ranrannerson
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Yoshi's Story
1997
There's a nebulous concept I've struggled to pinpoint about certain games that's completely intangible to the usual scale that's often used to weigh them of their quality. It's not really unique entirely to Yoshi's Story, but to me it's probably among the strongest in it's field. It's that magical ability to have your emotions be naturally struck and never fail to bring a smile across your face. I really don't want to just call it "nostalgia", because it implies that it's only associated with me in particular, and no one else can really experience that same sudden wave of warmness. As I slipped more into pessimistic adulthood though, I started doubting this magic really existing.
"It's just an easy platformer with some high score mechanics, nothing more, nothing less. It's nothing special."
Everyone was right, it really was just my nostalgia overtaking my childish feelings. I'm just overly emotional. Yoshi's Story isn't special. Despite this, throughout all the troubles...the frequent moves to different homes, the friends permanently borrowing games, the trips to GameStop to sacrifice others in hopes of getting something new outside of Christmas or my birthday.....even the near-complete extinction of my childhood N64 cartridges due to my own dwindling interest in the system.....you're still here. That's why I sit here on my notepad document struggling to write about you, and I ask myself that ever so important question:
"What makes you so special?"
It's all too much. My hope to secure my reasoning beyond my own overactive imagination continues to falter. It can't be just because of Shy Guy Limbo and singing Yoshis, there has to be something. I start to believe that the so-called magic that I conjured in my own head is just that, only in my head. Just close the damn document and get back to work on that concept art you're supposed to be doing for a friend. Stop wasting your time. It's hopeless.
but...
Once in a while, I feel that spark of hope once more, and my fire burns again. Those rare times I meet someone who utters "I loved that game", or even "yeah, that music cheers me up too". My childhood optimism returns, perhaps...it isn't just me. The magic does exist. That quality that transcends anything else, something so powerful that it negates any terrible feelings. To remind oneself of simple and innocent times, to give some much needed emotional relief in times of hardship. For me, that right there is the strongest quality any form of media could possibly have.
Thank you, Yoshi.
"It's just an easy platformer with some high score mechanics, nothing more, nothing less. It's nothing special."
Everyone was right, it really was just my nostalgia overtaking my childish feelings. I'm just overly emotional. Yoshi's Story isn't special. Despite this, throughout all the troubles...the frequent moves to different homes, the friends permanently borrowing games, the trips to GameStop to sacrifice others in hopes of getting something new outside of Christmas or my birthday.....even the near-complete extinction of my childhood N64 cartridges due to my own dwindling interest in the system.....you're still here. That's why I sit here on my notepad document struggling to write about you, and I ask myself that ever so important question:
"What makes you so special?"
It's all too much. My hope to secure my reasoning beyond my own overactive imagination continues to falter. It can't be just because of Shy Guy Limbo and singing Yoshis, there has to be something. I start to believe that the so-called magic that I conjured in my own head is just that, only in my head. Just close the damn document and get back to work on that concept art you're supposed to be doing for a friend. Stop wasting your time. It's hopeless.
but...
Once in a while, I feel that spark of hope once more, and my fire burns again. Those rare times I meet someone who utters "I loved that game", or even "yeah, that music cheers me up too". My childhood optimism returns, perhaps...it isn't just me. The magic does exist. That quality that transcends anything else, something so powerful that it negates any terrible feelings. To remind oneself of simple and innocent times, to give some much needed emotional relief in times of hardship. For me, that right there is the strongest quality any form of media could possibly have.
Thank you, Yoshi.
When it comes to the farming sim genre, I feel the reason why a lot of the games fail to catch on is because they misconstrue "cozy" for "mediocre." They fail to distinguish themselves from one another, and you never really have a reason to play one over the other. A lot have fairly surface level farming, several overdone, predictable, archetypes to interact with, and if they feel especially daring, combat.
Rune Factory understands this issue, and I feel this is the reason why it was able to capture the hearts of both farming sim fans, and JRPG fans alike. Each Rune Factory game feels like it’s building on the previous. Sometimes these experiments work, and sometimes they don’t, but they are always experimenting to see how they could make each game bigger without sacrificing the iconic sense of comfort that the genre brings.
In the game you take control of Micah, a half human half monster that lost his memories. He is given a home in the famous Sharance Tree, a towering cherry blossom tree that never seems to bloom. While living among them, he ventures into the desert and comes across a settlement of monsters that seem to hate humans with a passion for casting them out long ago. The Monsters are unaware Micah is a human, and the humans are unaware Micah is a monster.
While I can definitely see why some people might disagree with me, I really do feel like Micah is a step up from Ragunda and Kyle, as characters. Unlike previous entries, Micah is noticeably more animated and lifelike compared to other Harvest Moon and Rune Factory protagonists. Even if it isn’t a stroke of writing genius, Micah has a solid character arc and clearly becomes more confident throughout the course of the main story, Which might as well be Guts Berserk level character writing for protagonists in this genre. The protagonist isn’t the only character that seems to be a step up from previous games in the series, as the villagers also feel like a massive step up from the previous games. They all feel like they really do have their own lives outside of the protagonist. The style of quick conversations that you engage in have a charm reminiscent of cartoon strips in newspapers. Even with the fast paced conversational style, you still feel like you learn a little bit more about the characters, and I feel this is a result of the secret ingredient to why this series is one of the few that mastered the genre.
Rune Factory understands the importance of progression in gaming. A large chunk of farming simulator games I’ve played in the past are often lacking in this department. Marketing your game as “comfortable” isn’t an excuse to fail at introducing depth to your mechanics. People want to feel rewarded beyond meeting some superficial goal that the game says you have to meet for no other reason than stretching playtime. This is where Rune Factory 3 really shines, as its gameplay is deep enough to keep the player engaged, but just mindless enough to be a comfortable stress free experience for casuals and exhausted gamers alike. It has a very clear focus on farming, but the game gives enough alternative options to make a profit such as crafting, cooking, alchemy, and monster hunting. Each profession is incredibly useful, incredibly profitable, and incredibly satisfying. So I never felt an intense need to grind to buy things like equipment for the dungeons. It never betrays its more lighthearted tone even when venturing into more serious topics, to the point it’s to its detriment.
While Rune Factory is a light hearted series, I feel like it usually drops the ball when it comes to serious topics which is fine because it’s a farming sim first and foremost. The issue is that it never seems to want to fully commit to whatever bleak theme it’s trying to cover. In 3, this is apparent in how it handles the relationship between the humans and the monsters. It wants to present this complex dilemma about the humans outcasting the monsters unfairly, and the monsters being rightfully upset, stubbornly refusing to connect with the humans. This is a solid idea, but cracks in the execution present themselves when most of the monsters besides Kuruna don’t seem pressed by anything relating to forming a relationship with the humans, and the humans themselves barely acknowledge the monsters. It feels less like a story of bringing these two races together, and more of a way of trying to get Kuruna to forgive the humans for what they did. I’d be fine with this, if the game wasn’t selling this “humans and monsters have been fractured for so long, and scorn each other” idea to the player.
Rune Factory 3 is a shining example of the Rune Factory series constantly growing, and shows that the genre doesn’t have to incorporate bland, surface level, gameplay to feel approachable and fun. Even with some of its flaws, the characters and satisfying gameplay loop does more than enough to pull its weak story. If you’re looking for a solid JRPG or Farming Sim, this game will not disappoint.
Rune Factory understands this issue, and I feel this is the reason why it was able to capture the hearts of both farming sim fans, and JRPG fans alike. Each Rune Factory game feels like it’s building on the previous. Sometimes these experiments work, and sometimes they don’t, but they are always experimenting to see how they could make each game bigger without sacrificing the iconic sense of comfort that the genre brings.
In the game you take control of Micah, a half human half monster that lost his memories. He is given a home in the famous Sharance Tree, a towering cherry blossom tree that never seems to bloom. While living among them, he ventures into the desert and comes across a settlement of monsters that seem to hate humans with a passion for casting them out long ago. The Monsters are unaware Micah is a human, and the humans are unaware Micah is a monster.
While I can definitely see why some people might disagree with me, I really do feel like Micah is a step up from Ragunda and Kyle, as characters. Unlike previous entries, Micah is noticeably more animated and lifelike compared to other Harvest Moon and Rune Factory protagonists. Even if it isn’t a stroke of writing genius, Micah has a solid character arc and clearly becomes more confident throughout the course of the main story, Which might as well be Guts Berserk level character writing for protagonists in this genre. The protagonist isn’t the only character that seems to be a step up from previous games in the series, as the villagers also feel like a massive step up from the previous games. They all feel like they really do have their own lives outside of the protagonist. The style of quick conversations that you engage in have a charm reminiscent of cartoon strips in newspapers. Even with the fast paced conversational style, you still feel like you learn a little bit more about the characters, and I feel this is a result of the secret ingredient to why this series is one of the few that mastered the genre.
Rune Factory understands the importance of progression in gaming. A large chunk of farming simulator games I’ve played in the past are often lacking in this department. Marketing your game as “comfortable” isn’t an excuse to fail at introducing depth to your mechanics. People want to feel rewarded beyond meeting some superficial goal that the game says you have to meet for no other reason than stretching playtime. This is where Rune Factory 3 really shines, as its gameplay is deep enough to keep the player engaged, but just mindless enough to be a comfortable stress free experience for casuals and exhausted gamers alike. It has a very clear focus on farming, but the game gives enough alternative options to make a profit such as crafting, cooking, alchemy, and monster hunting. Each profession is incredibly useful, incredibly profitable, and incredibly satisfying. So I never felt an intense need to grind to buy things like equipment for the dungeons. It never betrays its more lighthearted tone even when venturing into more serious topics, to the point it’s to its detriment.
While Rune Factory is a light hearted series, I feel like it usually drops the ball when it comes to serious topics which is fine because it’s a farming sim first and foremost. The issue is that it never seems to want to fully commit to whatever bleak theme it’s trying to cover. In 3, this is apparent in how it handles the relationship between the humans and the monsters. It wants to present this complex dilemma about the humans outcasting the monsters unfairly, and the monsters being rightfully upset, stubbornly refusing to connect with the humans. This is a solid idea, but cracks in the execution present themselves when most of the monsters besides Kuruna don’t seem pressed by anything relating to forming a relationship with the humans, and the humans themselves barely acknowledge the monsters. It feels less like a story of bringing these two races together, and more of a way of trying to get Kuruna to forgive the humans for what they did. I’d be fine with this, if the game wasn’t selling this “humans and monsters have been fractured for so long, and scorn each other” idea to the player.
Rune Factory 3 is a shining example of the Rune Factory series constantly growing, and shows that the genre doesn’t have to incorporate bland, surface level, gameplay to feel approachable and fun. Even with some of its flaws, the characters and satisfying gameplay loop does more than enough to pull its weak story. If you’re looking for a solid JRPG or Farming Sim, this game will not disappoint.
Bleach: Dark Souls
2007
it's such a shame that fromsoftware literally stole from bleach and no one bats an eye, this is the real first soulsborne and honestly i would consider it a vital part of the series due to the lore and music and even the characters. a must play for all soulsbornesekiro bros
Giddy at the thought of at least one person grabbing a rom list without context, and thinking this was gonna be a depressing look at the corruption of the highest court of law in the American legal system only for it to be a basketballer with a terrible isometric camera.
Twelve Minutes
2021
Within the first 5 seconds of freedom this game gave me, I immediately picked up the kitchen knife and used it in probably the worst way possible. The game didn’t stop me and it also didn't seem to care, and neither did I. But that was probably the worst way possible to start this game, because as it dragged on for hours the main thought in my head was, “We were cooking on the first route” which should have ended the game. Instead I was trapped in a torture chamber of nonsensical solutions and horrible dialogue delivery, with an ending that wasn’t even interesting enough to be worth the painful drawl. The image of Daisy Ridley’s weird polygonal feet are scarred into my brain forever.
While I find the trial and error bit of gameplay to be rather neat, it’s done in such an excruciatingly painful way here. Every do-over lacks the ability to skip the cinematics so you’ll feel your body rapidly age with every scene you’re forced to watch on repeat. The lack of options your character gets to work with are frustrating and unrealistic. The characters shamble around like zombies and there’s zero way to speed up the process to get back to a later segment in the timeline aside from some line skips. I guess had they implemented such a silly concept then the game would quite literally be 12 minutes long. Instead, you sit through hours of trying out the smallest changes, only to awkwardly miss-click something and have to redo the whole process again. With every make-out session your wife assaults you with unprompted at the beginning of every loop, the more reptilian I felt while playing this game. How icky it made me feel while I slowly became an iguana.
You’d think a game that allows you to stab the shit out of your wife in the first five seconds would have literally anything to say about violence or impatience or domestic abuse or literally anything? Maybe it’d point a finger at me and go, “You’re part of the problem!!” and question my immediate conclusion to stretch the game's choices to it’s most inhumane limits. Nope. It meant nothing, like it was just something cool you could do for the sake of it. Violence is actually the only way to siphon any useful information from any of the characters, in fact the peaceful communicative solutions don’t even open up until after you’ve murdered so it’s not like it’s not encouraged. But, it literally doesn’t acknowledge this as something awful nor does it affect your character in any real way. The game does not care, so why should you? Allowing me to start the game with the ability to do this really set itself up for failure. It never challenged my thought process, so I just simply progressed with not giving a shit. It's almost like game interactivity has a way of affecting the player if it's implemented in a meaningful way instead of just existing for "artistic" shock value.
At the end of the day, does it even matter? I went through all this effort just to land on a conclusion that I said out loud as a joke. When the twist happened and that joke ended up being the reality, oh fuck off. This is it. It’s just a game that let me murder my wife in the first 5 seconds of it and nothing else. Riveting stuff, guys.
How they got James McAvoy, Willem Dafoe, and Daisy Ridley involved in this is insanely hilarious. They sound like they’re phoning it in the whole time, like they don’t even believe in this game’s bullshit themselves. It’s artistic, I’ll give it that. But, am I buying it? No. I ate chocolate mousse while a man screamed at my wife and hogtied her to the floor right in front of me. Neat.
While I find the trial and error bit of gameplay to be rather neat, it’s done in such an excruciatingly painful way here. Every do-over lacks the ability to skip the cinematics so you’ll feel your body rapidly age with every scene you’re forced to watch on repeat. The lack of options your character gets to work with are frustrating and unrealistic. The characters shamble around like zombies and there’s zero way to speed up the process to get back to a later segment in the timeline aside from some line skips. I guess had they implemented such a silly concept then the game would quite literally be 12 minutes long. Instead, you sit through hours of trying out the smallest changes, only to awkwardly miss-click something and have to redo the whole process again. With every make-out session your wife assaults you with unprompted at the beginning of every loop, the more reptilian I felt while playing this game. How icky it made me feel while I slowly became an iguana.
You’d think a game that allows you to stab the shit out of your wife in the first five seconds would have literally anything to say about violence or impatience or domestic abuse or literally anything? Maybe it’d point a finger at me and go, “You’re part of the problem!!” and question my immediate conclusion to stretch the game's choices to it’s most inhumane limits. Nope. It meant nothing, like it was just something cool you could do for the sake of it. Violence is actually the only way to siphon any useful information from any of the characters, in fact the peaceful communicative solutions don’t even open up until after you’ve murdered so it’s not like it’s not encouraged. But, it literally doesn’t acknowledge this as something awful nor does it affect your character in any real way. The game does not care, so why should you? Allowing me to start the game with the ability to do this really set itself up for failure. It never challenged my thought process, so I just simply progressed with not giving a shit. It's almost like game interactivity has a way of affecting the player if it's implemented in a meaningful way instead of just existing for "artistic" shock value.
At the end of the day, does it even matter? I went through all this effort just to land on a conclusion that I said out loud as a joke. When the twist happened and that joke ended up being the reality, oh fuck off. This is it. It’s just a game that let me murder my wife in the first 5 seconds of it and nothing else. Riveting stuff, guys.
How they got James McAvoy, Willem Dafoe, and Daisy Ridley involved in this is insanely hilarious. They sound like they’re phoning it in the whole time, like they don’t even believe in this game’s bullshit themselves. It’s artistic, I’ll give it that. But, am I buying it? No. I ate chocolate mousse while a man screamed at my wife and hogtied her to the floor right in front of me. Neat.
One of the best memories I have with this game was playing it with my (at the time) 8 years old cousin, as he called Donkey Kong "GRAMPA" because to him he looked like our grandfather..... I dunno where he saw the similarities but I love that memory.
Country Returns is great: it's a awesome revival of the series after DK went in sort weird places throught his "bongos-junglebeat-kingofswing" phase. It takes the magical atmosphere of previous renditions of DK Island and adds a new twist to hit, creating incredibly memorable environments for a 2D platformers (especially the sunset levels: those are gorgeous).
As a game it's way tougher compared to your other platformers on the Wii, but it never feels unfair: it's a great balance between challenges that makes for really enduring and fun to revisit levels.
The secrets are as great as the ones from the first games, and the flow goes own for almost all of the worlds. Some specific levels I absolutely love have to do with swarms of spiders constantly chasing you into an endless tunnel, canyons full of unhinged fossils, and everything that has to do with Rambi, cause Rambi is the GOAT
The bosses are also really neat. They are nothing extremely memorable, but they are mostly fun in terms of designs and gimmicks.
My only gripe with this game is... the overall lack of older DK characters: Diddy and Cranky are back, but for the rest of the memorable cast, apparently Retro Studio didn't want to "steal" Rare's ideas so they came out with new villains and settings.
WHich is kinda fair, but also the results are not endearing: the Tikis are not really a memorable part of this game, especially compared to the Kremlins, and the rest of the allies are either completely absent or turned into item shops (Like Country returns did Squawks dirty, I loved that guy in DKC2)
Overall a great platformer, and the perfect title to make a lot of people return or jump into the franchise.. I just feel like it misses a lot of the charm and overall creativity of previous titles. Still a great time.
(BT TIki Tong's plan SUCKS: dude literally sacrificed all of his allies to create a pair of hands that breaks in 2 hits: dude is an idiot why is he allowed in the Nintendo theme park?
Country Returns is great: it's a awesome revival of the series after DK went in sort weird places throught his "bongos-junglebeat-kingofswing" phase. It takes the magical atmosphere of previous renditions of DK Island and adds a new twist to hit, creating incredibly memorable environments for a 2D platformers (especially the sunset levels: those are gorgeous).
As a game it's way tougher compared to your other platformers on the Wii, but it never feels unfair: it's a great balance between challenges that makes for really enduring and fun to revisit levels.
The secrets are as great as the ones from the first games, and the flow goes own for almost all of the worlds. Some specific levels I absolutely love have to do with swarms of spiders constantly chasing you into an endless tunnel, canyons full of unhinged fossils, and everything that has to do with Rambi, cause Rambi is the GOAT
The bosses are also really neat. They are nothing extremely memorable, but they are mostly fun in terms of designs and gimmicks.
My only gripe with this game is... the overall lack of older DK characters: Diddy and Cranky are back, but for the rest of the memorable cast, apparently Retro Studio didn't want to "steal" Rare's ideas so they came out with new villains and settings.
WHich is kinda fair, but also the results are not endearing: the Tikis are not really a memorable part of this game, especially compared to the Kremlins, and the rest of the allies are either completely absent or turned into item shops (Like Country returns did Squawks dirty, I loved that guy in DKC2)
Overall a great platformer, and the perfect title to make a lot of people return or jump into the franchise.. I just feel like it misses a lot of the charm and overall creativity of previous titles. Still a great time.
(BT TIki Tong's plan SUCKS: dude literally sacrificed all of his allies to create a pair of hands that breaks in 2 hits: dude is an idiot why is he allowed in the Nintendo theme park?
Honkai: Star Rail
2023
never wanted to interact with trash cans more than i have in this game.
This review contains spoilers
NEO: The World ends with You, unfortunately had all of the odds stacked against it. from Square Enix's frankly moronic marketing decisions and unrealistic expectations. (Square, you are actually fucking high for thinking this would even compare Final Fantasy 7 Remake sales wise. ) Which is quite sad considering how great this game really is. While I do prefer the first game a bit (mostly for story reasons) to say NEO isn't a worthy sequel would be a bit of a lie in my eyes.
Let's start off with the gameplay, the way you can experiment with so many different types of pins and the synergies they all have pretty much almost always allows you to approach battles differently. chaining a bunch of attacks together feels satisfying especially when you get to top it all of with a huge super move like the elemental killer mixes (which also can also be used as combo tools depending on which element of the pin you last used so it's really not just your generic powerful damaging move) or the 300% one if you're low on health and want to increase drop rates. Now, I totally understand that this game's gameplay doesn't really have the same ludonarrative storytelling as the first game with it's partner system, which is a bit of a disappointment. but for me, this comes with the strength of the game being much easier to go back to since I don't have to deal with touch controls. both have their inherent strength and weaknesses, I cannot possibly say which one is "objectively better". though I do find myself having more fun with NEO's combat. Now, if there was one complaint I have about the combat is that some of the enemies are really, REALLY damn tedious to fight. the Wolf and ESPECIALLY the Chameleon noise come to mind. The Wolves absolutely love running around the field which can make your slashing and projectile pins whiff, not only that. the gold ones you fight in week 2 can leave a trail of fire, meaning you get BURNT EVERYTIME YOU TOUCH IT! not only that, some of these mongrels absolutely love jumping from off screen and then binding one of your party members. you have to target them and damage them enough to let them go...this feels incredibly frustrating especially since the game, especially in week 3 loves throwing a pool of enemies at you. this gets even worse when you account for the dive missions, WHICH ARE TIME BASED! so you can lose time for essentially getting attacked off screen...the Chameleon noise is another one that enjoys wasting your time since you have to wait for it to appear before you can deal any sort of damage for it. now, I wouldn't really mind this if these waiting times weren't so DAMN long. oh and to add the cherry on top of the shit Sundae, in week 3. you fight a variant of chameleon noise that can heal enemies back to full health. But thankfully, for the most part. the other enemies are tolerable or actually pretty damn fun to fight (the bosses, the Grizzly noise, Stingers etc). Overall, I still think NEO has a great combat due it's sheer variety of pins and the synergies they can have with one and other.
Let's get to the characters, shall we? to say we have a great cast of characters on our hands would be an understatement. I think all of them are really likeable and serve some purpose in the plot at least, on top of just being really interesting and well written. I will not be going over all of them because frankly, we would be here all day. so I'm thinking of doing dives on Rindo, Beat and Shoka. Despite me not doing dives on a lot of them, I do think a lot of these lads are genuinely entertaining (Kubo is such a fun villain, same with Minamimoto. and Nagi, while she can be a bit annoying at times, was still great to have around.)
Rindo's arc is about overcoming the struggles of making hard decisions and being generally passive, this is somewhat obvious as he pretty much entirely relied on Minamimoto for Week 1. his morale was absolutely destroyed when he left the team, losing all hope of winning the game. However, his development at the end of the game changes from him being passive to making incredibly huge decisions such as going back in time to save his friends after they were killed at the risk of making the "boss" fight even harder since every time he used this time travel abilities, the "boss" would get stronger...plus, seeing all of the characters in the game team up at the end of the game was just really awesome to see. while I much prefer Neku as a protagonist, Rindo is still pretty good.
to say I was excited when I saw Beat again in week 2 would be an understatement in the century, he's probably one of my all time favorite characters in all of gaming. and I'm happy to say he's absolutely great here, I love his vulgar attitude towards the reapers but he's like a genuinely caring bigger brother (pretty fitting, huh?) to the wicked twisters and their allies. I'd say he's like the second leader of the team. I was so happy everytime I saw this blonde shithead spoke. I wouldn't love this game THIS much if it wasn't for the GOAT himself #BeatSupremacy also, I'm not exactly sure if Breaking Free is his theme (I'm confident it is though since it aligns with his backstory pretty well) but my god Breaking Free is such an amazing song, the lyrics hit too fucking close to home ;_; I'm literally him fr
Shoka is probably my favorite New-comer from NEO. She was a huge dickhead to the Wicked Twisters at the start of the game. Seeing her get more and more discontent with being a Reaper, eventually rejecting her closest form of family (being Ayano and the other Reapers) to live for herself was an amazing moment. Also damn...her reaction to Ayano getting erased was genuinely sad :( the only real issue I had is that Ayano was the closest character in this game to feel like a "plot device" for another character's development, Kanon and Motoi had enough screentime to make an impression to make you feel SOMETHING at least for them...but Ayano just feels like she didn't do that much sadly. But still, Seeing Shoka being so vunerable to her friend's death was heartbreaking, man ;_; but also really heartwarming to see her eventually open up to the twisters and her "fearless leader". I think out of all of the characters Shoka has the most "noticable" development out of all of them...but saying the others were underdeveloped would also be really disingenious to me. (ESPECIALLY fret, he may not be a favorite of mine but I can't deny that him learning from Kanon to be genuine to those around him was absolutely fucking great.)
Overall, I highly recommend this to anyone who has played the first game. trust me, it won't disappoint. but please, play the first game before playing this one because a lot of scenes just don't feel that impactful if you haven't played the first one and you'll also just be somewhat lost as well.
I would like to thank you all for reading this, I love both of these stupid ass games and probably impacted the way I see life. Remember y'all,The world ends with you. If you want to enjoy life, expand your world. You gotta push your horizons out as far as they'll go. I shall bid y'all adieu, sheeple of Backloggd. <3
Let's start off with the gameplay, the way you can experiment with so many different types of pins and the synergies they all have pretty much almost always allows you to approach battles differently. chaining a bunch of attacks together feels satisfying especially when you get to top it all of with a huge super move like the elemental killer mixes (which also can also be used as combo tools depending on which element of the pin you last used so it's really not just your generic powerful damaging move) or the 300% one if you're low on health and want to increase drop rates. Now, I totally understand that this game's gameplay doesn't really have the same ludonarrative storytelling as the first game with it's partner system, which is a bit of a disappointment. but for me, this comes with the strength of the game being much easier to go back to since I don't have to deal with touch controls. both have their inherent strength and weaknesses, I cannot possibly say which one is "objectively better". though I do find myself having more fun with NEO's combat. Now, if there was one complaint I have about the combat is that some of the enemies are really, REALLY damn tedious to fight. the Wolf and ESPECIALLY the Chameleon noise come to mind. The Wolves absolutely love running around the field which can make your slashing and projectile pins whiff, not only that. the gold ones you fight in week 2 can leave a trail of fire, meaning you get BURNT EVERYTIME YOU TOUCH IT! not only that, some of these mongrels absolutely love jumping from off screen and then binding one of your party members. you have to target them and damage them enough to let them go...this feels incredibly frustrating especially since the game, especially in week 3 loves throwing a pool of enemies at you. this gets even worse when you account for the dive missions, WHICH ARE TIME BASED! so you can lose time for essentially getting attacked off screen...the Chameleon noise is another one that enjoys wasting your time since you have to wait for it to appear before you can deal any sort of damage for it. now, I wouldn't really mind this if these waiting times weren't so DAMN long. oh and to add the cherry on top of the shit Sundae, in week 3. you fight a variant of chameleon noise that can heal enemies back to full health. But thankfully, for the most part. the other enemies are tolerable or actually pretty damn fun to fight (the bosses, the Grizzly noise, Stingers etc). Overall, I still think NEO has a great combat due it's sheer variety of pins and the synergies they can have with one and other.
Let's get to the characters, shall we? to say we have a great cast of characters on our hands would be an understatement. I think all of them are really likeable and serve some purpose in the plot at least, on top of just being really interesting and well written. I will not be going over all of them because frankly, we would be here all day. so I'm thinking of doing dives on Rindo, Beat and Shoka. Despite me not doing dives on a lot of them, I do think a lot of these lads are genuinely entertaining (Kubo is such a fun villain, same with Minamimoto. and Nagi, while she can be a bit annoying at times, was still great to have around.)
Rindo's arc is about overcoming the struggles of making hard decisions and being generally passive, this is somewhat obvious as he pretty much entirely relied on Minamimoto for Week 1. his morale was absolutely destroyed when he left the team, losing all hope of winning the game. However, his development at the end of the game changes from him being passive to making incredibly huge decisions such as going back in time to save his friends after they were killed at the risk of making the "boss" fight even harder since every time he used this time travel abilities, the "boss" would get stronger...plus, seeing all of the characters in the game team up at the end of the game was just really awesome to see. while I much prefer Neku as a protagonist, Rindo is still pretty good.
to say I was excited when I saw Beat again in week 2 would be an understatement in the century, he's probably one of my all time favorite characters in all of gaming. and I'm happy to say he's absolutely great here, I love his vulgar attitude towards the reapers but he's like a genuinely caring bigger brother (pretty fitting, huh?) to the wicked twisters and their allies. I'd say he's like the second leader of the team. I was so happy everytime I saw this blonde shithead spoke. I wouldn't love this game THIS much if it wasn't for the GOAT himself #BeatSupremacy also, I'm not exactly sure if Breaking Free is his theme (I'm confident it is though since it aligns with his backstory pretty well) but my god Breaking Free is such an amazing song, the lyrics hit too fucking close to home ;_; I'm literally him fr
Shoka is probably my favorite New-comer from NEO. She was a huge dickhead to the Wicked Twisters at the start of the game. Seeing her get more and more discontent with being a Reaper, eventually rejecting her closest form of family (being Ayano and the other Reapers) to live for herself was an amazing moment. Also damn...her reaction to Ayano getting erased was genuinely sad :( the only real issue I had is that Ayano was the closest character in this game to feel like a "plot device" for another character's development, Kanon and Motoi had enough screentime to make an impression to make you feel SOMETHING at least for them...but Ayano just feels like she didn't do that much sadly. But still, Seeing Shoka being so vunerable to her friend's death was heartbreaking, man ;_; but also really heartwarming to see her eventually open up to the twisters and her "fearless leader". I think out of all of the characters Shoka has the most "noticable" development out of all of them...but saying the others were underdeveloped would also be really disingenious to me. (ESPECIALLY fret, he may not be a favorite of mine but I can't deny that him learning from Kanon to be genuine to those around him was absolutely fucking great.)
Overall, I highly recommend this to anyone who has played the first game. trust me, it won't disappoint. but please, play the first game before playing this one because a lot of scenes just don't feel that impactful if you haven't played the first one and you'll also just be somewhat lost as well.
I would like to thank you all for reading this, I love both of these stupid ass games and probably impacted the way I see life. Remember y'all,The world ends with you. If you want to enjoy life, expand your world. You gotta push your horizons out as far as they'll go. I shall bid y'all adieu, sheeple of Backloggd. <3
I hate the King so much. I know you are meant to, so it isn't a negative towards the game (Rather, it's a positive to me), but seeing a combination of his exuberant expectations, miniscule patience, and self-absorbed narcissism fills me with emotions I shouldn't have while playing the funny ball-rolling game. This game is overall charming and goofy while portraying a clearly infuriating message about dysfunctional parenting. Instant classic to me for that!
Watch Dogs
2014
The gameplay is fine. It has some cool ideas it doesn't really cash in on. It's cool to have an open world game in Chicago. Everything that is memorable about this game is focused around the protagonist, the story, and how tonally strange everything is.
It's very clear that Aiden's sister was originally written as his wife and there was very little done to the script to make it feel that way. I love that you can get experience points for non-lethal takedowns as tons of innocent civilians die in a horrible car crash that you caused by hacking the stoplight at an intersection. Technically it's the cars exploding killing them, not you.
It's very clear that Aiden's sister was originally written as his wife and there was very little done to the script to make it feel that way. I love that you can get experience points for non-lethal takedowns as tons of innocent civilians die in a horrible car crash that you caused by hacking the stoplight at an intersection. Technically it's the cars exploding killing them, not you.
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