-wiping "clean slates" because they KNEW their kingdom rode on the back of the farmers and the slaves that built their buildings. You're just going to have a kingdom with only an upper-class? Who is going to do your work?? Everyone seems to go along with this without thinking and it's impossible to even give a shit when everyone's dancing around, showing off how evil they are. Hikari himself has a major flaw, which is that his "cursed blood" is just embarrassing to watch and I'd never say this about anything. It sucks. I will not get into the fact that Hikari wants a kingdom of equality... but still strives to be a king, and doesn't seem to have an interest in actually changing the hierarchy of their social classes.
Agnea:
The best story in the game by far, warm-hearted and Agnea is just fun to watch. It is still plagued by the fact that apparently no one in this world is capable of doing anything without their parent doing it first, but I enjoyed watching her grow as a person with her new friends, and I love Giselle.
Throne:
Her adventure started out so good, ended up so bad. I... have no words for her final chapter... just revolting. I thought Throne would be a character that broke the weird parent thing this game had going on, because her metaphorical parents were the ones keeping her chained, but apparently even abuse is not enough to warrant hating someone. Her big reveal basically crushed anything she had going for her- relying on her heritage yet again more than her personal accomplishments. And that final boss? Had nothing to do with Throne's story, nothing! It was so revolting and misogynistic. And not to mention unfun to fight.
Castti:
My starting character and one I generally liked... till everyone started calling her "mother hen" cause she's an apothecary, though that's her job. Her big reveal too was not written with much care. I haven't done her last chapter but I can't imagine how it can get worse. Spoilers- this game really said to me that even the man who randomly decided to massacre untold amounts of people deserves forgiveness. Is he supposed to be mentally ill? Because that is some poor writing. A healer spontaneously turned bad because "life is suffering so I'll just kill everyone to free them" is so childish.
Ochette:
This character is unforgivable. Where do I begin? To start with, she is a race of humanoid beast that is very, very clearly inspired by island indigenous people. Already off to a bad start, but of course they talk in broken English. Ok. Do you not get it yet? Apparently not because there's human colonists that liken them to "dogs who can barely speak" and wants to take their territory. I could maybe, maybe see any of this as something in good faith but they couldn't even do any research into indigenous societies at all. Not in the way they are socially organized, not in the way they treat people, not in their philosophies, not even something as simple as what- if any- economy do they have. Ochette, the saying of your tribe is "the weak are meat for the string to eat?" and if that's not all, you're a hunter that feels as if they have direct control over the 'balance' of the forest. And of course, she can hear the trees and all that shit. You have to TRADE meat with the shopkeeper, instead of just giving them coin, somehow even going more out of their way to be ignorant. I don't know if anyone told them this, but the concept of money and exchange doesn't persist in every society from every time and place ever. I could go on, but this character just spits in the face of native peoples. A native character would of been interesting! In fact, Haanit from the first game might of been a better example than this girl.
Temenos:
An interesting character with a humorous and alright storyline, held back by the fact that the mystery present in his path is not strong, therefore making the investigation segments come off as stupid. I'm only halfway through with him so I hope this doesn't end badly like the others
Partitio:
He is blatantly stated to be capitalist that wants to end poverty.... through capitalism. I don't know what to say to that.
Lion Guy:
Haven't even started him though I am not really interested, at this point.
I truly do not know why the first Octopath got so much backlash. It had some flaws, but unlike this game it was very simple and did not go out of its way to seemingly destroy what is a very good base premise for no real reason. How the stories are now all connected in 2 does not matter to me, because the way they are connected is really insulting and ruins the quality of each characters tale. I want to have fun with this game so badly, but each time I try to appreciate something, for one reason or another, it gets in my way. I love Octopath and I see the ways in which this game shines, but it is so dulled by its final acts.
It was between this game and a hitachi magic wand and I think I chose wrong. Thank you so much for reading!
2008
I remember a story from a while ago...
A cherished memory from 2011, sometimes stories can transcend their purpose if the right person were to view them. One of the first games I ever knew about back in the 6th grade, and I didn't really remember why I was so drawn to it until now. For once, the narrative to me here is irrelevant, what matters is the prolific sense of repetition, loneliness, and dread this game creates. Though nothing about it feels like horror, it's not intrusive, I don't feel threatened down to the way the game refuses to let you full-screen. It is sad to me, and quiet- most of this game is music and repeating the same puzzle again and again. I'm not quite sure if its the game or me, but as an adult I can't help but see some traces of me still left there, down to the titles of the songs. It's a little startling how my life reflects in those songs today, I feel like they have an entirely different connection to me than anyone else. I understand them more now, I believe.
This is an interesting piece of my history, it was nice to look back and experience it again. I couldn't possibly rate it, it's not really that type of game... but i can still say I've never really seen anything quite like it, and I'm still impressed by the type of feelings this managed to create. Goodbye for now, Irisu, and thank you for the memories.
A cherished memory from 2011, sometimes stories can transcend their purpose if the right person were to view them. One of the first games I ever knew about back in the 6th grade, and I didn't really remember why I was so drawn to it until now. For once, the narrative to me here is irrelevant, what matters is the prolific sense of repetition, loneliness, and dread this game creates. Though nothing about it feels like horror, it's not intrusive, I don't feel threatened down to the way the game refuses to let you full-screen. It is sad to me, and quiet- most of this game is music and repeating the same puzzle again and again. I'm not quite sure if its the game or me, but as an adult I can't help but see some traces of me still left there, down to the titles of the songs. It's a little startling how my life reflects in those songs today, I feel like they have an entirely different connection to me than anyone else. I understand them more now, I believe.
This is an interesting piece of my history, it was nice to look back and experience it again. I couldn't possibly rate it, it's not really that type of game... but i can still say I've never really seen anything quite like it, and I'm still impressed by the type of feelings this managed to create. Goodbye for now, Irisu, and thank you for the memories.