It's a tactical turn-based strategy game, reminiscent of the original xcom mixed fire emblem, made by the same people behind girls frontline set in the same setting. Don't be fooled by the cutesy chibi presentation, the game is dark and gritty:
Most of the negative reviews are in chinese or mtl english. Why, you ask? Chinese gamergate. There was quite a bit of drama which turned out to be fabricated, but chinks will be chinks and tried to reviewbomb the game when it came out. Some of them are quite funny: View attachment 72804View attachment 72805
It's a tactical turn-based strategy game, reminiscent of the original xcom mixed fire emblem, made by the same people behind girls frontline set in the same setting. Don't be fooled by the cutesy chibi presentation, the game is dark and gritty:
Most of the negative reviews are in chinese or mtl english. Why, you ask? Chinese gamergate. There was quite a bit of drama which turned out to be fabricated, but chinks will be chinks and tried to reviewbomb the game when it came out. Some of them are quite funny: View attachment 72804View attachment 72805
Finished the Elden Ring DLC and figured I'd write my thoughts out. Big story revelations in this content, and I found them to be very interesting. I can't say all of them are very surprising, but they make sense and I overall like the direction the lore went. The boss designs are fantastic as expected, and the amount of content here is absurd for a DLC (totally worth the $40, obviously). I still cannot get over the fact that Miyazaki said it would be the size of Limgrave. They massively under promised, and in turn overdelivered to an absurd degree.
They absolutely blew me away with the OST. I found myself once again prolonging boss fights just to hear it more, and I'm tempted to go through the DLC once more just to face the bosses again. And damn, the new weapons/armor sets are fucking killer. So many amazing pieces of gear, I had a really hard time sticking to one weapon for very long. I'm not sure exactly where I would rank this in terms of Fromsoft DLCs, but as of right now it's tied for 1st with Old Hunters. I'll give it some time to simmer, and see if my opinion shifts at all.
Wanted to write a bit about each boss, as some of these are the most enjoyable bosses From has made imo. Obviously all of the music is fantastic, so I feel like I'll sound like a broken record if I go into it with every boss.
Not much to say here, it was a very fun boss. A good one to start with, and the element shifting was really cool. I especially enjoyed the hidden one with Death Blight in the Rauh Ruins. Stumbling across it and getting it down first try was really satisfying.
Oh Rellana, you pissed me off until I got your move set down. Incredibly fun to dodge her combos, but holy hell is she fast. I probably had the most trouble with her out of any boss in the DLC. I did essentially perfect my dodges on her though, so that's cool. Her double moon attack is really satisfying to dodge, even if it looks super sketchy with how late you have to jump.
I could honestly do without his serpent form, as his first phase is way more fun to fight. I do wish he had more health though, or maybe a full healthbar for first phase, and a half one for second. Felt way too easy for the poster boss, especially since both him and Malenia had collector's edition items. His edgy ass speech was kino though, love that shit.
Editing this in since he completely slipped my mind. Fight was fine, but the charge was annoying to dodge. Cool that he's an Albinauric. I will once again make it known that Torrent fucking blows, don't bother with that. Cool ass weapon though, love me some heavy thrusting swords.
This dude was pretty disappointing to me. With the area being locked by Miquella previously, and the arena doing the whole long drop entrance, I expected better. Certainly looks cool, but I was hoping for a much more intimidating boss for the area.
CURSE YOU BAYLE!! Absolute cinema, absolute fucking cinema. Igon is a legend, and Bayle is one of the best dragon fights From has made, if not the best. Such well telegraphed moves, and a phase transition worthy of endless praise. Perfect design, he looks so fucking cool. The journey up to him is a visual feast as well, with the lightning crackling in the sky.
This boss FUCKS. God I fucking adore this fight. The buildup with the Abyssal woods after finding a hidden wall was so cool. Walking up to Midra's Manse and seeing the headless people kneeling, then going in and being greeted the way we are was amazing. The music in this fight is particularly incredible, especially the later bits. The opening cinematic for him was pure fucking cinema, and the madness nuke he does put such a big smile on my face when it happened. Easily my favorite boss in the DLC, I fucking love it so much. Best music, best boss, hell yeah dude. Oh yeah, and his weapon? Using it in PvP is a war crime and I'm guilty. No, I will not stop. Yes, I will one shot you every single time.
Surprisingly cool fight. I thought there would be more significance to killing it, but I guess not. I quite enjoyed having multiple phases with increasingly dangerous attacks as well, very nice.
Cool ass boss, with a weird ass questline. The big dual laser was really cool, though a bit annoying to avoid. Crazy lore with this boss though, with the Greater Will being absent far longer than we assumed, and the Two Fingers having been communicating with Metyr instead.
I really love this fight, it's so much fun. Such a fair fight as well, which is shocking to say about anything that has rot involved. I really wish she was more difficult though, since I kind of just flattened her on my first try... Great music here, and hearing a bit of Malenia in her theme was really fucking cool.
I'm probably alone with this opinion, but I really enjoyed this fight. Was Miquella's inclusion in the second phase annoying with his holy stuff? Yeah, at first. Once I got used to the timing though, I loved it. The satisfaction of learning the tight windows was so fucking nice, and I wish more of the fights had even half as much difficulty. Badass music too, loved it.
The lore here is insane though. Forcing Radahn's soul into Mohg's body is weird as fuck, and Miquella is an evil motherfucker. Manipulating Mohg to kidnap him, so he could get to the realm of shadow in the first place, and now this? It's hard to even believe anything regarding Miquella, especially actions/words from those around him. Did Radahn actually agree to this (and what about the earlier vow? was he charmed then?), without Miquella charming him? Is Radahn conscious of this? What the hell does he think of being resurrected like this? For 2 years we thought Mohg was a weird ass dude, but it turns out he was being manipulated the entire time. I'll stop yapping, this is already too damn long lmao.
Second playthrough soon, I really want to use the Sword of Night...
Did Radahn actually agree to this (and what about the earlier vow? was he charmed then?), without Miquella charming him? Is Radahn conscious of this? What the hell does he think of being resurrected like this?
My impression was he isn't really in control of himself. Seems like Malenia (mostly) killing Radahn would have been done under Miquella's instruction, if he was a willing participant then that step feels unnecessary. The only other reason you'd need him in Mohg's body would be weird bloodline stuff I guess, maybe for some reason Radahn needed to become part of the golden lineage in order to be the ideal consort? The zombie slave angle seems more likely though.
My impression was he isn't really in control of himself. Seems like Malenia (mostly) killing Radahn would have been done under Miquella's instruction, if he was a willing participant then that step feels unnecessary. The only other reason you'd need him in Mohg's body would be weird bloodline stuff I guess, maybe for some reason Radahn needed to become part of the golden lineage in order to be the ideal consort? The zombie slave angle seems more likely though.
After thinking on it yeah, similar conclusion here. I also went and read Radahn's dlc armor, and we finally found out what Malenia whispered to him in the trailer. "Miquella awaits thee, O promised consort." So Miquella did send her there, probably under his charm, to kill Radahn. This makes me assume we fight Malenia after the charm has worn off. Unless she still is charmed, but Miquella never informed her what he's doing regarding his charm on Mohg. Could be either of them. Makes me wonder if Miquella's charm persists after he goes to the realm of shadow.
Another thought. The whole reason we kill Radahn in the main game is to allow the stars to move again, as he is literally halting fate itself. Just one more thing that affirms he never agreed to this.
Well she is "Malenia, Blade of Miquella" and his twin sibling, I think she is just absolutely loyal to her sibling who she has sworn fealty to. She is wallowing in Haligtree but still introduces herself as such: "Heed my words. I am Malenia. Blade of Miquella. And I have never known defeat".
How Miquella felt about Malenia is a more interesting question I think. I believe it's noted that the reason Miquella abandoned the Golden Order to forge his own path was because fundamentalism "could do nothing to treat Malenia's accursed rot". On the other hand he seemingly planned her absence partly so he could be kidnapped by Mogh and then left her alone. Perhaps the plan was that Malenia would kill Radahn completely and then cadaverise Mogh before reuniting with Miquella in the shadowlands? But Malenia wasn't strong enough to cleanly end Radahn, accidentally became an avatar of rot that nuked Caelid, so she returns in shame to quarantine herself only to realise she also failed to protect her lord/sibling? So she exiles herself within the depths of Haligtree as penance and the pieces of Miquella's plan don't come together until the player character triggers them.
Here are some more summer sale recommendations before I dive back into my journaling -
Starting off is Astlibra, which is another in a long line of examples that if a game is good, people won't even mind that it's using free/modified assets. It's the sort of game that you would have imported from Japan at a young age, I don't know how else to describe it other than they don't make games like this anymore:
And here's easy access to the Astlibra DLC, recently released and highly recommended to play through the story before starting it:
In a similar vein is Actraiser Renaissance, which you're probably already aware of if you watch Korone, but it still needs more attention and sales so Square-Enix will actually do something more with the IP instead of maintenance/fixes:
The remaster of Baten Kaitos I + II is on sale until tomorrow (as of writing), good for JRPG enthusiasts, even though this year is already jam packed with JRPGs. Still, good to support re-releases of old titles so that it shows interest in further re-releases, because there's still a lot of JRPGs that are otherwise lost to scalpers and...well, mainly scalpers!
...Speaking of keeping to the old ways, there's Crystal Project, which is - for all intents and purposes - Final Fantasy V made in modern tools with extensive modding capabilities. Exactly as it presents itself as, you can't get more obvious than this, and for some JRPG enthusiasts that's a good thing!
Or if you're looking for something more niche, Kowloon High-School Chronicle is a remaster of an early-2000's Japanese ADV-hybrid-Dungeon-Crawler that wears its inspirations on its sleeve, and if that doesn't get you fired up to play it already, nothing will:
And if you want more of that sort of game, there's Tokyo Twilight Ghost Hunters, all the way back on the PS3 - same developers, same philosophy of development as Kowloon High-School Chronicles, more people should have bought it:
To give a better idea of what I'm aiming to create, I've put together a shortlist of games that I'm currently studying, all of which fit the criteria of "classic horror" and "anime/japanese inspired":
...no surprise at all that these are primarily doujin games, which is the sort of creative spirit I need to bring into this - and these games should present a baseline of content that their audiences come to expect that I will need to match. escape rooms leading to environmental puzzles leading to monster or NPC encounters, and everything in-between wrapped around the various story beats, preferably in hand-made content over randomized/roguelike. since I'm aiming on utilizing MSPaint as a primary aesthetic choice, the only reason why I haven't listed Higurashi and Umineko is because those should already be a given for anyone making anime-inspired horror, really.
to prevent myself from going into further paragraphs and making this post even longer than it needs to be, I'll save the high-level gameplay descriptors and mouse-drawn MSPaint monstrosity prototypes for next time. long live ham hands supremacy.
I'd love more games like the original Pokemon Trading Card Game on Gameboy. Going around, doing card battles, collecting booster packs for more cards after winning battles, building decks from the cards you earn, etc. I still enjoy going back amd playing the original Gameboy game from time-to-time.
I think I just mostly miss the aspect of earning the booster packs from winning battles, rather than having to drop money on booster packs with the modern games.
(Also, the soundtrack was awesome.)
The early Yugioh Tag Force games had a Persona-like social system the game revolved around. You had a schedule to manage and relationships to develop all on a fixed calander with timed events you could fail to keep you diligent, which were used to unlock new types of booster packs to build your deck (or you could find singles lying around or through special rewards).
I thought it was a shame that those elements got slowly worked out of the franchise with every sequel, and Konami eventually dropped it altogether for quick games like Master Rule, but that's just Konami all over. I'd love to replay them again but it'd have to be emulation now they're that old and my psp gave up the ghost after all the time I spent on them.
So these first three are some of the essential Atari Lynx games. (The roms are available in the packages to play on your favorite emulator system. Great on handhelds.)
The above is arguably the best NeoGeo Pocket Color game, a masterpiece SNK was hoping would sell the system. Sadly it didn't but now you can play it on your Steamdeck (or extract the rom and play it on some other hand held).
A great couple of collections of NeoGeo Pocket Color games. The roms are all extractable if you prefer to play them in an emulator. (Of course, you can probably find them for free somewhere on the Internet too.)
All I've bought in the Steam sale so far is Forza Horizon 4 - it's being delisted from Steam in December so there's a huge discount at the moment (80%). I was also looking at Star Ocean: The Second Story R but I might wait for the Switch version to go on sale instead.
I think i played like 4 hours max of this game. I did play a shit ton of Forza Horizon 3 though. And its pretty much the same game anyways. There has been a a twitter debate recently about the pause feature in video games after a female streamer ranted about wanting one since she has kids. Im curious about the people's opinion on TVA sincd i hate discussing with twitter people.
It waa specifically about Elden Ring since there is no option to pause unless you go on the help menu. Should there be a pause feature in Elden Ring?
There should be a pause feature for every video game that isn't multiplayer only, I thought we agreed on this decades ago. Forget being a woman with kids, there's a million reasons one might have to get up and do something mid-gaming. You're telling me if I have to take out the trash, I need to turn off Elden Ring or quit to the main menu? Are they retarded?
There should be a pause feature for every video game that isn't multiplayer only, I thought we agreed on this decades ago. Forget being a woman with kids, there's a million reasons one might have to get up and do something mid-gaming. You're telling me if I have to take out the trash, I need to turn off Elden Ring or quit to the main menu? Are they retarded?
i dont like it that much but i find people seething about it on twitter funny so ill put up with it solely for that
99% of modern internet discussion suffers from people having very sensible or agreeable opinions but being complete smuglords about them and torpedoing their entire cause purely on their own egos or lack of intelligence
There should be a pause feature for every video game that isn't multiplayer only, I thought we agreed on this decades ago. Forget being a woman with kids, there's a million reasons one might have to get up and do something mid-gaming. You're telling me if I have to take out the trash, I need to turn off Elden Ring or quit to the main menu? Are they retarded?
I agree with you, there's a lot of people (probably teenagers with zero responsabilities) that argues that you just shouldnt play if you dont have all your time to waste on it. Lots of retarded takes in general.
Rabid FromSoft fanboys would take having to pay a dollar every time you die in their games to get revived because their answer to complaints would just be "jUsT gIt GoOd lul".
I don't see much of an issue having the ability to pause outside of obvious particular instances. I'd definitely use it as there are times when I need to step away while playing. That being said, I've also never really had too many issues of just finding a spot away from enemies and stepping away if I don't want to log off. If I'm in a boss fight, then I just have to die and try again later. I've had this happened a few times. Sucks, but it's a game, so it's whatever. It happens.
I'm definitely pro-having the ability to pause, but I'm not too bothered by it not having the option. But I'm also not in a spot where I need to unexpectedly step away from a game as often as others. Not sure what this debate is looking like as I've only seen one Tweet about it, but I wouldn't be surprised if people are getting really stupid with it.
Is the pause feature not just sitting at the bonfire/Whatever-it's-called in-ER? Like, if you can run from the bonfire to your objective and back I don't see a need for a pause button tbh.
Is the pause feature not just sitting at the bonfire/Whatever-it's-called in-ER? Like, if you can run from the bonfire to your objective and back I don't see a need for a pause button tbh.
I'm pretty sure opening the equipment menu pauses the game anyway. It's not a split second pause, obviously, but it seems to me I've used it when I have to eat dinner or whatever. Hmm, let me give it a try:
Ok, so, umm, yeah... you can't pause in Elden Ring! Dinner is for the weak! Git gud!
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