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bearpillowmonster · 3 years

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FF6 Review (Overall)

I'm going to rate similar to the way I did FF7 Remake, but in only 2 parts, so there will be an overall review then a separate deep dive into the characters.

I played this game using an emulator and I'm not ashamed of it because I used the FF6 Relocalization project which I'll link

Basically nerd talk and explanation of what that means: It's basically a retranslation of the original SNES script using the GBA port as a base and mixing and matching some of the best parts so there you go. They have a way to mod the PC version to have the OG sprite work because sheesh is that thing ugly and they also have a way to resprite and resound the GBA version but this is the easiest and logical solution to get the best of all worlds. There's also "Anthology" which is the PS1 port that adds some CG custscenes which I just watched off of YouTube because it's only a few of the major scenes.

Anyways, yeah, I'm glad I emulated it especially because of the fast forward function. That first chunk would've been rough without it because you're left just waiting for one of your party's commands to be ready but it eases up as the game goes on because you get pretty busy with the combat.

I'm not a fan of turn-based RPGs which was the main reason I haven't touched a 2D FF game until now so this is my first and oh boy, what a first!

Could you just watch a playthrough or read the story then? I wouldn't recommend it. There are certain things that I feel are better experienced.

Gameplay actually wasn't all that gruesome, as I mentioned, it got better thoughout but I know for a fact that I didn't do everything it had to offer because I see other people doing it online and I just had no idea how. That's not to say it's not newcomer friendly though, I mean I beat the game, didn't I? I think it would've just gotten complicated and made me confused if I learned how to do everything in the game anyway.

I found myself liking some of the mechanics and recognizing some of the systems from games as late as today (I'm not sure if this is where they started but I wouldn't be surprised). The random encounters weren't all bad because of the emulator's speed up function but there were definitely times where it felt a little out of hand with the amount I was getting. (I'm looking at you Cave to the Sealed Gate!) So it's all pretty familiar, though there are "Relics" which are kind of like Materia but each member has 2 each where it gives you an ability, f.e. Reflect, every attack hits, extra power, auto cast protect, heal with every step, etc.

One of the drawbacks of using BSNES though was that there was no toggle for a L or R shoulder button, just turbo and while that's not a big problem, that is the button to Flee a battle, so I just never fled. There is an item that lets you escape any dungeon or battle but I didn't really use it, same with the permanent item that Mog has in the cave (pretty late in the game). I'd rather there be a repel than the warp stone, but I figured that if I just fought whenever the opp arrived then I wouldn't have to grind, which is another thing I hate about RPGs! Luckily, I didn't really feel the need to grind other than for the ending.

Difficulty wasn't really a grind but make sure once you get to the floating island, that you know what you're doing because that level was annoying and I felt a very stong spike in difficulty as soon as I landed on it. Another thing is that sometimes it'd glitch and an enemy would have infinite health so I'd just sit there on fast forward, watching and watching then finally use Libra and no damage was made, might be an emulator thing, might be a game thing and although rare, it still happened.

There are these sections called scenarios where the game branches off into multiple different paths and you can choose which order to follow the specific sets of characters. I really like that aspect and makes it seem less linear and interactive because it's letting you choose how to tell the story. I have a thing for games that let me interact with it (That opera scene is pretty interactive too).

For a 2D sprite game, it has quite a personality with its cutscenes. They can be very cinematic and defintely makes the characters just that more engaging with some of their mannerisms.

Ok, I get it now. The music is bomb. If anything, that would be worth doing a remake for, to get orchestral and updated versions of some of the themes. (I'd probably cry at that opera scene) But Celes' theme is probably my favorite. The PC port has pretty good remixes for the most part though.

Could this use a remake? It's a trivial matter because I think a good majority of fans want it to be remade and I understand why but at the same time I understand the other side of the argument as well. This was the last 2D FF game and that's special, in a way, the story kind of reflects that. And I think with all the personality comes a bit of caution because you might see something in these characters or scenes that may be misinterpreted or done differently in a remake, similar to how you read a book and just imagine how it's playing out. I think it lays enough ground so that you don't "have to interpret" like with most NES games (how the Super Mario Movie was born) from an outsider's point of view, it may first seem that way though. (myself included (yes, I know this was SNES era. Shut up!))

What would I want out of a remake? I would want the airship to return and be able to move around freely but keep the towns pretty faithful (which makes for more linear opportunities). I could see Edgar's tools being used similar to Barrett's but we have "First Soldier" now which is a 3PS Battle Royale, why not have his tools play similar to that? Then actually give him story opportunities to pick up his tools rather than "just because you bought them" It would be a nice natural progression. I would suggest the same with Sabin and Cyan, have them learn their Blitz and Bushido moves by being taught by Duncan, you do learn one move from Duncan in the vanilla game but I'd see it as more opportunity to build your characters and make it feel rewarded. So, in those aspects, I would like to see FF6 remade or improved but as for everything else, they should keep it a lot similar to the original than FF7R did. I think that's where a lot of the criticism with FF7R came from (as well as what I mentioned in the previous paragraph) While I'd prefer a gameplay overhaul similar to what they did with R, I'd rather keep the essence. There aren't sequels or spinoffs or anything of this game so this is all it has (unless you count the ports but that's minimal).

In the CHARACTERS section, I compliment the side-quest system but I would like there to be a better indication as to "what" you're doing, rather than just looking up the next steps or be left to travel around until the goal is clear. They have the quest completion menu as well as waypoints in FF7R, I could see that being put to good use in a game like this. It would also be cool to actually "visibly" wear the gear that you equip to your character but I understand why that isn't utilized in most of the games (probably makes for better character models) especially considering most of these characters' costumes could use an update. You didn't get to use the Magitek suits nearly as much as I thought you would from the marketing and even the dang cover and logo, so a remake could improve on that as well. Another small complaint is that it doesn't tell you what the items do WHILE you're in battle, only when you're in the menu, sorting them and while some are staples like Phoenix Down, I still don't remember what the heck a 'Gold Needle' does.

Overall I'd probably rate the FF games that I've played (but maybe not finished all of) as such: FF7 > FF13 > FF6 > CRISIS CORE > FF15 > FF12 but I think 6 and 13 are kind of interchangeable because if you said one over the other, I wouldn't really argue.

#ff6 #final fantasy #review #ffvi #final fantasy 6 #final fantasy vi #game review #game #it's also considered ff3 but nah

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lvlyhao · 3 years

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「PART TWO: FEAR」

HUMANITY SERIES; Q.K

A/N: took me long enough to post, I know, but thank you to that last anon for reminding me of the series lol with school i tend to forget what i have and haven’t posted but i’ll do better from now on. i hope you like this :)

important: this chapter includes mentions of vomiting and though i’ve already put a warning for violence and gore in the masterlist, i’m saying it again: please don’t read this if you are not okay with that!!!!

word count: 2.1K

pairing: qian kun x reader

disclaimer: the characters in the story below do not reflect real people or present real facts. this is purely fictional, and you may not copy, change, translate or repost my work in any way. all rights reserved © cherry-hyejin 2021.

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“I’m heading out”, your hands fondly squeeze Taeyong’s shoulders from behind him. He does not look up from his task for a few seconds, counting rolls of gauze. Then, upon processing your words, he twirls to face you. His eyes trail up and down your figure, making a mental checklist of everything you need to be safe. Apparently, one thing is missing.

“Take Jaehyun with you”, he asks, “or maybe Yuta. Johnny is always good to have around, and so is Renjun. Those swords of his are no joke”, he rambles, losing focus. The way he places his hands on his hips and sighs tells you he’s absolutely drained. “Or maybe I should go with you—”

Shaking your head fervently, you pat his cheek for his attention, observing the streaks of noon sunlight across his face. He stares at you with concern and shifts his weight.

“You’re staying right here and so are the boys, Tyong. We haven’t found a survivor in weeks, and taking one of them is always more stressful than anything”, you reason. Recollections of how the boys attract trouble wherever they go cloud your mind, far too many to count. The air suddenly feels too chilly, with shivers running down your spine.

“Just stay here and maybe find a way to rest. You know Doyoung won’t mind keeping track of the supply for you.”

At this point, he knows it’s no use arguing.

“Just be careful… and get back before dawn”, he adjusts the collar of your jacket, thinking back to the weather outside of the grey walls of the dorms. “All I’m saying is you never know what you’re gonna find.” Giving you a tight-lipped smile and a nod, he resumes his job, and you leave him. Headed to the heavily locked iron doors guarded by the towering figures of Shotaro and Sungchan, you ask yourself if there was any hidden depth to Taeyong's words.

“You never know what you’re gonna find, huh", you mutter.

Now, roaming the deserted streets on your own and basking in the orange glow of the afternoon, you just think he was wrong.

It’s already been a couple of hours since you left: you’ve explored parts of the district you barely even knew before the virus, seeing all kinds of animals scurrying around your path. You’ve also eaten the rice balls Jaemin packed for you, and you’ve gawked at the decaying building that used to be your favourite theatre. It’s all the same as you imagined it would be. Not many walkers litter this part of town—just 7 or 8 you managed to avoid—and no people. No one worth rescuing.

Wandering like this, in silence, brings back memories you're not sure you like. Weekly game nights with your friends, attending Jisung’s dance presentations, playing in the park’s playground at night... All of those feel foreign to you, parts of life too good to have ever been yours. Still, the need for a shot of wistfulness takes over, and you sigh. Better now than when it gets late, then. With a shake of your head, you pick a destination and start moving.

You’re conscious of your surroundings as you keep one hand on the bow and make your way across the square. Dry, fiery leaves crunch under your boots, being the only sound you pick up. Nothing looks out of the ordinary, either. The same old abandoned stores seem to look down at you, their busted windows moaning in the wind. But, right then, something jabs at your gut. It's a silent alert to a threat you can't see.

Damnit. You better pick up the pace.

As soon as you make a turn to the left, spying the pizza place you used to visit, you freeze. Walkers, maybe 10 of them, whimper and try to get past the debris to reach something inside a pharmacy.

How could you not notice them earlier? They’re not a quiet horde, and the awful stench is not something you should have missed either. Have you been that lost in your nostalgia?

Whatever happened, you don't have much time. If the undead are making that much effort to get around the rubble, there has to be someone inside. A fellow human being—hopefully, a nice one. Someone you can help.

Acting out of instincts, you drink in your surroundings. Having your back hastily pressed against a tree trunk is not ideal, but it's what comes to you. While you can't call yourself a strategy master, jumping right into action is not the right plan when someone else's life is in danger.

Mind racing, you know you need a better shooting spot now if you want to make a move. Drawing them out to an alley is not a totally bad idea either. They wouldn't be able to escape, and maybe then they could flee.

As soon as you found a perfect corner for that, the screech of old door hinges catches your attention. A second later, shattering glass.

Shit. They broke in.

With no more time to assess the situation, you quickly climb up a rotting picnic table. The zombies, some missing a limb, slowly drag their feet towards a man in a plaid, blue shirt.

He's petrified, head lashing from side to side, looking for a way out. You know very well there is none, and soon enough it will be too late. He’ll be just at reach for those disgusting, putrid fingers. If they get a bite in, it's over for you, and it's over for him.

That’s when you take the stupidest decision of your life.

Screaming.

“YO, YOU POINTLESS MEAT SACK! WHY DON’T YOU LOOK OVER HERE?”

The boy might just get whiplash from how fast his eyes find yours. His are dark and desperate, but there is something else to them—to him. Something you will never find it in you to explain.

It could have been the way the stares right at your soul, or how his face displays every emotion from relief to terror. You could even say it was how his knees buckled under his weight or his fluttering hair in the wind. You can blame your reaction on a lot of things, but none of them startles you as much as yourself.

A cold hand grasps at your heart, squeezing it tightly in your chest. Blood drains from your face, and your frame shakes in the wind. You know this sensation all too well to have doubts, although it is what you swore never to feel again. Fear. Not for yourself, no, even when the undead start walking towards you instead. You don't—can't— care enough about your life, and you know it. It is all for him, the beautiful stranger you are going to save.

The first two arrows find their aim, speeding right through the undead’s skulls, but something shifts in your arms. The rest of your arrows now seem to swerve a bit to the sides, lodging themselves on necks or shoulders. In other words, not where they are supposed to.

Oh, how much you hate that the walkers will only die if you damage their brains.

“Annoying bastards, I swear—”

Falling into a state of near panic, you drop to the floor unceremoniously and race to the horde. If your bow won't do the trick, your other weapons will.

Momentarily thankful for their lack of agility, you pull out the knives hidden on the sides of your shoes. In a flurry of drive, you slash and stab everything around you. While throwing some hand-to-hand-combat here and there, your eyes start to burn. The walkers smell even worse from up close, you bitterly recall from past encounters. It's one of the things that make fighting harder—the urge to run away from them at every second.

The more daring among them clutch at your clothes, keeping your movement limited, but you manage to cut off their hands. The slick sound it makes is enough to make bile rise up your throat, but you swallow it back.

“C’mon, Y/N”, you pant, kicking what had once been an adult woman in the chest to send her down to the asphalt. “You’ve had tougher battles than this." With a breath as deep as you can manage, your knife cuts at another zombie.

It is true, you know. It's impossible to count the times you’ve been up against groups of 20 or more. You were always fine. Right now, though, wincing from multiple wounds scattered around your skin, you question how the hell did you do it.

Hurriedly glancing to your right, you notice 5 are already dead—well, dead-er than they had previously been. The lady you kicked struggles to get up, giving you a gap to spin and bury your knife into her scalp. She goes limp right away, and you stare. 4 more to go.

Just as you retrieve your blade and turn to face the other walkers, something bites your dominant hand. Hard.

With your knife tumbling down in a metallic clunk, fire shoots up your arm. The first thing you do is wiggle your hand back and forth. Some part of you thinks it was going to let go like it’s some sort of dog. You realize you were wrong when darkened saliva flows into the cuts, your mind going blank with agony.

You figure it was one of the undead you had pushed down before, only to lose sight of him later. And, yes, wiggling was a poor attempt at getting him to drop you, but you did it out of pure alarm. Fear is gradually taking over you now, freezing cold and impossible to fight.

With only your non-dominant hand free, you sloppily sink your blade down however many times it takes for the corpse to stop moving. The pain you feel is sharp, travelling through your veins like blue fire. As his grip slackens, the body slumps to the ground, a wet thud echoing. Despite the agony that threatens to blind you, you're aware of the other 3 walkers you have yet to take down.

One is easy enough, with an arrow embedded deep on one side of her neck, and another coming down on her brow bone. Repugnance swirls in your gut, and you have to look away. Their skulls are incredibly soft.

Your remaining enemies pace at either side of you, circling you with dead eyes and faltering strides. You keep your wounded hand close to you while the other clutches the leather grip of your weapon. It's time to put an end to this.

Choosing to go for the right first, you slash at his chest, grimacing at the black blood that oozes. It taints his shredded red hoodie and sprinkles at your front. The shudders that course through you in silent rage give you the strength to finish it off.

In one clean, powerful strike, your knife goes through an eyeball, but he collapses a bit too fast. You can't recover your blade.

Having no weapons on your hands, even for a second, is critical. The walkers are borderline sluggish, but it was easy to lose track of them: your severed hand was proof.

To your relief—or mild disgust—, hasty strides bounce at the pavement behind you, followed by heavy thuds on a slimy surface. It takes no more than 3 seconds for the last body to tumble by your feet, face down.

It's only then you see the skull, or better, what is left of it. Blood and brain flow over a gaping crack, done by something sharp. You could guess it was the heavy, black rock that you find before you, held in the hands of the man you are supposed to be saving.

From there, you realize his medium length hair is a faded blue, with dark brown at the roots. A grey university hoodie hugs his slim figure under the plaids, matching his cargo pants and busted sneakers. His face is all sharp angles and soft edges, but his gaze is nothing short of magnetic.

Wide, chocolate eyes glare at the body with such horror your own throat tightens. Then, with no words shared, he lets go of the rock and stumbles back like he cannot believe what he did. Your own eyes divert to the cloudless sky, hearing him vomiting on the concrete in a matter of seconds. Poor dude.

Pity, combined with the reminiscents of adrenaline and dread, settle in you. Your thoughts boil down to one small detail: the Sun is setting.

The throbbing on your hand momentarily vanishes, lost in the memory of Taeyong very clearly telling you to be back before dawn. Aside from that, the memory of what you did to get the walkers' attention still burns at your mind. That goddamned shout. Having a sense of hearing as acute as they did, you are sure any other zombies around you are coming your way.

You have fucked up big time.

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final notes: ik chapter one wasn’t all that exciting but i’m hoping this one is better wheeze two more to come, stay tuned <3

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self-loving-vampire · 3 years

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Ultima V: Warriors of Destiny (1988)

Summary

Ultima 5 is what you could call Ultima 4′s edgier but “cooler” sibling. The gameplay has gained in complexity, dialogue has been greatly expanded, and the ground-breaking system of virtues and morality from the previous game has been twisted by the tyrannical Lord Blackthorn following the disappearance of Lord British.

Ultima 5 also introduces more of a day/night cycle to the proceedings with the introduction of NPC schedules, enabling a level of world simulation that was very new at the time of release. It goes on to make good use of this system by casting the player in the role of an outlaw fighting against the new government, meeting with members of the resistance in the shadows, and going around the martial law that has been imposed.

Freedom

Just like in Ultima 4, you are dropped into an open world right from the beginning, and your tools to explore the world have been expanded.

The inclusion of more complex systems also enhance the feeling of being able to interact with the world with less barriers, as there is now furniture you can use, barrels you can search, etc.

Like with Ultima 4, there is only one way to win and a list of absolutely required steps that must be taken to reach that victory, but the order in which these steps can be taken is rather flexible, allowing players to create more of a personal narrative as they follow clues they picked up on wherever their instincts or whims took them first.

It is worth noting that there are actually some optional quests dungeons this time around, which is always nice.

Character Creation/Customization

While it is very nice that you can import your character from Ultima 4 into this game, I would say that this aspect of the game has taken a step back in a sense even as it has made progress in other ways.

The eight classes of the previous games have been reduced to four: The standard Fighter/Mage/Rogue Bard trio plus the Avatar class the main character belongs to, which is an all-rounder. As before, there is not really any customization beyond equipment either.

However, the positive of this is that equipment has been greatly expanded from the previous game. While in Ultima 4 you were limited to merely choosing your character’s weapon and armor set from a very short list, Ultima 5 not only enlarges the list but also allows for equipping multiple armor parts (such as a helm or amulet) while also providing a secondary hand slot.

What this means is that two-handed weapons now also give you a trade-off between their big damage and the option to use a shield in your other hand, or even dual-wield.

This greater variety of equipment allows a greater degree of specialization for your party members, though by modern standards this still isn’t much. The supremacy of ranged weapons also continues here, as magic axes are undoubtedly what you should be equipping everyone with later in the game, and now that class does not restrict equipment every single one of your party members will end up in plate with a magic axe.

Story/Setting

This is, in my opinions, one of the most interesting things about the game. Ultima 5 takes all of the virtues from the former game and turns a corrupted form of them into the law.

The game is pretty explicit about this too. Early in the game, in the town closest to the shack you start in, you can find a man in the stocks together with his son. The man is being punished for failing to donate enough of his income to charity as the Law of Sacrifice demands, while his son (who is barely breathing at this point) is being tortured for not reporting his father to the authorities.

Throughout your travels, you meet many kinds of people. From victims, to resistance fighters, to supporters of the regime and everything in between. Throughout your interactions with these groups you will have to discern who can be trusted (generally easier than it should be since the bad guys tend to be meaner or even cartoonishly evil at times) and learn how to fight Lord Blackthorn and the Shadowlords who corrupted him.

The Shadowlords are, incidentally, the part of the story that I don’t quite enjoy. Fantasy is full of one-dimensional ancient evils and dark overlords. By making the events of the game the result of an unambiguously malevolent supernatural force rather than human failings of the type that are not uncommon in real life, the game makes those events feel more distant and less complex.

This very series already has had plenty of “Defeat this one evil force and everything will be fine” plots. They are generally devoid of the moral complexity that the series is now aiming to explore and I want to know what this game would have looked like without the Shadowlords.

Fortunately, however, this effect is not too pronounced. Blackthorn remains a misguided man with good intentions. He admires you a lot, actually, and seeks avatarhood himself. He has such a positive view of the virtues that he sought to enforce them by law.

(Then again, his actual plans for the shrines make this apparent idolization feel dishonest, or at least inconsistent.)

And there is a real type of authoritarianism that functions a lot like this. Even on this site there are many who would be in favor of things like surveillance, police brutality, and harsher punishments. Even on this site there’s a whole lot of people who seek to punish others over stupid things like shipping the wrong fictional characters.

The people I grew up with even went as far as yearning for a dictator who would unleash death squads to execute all the “bad” people. This is a wish that I still see in many people, even those who grew up outside of the circumstances of my country of birth.

This is not an error that humans need supernatural corruption to fall into.

Other than that, I find the dark twist on the existing setting from the previous game to make for a spicier world to explore.

This is also the section where I should point out that Ultima 5 introduces a rather large and dangerous “Underworld” map that is easy to get lost in. While it is mostly barren, you do have to visit various parts of it as part of the main quest, and I just find the concept of a massive dark world beneath the earth to be a super interesting one (I mean, I have even run D&D campaigns based primarily in the Underdark).

I kinda wish there was more to it other than some items and a companion to collect. Something like a town would have been interesting.

Immersion

This is one area where the jump from Ultima 4 to Ultima 5 was massive thanks to the day/night cycles, NPC schedules, expanded dialogue, and even the addition of words of power to the magic system.

But the best thing I can say about it is really that it calls on you to actually roleplay and engage in the world as if you were actually there, at least to a degree, and it does so through a combination of atmosphere and gameplay.

You will not only want to be careful with your words when talking to certain people to avoid being reported to the regime, but you can also learn the resistance password and use it to get help and information from other members.

While these systems are all still pretty rough here, they still come together well enough to make this a lot more immersive than the average JRPG.

One thing that does feel really off is that the guards are not only superhumanly tough but you also lose karma for attacking them. They also behave strangely in that even though you are a wanted outlaw they don’t actually hunt you on sight, only trying to arrest or kill you if you refuse to pay tribute (as if they didn’t recognize you or your companions at all). This despite wanted posters.

So there’s definitely some rough aspects to the crime system in this game.

Gameplay

Massive improvements have been made in this area, and I don’t just mean the above-mentioned expansion of items and the addition of NPC schedules.

For one, enemies now drop things other than gold, such as food and armor pieces. The magic system has also been improved so that you can now mix multiples of a spell at once instead of having to do it manually every single time.

Additionally, spells are now cast using a consistent language of magic composed of several words of power, which you can chain together to produce effects.

But I would say that the single most significant improvement in the gameplay is the simple fact that most NPCs now have significantly more keywords that they react to in dialogue, including many that do not come up through normal conversation with them. The system is still not perfect, but you can have more of a conversation with characters now and switch from topic to topic relatively easily.

In terms of combat, you can attack diagonally now (only monsters could do that in Ultima 4) and random overworld encounters are much easier to avoid now, cutting down on what eventually starts to feel kind of like padding in the previous game (but see below).

Despite the fact that the material rewards from combat have been increased and items are much cheaper now, Ultima 5 is actually significantly more difficult than Ultima 4. Not only do you have less health, enemies also seem to do more damage.

Dragons and daemons in particular are a nightmare, as they can summon more daemons (who can posses party members) and are extremely durable. A single dragon is a very tough challenge for an unprepared mid-level party, and even after giving most characters magic axes they still prove tough to take down while also being extremely damaging. Trying to fight multiple ones at once without blowing powerful spells or glass swords is costly at best and foolish at worst. Dragons are best thought of as boss-level enemies probably.

I am pleased to report that the dungeon crawling is better in many significant ways. Not only are the graphics more pleasant and immersive but also fully cleared rooms no longer respawn endlessly the moment you step out of them (in fact, they may not respawn at all).

It is not all positive however. The descend and ascend spells seem to be nearly useless this time around and the spell to instantly exit a dungeon is gone entirely. This can make getting out of the underworld such a pain at times that you might even prefer to literally kill yourself in-game and lose some XP instead of doing that. Fortunately you can now dig up and bury moon stones, so you can create moongates down there to quickly escape that way.

There is one problem in terms of balance though. While obtaining gear is significantly less of a problem now due to many enemies dropping tons of torches, gems, and keys, your experience will lag far behind your itemization and your quest progress. This means that to actually reach the 8th level and unlock all of the ultimate spells you will need to either explore all the dungeons thoroughly while focusing XP on one character, or otherwise just grind a lot.

Enemies just don’t give enough XP for a smooth progression otherwise. This would have been solved entirely by making significant main quest events (such as finding the artifacts of Lord British or destroying the Shadowlords) grant experience, but no such luck.

This makes for a strange endgame where you’ll have so much money that you run out of worthwhile things to spend it on while at the same time still feeling forced to grind out enemies, even if you imported your Ultima 4 character for an XP boost.

You do want to have access to these 8th-level spells too, as the final dungeon can be brutal without them or items that replicate their effects.

Adding to the experience issue is the fact that you can’t level up at will in this game. You have to camp and hope that an apparition of Lord British will appear and level you up (if you have enough experience). He does not always show up, and as far as I can tell he does not appear at all if you sleep on a bed or camp inside a dungeon. It has to be out in the wild in the overworld (and possibly also in the underworld).

I wish leveling up was just not tied to him at all.

Aesthetics

As is often the case for this series, the game looks and sounds really good for its age. The jump from Ultima 4 is particularly notable, as the level of detail is on a whole other level, particularly within the dungeons.

As with the previous game, the aesthetic core of the Ultima series (after the first trilogy) lies in the virtues. While there is still a karma system involved, it is much simpler than having to maximize eight different virtues. The karma system determines how much XP you lose on death and how much shops charge you, encouraging players to behave (or at least atone for their misbehavior).

But the biggest impact on the feel of the game is the above-mentioned corruption and tyranny affecting the land. Some of my favorite moments were early on, when I was just starting to get involved with the resistance and investigating what was happening around the overworld.

That said, I think that if the guards did actually recognize you on sight and hounded you more aggressively after spotting you the atmosphere could be even better (assuming they were balanced a bit better).

I think some of the music some versions of the game have is quite good too.

Accessibility

This game manages to up the complexity from Ultima 4 while not being any harder to play. Chances are that if you’re importing your Ultima 4 character you will need only a little bit of adaptation to do fine in Ultima 5.

As before, you will need to take many notes throughout the game. More so than in Ultima 4 due to the greater size and density of content. However, if you played Ultima 4 and took notes for it, this is somewhat alleviated. The mantras for the shrines remain the same, and the world’s geography should be mostly familiar (though there have been changes there as well).

You will also still need to consult the manuals and map frequently, at least early on.

The difficulty has also increased dramatically. You will likely end the game with about 200-ish HP rather than 800 and every enemy is much more deadly. Both the early game and the final dungeon will challenge the improvident.

For these reasons, the game is not that easy for newcomers to pick up but I would not call it obscure or complex.

Conclusion

I would say that the positives definitely outweigh the negatives on this one. The story and setting are interesting even if I don’t agree with all of the decisions made in crafting it, and the rest of the game is usually tolerable at worst. Nothing nearly as annoying as Ultima 4′s Reaper and Balron sleep spam (in fact, a plot-relevant item you can find renders Reapers pretty much helpless).

My primary complaint about the game is that the balance is poor. You will end the game loaded with all the items you could ever want while struggling to reach level 8 with even a single character even after doing nearly everything you need to do before the final dungeon.

I know there is a remake of this game made using Dungeon Siege, which I have not played. I think this is a good thing and I’d hope that it fixes some of these issues, but even apart from that I wish there were games that set out to achieve the core concept of this game.

What I am talking about is an open world RPG in which you play an outlaw who must hide from the state and meet other rebels in the darkness, but with complex and mechanically-competent systems to enable all the interesting possibilities this should enable.

I do not assign numerical ratings to games with these reviews, but I can definitely say that I liked Ultima 5 better than Ultima 4. I think it is worth trying even today despite the late game grind.

#vampire reviews rpgs #ultima 5 #warriors of destiny

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onebedroomvoid · 3 years

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My open letter to Star Wars Fans that have not watch The Clones Wars and are considering it

So, maybe you got super into The Mandalorian and had that one friend that kept saying a or z was from one of the animated series. And while yes there are a lot of Rebels references you reeaaaaalllyy need to start with the Clone Wars animated series even if it's seven seasons long. They swear, it's really good. You'll love it.

So look, I want to be a voice of honesty to tell you it will be hard.

You will not enjoy this show the whole time. You will want to quit. You might actually quit. It may take you three attempts to finish and there will be points where you stare at the screen in despair when you realize yes, there is yet another episode of the arc staring droids featuring a droid that speaks in a voice reminiscent of Napoleon Dynamite and a Patton-esque alien. You may hate those characters by the time that arc is out, and that is okay. It's also okay if you love them, no judgment because I love Trace and Rafa and I know plenty of people who decidedly do not, and acknowledge that is also fair.

And yes, watching them in chronological order may help. Also yes, it will be a pain in the ass that will involve consulting the watch order page constantly - at least if you're like me, maybe you have better memory - and stopping the next episode from launching to hunt down the one you need in another season and enjoying the jarring change in animation quality.

Does it get better? Yes! Definitely! It will also get worse again. And then slightly better, then even worse, and then you'll hit some sweet sweet arcs - not going to lie, I will almost grantee they focus on the clones or Ahsoka but I'm bias - and it will feel so worth it as they rip out your heart and laugh at your tears. Hell, you might even finally get to see and understand Padme as a character in and of herself and not just through the obsessive love gaze of Anakin. And yes, Anakin will be there! A lot. He uh….look I just don't like Anakin, so let's move on.

You will learn to tell the clones apart, you will start having your favorites, and then realize you will likely never see them again, and given the body count of this show you might consider that a good thing. This will also be true of other Jedi you get to meet and some super interesting side characters you encounter. Want more episodes of them? Get used to disappointment or consider looking into novels or comics. Additionally, you may find the children staring in one arc cute or annoying, but I will remind you because the thought kicked me in the gut either way, all those children will likely die come Revenge of the Sith time. Yeah, fun thoughts.

Also, also, the opening narrator will reference events in the first couple of seasons that did not in fact happen in the previous episodes. I am passing on this warning so you do not waste time as I did scanning through all the previous episodes trying to find the event being referred to convinced I had fallen asleep in front of the TV again. I did not. This was a deliberate narrative choice that has been explained to me many many times, and while yes, I understand what they are going for I don't have to like it.

But wait, you say, did you even like this show, it sounds like you hated it. Why should I trust your opinion on this beloved animated series my trusted fellow Star Wars fan recommends so fervently? And that is a fair question. Because yes, there were points I hated this show. I gave up multiple times, the words "fuck it, I'm just going to watch Rebels, references be damned" were uttered and followed through, as were "you know what, I think I'll just do a rewatch of Rebels". Look I really liked Rebels okay? Like seriously, fuck the droid arc, fuck it so much especially for that one plot point you threw in at the end that makes it so I can't tell others to skip it. But in the end, when it was all tied together and we hit those beautifully animated, scored, and written final episodes it somehow glossed over everything else and made it come together in a wonderful whole that made my jaded little heart feel things. I mean no, not all your questions are answered, but you'll be somewhat okay with it. Maybe. I mean I was at least, but I might have also been relieved I finished it.

To all the fans that fell in love with the show and got the rest of us those last couple of seasons, you're the real heroes. Those seasons are honestly what made me love the Clone Wars. But wait, you say, can't I just skip to the end? And sure, you could, but to quote a line thrown at me by many a fan, you really do need the context of the seasons leading up to them. And I'm not just saying that because if I had to suffer through them you do too. Well, not entirely. In all seriousness though there are a lot of wonderful episodes in the early seasons. There are a lot of "meh" episodes, and there are some that I might have slept through and fever dreamed, but somehow come the end of the series you truly appreciate that they got you to that point. You too have survived the Clone Wars, especially if you resorted to alcohol and drinking games for some of those earlier episodes.

And in conclusion, at the end of it all when the fan who insisted you watch this seven-season death march because it will make you understand Star Wars so much better like them, asks you in a confused note where exactly the Bad Batch is set in the Star Wars timeline, you are completely and totally allowed to punch them. I'll speak for you at court, I'll bring the droid arc as evidence.

#the clone wars #star wars #What could be seen as criticism #i mean i do like it but our relationship isn't as healthy as it could be #getting the thoughts out of my head #but seriously #i hate the droid arc #rambling stream of conscious

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kingjasnah · 4 years

Note

Is there the full list of brandersons favourite games reposted somewhere?

i dont think so? or not that ive seen. u can literally just sign up for the newsletter on his website but screw it ill just post them for u. it sure was a TRIP scrolling past these to get to the interlude though. undertale is on this list.....im shakign at the thought that adolin was based off ff10 tidus but i cant get it out of my head now

#10: Katamari Damaci

I love things that make me look at the world in a new way. Katamari did this in spades. It is an imaginative, bizarre vision with unique gameplay. It is like nothing else in the world and I love it for all its strangeness and occasional lack of gameplay polish.

I was transfixed the first time I played it, and have looked forward to it being remade and rereleased on multiple different consoles. I love the cute—and somehow creepy at the same time—storyline. It feels like a fever dream more than a game sometimes, and is probably the closest I’ll ever get to understanding what it’s like to do drugs.

#9: Undertale

This is an oddball on this list because I think it’s the only game that is not a franchise from a major studio—but is instead an indie game, which I believe was originally funded on Kickstarter.I loved how this felt like a novel as much as a game. It was one person’s vision; a single story told really well, with a huge amount of personality. The humor was just my kind of wonderful/terrible, and I was instantly enamored with the characters.That probably would have been enough, but it is a nice deconstruction of video games as a medium—and has not one, but multiple innovative gameplay mechanics. Together, the package left me enamored. This is a work of genius that I feel everyone should at least try, even if it ends up not being for them.

#8: Fallout: New Vegas

I have played all of the core Fallout games, and I was one of the (it seems few) who was really excited when it moved from turn-based tactics to first-person shooter. While Fallout 3 was good, it didn’t have the charm of the first two.New Vegas delivered on everything I was hoping to see. The charm was back, the writing sharp, the quests imaginative. The gameplay was engaging and branched in a variety of directions, the gunplay was solid, and the atmosphere immersive. I of course love the first two games in the series—but New Vegas combines everything I like in gaming into one package. (As a note, I own the Outer Worlds, and am looking forward to digging into it. Consider this item on the list a recommendation of other Obsidian games—like Knights of the Old Republic Two—regardless of genre, as I’ve found them universally to be superior to their contemporaries.)

#7 Super Mario World

When I was eleven, I flew (alone, which was very exciting to me) from Nebraska to visit my uncle Devon in Salt Lake City. Before I left, my father gave me $200 and told me to pay for my own meals while on the trip—but of course, my uncle didn’t allow this. At the end of the trip, I tried to give him the money, which he wouldn’t take.I mentioned my dad would take the money back when I got home, but that was okay. Well, my uncle would have none of that, and drove me to the local mall and made me spend it on a Nintendo Entertainment System. (This uncle, you might guess, is an awesome human being.)Since that day of first plugging it in and experiencing Mario for the first time, I was hooked. This is the only platformer on the list, as I don’t love those. But one makes an exception for Mario. There’s just so much polish, so much elegance to the control schemes, that even a guy who prefers an FPS or an RPG like me has to admit these are great games. I picked World as my favorite as it’s the one I’ve gone back to and played the most.

#7: The Curse of Monkey Island (Monkey Island 3)

I kind of miss the golden age of adventure gaming, and I don’t know that anyone ever got it as right as they did with this game. It is the pinnacle of the genre, in my opinion—no offense to Grim Fandango fans.This game came out right before gaming’s awkward teenage phase where everything moved to 3-d polygons. For a while after, games looked pretty bad, though they could do more because of the swap. But if you want to go see what life was like before that change, play Monkey Island 3. Composed of beautiful art pieces that look like cells from Disney movies, with streamlined controls (the genre had come a long way from “Get yon torch”) and fantastic voice acting, this game still plays really well.This is one of the few games I’ve been able to get my non-gamer wife to play through with me, and it worked really well as a co-op game with the two of us trying to talk through problems. It’s a lovingly crafted time capsule of a previous era of gaming, and if you missed it, it’s really worth trying all these years later. (The first and second games hold up surprisingly well too, as a note, particularly with the redone art that came out a decade or so ago.)Also, again, this one has my kind of humor.

#6: Breath of the Wild

I never thought a Zelda game would unseat A Link to the Past as my favorite Zelda, but Breath of the Wild managed it. It combined the magic of classic gameplay with modern design aesthetic, and I loved this game.There’s not a lot to say about it that others haven’t said before, but I particularly liked how it took the elements of the previous games in the series (giving you specific tools to beat specific challenges) and let you have them all at once. I like how the dungeons became little mini puzzles to beat, instead of (sometimes seemingly endless) slogs to get through. I liked the exploration, the fluidity of the controls, and the use of a non-linear narrative in flashbacks. It’s worth buying a Switch just to play this one and Mario—but in case you want, you can also play Dark Souls on Switch... (That’s foreshadowing.)

#5: Halo 2

Telling stories about Halo Two on stream is what made me think of writing this list.I’m sometimes surprised that this game isn’t talked about as much as I think it should be. Granted, the franchise is very popular—but people tend to love either Reach or games 1 or 3 more than two. Two, however, is the only one I ever wanted to replay—and I’ve done so three or four times at this point. (It’s also the only one I ever beat on Legendary.)It’s made me think on why I love this one, while so many others seem to just consider it one of many in a strong—but in many ways unexceptional—series of games. I think part of this is because I focus primarily on the single-player aspects of a game (which is why there aren’t any MMOs on this list.) Others prefer Halo games with more balanced/polished multiplayer. But I like to game by myself, and don’t really look for a multiplayer experience. (Though this is changing as I game with my sons more and more.)I really like good writing—which I suppose you’d expect. But in games, I specifically prefer writing that enhances the style of game I’m playing. Just dumping a bunch of story on me isn’t enough; it has to be suited to the gameplay and the feel of the game. In that context, I’ve rarely encountered writing as good as Halo 2. From the opening—with the intercutting and juxtaposition of the two narratives—to the quotes barked out by the marines, the writing in this game is great. It stands out starkly against other Halo games, to the point that I wonder what the difference is.Yes, Halo Two is a bombastic hero fantasy about a super soldier stomping aliens. But it has subtle, yet powerful worldbuilding sprinkled all through it—and the music...it does things with the story that I envy. It’s kind of cheating that games and films get to have powerful scores to help with mood.The guns in Two feel so much better than Halo One, and the vehicles drive far better. The only complaint I have is that it’s only half a story—as in, Halo 2 and 3 seem like they were one game broken in two pieces. And while 3 is good (and Reach does something different, which I approve of in general) neither did it for me the way Two did, and continues to do.

#3: Final Fantasy X

You probably knew Final Fantasy was coming. People often ask if the way these games handle magic was an influence upon me. All I can say is that I’ve played them since the first one, and so they’re bound to have had an influence.On one hand, these games are really strange. I mean, I don’t think we gamers stop quite often enough to note how downright bizarre this series gets. Final Fantasy doesn’t always make the most sense—but the games are always ambitious.Ten is my favorite for a couple of reasons. I felt like the worldbuilding was among the strongest, and I really connected with the characters. That’s strange, because this is one of the FF games without an angst-filled teen as the protagonist. Instead, it has a kind of stable happy-go-lucky jock as the protagonist.But that’s what I needed, right then. A game that didn’t give me the same old protagonist, but instead gave me someone new and showed me I could bond to them just as well. Ten was the first with full voice acting, and that jump added a lot for me. It has my favorite music of the series, and all together is what I consider the perfect final fantasy game. (Though admittedly, I find it more and more difficult to get into turn-based battle mechanics as I grow older.)

#2: Bloodborne

Those who follow my streams, or who read other interviews I’ve done, probably expected this series to be at or near the top. The question wasn’t whether Souls would be here, but which one to pick as my favorite.I went with Bloodborne, though it could have been any of them. (Even Dark Souls 2—which I really like, despite its reputation in the fandom.) I’ve been following FromSoftware’s games since the King’s Field games, and Demon’s Souls was a huge triumph—with the director Hidetaka Miyazaki deserving much of the praise for its design, and Dark Souls (which is really just a more polished version of Demon’s Souls).As I am a fan of cosmic horror, Bloodborne is probably my favorite overall. It really hit the mix of cosmic and gothic horror perfectly. It forced me to change up my gameplay from the other Souls games, and I loved the beautiful visuals.I am a fan of hard games—but I like hard games that are what I consider “fair.” (For example, I don’t love those impossible fan-made Mario levels, or many of the super-crazy “bullet hell”-style games.) Dark Souls is a different kind of hard. Difficult like a stern instructor, expecting you to learn—but giving you the tools to do so. It presents a challenge, rather than being hard just to be hard.If I have a problem with Final Fantasy, it’s that the games sometimes feel like the gameplay is an afterthought to telling the story. But in the Souls games, story and gameplay are intermixed in a way I’d never seen done before. You have to construct the story like an archeologist, using dialogue and lore from descriptions of in-game objects. I find this fascinating; the series tells stories in a way a book never could. I’m always glad when a game series can show off the specific strengths of the medium.In fact, this series would be #1 except for the little fact that I have way too much time on Steam logged playing...

#1: Civilization VI

This series had to take #1 by sheer weight of gameplay time. I discovered the first on a friend’s computer in the dorms my freshman year—and I can still remember the feeling of the birds chirping outside, realizing I’d been playing all night and really should get back to my own dorm room.That still happens, and has happened, with every game in the series. I have a lot of thoughts on this series, many of them granular and too specific for this list. (Like, it’s obvious AI technology isn’t up to the task of playing a game this complex—so could we instead get a roguelike set of modifiers, game modes, etc. to liven up the games, rather than just having a difficulty slider that changes a few simple aspects of the game?)I’ll try not to rant, because I really do love this game series. A lot of people consider IV to be the pinnacle of the series, but after V unstacked units—and VI unstacked cities—there was no way I could ever go back. If for some reason, you’ve never played this grand patriarch of the 4X game genre, it’s about starting with a single stone-age settler who can found a city—then playing through eras of a civilization, growing your empire, to try to eventually get offworld with a space program. (Or, if you prefer, conquering the world.)It’s a load of fun in the way I like to have fun, and I feel like the series has only gotten better over the years. My hat is off to the developers, who keep reinventing the series, rather than making the exact same game over and over.Now, about that request for difficulty modes...

there are runner ups but for the sake of anyone whos on mobile and cant get past a read more (first of all omg im SO sorry) ill refrain. anyway he thought WHAT loz game was the best before botw?

#mix between HARDCORE judgement and like. yea. yea ff10 was pretty good wasnt it #but i dont think its anywhere near the best of them #long post #im read mores dont work imm so fucking sorry this is so long #MOST of these games are good its just so wild its so wild its SO wild #asks #Anonymous

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ranger-report · 4 years

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Review (In Progress): THE WITCHER 3: WILD HUNT (2015)

The third and final (so far) game in The Witcher trilogy is big. Very big. Massive. Supermassive. Maybe I’m just a little intimidated by the depth and width and density of the game, but as of this writing, I’ve clocked in 62.4 hours on the game. That’s compared to the 48.1 hours of The Witcher and 31.5 hours of The Witcher 2. I’m closing in on the point where I’ve played Wild Hunt more than the first two games combined. From where I sit, there’s no end in sight, either; I have yet to complete the story, in addition to multiple sidequests, witcher contracts, and treasure hunts, not to mention the jawdropping expansion quests Hearts of Stone and Blood & Wine, which combined supposedly equal the length of the main story quest itself. Throw everything in a blender and pour it out, and I’ll be surprised if I eventually finish everything I’ve a mind for in under 150 hours. This is a big game. This is a dense game, packed with content every couple of miles or so, in a world where you can’t walk into a town without stumbling onto someone -- or something -- in need, and that’s ignoring the contracts on notice boards. People walk, talk, argue, cough, stumble around drunk, and get into fights with you. Oh yes, run afoul of local gangs, and they will come for you. Meanwhile, the vast open world is teeming with monsters to battle and loot, from the continual presence of drowners to the new griffins and basilisks. An overwhelming amount of content in a series that already packs plenty of content into each game. It would be far, far too much and monotonous if it wasn’t for one thing: developers CD Projekt Red write compelling material, and they know how to write a damn good story.

When the game opened up, it looked just like any other open world game I’ve ever played, and immediately I felt a pang of disappointment. I’ve done Far Cry 3, Horizon: Zero Dawn, Grand Theft Auto V, Assassin’s Creed: Origins, and like many of my gaming generation I get what to do. Seek out loot, checkpoints for fast travel, towns, fight things to get xp, ignore the “pressing” main story in favor of side quests for cool shit, yadda yadda yadda. Considering the first two Witcher games felt like original experiences in what they were trying to do, to walk into such a generic open-world framework was such a let down.

At first.

But then, something strange began to happen: I settled in. Two random quests twisted and convoluted into a connected thread, which was followed by a third main quest which circled back to this thread and elaborated on it. Suddenly a character who just seemed off her rocker was now a fearfully sympathetic human being, now seen in the light of someone else’s story. CD Projeckt Red hooked me, hooked me bad, and now this wide wide world was no longer a series of performances, it was the lives of people in this world and how Geralt affects them -- just like in the previous games. Only here, it’s bigger and wider and seemingly less connected, but it still all comes back together. Choices matter. People matter. The world itself twists and winds according to you, the witcher, and who you side with/fight for. Every other open world game I’ve played has had Things To Do, and this is no exception, but now suddenly it feels like everything matters. Before, everything I did felt like it was to further a progression percentage, to get trophies and upgrade items and simply arcade my way through a sandbox which promised “openness” but really was just all the levels of a video game laid out side-by-side so you could see them all at once instead of having to press through to get to the next one. This is the first time where I’ve really, honestly felt like I was walking through a living world, and to say that it’s captured me is an understatement. Where once I would have rolled my eyes at sidequesting in the face of a main quest where the point is to track someone down or save someone because it is incredibly important, now it feels like the most natural thing because the main quest requires you to go through some shit first. Every contract and quest met along the way furthers the main quest in some way or another, particularly when you open up new quests AFTER helping old friends, friends who now desperately need your help again, and what would happen if you weren’t there? Combine all of this with exceptional voice acting, talented writing, detailed animations, and we have compelling content literally around every corner. And that’s even when you’re just out searching for treasure or diagrams to make better witcher armor! Stories pop up everywhere, all of it interesting, even the slightest of things, and it truly crafts a distracting world to be enveloped by.

A living breathing world would be one thing all on its own, but thankfully Wild Hunt features the best-looking graphics in the series to date. I was genuinely worried that my old rig wouldn’t be able to handle a massive open-world game from 2015 without some tweaks (my desktop is old, shut up), but for the most part I’m running everything on high and it is breathtaking. Weather effects, god rays, BLOOM jesus christ I’m appreciating bloom in a video game for the very first time and I hate that I am but god fuck the first time you see the moon behind clouds in this game with bloom on, and I’m talking a full moon so it is BRIGHT and BEAUTIFUL and just. But I’m getting ahead of myself. Detailed textures and character models, the best in the series so far, a wide palette of colors (which sometimes makes the game look like a living painting, in the best of ways), absolutely masterful work. There’s the odd object-poking-through-something-it-really-shouldn’t, or the glitchy human being moving/acting/dying in ways they shouldn’t be, but that’s also a staple of both open world games and this series in general. Jank happens, especially in a game this size. It’s not as breaking as it has been in certain aspects of the first two games, and it’s mostly Bethesda-level charming. What matters though is that it doesn’t kill the experience, nor does it happen so often that it feels like the game is bugged or broken.

Combat, meanwhile, is still not perfect but it’s the best it’s been in the trilogy. Fast and furious, yet rewarding for those who have more patient skills, swordplay is easy and comfortable and versatile. Similar to the second game, one needs only turn the camera towards whichever enemy they want to attack and Geralt automatically goes for whichever monster or human is highlighted. Sometimes this can be fraught as the game will erratically highlight a different character than the one you’re facing, or will transfer the highlight to a different enemy if the one you were facing dances out of sight due to a roll or dodge or other maneuver. But it’s only frustrating sometimes; this was a flaw far more prevalent in the second game than here, and the lock-on mechanic is a godsend when paired against high-level creatures. With patience and tactics I’ve been able to competently square with beasts far too high level for me to tackle, and actually come out the victor, an idea that would be absolute suicide in the first two games. But now strategy versus simple number rolls can prevail, provided you are prepared and/or willing to have the patience to chip away while dodging for your life.

Wild Hunt is one of the few game worlds I’ve entered that feels stunningly alive. Whenever I start up the game, I am transported. Taken away. Breathlessly in awe of how real and vibrant the physical presence of the visuals on screen are. What a strange gift to behold. And, yet, aggravatingly, it frustrates me that most opinions I have encountered are that players don’t need to play through Witcher 1 & 2 in order to play this game. You certainly can, but so much context is lost. Geralt’s relationships with Triss and Yennifer and the struggles between them (that is, should you decide to romance Triss); the nostalgia and heartache of coming back to Kaer Morhen and revisting the other witchers; the friends and former alliances who pop up under vastly different circumstances; the paths taken and decisions made which impact where and how you begin this story. Wild Hunt is the culmination of a near-decade’s worth of storytelling, and the rewards for having played through the previous two games are plentiful. Nilfgaard’s invasion has extra oomph knowing where they were before, and walking through Vizima’s capital now occupied by Emperor Emhyr is especially chilling and devastating. I have no doubt that someone could pick up this game and play it and get the jist of what’s going on without playing the first two games. But will it mean as much? I daresay no. It is absolutely essential to play the first two games to truly feel the depth of impact that this story -- this world -- has to offer.

At this point in time it seems I’m coming upon some kind of resolution to the story. I’m off in search of allies to help combat a vicious foe, meaning it’s time to wrap up any side quests I still have in my ledger. There’s a lot to do. Once I’ve reached the conclusion of this game, this story, I’ll provide a wrap-up review. For now, this deep and still ploughing through, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt is not only the best of the trilogy, it makes me want to go all the way back to the first game and play through the whole series again with different choices, for different outcomes, if only to see the roads I did not take and who was left behind. This is an amazing experience with literally hours of content to take in, and I am eager to devour the remainder.

Score (So Far): 9/10

#the witcher #wild hunt #blood and wine #hearts of stone #geralt of rivia #Yennefer of Vengerberg #Triss Merigold #CD Projekt RED #pc gaming #rpg #review #ck burch #ruby ranger #ranger report

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welsh-gamer · 4 years

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Finished Pokemon Sword and Shield

Spoilers below

Ho boy this one has been a doozy - it’s easily the most controversial Pokemon game so far, what with how many changes have taken place.

Pokemon has managed with annual development cycles for the past 24 years. It’s not like every year has seen the release of a core series game but they’re out enough that you’ll find two or three on every Nintendo console. In fact I think the only console NOT to join in on the fun is the Wii U... It had a bad Pokemon Rumble game but that’s all I remember.

I went into this game with very low expectations. Having played Persona 5, I knew what a good UI felt like. Persona was responsive, you pressed a button and something happened immediately. In scenarios where your teammates get hit all at the same time it happens, you don’t get hit one by one, and when you’re hit by multi-attacks it just..... shows the attack hitting you or your enemy rather than AGONIZINGLY showing each impact one by one.

Pokemon is a game with no respect for your time and Sword/Shield do not show remarkable improvements for this area. This is by and large the greatest flaw of the game, which claims to be catering itself to a younger audience when we know no small child will put up with this boring crap in silence.

The Galar region is a step back from the fantastic Alola region too, with a lack of any proper worldbuilding. In previous Pokemon games you would enter a town and some NPCs would tell you the purpose of the town. Not in this game, where there’s a desert, a snow city, a bunch of other places all with no lore whatsoever. You enter them, fight the gym leader, and leave.

I think that the core gym challenge, however, is one of the best that has ever been in Pokemon. Instead of just fighting a bunch of randos, you complete minigames called a “gym mission”. Past gens have done this (a prime example being Generation 5), but you can tell that GAME FREAK are taking advantage of the console’s power during these challenges, compared to Gen 7 which had nothing of the sort. The game has actual physics in some of the Gym Challenges.

Exploring the Galar region at my own pace, being able to selectively encounter Wild Pokemon which now appear in the overworld.... Biggest improvement by far over the previous gens. This one needs to stick. Your quality of life is much better when you can see all the cute pokemon bumbling around.

I found the characters to be, eh, nowhere near the level of Gen 7′s cast, but pleasant enough to want to see more of. This includes all the gym leaders, the champion Leon, and your pseudorivals Bede and Marnie. Hop, however, is a pain in the backside who becomes more of a loser as the story goes on. I’m not sure if he ever stops being one. No kidding - In the end he just has to accept that he’s a loser and do something else with his life.

The “villain” was just some guy whose home we invaded. He went “F*** it” and tried to solve the energy crisis, then cried to the Champion when it went wrong. This was all just leadup to the awesome final battle against Eternatus, which has no difficulty at all since you can just sit back and watch the fireworks, but has a rocking soundtrack and feels epic enough.

The postgame is lacking, no fun minigames like Gen 7, no dark Ultra Beast story like Annabelle’s and Looker’s, but it was servicable enough. You beat up Jedward and catch a puppy.

The multiplayer aspect is HIGHLY LIMITED. It’s fun to be able to engage in battles against Gigantamax Beasts but it’s repetitive and difficult to matchmake with since you have to join each match individually and many of them are just people exploiting the game’s clock to get the Gigantamax pokemon they want. These people will glitch you out if you try to join them. If you leave the multiplayer on in the Overworld, it has the quality of Dragonball Xenoverse where the ally characters may or may not pop-in every couple of seconds. It’s chaotic and it will slow your game right down.

The pokemon themselves.... In a static image they look super boring, but in the Pokemon Camp minigame and during certain battle animations they can look impressive. My favourite was the ladybug pokemon, which is covered in spots that will flicker in its middle stage and outright swirl in its final form. I also enjoyed Scorbunny’s epic kick, everything to do with Sirfetch’d, and a certain fighting type’s special move called “No Retreat” which has all 5 of its components band together in a Spartan march.

Overall, I would not say the game is worth the high price tag of £50. Get it cheaper if you possibly can.

Ratings below:

Gameplay: 5 - A servicable battle system but it needs to move much faster.

Story: 3 - Even the other characters treat the story like it’s interrupting your true journey; Pretty much nonexistent, then crammed into the final 5 minutes before you fight the Champion. This game was better when it was just letting me do my own thing.

Music: 6 - Not up to Sun/Moon’s standard. Wild battle theme is good. Hometown theme is among the best. Everything else is pretty generic. The basic gym leader theme fights Gym Leader Piers for supremacy.

Presentation: 2 - Considering the amount of resources this company have and how cheaply it continues to present its games, the only way this could get a lower score is if they went back to what Gen 1 looked like.

Replayability: 7 - Benefitted greatly by the Switch’s multiple profiles. I could see myself trying a nuzlocke run for laughs. This game also gives you more peace and quiet, making it ironically more replayable than the superior Gen 7.

Timewasting degree: GAME FREAK. I christen this development team with its own category, because I cannot express enough how much they want to waste the player’s time on innocuous crap. God forbid I play a game which wastes my time more and create the “Worse than GAME FREAK” category.

Overall total: 4.5 out of 10. This game has its cute parts but you can do so much better. It’s time to start trying.

#pokemon #pokemon sword and shield #gaming

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mllemaenad · 5 years

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Cruelty vs Compassion: Cullen and Niall in Broken Circle

Cullen: Uldred tortured these mages, hoping to break their wills and turn them into abominations. We don’t know how many of them have turned.

Irving: What? Don’t be ridiculous!

Cullen: Of course he’ll say that! He might be a blood mage! Don’t you know what they did?

Greagoir: I am the knight-commander here, not you.

I know much is made of the torture Cullen suffered in the Fereldan Circle. In Dragon Age 2 it is used to set him up as an extremist, and an ally of Meredith. In Dragon Age Inquisition it is used to excuse and moderate his actions in the previous game, and to justify his ongoing persecution of mage characters.

However, I think it’s worth looking at that scene in the original context, in Broken Circle. Here, it isn’t really about Cullen’s pain at all. Rather, it is about establishing him, as well as his fellow templars, as the bad guys of the quest.

Bioware and its grey morality is ... a thing. When it works, it offers layers and complexity to the world and its story. When it doesn’t, it can leave the player frustrated and angry with a story that’s asking them to sympathise with vicious slavers, nobles and religious extremists.

Origins’s take on grey morality is to ... more or less literally let the player get away with murder, if they want. One way or another, you’re going to end the Blight, and then your Warden will either be a dead hero, or the living Hero of Ferelden, who can damn near do no wrong. While in Inquisition, and even DA2, it can be difficult to remain friends with a companion if you take a hard line stance on something they hate, in Origins they rarely have strong reactions to quest-based decisions. And hell, I have the Feast Day pack, so Seanna could disagree with her companions all day and then feed them cake until they loved her again, if she wanted. Origins is big on options; low on consequences.

It does, however, tend to give you a broad sense of which would be the ‘good’ or ‘evil’ options in a given quest. Murdering slaves to increase your stats is evil. Saving children from demons is good. Some quests have multiple options, and I don’t necessarily agree with the framing (the morality of The Urn of Sacred Ashes is pretty fucked up, if you ask me), but you can generally get a sense of whether your Warden’s behaviour counts as moral.

Cullen’s torture in Broken Circle, and his reaction to it, exists in counterpoint to someone else’s torture, and his reaction to it. Cullen is a foil to a much more important character: the man with the plan, and possibly the true saviour of the Fereldan Circle – the mage Niall.

Niall: Who are you? Where did you come from? Are you a demon?

Cullen: This trick again? I know what you are. It won’t work. I will stay strong.

Niall: This place drains you of everything ... hope, feeling, life ...

Cullen: Enough visions. If anything in you is human ... kill me now and stop this game.

Unless you actively choose to go back downstairs after completing the Fade sequence (who hasn’t forgotten they still need to fight Shah Wyrd and made a last minute dash to the ground floor at least once?) you’ll likely have these encounters one after the other. Collecting the Litany of Adralla is the last step before you’re ready to take on Uldred.

It’s impossible to miss the parallels in these encounters: both men have been captured and tormented by demons; both are exhausted, despairing and at the end of their endurance; both have been confused enough by demons and Fade dreams to initially mistake the Warden for another spirit.

Niall: I gathered some of my fellows and we obtained the Litany from the stockroom. I thought if we disabled the others, we could throw everything we had at Uldred.

Niall: But I saw my friends fall, one by one, and now it’s my turn.

Cullen: You broke the others, but I will stay strong, for my sake ... for theirs ...

Both have lost the friends they came with, and have found themselves the last man standing against an enemy they have no hope of defeating. Both have, in short, had a really shit couple of days. They’re not equally bad, of course: Niall is being quite literally eaten alive by a sloth demon, and will not survive the day; while no doubt exhausted and distressed, Cullen is more-or-less fine. But let’s not quibble: they’re both in a bad way.

Niall: It is time for us both to be on our way. Remember the Litany of Adralla. The Circle is all that matters now.

Cullen: To ensure this horror is ended ... to guarantee that no abominations or blood mages live, you must kill everyone up there.

And, significantly, both characters advise you on how to complete the quest: Niall wants you to save anybody who’s still breathing; Cullen wants you to murder everyone. Niall’s plea, while impassioned, is also reasoned and well thought out – he came in with a plan, a good plan, and he only needs your help to complete it. He is profoundly dignified, even at the point of death, after days of wandering through the same hellscape you just golem-and-fiery-skeleton-ed your way though. He judges himself for failing to win a battle he should never have had to fight. Meanwhile, Cullen is aggressive and demanding. He rejects any offer of compassion – especially from Circle mage Wynne, despite the fact that she has come to save him – and he doesn’t really have a good argument as to why you need to kill everyone. It boils down to ‘kill them just in case’.

You don’t need to put a halo and a pair of horns on these two to guess who is sitting on which shoulder.

It’s worth noting, at this point, that the choice between Niall’s way and Cullen’s sits against the background of information you’ve gathered as you ascend the tower. Mage wardens will obviously have a little more context for the places and characters you meet, but you don’t need that. The story establishes it on its own: templars are full of shit; mages are pretty awesome.

Greagoir: We saw only demons, hunting templars and mages alike. I realised we could not defeat them and told my men to flee.

Greagoir: They took us by surprise. We were prepared for one or two abominations – not the horde that fell upon us.

Greagoir: No one could have survived those monstrous creatures. It is too painful to hope for survivors and find ... nothing.

When you first enter the Circle you encounter Knight-Commander Greagoir, who makes it abundantly clear that, though the templars are technically trained in dealing specifically with demons and blood magic, they were in no way prepared for any situation involving demons, plural. They cut and run immediately, leaving behind both the entire mage population and their own templar brethren. Greagoir is firmly of the opinion that the situation in the Fereldan Circle is not survivable. Everyone in there who is not a demon is dead.

Wynne: It’s you! No ... come no further. Grey Warden or no, I will strike you down where you stand!

As soon as you step through the doors, you find that he is thoroughly and disastrously wrong. You encounter an entire section that has been successfully cleared and secured. You watch a mage defeat a demon – entirely without your aid. You see that, not only are there survivors, some of the survivors are children.

Greagoir: This situation is dire. There is no alternative – everything in the tower must be destroyed so it can be made safe again.

Wynne: Yes. Even if we cannot eliminate all the demons and abominations, together, we could lead the survivors out.

Greagoir’s plan is simply to murder everyone: to charge in and stick a sword in anything that moves (children included) without any thought of strategy or reason. Wynne would like to be methodical: she would like to go from room to room, killing any hostiles she encounters, and send survivors down to safety.

We already have evidence that Greagoir's assessment of the situation is wildly inaccurate – the mages in front of us. Likewise, we have evidence that Wynne and her people can follow through on the plan: they’ve already cleared this area, and protected the children.

Wynne pairs with Greagoir and Niall pairs with Cullen. The debate you hear at the bottom of the tower is repeated at the top. In both instances, the mages present solid plans to save as many people as possible; in both instances, the templars advocate wanton destruction for no clear reason.

The templars’ argument is further undermined by evidence you find as you climb the tower:

Pile of Rubble in first area after ascending to this level: I have the utmost sympathy for what happened to your charge, but it is beyond the Cicle's ability to anticipate every obscure demise that an apprentice might face, especially involving methods outside the already extensive realm of magical study. We simply don't have the room for additional training facilities, and there are concerns about becoming too inclusive that I will not elaborate on. Your request is denied.

--First Enchanter Sinclair

Pile of Books in next room after escaping from the Fade: If space is your excuse, I will surrender my quarters. If it is about money, I will hire the appropriate people. I will not graduate another student ignorant of weapons that any ditch-digger can shove into his ribs. We teach them to append ridiculous glamours on parade arms, but they don't know simple steel. That is criminal.

--Enchanter Bergin

Pile of Books in room with Blood Mage and Charmed Templars: Notice herewith that the exercise area on the fourth floor shall serve as permanent berthing for the templar garrison stationed at the tower. Since facilities that accommodate their particular training requirements are already on hand, they will be assuming an even closer watch over Circle affairs. Enchanter Bergin's optional weapons training is canceled until further notice. Enchanter Bergin has additionally stepped down from teaching duties.

--First Enchanter Sinclair

– Extracurricular Studies

It’s established that the mages have been actively prevented from learning how to defend themselves. There used to be combat classes, taught by someone named Enchanter Bergin, but he was forced to stop and templars moved in to his space to “assum(e) an even closer watch over Circle affairs”.

Owain: Please refrain from going into the stockroom. It is a mess and I have not been able to get it into a state fit to be seen.

Tranquil: Thank you. That was an uncomfortable experience.

Nevertheless, there are several encounters with mages and tranquil in this quest who are fighting, hiding, resisting torture – still trying to find a way through this nightmare. There are survivors. Despite what the templars tell you, there are people you can save.

Desire demon: We are partners. I give him what no one else can, and through him, I experience what it is to be mortal.

Meanwhile, Cullen outright admits that the rest of his comrades broke (we have only his word that he didn’t, which strangely enough he expects us to accept, while not regarding Irving’s word as good enough), and there are no free templars in the entire quest. They are all possessed or charmed by demons.

Broken Circle is asking you a simple question. Which do you want? Warriors trained in dealing with the arcane and the monstrous who will absolutely scream and run away if the fight gets a little bit difficult? Or civilians with no combat training who have proved to be surprisingly resilient in a crisis?

Strategically, that might be a bit tough: what you actually want is competent professionals, and those are in short supply right now. Morally, it’s an easy call: the mages are heroes, survivors and innocents; the templars are murderous cowards.

Alistair: His hatred of mages is so intense ... the memory of his friends’ deaths is still fresh in his mind.

Wynne: He’s suffered pain and anguish like few have had to endure. That and his lust for revenge have confused the issue –

Cullen: Do not presume to judge me, mage! I am thinking clearly – for perhaps the first time in my life.

Cullen: As you can see, I am in no position to directly influence your actions, though I would love to deal with the mages myself.

To return to Cullen’s motivation – while no one is disputing that he’s had a really bad day (We’re not! We’re all being very understanding about his demands for mass murder!), the story doesn’t actually emphasise his distress very much. That is raised and dismissed. What is raised and accepted is that Cullen is angry. Cullen is vengeful. The mages (some of them, anyway) have risen up, and templar blood has been spilled. Now mage blood must be spilled in return. It doesn’t matter very much if the mages were involved in the uprising or not. He just wants to kill them in an act of revenge.

While we can understand Cullen’s grief over his friends at a personal level, it’s worth considering whether it’s reasonable. We have just established that the mages are imprisoned in the Circle tower, that they have been prevented from learning how to protect themselves, and that the templars have not only abandoned their charges to die, they are actively in favour of murdering them.

Do ... we care that much about their deaths? This looks like the only part of the uprising that went right.

This is like Nathaniel Howe’s distress over his father’s death. Of course you can sympathise: this was his dad. But at the same time, you expect him to look at the evidence, and come to understand that his father was not an innocent. Nathaniel does, because he is a fundamentally decent person. Cullen doesn’t.

Put another way: if you’ve played Fallout 4, you’ll note that the NPC raiders sometimes cry out in grief and distress when their comrades fall in battle. That’s a nice touch on the AI: the raiders are human beings, with human emotions, and the people you’re killing are their friends, their family. But when the battle is done and you walk into their camps ... and you observe the bloody remains of their victims scattered about for decoration ... maybe you don’t feel too bad about making them sad?

Same deal.

The original epilogue for this quest has this:

Templars

Once the tower was rebuilt, Knight-Commander Greagoir stepped down from his post and retired to a life of private contemplation as a brother in the Chantry. His health failed over time, and after refusing treatment, he perished in his sleep. Knight-Commander Cullen was said to be more strict and less trusting of the mages even than Greagoir was. He ruled the Circle with fear.

Mages

The young templar Cullen never quite recovered from his ordeal. After months of attempting to convince his superiors that the tower was still a danger, he finally snapped and killed three apprentices before being stopped by his fellow templars. Eventually, Cullen escaped from prison, a madman and a threat to any mage he encountered.

– Epilogue

Now, I realise the details of this have been pretty thoroughly retconned. There is absolutely no point in bringing this stuff up in relation to later games. However, it is worth looking at the epilogue in relation to the original quest. Regardless of the ending you choose, these epilogues tell you that the real threat was never the mages, or even the demons. The threat was the templars – the individual murderer, or the institution with a cruel man in charge.

The mages are not possessed (at least not in a harmful sense – Hi, Wynne!). They are not evil. But the templars always have power over them, and they can hurt them simply because they hate them. Cullen hates them, and was thwarted in his vengeance. So he hurts them.

Also, if you mash those two endings together and change the location you’ve pretty much got the plot of Dragon Age 2. So the details have changed, but the theme remains the same.

To end: Broken Circle fundamentally lets you choose. You can show compassion to the tortured mages, who asked for none of this, and who were never prepared for this violence. You can accept the aid of their heroes, enact a plan, and save the survivors. Or, you can murder them to satisfy the vengeance of their gaolers who resent having to take any risks on behalf of their charges.

Niall represents that compassion. Cullen represents that cruelty. It isn’t really about Cullen’s tragedy at all. If anything, it’s about Niall’s. And yet, two games on, he is effectively forgotten.

Niall: Dark times, greater acts of heroism, eh? You may be right.

A salute to Niall – who fought for compassion and saved the Circle (at least from my save game) when the templars would have destroyed it.

#dragon age #dragon age origins #Seanna Brosca #niall #cullen critical #broken circle

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gaijinhunter · 5 years

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Monster Hunter World Iceborne: Review

I haven’t had the time to edit a video review so here it is in text!

Iceborne came and I got though Master Rank, through the last boss, and got to mess around with the end game in the 45 hours I have put into the game. Here is my spoiler free review. A shout out to Capcom for giving me a review code to play.

First off, I’m working off the assumption that you know about Iceborne and all the features it brings to the table so I’m not going to cover everything.

Main Story

While the main World story took about 40-50 hours, Iceborne will take about 30-40 depending on how you play. The story never felt like it was too much, and for the most part the flow was good. The story itself, like world, is nothing to write home about but it does add context to what you are doing, and also helps to explain why the new area opens up in parts.

Things I liked about how they handled it this time. First, all the major quests in the Hoarfrost Reach start out as expeditions, so that means if you are geared up enough, you could just beat the story monster in expedition mode, meaning you can cart more than twice and you won’t fail the quest.

Second, there is a large enough roster that if they tried to make you fight all the monsters as assigned quests, the game would be paced bad and the difficulty curve would be hard to control and I think they did a fine job of selecting the few monsters that did get featured as story quests and the difficulty goes up very nice and smooth from start to finish.

Seliana

The town of Seliana has the benefit of Capcom realizing what did and didn't work well in Astera and the result is a lovely town with a lovely main theme song. The layout is so well done, you won’t ever want to go back to Astera, and if you use the main functions of the hub town, I’d go as far as saying Seliana is a killer feature that makes Iceborne that more worth getting.

The thing I liked most about Seliana was the attention to detail especially when it comes to the felynes. There are some goofy things added in, which is something I felt World needed more of.

The customization options to your room are really fun and makes exploring maps and doing some of the less hardcore things really worth it. I also love the new slot machine mini-game in which you can earn tons of useful items, including a rare ticket which can be exchanged for precious master rank Pallium. No, there are no micro-transactions in this game, this is all in-game fun for fun’s sake.

Monsters

Iceborne has to my knowledge 8 additional monsters they haven’t publicly revealed, 5 you will encounter in the main game and 3 are special goodies for post game. Then of course they will add new monsters via DLC. All of the new monsters are memorable and fun, and more than world, monsters will appear in all sorts of maps, which makes the hunts against them more varied and enjoyable. Turf wars seem to be a huge feature of the game and luring monsters into each other so they can help shave off a few thousand hit points is a useful strategy you can employ in each hunt.

Mechanics

The game really focuses on using the clutch claw and for the most part it works well. The monsters do fatigue for a few seconds quite often but they are also tank like in how much health they have, so the addition of the claw and these new moments of opportunity don’t make the game easier. In fact, hunts take longer this time than previous games, which I think a lot of players might like. I still suspect the end of Master Rank hunts are taking too long for my comfort at about 20-25 minutes, but I think they might be adding this buffer to account for all the end game mechanics for buffing your weapons. Either way, the hunts are longer, the additional difficulty levels work especially 2 player, and the hunts are fun.

Weapons

Monsters being fun to hunt is good since since they fine tuned the game so that elemental weapons are meaningful again, so you’ll want to get a nice non-elemental weapon to stick with as you start to collect the other ones for the weapon or weapons of your choice. They don’t have a lot of choices for weapons so there isn’t any confusion on what to make or debate on which is the best elemental weapon to make. But weapons is one of the few things that remains very disappointing.

While some monsters like Zinogre saw most of its original weapon designs return, some of the weapons still are just ore or bone weapons with some monster material slapped on like a decoration. It hurts even worse this time, because there are so many iconic monsters that have returned. Capcom seems to have no clue that part of our memory of these monsters were the weapons we made from them. Looking at the Brachydios lance, I can’t see anything that excuses this design, and as a fan of these monsters, it feels like a slap in the face. What makes it worse is there seems to be no rhyme or reason for which weapons got to retain their iconic design and which got the ugly treatment, which just adds to the frustration because we don't even know why. This actually takes away some motivation for me to make more weapons and thus is something I need to be blunt and critical about here in my review.

Armor

The new armor is okay I guess. There isn’t a lot of variety but I think they are keeping it low to start so they can add in event variations and stuff, so it’s still too early to judge. I am disappointed that transmog hasn’t been introduced because some sets are still rubbish due to the focus on decorations. Take the Master Rank Odogaron set. First, the design is nice. But the set bonus is protective polish, which you can get in a single decoration if you get lucky, meaning that using 3 or more pieces form this set is kind of a waste. They could have made this version be called True Protective Polish and added in an attack or affinity boost, or something to make it different than the decoration, but they didn't. And ebony and basic odogaron have the same skill which was disappointing.

None of the new sets really screamed out to me as something I really wanted to get, and most of them come with random skills that I simply don’t want. In most cases it’s better to just get the beta sets since they have more slots, but the same can be said for world. One thing that is nice that they did was introduce new set bonuses for some monsters that raises the level cap of a specific skill, like say you want to have even more slugger KO damage, which normally goes to level 3, well if you trigger the diablos set skill you can raise it to level 5. The new decorations are simple and nice in that they are 4 slot decorations that have 2 skills or multiple levels of a single skill, so you could just theoretically grab a master rank weapon and terrorize high rank tempered monsters to collect a bunch of the core decorations you might be missing.

End Game

I won’t go into end game details but it’s certainly going to be something that people can sink several hundred hours into, so it’ll be fun to watch streamers play and do it, and it does give Capcom a new way to introduce new monsters later down the line. With world being a console game I probably won’t sink much time into the end game personally but I am still very happy with the overall package and I can always go and join other people on their quests so it’s not like I’m missing out on anything.

Overall:

Iceborne does a great job of building off the strong foundation that world gave it, fleshing it out with more monsters and things to do, and all the new mechanics feel and look great. The new hub town is a delight and master rank quests, while they can be a tad long, I bet most people will appreciate that instead of going in with 4 players and destroying a quest in 4 minutes. The choice to make some weapons look like a basic weapon with decorative material baffles me and I hope enough people will voice their unhappiness so that Capcom rethinks this artistic direction. But even that can’t change the fact that Iceborne is a fantastic addition that really completes the monster hunter world experience and in my opinion is more than worth its price-tag, I just feel that it holds it back from true greatness a little.

I hope you guys enjoyed this review, and and until next time, happy hunting!

#MHWorld #Iceborne #Review

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voidendron · 4 years

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Story Time

One-Shot, 2′327 Words Star Wars AU

(( the formatting got fucky and hard to read for mobile, can’t get it to fix itself, so reposting as a text post instead of answer in an attempt to get it to work.

set later than previous SW fics where they actually like. can stand each other. it ended up WAY longer than I anticipated, but So. Worth it. It was a lot of fun :D ))

Warnings: Alcohol, Drunkenness (mild), Swearing Characters: Chase Brody, Jackieboy Man, Jameson Jackson, Marvin the Magnificent, Dr. Schneeplestein, Septic Eye Sam

Chase had dropped off a pretty large shipment earlier, which left the cargo bay of his ship with plenty of room. With an empty crate acting as a makeshift table, they all sat around it, some with more distance between them than others. It had been Chase’s idea, because of course it had been.

Jackie was looking at his drink skeptically (probably wondering if Chase had come by it legally or not) while Sam pouted at the fact Marvin wouldn’t let them have any. …Which was funny considering that, while they were the youngest there, they were as much an adult as the rest of them. Jameson had waved off the offer, not wanting to remove his vocoder—vocabulator?—whatever it was; Chase had heard multiple names used for the things.

Chase might have been a little tipsy at that point and he could feel Schneep eyeing him. He was watching himself, though, and at least his astromech could pilot while he was unable.

“Anyway,” the Bothan said as he threw a hand up, “that’s how I accidentally pissed off a governor and got an assassin sent after me!”

Marvin made a noise akin to some sort of hissing laugh. “I think I’ve got more questions than I started with.”

“Yeah…” Jackie took a testing sip of his drink as he leaned back against an empty pallet. “What was that part about getting stuck in the wrong vent again?”

“Doesn’t matter—my time’s up! Who can one-up that?” Chase pulled his best rendition of a grin that he could with a snout full of sharp teeth.

“Eh, I’ll give it a shot.” Marvin adjusted his legs and patted his helmet to make sure it was still resting at his thigh. “This was back when Sami was a teenager, but… Heh. You remember that Acklay?”

The younger Mandalorian immediately perked up and started grinning. “You told that story for weeks after!”

“Hey, that’s where I earned my signet—‘course I’d keep telling it!”

“Acklay…” Jackie rubbed at his chin. “You mean those freaky six-legged buggers that try to spear ya?”

Marvin grinned; his feline fangs were even sharper than Chase’s and glinted in the light from overhead. “Oh, yeah. And those legs are sharp, dammit.” He traced a line over his breastplate up to his shoulder and added, “Got a nasty scar here from it, and proud of it!”

“So what about the Acklay?” Schneep actually…tilted his head a little. God was he expressive for a droid.

“All right. Let’s see if this one-ups Chase’s ship-crash of an experience, huh?” He took a swig of his drink, then settled back comfortably. “I did a lot of our clan’s supply runs—especially if it was into dangerous territory. I had to go to Felucia for some plant. Not a botanist, so don’t remember what it was or what it was used for, but whatever. We needed it and that’s all you need to know about that.

“So, I was searching for this plant, watching my back for dangerous fauna, and then I heard it.” He gnashed his teeth together, making poor Sami jump at the noise. “It was above me, on one of the…root-things all over the place. Just watching me. And the thing was huge. I’d only seen them from a distance until that point, but one good strike would’ve speared one of its legs straight through me.

“When it shifted, the entire root creaked under it. It must’ve been waiting there long before I got there ‘cause there was no way I wouldn’t have heard it walk up there.” He muttered something in Mando’a and chuckled to himself. “So I did what any impulsive Mandalorian would do and started shooting at it.”

Jameson startled Chase—as well as some of the others by the looks of it—when he suddenly piped in. He hadn’t expected the guy to actually listen enough to contribute. “Acklays have exoskeletons. A blaster such as you carry would do little.”

Marvin frowned a little at Jameson, but at least he wasn’t baring his teeth this time. For once? “Yeah. And I remembered that fact only when it lumbered off the damn root and nearly speared me under it.

“That was back before I got my jetpack, and carried a vibroblade instead of my electrostaff.” He patted said weapon where it laid next to him. “So I was stuck on the ground with somethin’ a whole lot faster than me, with more reach, and those fuckers are scary agile, too. I was alone with the only things I’d have a chance with being a few grenades and my blade.”

Jackie arched a brow. “…You say that like ‘a few’ grenades are just a casual thing.”

“Well, yeah. Mandalorians are usually armed to the teeth.”

“Fangs,” Chase corrected with a chuckle. “’Cause you’re a Cathar, so you’ve got fangs.”

Marvin just snorted. “Someone get him to bed—”

“—I’m not that drunk—!”

“—Anyway. So I’ve got this Acklay that’s way bigger than me trying to knock me over, spear me, chomp me, whatever it can. It broke some of my straps, so I was left without a breastplate or right pauldron, lost one of my blasters, I’m dragging my sash in my hands since that got cut, too, and I really wanted to keep my grenades with me, all while I’m trying not to let this thing make a meal of me and it’s screeching in my ear.

“So I’m trying to duck around plants and dive for areas it can’t fit, but it just plows through or destroys them to leave me floundering for a new spot. I can see my ship, but this thing’s driving me farther and farther from it, then I trip, and all I see is one of its legs poised to impale me. I roll, but it still catches me,” he traces the line on his chest again, “so now I’m bleeding, can’t move one arm, and this thing reaches down to chomp me, catches my other pauldron instead and pulls it off so I scramble to my feet.

“I’m covered in mud and pollen and my own blood, my visor’s so filthy I can barely see. I pull a grenade off my sash and activate it, ‘cause at that point I’m thinking I’m about to die and I’m desperate. So I throw the fucker, and the Acklay snatches it out of the air and swallows it.

“Boom. I watched the thing get blown apart, grabbed my stuff and the plant after looking around for it again, and beelined it for my ship.”

Sam shook their head and grinned. “When he got back to camp he was a mess. He was dragging the armor that was pulled off by its straps and had his arm against his chest. His collar bone had been broken and he didn’t even sling his arm! The medical droid scolded him so bad. And the first thing he does? Pull off his helmet, grin a huge grin, and give the plant to our leader all proud of himself!”

“Hey, I had a right to be proud!” Marvin turned to show the marks on his pauldron; sure enough, it was an Acklay head. “That’s how I earned my signet!”

“…Damn.” Chase shook his head. “I’ve heard those things can kill groups of trained soldiers if they’re caught off guard.”

“Impressive,” Schneep agreed. “Very impressive!”

“So. Anyone wanna one-up that?” the Cathar challenged.

Jackie shook his head. “I thought I had a story. No way it tops that.”

“Let’s hear it anyway!” Chase said.

“Yes, please,” the droid agreed.

“Eh. Well.” He rubbed the back of his head. In the dimmed light of the cargo bay, it was almost eerie the way his red eyes glowed as he cast them around the room. “I was in my Y-Wing when Vader joined a battle?”

Chase choked on his drink and was left coughing for a solid thirty seconds. “You survived an encounter with him?!”

“I spotted his TIE from a distance, but it didn’t really…register? that it looked a little different from the rest? Soon as my squad leader saw it, I swear I was gonna go deaf. She flipped. Out. Ordering the squad to retreat immediately. It was right about then that a star destroyer came outta hyperspace.

“We knew that was it. We didn’t have a chance of winning that battle, so we fell back in the hopes of not losing multiple squads.” Jackie frowned. “Half my squad was killed—all good men, friends—when Vader showed up. Pretty sure he’s the one who got to ‘em. I’d never been so terrified. Heh. And I never even got close to it—just saw it on the other side of the battle. Even now, I don’t think anything’s scared me so damn bad as seein’ that one TIE.

“I wouldn’t fly for days after that, and none of us would shut up about seeing it. We didn’t win that battle, but surviving that sorta encounter at least deserves some bragging rights. Right?”

“Wow!” Sam leaned forward, hands on their knees. “I’ve only ever heard stories of him, but that sounds scary!” They were…grinning, as they said it. Of course they were, Chase thought with a chuckle. He swore those two Mandalorians were addicted to danger. Maybe he was a little, too, but hey.

“Okay, we’ve got a game goin’ now,” Jackie said. “Someone’s gotta go next.”

Schneep shuffled awkwardly, then offered, “I was stolen by pirates?”

“Hey, now.” The Chiss frowned despite the story he’d just told. “We rescued you. Can’t hold that over our heads forever.”

“Oh, no, no!” He put up his hands, shook his head. “You saved me from the third time! But I’ve been stolen before.”

“…Third time?”

“By pirates, yes.”

“That implies you’ve been stolen by things other than pirates, too,” Marvin muttered with a huffed laugh.

“Dude,” Chase grinned, “you’ve got tell us about the first time. Or second—whichever’s more interesting. Please?”

The arms set into Schneep’s back for more fine-tuned work shifted and clattered and his eyes brightened a bit. Maybe he couldn’t make facial expressions, but he had other ways of showing how he felt. It was frankly adorable how expressive he actually was.

“This happened during the Clone Wars. I was a Republic medical droid—”

“I…had forgotten how old you were,” Jameson said.

Jackie scoffed. “You forgot something? You’ve got like. A literal computer attached to your head.”

“It didn’t seem like important information, so I disregarded it.”

“Guys,” Chase scolded, “don’t interrupt him.”

His extra arms fidgeted even as he tried to remain still. “I had been stationed at a small outpost to tend to the Clones there. It was too small and not well-defended—in a very bad location, as well. Very bad planning overall. That is what I was told. Pirates were able to overwhelm it.

“They took hostages, stole the droids and supplies, and fled back to their ship before reinforcements arrived.” He put his hands on his hips like he was disappointed, but also chuckled. “They tried to short me out! But they shocked themselves instead—is very funny to remember. They cursed and jumped around while their little machine zipped and zapped. The astromechs they stole found it hilarious and would not stop chittering!”

Chase laughed. That seemed to make Schneep a little more confident—he wasn’t used to talking so much about himself, it was clear, but the Bothan hoped he would start loosening up like this more often.

“The pirates were incompetent. They overwhelmed the outpost with sheer number and firepower, but I swear, far dumber than a battle droid. The Clones complimented one with insults—right to his face!—and he took it as genuine!

“They floundered around each other like the fish out of water! One accidentally released one of the Clones and the poor man was so confused that he just sat there waiting to be cuffed again, and another nearly shot his buddy while cleaning a blaster and having it go off. It was maddening! They wanted to sell us droids and ransom the Clones, but the truly frustrating part was watching them all be the idiots! I do not even think we were worried for our own well-being they were so nonsensical!”

Most of them were laughing, now. Even Jameson had his head tilted like he just couldn’t make sense of pirates. One of the lights on his AJ^6 was even blinking very, very slowly.

“Dude.” It took Chase a couple tries to actually get any proper words out through snickers, “I’m actually afraid of the answer, but… How badly did you embarrass them to get away?”

The droid cupped his hands over his face and laughed again. “The Clones tricked them into undoing their binds, but they were still locked in the cell. So the astromechs—they ambushed a pirate and stole the key from him!”

“Oh, god. Did they not know how freaking feisty mechs can be?! You don’t tick them off—‘specially not a group of ‘em!”

“Apparently not! They zipped and zapped and pinched until they got the key and released the Clones, and then they took over the ship! The pirates were locked out of the cockpit and the mechs found us the nearest Republic fleet. We all had such a hard time believing it actually happened—and no one would believe us! They could not believe someone could possibly be that incompetent!”

Sami looked like they were having a hard time breathing they were laughing so hard, and both Jackie and Marvin had covered their faces.

“…I think Schneep wins for most entertaining story,” Chase suggested. The others only nodded. “Unless Jameson..?”

“I have nothing interesting to tell.”

“…Oh-kay. Our dear droid with the freakin’ comedy gold of dumb pirate stories wins.”

Schneep clasped his hands together, something in his chest chirping.

#fanfic #jacksepticeye #chase brody #jackieboy man #marvin the magnificent #jameson jackson #dr. schneeplestein #septic eye sam #answered ask #anonymous #star wars au #blitz indites #swearing /#alcohol /#drunkenness /

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class-wom · 5 years

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Pretty good points arising on all sides, although I’m still not as ready to view Farouk with as an objective, sympathetic eye as this writer is. I guess the implication of David’s intrusion “turning Farouk unfriendly and menacing” is worth noting, but wouldn’t he be exposing his dark side rather than triggering it? I’ll be fair and admit that the door may swing both ways for David, since his realization of what Farouk did to Amy in Chapter 13 pushed him past the point of no return in the darkness department. That being said, David had absolutely nothing to do with Farouk’s decision to taken an entire country and king prisoner and trap them in the bodies of orphans and a monkey, the latter of whom is trapped in a physical cage as well for good measure!

How does time work on Legion?

It’s a question I don’t think we’ll be fully able to answer until after the finale next week, and even then I doubt things are going to feel straightforward. But if the claim that time is a jungle from Switch’s time travel tapes struck me as significant before, it does even more so now.

David’s plan of going back to the past to prevent his possession by Farouk failed, so his new plan appears to be to team up with his father to kill Farouk instead of just dispelling him from his body. But this not only causes Switch to lose more teeth—and worse—it brings the time demons back in a big way.

They, at least, can change time. This was established in my mind by what happened with Lenny and her daughter, amongst other things. However it works exactly (given that time itself is presented as not exactly linear), it would seem that they ate that part of Lenny’s life, and it’s just gone now.

But, then, did it ever really exist? Ostensibly on Legion, it did. Apparently on Legion, David’s attempt to go back in time caused this. Evidently on Legion, time travel can awaken these demons that eat time and alter it.

But it remains possible that this was what always happened.

This is a big question that runs through all time travel narratives. Can attempts to change things actually do so, or will they inevitably lead to the very events they are intended to prevent?

We won’t know where Legion will come down on this until after the finale, but certain elements seem to foreshadow that it will be in line with the latter option.

Farouk seems friendly before David intervenes and alters Charles’ perspective. And though Charles seems a bit skeptical and hesitant in his judgment of Farouk from the get-go, it really does seem to be David that pushes him towards the decision that Farouk needs to be stopped.

David insists that they will have the upper hand because it will be two against one, but then the episode ends with the older Farouk coming out of a painting on the wall to greet his younger self. And so it seems all too likely that we are gearing up for a battle with Charles and David on the one side and two Farouks on the other.

Is this, perhaps, always what happened in Morocco?

Of course, we’ve also got Charles’ assessment of David to grapple with, as he encounters the various versions of self that constitute Legion. It’s hard to imagine him feeling fine and dandy about what he witnessed in his son’s psyche.

That may contribute to a desire to defeat Farouk, along with the fact that he is clearly disturbed by the mind of the “tyrant” being trapped in a monkey, and those of his followers being stored in a little girl.

But if Charles and David succeed in killing Farouk, we’ll have a Grandfather paradox, insofar as it would be the David that resulted from Farouk’s possession that resulted in Farouk’s demise. If they fail, however, we’ll have a Bootstrap paradox, where an event from the future causes an event in the past, which in turn causes the events of the future.

We won’t know how that plays out until next week, but the time demons do strike me as a wrinkle that will be worth thinking about. Of course, their actions could fit into either of those paradoxical structures as well, but they also seem to be so chaotic that it’s hard to predict what will happen.

I don’t really like speculating about what will occur in the finale of a TV show (though I stand behind my Game of Thrones finale prediction as what I wish had happened), so let’s move to discuss some things pertaining to the main characters in Legion.

Kerry

Kerry seems pretty nonchalantly OK with the idea of killing the baby David. It’s humorous, but this is a debate that some have had with a degree of seriousness, usually about Hitler.

If you could travel back to the past and kill baby Hitler, would you? Should you?

The morality here is a bit tough, as the thought of preventing something very bad from happening certainly holds some weight. Though, at the same time, you’d be killing a child that at that point had not yet done the very bad things.

So, is it right to kill someone who is innocent now in order to prevent them from doing something heinous in the future?

Or maybe is it a better plan to work on making Hitler a successful artist?

But it’s pretty clear that Kerry wants to kill the baby.

Syd

Syd seems to be in line with that second thought about trying to change the past in less violent ways. She doesn’t think the adult David can be saved, but she has to believe that the baby one can, and the second childhood we saw her experience seems to be play a role in how she comes to this position.

She devotes herself to trying to help Gabrielle be a better mother, and perhaps not give David up, and so on. If only she can make his childhood better, maybe that’ll do the trick. (Of course this largely ignores the influence of the Shadow King, and some things Syd says indicate that she may be putting more blame on David than is appropriate.)

But it’s not clear that this is going to have any effect. After spending some time chopping wood for some reason and giving Gabrielle advice, the latter asks Syd if she is really there, and all of the wood is suddenly no longer chopped.

The time demons are to blame, it would seem, but we also see Gabrielle’s concerns about her own mental state arising again here. She’s not sure that she is sane, and not sure that it matters. This would seem to explain how unfazed she is when Syd, Kerry, and Cary appear outside of her home.

Charles

We don’t have a lot to work with when it comes to Charles Xavier still, and it’s not clear how much it is appropriate to bring in from other sources.

As he’s been presented here so far, he seems like a decent man, who loves his wife and child. And it seems that he did indeed seek out Farouk in the spirit of friendship.

But this makes it rather unclear how certain scenes are supposed to fit in. Did he see what we did in Episode 3? And what about the scene early on here in Episode 7 in the theater?

Further, his interaction with Legion should make him suspicious of David, but it’s not clear how much it does so. Certainly he realizes that he is dealing with an unstable mind?

Finding a man’s consciousness trapped in a monkey must be disturbing. And discovering multiple other minds within that of a little girl has to be pretty disconcerting. But do we know that this wasn’t a tyrant and his followers?

One question worth asking is whether it matters. After all, even if we buy Farouk’s line on the matter, one could argue that what he has done is considerably worse than just killing the people in question.

But then there is Farouk’s previous characterization of Charles as a colonialist interfering with a culture he didn’t understand how to grapple with.

Maybe he should have left well enough alone? Perhaps he should never have come?

Farouk

Farouk seems really friendly when Charles arrives, and like he is genuinely happy to have found a compatriot in the world who shares powers similar to his. Maybe it is weird to greet the man with a driver holding a painted portrait of him, but still, Farouk’s exuberance doesn’t seem to me to be feigned.

What a privilege it is to see and be seen!

It’s at least tempting to believe that he was being genuine, until David arrives and disrupts him. He reads David’s mind and keeps getting images of his hippie cult. The Caption Sensible song we previously heard when David broke through to the past gets a recurrence, and it’s hard to say what all exactly Farouk may have intuited. All we know for sure is that it was enough for him to excuse himself.

So, if we put things like the man trapped in a monkey aside, how malicious was Farouk prior to David’s intervention? Was this a trap that he’d laid for Charles, as David suggests, or was he perhaps truly looking for a buddy?

I have to say it struck me as the latter, but given what occurred over the rest of the hour, we’re never going to really know.

Is he the prince of lies, or does the name “Shadow King” merely derive from the way he puts on shadow plays for the children? Is he a force of evil, or did he just go too far, or in a suspect way, when he deposed a man who really was a tyrant?

If we look back to Season 1, the version that has him evil all along makes sense, but those events also occurred after what we’ve seen here in Season 3 Episode 7. And this is not in any way to suggest he should be excused for anything; it is just to note that Farouk’s character has become increasingly complex.

But then again, there are the scenes like the one I mentioned before, where he tells Charles he shouldn’t have come. And we have to ask where and how exactly these fit in.

David

I know there are those who have remained pretty squarely on David’s side throughout the course of this season, but his hubris and narcissism are on full display in this episode.

We can understand it. Convinced that Farouk is a malevolent force (and he probably is) responsible for all his problems, David wants to go back and fix it. He effectively wants to erase his own existence, or get a do-over.

But this is worth thinking about: the David we know would not exist if he succeeds. Not only would all of the death and destruction he has wrought be undone, he himself would be. And this is what he wants.

In this regard, whether or not Farouk was the cause of David’s mental illness becomes a bit irrelevant. You’re not responsible for the illness, but you are for how you deal with it. And to treat it as an excuse is to shirk that responsibility.

Worse, David seems to think that if he can only change the past, it won’t matter what he’s done. And while in the real world we don’t tend to encounter the alteration of past events as a live possibility, this structure of thinking that one is justified in using whatever means necessary to achieve a goal is something we can point to all over the place.

And, so, it is how he treats Switch in this episode that leads me to my deepest condemnation of David yet.

She’s a great character. Her dedication to David might have been a little under-justified in terms of the text of the show (as she does seem to have followed him freely, as opposed to having been psychically swayed to do so), but it’s been there and it hasn’t really felt forced. For whatever reason, our time traveler has decided to be on his side.

She loses teeth to help him go back to the past—more and more teeth—and ultimately collapses from the strain of the whole thing. And yet, when Charles asks about her, David says she is no one: a means to an end.

David’s narcissism and obsession with changing the past have become all-encompassing. And, again, this is somewhat understandable. Legion has done a great job of doing this in a way we can understand where David is coming from, leaving the space open where he might possibly even be right.

But even if he is right about the Shadow King, and even if he is able to change the past, the way he has acted is unjustifiable, and mental illness only goes so far as an excuse.

Presumably on Legion, we’ll see next week how this all pans out.

#time travel #Legion #Chapter 26 #Chapter 27 #Spoilers #Spoiler Speculation

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tenscupcake · 5 years

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Kingdom Hearts 3 - An Honest Review

I’d like to preface this review by saying I am an unabashed Kingdom Hearts geek. Like, through and through. I played KH1 when I was just a tween, and have picked up a copy every installment since (in some cases, even bought the entire console just to play that one game). I still have CDs of the game soundtracks, a few discs which have nearly burnt out on replay in my car. Sanctuary After the Battle will forever make me cry, whether or not I’m watching the cutscene that goes along with it. I’ve replayed most of the titles multiple times. Wasted away hours on YouTube watching Story So Far recaps and funny commentaries about the games in preparation for KH3. Like millions of other enthusiasts, I have been eagerly and patiently (all right, sometimes not so patiently) awaiting the arrival of KH3 since the moment I first finished KH2 – 13 very, very long years ago.

At around eight o’clock on premiere night, I took my place in line at my local GameStop wearing my Kingdom Hearts t-shirt and pajama pants, brandishing the miniature Kingdom Key clipped to my lanyard. Finally holding that blue case in my hands was absolutely surreal. One of those natural highs it took me hours to come down from. Tears welled up in my eyes at the first few somber piano keys as the title screen faded into view.

Lots of people asked me, in the weeks and even months leading up to the release (because believe me, at any opportunity, I would not shut up about how excited I was about this game), if I thought it would live up to the hype. Pfft, I thought. People outside the KH fandom never understand. Of course it will. Sure, the series has had its weak links, its hiccups (the battle system in COM and the perpetual re-releases of old games with minor tweaks, to name a couple). But with the compelling cinematic storytelling and uniquely delightful gameplay of the main series’ smash hits - KH1, KH2, and BBS – in their repertoire, I knew the team at Square was capable of pulling this off. To me, it was just a given that it would be epic. That playing it would be worth all the years of waiting. I had absolutely no doubt in my mind this game was going to be lit. As. Hell.

I’m only saying all this so as not to give the impression I went into this game looking to find flaws, to nitpick it. Or with the expectation of being disappointed. In fact, quite the opposite.

I wanted to love this game. To me, loving KH games is one of very few constants in my life. I was supposed to love this game. I needed to love this game.

But the truth is, I didn’t.

That statement has been pretty difficult for me to come to terms with.

In what few early reviews and videos I’ve found of people discussing their thoughts on the game, I’ve found fans to be quite split: with some unreservedly loving, others downright hating the game.

I fall somewhere in the middle of the polarized fandom. I did NOT hate the game. It was actually a good, if not great game. But putting it on a sliding scale of satisfaction and disappointment, I would say it’s tipping toward the latter. And as it’s taken me hours of mulling, reading, and discussing with other players to characterize and articulate precisely why, and because I think I owe it not only to the series and the characters therein, but also my younger self to leave no stone unturned, this review is going to be a long one.

I’m finding it easiest to break it down by category:

Graphics.

This game is beautiful. It was sort of a dream come true to meander around in real time with the gorgeously, smoothly animated versions of Sora and the gang that we’d previously only been able to see in the rare cinematic cutscenes at each game’s beginning and end. Most of the Disney and even Pixar worlds and characters are rendered to nearly the same quality as their film counterparts. I often found myself just standing in place for a while, admiring it all. The vivid green landscapes of Corona, the beaches and sprawling sea in the Caribbean, the towering cityscape of San Fransokyo. And walking on water where the sky meets the sea? Stunning.

Gameplay.

All in all, this game is pretty damn fun to play. It was all I thought about during long days at work: I couldn’t wait to jump back into the action. Pounding on Heartless still brings me back to the good old days. And who doesn’t want to run up the side of buildings as Riku and Roxas demonstrated so epically, so long ago, in the World That Never Was? Soar to sky-high Heartless as easily as you can lock onto them? These new movement aspects brought an almost superhero-esque quality to the game, reminiscent of Spider-man’s wall-crawling or Batman’s grappling hook, that, if a bit unrealistic, I found to be immense fun. And compared to previous games, worlds are no longer cordoned off into many separate areas, and with the sheer scale of them, KH3 experiments with a quasi-open-world style that is rather freeing.

I also really appreciate that the character interactions with your party and with NPCs felt much less clunky. For one thing, they FINALLY did away with the press X-to-progress text-only conversations that were so prevalent in previous games, with all the dialogue left to voice actors. Even minor NPCs that only show up one time were given a voice, making every interaction that much more immersive. Transitions from cutscenes to the action were also much more fluid, and Sora and his current teammates talk to one another as you pow around. Even if it’s just a warning from Goofy you’re going the wrong way, or a heads-up from Donald there’s an ingredient or lucky emblem nearby, it was still a new feature I was glad to have.

Combat-wise, this game has a lot going for it. This installment brings nearly all the combat styles we’ve seen up until this point: magic, combos, form changes, flowmotion, shotlock, companion team-ups, and links. And it even introduces a few new ones on top of all this: the ability to swap between three different keyblades at will, and the new Disney parks-inspired attraction commands, where you can summon roller coasters, tea cups, and spinning carousels to your heart’s content. What this enables is for the player to never get bored during a battle. With so many options to choose from in each new enemy encounter, you never have to stick with the same combat style or get stuck in a rut of just mashing X to hack and slash everything. All things considered, Sora’s got some pretty sick moves this time around. Whipping out Thundaza, watching lightning explode across the screen and zap all the enemies in sight with it? Wicked. Floating above the ground, wreaking ethereal, glowing havoc with the Mirage Staff? Awesome. Surrounded by a sea of Heartless, locking onto 32 different targets at once and unleashing a flurry of lasers to slash through them all? Amazing. Thumbs getting fatigued fighting the third maddening iteration of Xehanort? Give yourself a break from the chaos in a giant, technicolor pirate ship, watching it thwack your adversary on every rock back and forth.

On one hand, the hefty damage most of these combat options deal gives the game an almost Ratchet and Clank-esque ‘blowing shit up’ vibe, which is undeniably fun. But, this array of choices does become a double-edged sword. With grand magic, attraction commands, form changes, and team attacks all fighting for space atop the command deck, they tend to pile up quickly. It’s not at all uncommon to rack up three or four different situation commands after only about 30 seconds of fighting. Sometimes, the constant need to make a choice, especially in a busy battle, can be more of a burden than a blessing. Having to shift between situation command selections on top of attacking, blocking, and accessing your shortcuts can be a bit cumbersome.

Unlike in previous games, there also aren’t many consequences for over-using special attacks. In KH2, your drive gauge ran out and needed to be slowly refilled. You also ran the increasingly high risk of morphing into the near-helpless Anti-Sora by relying too much on drive forms. But here, no matter how many times you’ve used a special attack, your MP will reload in a few seconds, and you can easily just ignore the situation command for Rage Form when it pops up. In BBS, it felt like it took a good while to power up to a form change, whereas in KH3 it seems like you can spend just as much time in a powered-up keyblade form change as in regular combat.

And, because so many of these situation commands are so powerful and frequent, they tend to dominate the entire battle, making the combat in the game much easier than previous games. Bordering on too easy. Where in other entries in the main series, I usually had to die several times on each boss in Proud mode before I devised the right strategy to defeat them, I rarely died at all in this game. On the surface, that isn’t such a bad thing. As I like to say a lot of the time, when I play a game “I’m here for a good time, not a hard time.” But there comes a point when the combat is so easy that it no longer gives you that sense of accomplishment when you progress past a tough batch of heartless or a particularly merciless boss – you know, that punching the air, whooping to yourself sort of pride. I was definitely missing that, at times.

Believe it or not, I think the Disney attraction commands, though powerful, and at first hilarious, were a bit too extra. After only a few hours in they just became annoying, and I was doing my best to ignore them when they popped up, even wishing I could turn them off. Now and then, I’d accidentally trigger the Blaster or the raft ride and just roll my eyes while canceling back out of it. Because it doesn’t really feel like you’re doing any fighting, let alone the real-time keyblade-style fighting uniquely special to this series. And forget trying to effectively aim while you’re in one. After a while the only thing I found them useful for was, as I mentioned earlier, taking a break from a fight when you’re fatigued, as they give your thumbs a break and cause you to take much less damage. While they were cool at first, my final impression of this addition to the combat was all flash, no substance.

I was one of the few who actually liked and took advantage of flowmotion in DDD, and was excited to see it brought back here. But this, too, turned out to be mostly another annoyance. I’m not sure if it’s because the actionable objects are so much more spread out in KH3, or because they actually built in restrictions on combos here, but I was unable to keep a flow going at all. After only one successful strike after leaping off a wall or pole, the blue glow of momentum vanished. It didn’t feel like “flowmotion” at all, just a one-and-done special attack that tended to kill any rhythm I had going moreso than facilitate it. So while conceptually and visually it was promising, I unfortunately no longer found it very useful.

Also, and I realize this is completely subjective, but I found the form changes to be stylistically underwhelming overall. I thought the drive forms in KH2 (especially Master and Final) were visually and stylistically cooler, and seemed to have more finesse.

Worlds.

When I was whisked away from San Fransokyo and landed in the final world of the game, I found myself disappointed by the number of worlds I’d been to, expecting there to be a handful more. Though, when I counted the worlds up, the tally was at nine. So I asked myself why it felt like so little, when nine didn’t seem like a small number. But, tallying up the worlds in previous games, KH1 had 13, KH2 had 15, and BBS had 10. Which does put KH3 on the low end of world count. Also, in all three of these previous games (especially KH2 and BBS), you had to return to these worlds more than once, usually unlocking new content and/or areas each time, leading it to feel like there were more worlds than there actually were. Though KH3 has a comparable length of gameplay to complete the story, it definitely does feel like it comes up short in terms of variety of worlds you get to visit. As a result, some of the worlds where you spend 3 or 4 hours at a time can start to feel like they’re dragging on a little bit. And on the flipside of that, there are certain worlds that you technically do visit in KH3 I did not include in the world count, because you are there for such a fleeting amount of time, or in such a tiny portion of the world – e.g. Land of Departure, the Realm of Darkness. Worlds that would have been awesome to get to actually explore! And perhaps the biggest letdown of all, though you get to visit Destiny Islands and Radiant Garden via cutscenes, there is no play time in either. Serious bummer.

As far as the worlds they did choose to include, the selection admittedly left me ambivalent. I was really glad to see Toy Story, Monsters Inc., and Big Hero 6 included, but wasn’t over the moon about any of the others. I was really counting on having a Wreck-It-Ralph world (I mean, how perfect would that be?), and would love to have seen them tackle Zootopia, Wall-E, Meet the Robinsons, or the Incredibles. I’d even settle for a return to Halloween Town (shameless NBC fangirl, what can I say). The Emperor’s New Groove could have been pretty damn funny. Even A Bug’s Life or Finding Nemo could have offered some unique gameplay opportunities. Certainly better content to work with than Frozen, at any rate.

As far as the plot/experience within the worlds, I also found it to be a mixed bag. I did enjoy all of them, even ones I did not expect to enjoy too much (i.e. Frozen and Pirates). Honestly, though, I found myself a bit bored in worlds where they followed the plot of the films too closely, to the point that it felt like an abridged re-hash of the movies. I know they’ve taken this approach before with earlier Kingdom Hearts games, and I may sound like a hypocrite for only critiquing it now. But I think even in stories where they did do this earlier, like Tarzan or Aladdin, they executed the re-tellings more successfully. The plotline was altered just enough to ensure Sora was a part of the action through and through. After playing those games, Sora was indelibly inserted into those films in my head. To where the next time I watched them, I was jokingly asking myself “Where’s Sora?” But that was not the feeling I got here. In worlds like Corona or the Caribbean, Sora was just sort of jammed into the plot where he didn’t really fit. In many of the longer cutscenes, I actually forgot Sora was even there – even forgot I was playing Kingdom Hearts. Sora didn’t really feel needed. I definitely found it more enjoyable to be part of a new adventure with the characters – like what was done with Toy Story and Big Hero 6, where Sora was able to play more of an active role in progressing the subplot. It was nice to feel like I mattered!

Extras.

These were hit-or-miss for me. I actually screeched with excitement when Sora and the gang ran into Remy, and enjoyed the scavenger hunt for ingredients. And while cooking with little chef was a treat I wouldn’t want to see cut from the game, I found most of the cooking mini-games to be simultaneously too short (less than 10 seconds each!) and needlessly hard to master (especially cracking that egg).

Admittedly a Disney and Disneyland fanatic, I also got a kick out of the lucky emblems (aka hidden mickeys). I thought they were one of the most fun collectibles we’ve seen to date in the franchise.

Which brings me to one of the more controversial extras in the game: the gummiphone! While a lot of people are ragging on the inclusion of this dynamic, I enjoyed it. The Instagram loading screens were a little jarring at first, but they really grew on me. And being able to point the camera at Goofy, Sully, or Hiro and watch them pose for a picture in real-time was nothing short of adorable.

Another thing that surprised me? The game’s occasional self-awareness. I almost included a separate category for this, because I’ve never seen another game do this, and did not see it coming! But the “KINGDOM HEARTS II.9” title screen gave me a good chuckle. It doesn’t make up for all the 1.5, 2.8, 0.2 nonsense we’ve had to put up with, but it’s at least nice to see they can poke fun at their own ridiculousness. And when Sora laments how long it’s been since he’s seen the folks in Twilight Town; then Hayner, confused and even a little creeped out, says “It hasn’t been that long”. Simply acknowledging the vast disconnect between the short time that’s passed in-universe since KH2 and how egregiously long the fans had to wait – well, it had me in stitches. It was morbid laughter, sure, but refreshing nonetheless.

Um, the folk dancing in the square in Corona? Literal funniest thing ever.

One thing that I really missed? Closing keyholes. Finishing worlds wasn’t the same without them.

At this point in the review, I’ve covered basically every aspect I can think of save for one: the story. I’ve purposely saved it for last, because it’s the most important aspect of the series to me, the one that can make or break a Kingdom Hearts game.

From the categories I’ve judged thus far – content, visuals, gameplay, extras – I’d probably give this game a solid 8 or 9/10. I had some issues with the overly cluttered combat, the difficulty level, and the slight disappointment with which worlds were included and the ways they chose to play out the subplots in each. But in the grand scheme of things, all these complaints are minor, and don’t detract from the fact that it’s just plain fun, in a new league with some of the most entertaining and most beautiful titles out there.

But that’s exactly it. Beautiful graphics are the new bare minimum for this generation of console gaming. If a game released for the PS4 or Switch isn’t visually outstanding, it runs a real risk of faltering behind the competition. There is no shortage of beautiful games on the market in 2019.

And if I want a fun game, I can pop back into Mario Odyssey or get a group together to duke it out in Super Smash Ultimate. I can easily download a dozen fun platformers on Steam for less than 50 bucks.

Yes, KH3 is really beautiful, and really fun.

But that’s not why I was so excited to play it.

A legion of kids and teenagers stuck with this series well into their twenties and thirties, never giving up on the release of the next installment. Trudged through handheld games and blocky graphics and clunky battle systems and convoluted plot lines. Why? Well, of course I can’t speak for all KH fans, but for me, and all the ones I know personally, it’s because of the story. It’s always been what, in my mind, sets KH apart from any other video game I’ve ever played. It’s the only game series that’s ever made me cry. The only one I’ve ever owned merchandise for. The only one I’ve ever been so invested in that I can discuss it with friends, even acquaintances, for hours on end. The only one that’s made me care so much about the characters that they feel like my friends. With how much time has passed since I started, maybe even my kids. No pun intended, the series has heart. It contains the same sort of magic that going to Disneyland as a child did. Or, it used to.

Kingdom Hearts 3 didn’t need to just be a great game. It needed to be a Kingdom Hearts game. One that built a wove a compelling story filled with intrigue and emotion from the first hour. One that did justice to all the characters (and by now, there are a lot of them) that we’ve grown to love over the last 17 years. One where a prepubescent kid can yell a speech up at a threatening villain that makes you believe, harder than you’ve ever believed, in the power of friendship. One that instills a childlike optimism that no matter how dark the world gets, as long as someone keeps fighting, good can still triumph over evil. One that tugs on the heartstrings in just the right ways, at just the right moments, to manage to make you cry – repeatedly – over a gang of outspoken, angsty kids with clown feet.

The thing about the story in KH3 is: it’s not inherently a bad story. Sure, it’s a mess, it doesn’t make much sense, it leaves you with more questions than answers, it’s incredibly cheesy, and it retcons a good deal of lore from previous installments. But many of these things could be said of other Kingdom Hearts games. The fact that these descriptors apply to KH3 isn’t what disqualifies it as a worthy entry in the series, in my mind.

For the most part, it’s not the story itself I found disappointing. After all, think about how a summary sounds on paper: reunions with long lost characters, long-awaited battles, conclusions of lengthy character and story arcs.

The biggest problem wasn’t so much the concept of the story, but rather the execution.

First of all, the pacing. The pacing was terrible. Almost nothing happens the first 20-25 hours of the game. I can think of maybe two scenes that got me on the edge of my seat, gripping my controller in the hopes it would advance the plot further: the scene with Mickey and Riku in the realm of darkness where you get to play as Riku for a few minutes (sadly the only time in the game that you do), and running into Vanitas in Monstropolis. Nothing. Else. Happened. Sure you run into Larxene in Arendelle, and goof around chasing Luxord in the Caribbean, but none of this is actually relevant to the plot we care about. Certainly not the plot the story is telling us to care about from the beginning.

And that leads me to the second issue – how vague your objective actually is. The ultimate objective of the game seems clear enough: rescue Aqua from the realm of darkness, maybe worry about the other two Wayfinder trio once we’ve found her, and defeat Xehanort. But this is not Sora’s given objective. Rather, it’s to find the ‘power of waking.’ Which is not explained, either to Sora or the player. Sora, on the other hand, appoints himself to another mission entirely: contemplating the unfairness of Roxas’ disappearance, he seems to mainly be focused on finding him and restoring him to a physical existence. However, this mission is starkly at odds with the canonical explanation of Nobodies in general and Roxas, specifically. The last time we saw Roxas (chronologically speaking) he reunited with Sora, and as far as we know, he’s still part of Sora. So, the mission to “find” Roxas as if he exists as an entity in the real world is perplexing. Second, lacking hearts, Nobodies can’t exist as a whole on their own. So even assuming we can “find” him in Sora, how far we going to bring him back without splintering Sora into a Heartless and a Nobody again? Even according to the series’ own complex lore, it doesn’t make sense. Therefore, the first half or more of the game seems aimless, not really knowing what we’re meant to be doing, or how. It’s hard to be invested in a story with no clear objective. Not something we can easily get on board with like “Find Riku and Kairi” or “Track down the Organization.” Just “Go find the power of waking.” Okay.

And while a lot (and I mean a lot) happens in the last 4-5 hours of the story to tie up loose ends, it’s crammed together in such a jumbled rush that it’s almost impossible to appreciate any of it.

After collecting Aqua and Ventus, long lost characters reappear on screen one right after another assembly-line style, to the point that none of them feels special or poignant anymore.

Not only that, but the characters who are brought back, many of them beloved protagonists from earlier installments in the series, are not given any time to shine.

It was promising when they let Aqua fight Vanitas in the newly restored Land of Departure. Ven is her friend, her responsibility; it was her fight. But with this taste of getting back a playable character from the franchise, I expected that as the plot progressed, it would open up plenty more chances for past protagonists to take the stage. That we’d be able to step back into the oversized shoes of other playable characters we’d missed. That when (or if) others returned in all their glory, they’d get to strut their stuff.

But that is precisely the opposite of what happened.

I mean, Ventus didn’t get to steal the spotlight for the final clash with Vanitas? By definition, his natural foil?

Terra didn’t get to exact his revenge in an epic showdown with Xehanort, the guy who stole his body and enslaved him for more than a decade?

Roxas and Axel, reunited, couldn’t team up to pound on the Organization members that tormented them? Instead, after his surprise entrance, Roxas got hardly any screen presence at all, and Axel’s epic new flaming keyblade got destroyed, making him sit out most of the fighting after all the build up that he was training to fight?

Oh, and you know who else was utterly useless through the final battles, demoted once again to a damsel in distress despite years of hype that she’d wield a keyblade in this installment, and multiple cutscenes indicating she, too, was training to actually fight? Yup. I don’t even need to say the name.

And to only get one small boss fight as Riku, when in the previous installment he had half the screen time?

The heroes we’ve missed for so long and longed to return to the screen are not resurrected with the dignity and respect they deserve. They are relegated to side characters, who are either completely sidelined for the final battles, or else just hacking away mindlessly in the background as you marathon one ridiculously easy “boss” after another Olympus Coliseum-style.

Speaking of resurrecting characters: the manner in which they brought some of them back was so nebulous it was impossible to understand, let alone experience any sort of emotional reaction.

For one: Roxas. For starters, it’s pretty lazy writing to have Sora be the one pursuing his return (however that was supposed to happen), only to have that pursuit peter out completely, and for Roxas to just appear at the final battle with no resolution or explanation of how. (Nor the satisfaction of fleshing out how Sora achieved it.) But more importantly, where did he come from? There was no scene in which he emerged from Sora’s being. So, where was he? Also, I get that they must have used the replica Demyx/Ansem brought Ienzo as a vessel for him, but how does he have his own heart now? There was no evidence to indicate Sora or Ven lost theirs again. This is a pretty glaring plot hole.

Second? Naminé. This one really came out of left field. No one had even spoken about Naminé the entire game, save one throwaway line. Then all of a sudden, near the very end of the game, everyone cares about bringing her back, too? Even Sora, despite his hours-long obsession with bringing back Roxas without a word about Naminé, sees a newly empty vessel and asks “Oh, is that for Naminé?” All I could do at this point was laugh at the absurdity of it all.

Even more confusing? Xion. She was a replica, with no heart, no personality... a walking vial for Sora’s memories. How on Earth did she get brought back? What was there to bring back? And what was the point? Xion always felt far more like a plot device than an actual character.

At this point, so little made sense and so many characters had appeared in a row with no regard for continuity or maintaining canon that my heart was really starting to sink. It all felt like it was meant to be fan service. Bring back everyone’s favorite characters: they’ll love that, right? But the issue is they did it no matter what rules they had to break, or canon they had to ignore. Sure, I wanted a lot of these characters back, I think a lot of people did. But not at the expense of good writing.

Even if one completely excuses the hole-filled poor writing that got us there, it didn’t even feel real that we had these awesome characters back. Because they just sort of existed, as high-def cool anime hair and porcelain skin and not much else. Not only did they not get to show us what they’re made of in epic fight sequences, but there was no meaningful dialogue from any of them. Where was Terra giving his friends any sort of recollection of his time as Ansem’s guardian? Riku and Roxas making amends? Aqua thanking Sora for keeping Ven safe? A brofest about protecting their friends between Riku and Terra? Axel saying anything at all meaningful to his best friend when he finally saw him again? For all the reunions we got, it was shocking how little substance there actually was in any of them.

It was an insanely rushed ending, with stunted, shallow dialogue, and awkward tears that felt forced rather than genuine.

KH3 is to KH1&2 what Moffat Who is to RTD Who. A lot more flash, a lot less substance, and hollowed out characters that no longer provoke deep emotion.

Characters’ emotions were not handled well in this game. Like when Sora, notorious for being a persistent optimist, dissolves to hysterics and claims he’s “nothing” without his friends. But we never get to see this sharp departure from his M.O. (because he has lost his friends over and over throughout the series without reacting this way) really wrestled with. It’s just swept under the rug after a single line from Riku. It’s okay for characters to hit rock bottom: in fact, it’s good for them. But such episodes have to be properly fleshed out, or they won’t have an impact.

Also, just my two cents? Making your characters cry is not a shortcut to get your audience to cry. It’s a lazy way of demonstrating feeling. In the writing world, there’s something called “show, don’t tell.” Making characters cry left and right with hardly any time devoted to the proper dialogue and action is the equivalent of telling, rather than showing. This series is unique to me precisely because it’s the only video game to make me cry (repeatedly). But I didn’t shed a tear in this game. And I think that is so telling. I always think of this behind the scenes video I watched for Doctor Who, in which they filmed different versions of a (very) emotional scene. In one of these versions, the Doctor properly breaks down and cries. David (the actor) upon seeing this version played back to him, said: “I worry if you see him breaking down, it stops you breaking down, as well.” He was onto something there. They didn’t end up using that take in the episode, and I think everyone would agree it was the right call. I’m not saying crying is inherently bad and always to be avoided. In fact, the opposite: it can be very powerful if used sparingly, and at the right moments with the right build-up. But overusing it, with no apparent regard for characterization nuances, basically making it your only method for tell your audience a character is emotional? It’s a little insulting. You also need good dialogue, good acting (or in this case, good animation and voice acting), and proper timing if you want to strike a chord with anyone.

Which, speaking of, I thought both the dialogue and the voice acting in the game as a whole left something to be desired (and seemed almost painfully slow?), and I think a big reason why emotional moments tended to ring hollow.

Onto another aspect of the story: how it ties in to earlier installments in the series. There was a fair amount of speculation going into this game whether or not smaller, handheld-console based installments and extra nuggets from mobile games and re-releases would be relevant in KH3. But regardless of which side of the argument fans fell on, the fact remains that many fans had only played KH1 and KH2, possibly BBS, prior to playing KH3. Many people don’t have the money or the interest in playing on multiple handheld consoles (me being one of them, though I toughed it out in this case) or cell phones, nor the tireless dedication and yes, more money, to purchase games a second time for Final Mix versions and secret endings. This is not a bad thing. It doesn’t mean they are bad fans, or less deserving of playing or enjoying KH3. Someone should not have to be a zealous super-fan to be able to enjoy a video game, or any form of entertainment. If you show up to Avengers: Endgame without having seen some of the previous major installments in the film franchise, you are probably going to be confused. I don’t recommend doing that. But is it necessary to have re-watched them all 20 times, speculated for hours on blogs and message boards, and read decades worth of Avengers comics to be able to understand it? Of course not. Though some insufferable comic book elitists insist they’re better than everyone else because they know more about the Marvel universe, the fact is you don’t have to be a Marvel super-fan to enjoy the films. That’s how it should be. Because it’s okay to be a casual fan of something. Content creators normally recognize this, and respect all of their audience. But here, there was critical information from pretty much every spinoff handheld game that you needed in order to have any idea what was going on. There wasn’t even any recap system like in KH2 (the static memories) to get you up to speed on what had happened in the series up until this point. Not to mention the location of the final boss fight, as well as the very last cutscenes centered around a mobile game/movie that I had never even heard of until I was in the middle of playing KH3. Now I am something of a KH geek as I said, so I’ve sat through Union Cross now and done my best to understand some of the more obscure lore. But, call me crazy, I don’t think it’s fair to expect every single person who plays the game to do that in order to understand it. Games are supposed to be fun, not homework.

Which brings me to my last point: this game was supposed to be the end of the saga as we know it. Whether it’s the end of the series or simply the end of this story arc and subsequent games will follow a villain besides the many iterations of Xehanort is yet to be seen (as of me writing this), but it was established this game would be the end to the main trilogy so far. And, to have that end be the main character swanning off on his own (as some have speculated, possibly to his death)? With everyone else from the series partying on the beach like someone important isn’t missing? As someone who came into this game expecting closure, I felt completely blindsided by this ending. After all he’s been through and all the sacrifices he’s made, Sora deserves better.

Kingdom Hearts 3 was visually and mechanically a blast, and credit should go to the developers, artists, and designers where credit is due. But as a fan who plays this series not for graphics or flashy gameplay, but to immerse myself in the story, I’m left feeling cheated. The way the plot unfolded and the way the characters were handled did a disservice to both long-time fans of the saga and to the characters themselves.

I always have a hard time with this, but if I had to put a number to it? I’d say maybe 6/10.

It hurt just to type that.

I’m not giving up hope in the franchise. If there’s ever a KH4 (which still seems unclear right now), I’ll probably still play it. I’m trying to give the creators the benefit of the doubt: they were under a lot of pressure to create a great game, and had too much time in development on their hands and too many sprawling ideas and tried to do too much at once. I’m all for second chances. But if they want the trust of fans like me back, they’re going to have to earn it.

Over the last couple months as I’ve put together this review, I’ve found myself in doubt. Even, dare I say it, like a bad fan, though in principle I vehemently reject the notion someone is a bad fan for disliking an installment of any franchise they love. Am I just too old for Kingdom Hearts now? I wondered. Was I romanticizing the series the whole time, and it’s not as good as I’ve built it up to be in my head? After all my time spent waiting, am I being too critical? I tortured myself over it. So, a couple of weeks after finishing KH3, I popped in the 1.5/2.5 HD compilation into the PS4 and restarted KH2. I had to see if it even came close to the hype I’d built in my head in the 8 or 9 years since I played it last. Almost 60 hours of gameplay later, I can say with confidence that I had not romanticized it at all. This game is amazing. I didn’t mind watching 30 minutes of cutscenes at a time because everything is so compelling. So the graphics are dated, but who cares? The combat is FUN without ever being cumbersome. It’s just the right level of difficulty that there are still some battles and bosses that require multiple attempts and the journey continuously instills a sense of pride and accomplishment. It has so much heart. I still teared up in the same places I used to as a teenager.

KH2 is still a perfect 10/10, and playing it again with fresh eyes only made me realize just how disappointing KH3 actually was.

There’s an old adage that it’s the things we love most that hurt us the most. I wouldn’t feel so let down, or compelled to write 6800 words why, if I didn’t love this series with all my heart. I’ve seen a lot of fans insulting and belittling anyone who dares to criticize the game online, and frankly I’m baffled by that. I critique and discuss all forms of entertainment I enjoy: and that includes both the strengths and weaknesses, the successes and flaws. And I guess I tend to associate with people who do the same. It doesn’t make us bad fans, but passionate ones. I’m not sending hate mail to Square telling them the game unequivocally sucks. I don’t have any ill will towards them or think they’re irredeemable writers or developers. I’m simply recording and posting my honest thoughts to help myself process how I’m feeling, and perhaps others if they choose to read them.

I’m genuinely happy for the fans who loved the game and felt it worth the wait – I don’t want to pick any fights with them (so please don’t pick any fights with me, either). I’m sadly - believe me, no one is sadder than me to admit this - just not one of them.

#kingdom hearts #kingdom hearts 3 #kh meta #kh3 #kh #idk if any of my followers play but #there aren't many places i can post such a long review #so my old blog seemed an appropriate place #written by yours truly

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limpovlsen42-blog · 5 years

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Un-Answered Problems With Fallout 76 Exposed

What You Need to Do About Fallout 76 At the very least, the similarities between both games indicate that the team split its attention between both projects in the past several years and was prepared to sacrifice elements of Fallout 4 in service of earning a game for a service'' project like Fallout 76. Obviously it is not possible to experience each and every change, but the main changes come in the shape of performance and stability, where Bethesda notes that various client and server-side changes are made to enhance the total stability of the game and boost the operation of the game across numerous end-user systems. You will have to collect resources so as to construct your base out. Fortunately, you are able to move your base whenever you desire, for a small charge. There's also an immense collection of special, common and craftable weaponry, which only increases the addictive reward loop. If it still feels choppy, you can also try turning off Anti-Aliasing which is a method used to help smooth out jagged lines. Here's What I Know About Fallout 76 Crafting is a huge deal, requiring recipes which are found in a variety of ways on the planet, and you're able to craft nearly all of the items which you'll use in the game, including weapons and power armour. Players might have to devote a varying quantity of points on cards, dependent on initial price. A wide selection of sporting groups, including Formula Drift, have made the choice to partner with a certain television network or numerous them. You have to concentrate on the positive. It is going to be entirely online. The Good, the Bad and Fallout 76 Full instructions about how to grab the game are available here. Players can also make base defences like automated machine gun turrets. Fallout 76 has lots and tons of small pleasures but not a great deal of giant thrills. The firm's robust item system means players should have the ability to cope if nobody sets up shop in their region of the map. Due to that, here is what you have to know before diving in to a server with 24 other survivors! It's pretty probable that many different players will try out recreating this by synchronizing nuke launches all over the map to find out whether the patch really does fix it or not. Or it is a tribute video to the employees of the business. No matter whether you're playing solo or with pals, you will probably still get a feeling of deja vu. All might not be well through the game, but it's a great sign. Fallout 76 Explained How misguided it's to remove the 1 factor of that function that made it special. Running things a little differently from different companies, the Fallout beta won't be available 24hrs per day. The event was supposed to offer content creators and influencers a chance to experience Fallout 76 first, in addition to to convince them that it's worth playing. What You Must Know About Fallout 76 The game's servers were only up for a couple hours at a moment, so as to test considerable amounts of players online at exactly the same moment. The SPECIAL system returns and it is a bit different. By default, Fallout 76 has an extremely narrow view and, depending upon your sensitivity to this aspect, you might wind up feeling sick. Or you may set up a shop. There are balloons and confetti all around the vault's most important location. Basically, after you put off your camp robot, you are going to open the building menu, which allows you to construct your own residence. The Characteristics of Fallout 76 You will explore six unique areas of Fallout 76. Fallout has a fairly sturdy formula. Nevertheless, Fallout 76 will prove very popular, but not everybody will be able to play it at precisely the same time. Graphics and Sound Fallout 76 brings a number of improvements regarding visuals over the previous game. The good thing is that players on PS4 and Xbox One won't even should download a patch, whilst PC fans will just have a small update. Crafting is a somewhat huge portion of Fallout 76. Fallout 76 Explained Fallout is a string of post-apocalyptic role-playing video games. Rather than a lengthy single-player experience, Fallout 76 is a web-based game that puts players into an enormous world with different players. Fallout 76 does not mark the conclusion of Fallout as a run of single-player games tuned to provide everybody who plays a distinctive personalised adventure. The shooting in the game feels a bit clumsier than Fallout 4, but it's further limited as you are supposed to spend as much time with a couple boring weapons. Players will be able to go through the complete game with the beta. It might be a MMO as opposed to the single-player gameplay the rest of the series has showcased. There were still several things that Bethesda had promised that it wasn't likely to deliver. Regardless, the simple fact that Bethesda is banning people for actions associated with Fallout 76's developer room usually means that we're not likely to share how to go into the room or encourage everyone to look for that information out unless they are well prepared to handle the consequences. The fallout from this is likely to last. The Number One Question You Must Ask for Fallout 76 Depression is normal in the aftermath of a breakup. The psychology of a busted heart is still a little mystery to modern medication. Fighting feels somewhat more sluggish than in Fallout 4 and, due to its multiplayer nature, you are going to feel pretty overwhelmed in early skirmishes because of a deficiency of resources and weapons. There are additional individuals. So 76 will be like that. As an example, in one specific team hire people that are incredibly organised alongside people that are incredibly creative. Armor is an excellent example. Nuclear codes don't work unless you've got the complete key, and that means you will have to collect multiple. To find the rest of the codes, they can obtain them in a similar fashion around the map or may be able to find them in the possession of another player that theyall encounter. fallout 76 appalachia radio

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hacks-and-heroes · 6 years

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Hacks and Heroes #2

So let's talk about a favorite series of mine, Fallout. And what better time? With Fallout 76 on the horizon like a mediocre tsunami, the SEO is perfect.

The question is how would one go about adapting Fallout into a tabletop setting. Well that's easy actually, plus there are a bunch of hacks out there for Fallout already. I'm gonna point out a few key things that make a Fallout setting, and then get into the hacks.

So first there's themes. The most forefront and clear theme of Fallout has always been the cautionary tale of nuclear war. Atomic annihilation and Cold War era fear mongering is shown through its mix of propaganda posters, devastated landscapes and visual aesthetics. The distinct 1950s art style, especially Vault Tec’s Vault Boy, show a campy contrast to the horrors the world shows. Things like the upbeat music and pulp sci-fi weaponry mask a dark undertone. For those who plan on game mastering a Fallout game, I highly recommend playing the first two iterations to really get a sense of this tone.

Political agendas, conflicting ideologies, fate of technology, capitalism, communism, colonialism; all play a part in a great Fallout story. A good mix of these elements will truly help bring together any Fallout story.

So let's get into the hacks:

Fallout GURPS/Exodus-

I want to start with the two oldest Fallout hacks. Fallout has a history with GURPS, being the system it was first based on. Originally, GURPS was in the title of the first game. However, after a rift between developers, GURPS was dropped. However, several years ago someone revived the idea by adapting Fallout for the GURPS RPG system. While I have never played GURPS, it seems this system is the closest you'll get to a system that feels like the original games would translated to paper.

If you prefer a system with more number crunch, GURPS is a safe bet. It's also a well made book with a lot of detail and lore. It was made around the time of Fallout 3, so it may feel a bit outdated. It does include stuff from Fallout Tactics though. So I appreciate that.

Now onto Exodus. Exodus is a “licensed" Fallout game. Or at least that was the idea. At some point during its creation, the license was pulled. So what would have been Fallout d20, became Exodus. One of the major problems with this particular game is that it is a game based off the d20 Modern system. Sadly for the old SRD games, they have not aged well, especially d20 Modern. I only recommend this adaptation if you really enjoy the old d20 games like 3.5 and Modern. Even then, the poor cover up and woeful bestiary will probably be a turn off.

Fallout 5th Edition-

To start, this is probably one of the best and most detailed fan conversions I've seen. It has so much content for what is essentially a free sourcebook. The font and graphic design is great. There is multiple racial subtypes, backgrounds, and over 100 pages of Fallout monsters. There is a piecemeal armor system that will be a nice touch for those most familiar with Fallout 4. Seriously, for a class based system, this is probably one of the best portrayals of Fallout. Hell, it has stats to play a goddamn Eyebot. Who wouldn't??

Now it isn't all perfect. The biggest flaw is that many of 5e’s base classes are considered unviable. This would be fine, should the book offer replacements. Instead the book suggests purchase of a supplement that has classes more suited for the game. I totally understand why this is such, after all it is a free fan made conversion. However, an additional class or two would have more incentivized purchase of the other book. The only other gripe is that that 100 page bestiary is a lot of the same creatures with very minute changes. Similar to the games, though in a pen-and-paer RPG it's a bit needless.

(I will have a review of that class supplement for those interested midway thru the next week.)

On a side note, while there are Pathfinder hacks for Fallout, there aren't any detailed enough to really mention. With enough effort, one could customize it to fit a Fallout setting. I may go into it in the future as I tackle other topics.

Savage Fallout-

Okay so now we get into the most extensive collection of Fallout hacks. There are a handful of these for Savage Worlds, so we’ll just go at them in no particular order.

Savaged Fallout!

When you Google Savage Worlds Fallout, this is the first one that you’ll encounter. On a blogspot aptly named, there are about 13 PDF downloads by Shane Hensley. It is clearly a passion project, having started in 2003, though it has gone dark since 2016.

I’m gonna get the bad out of the way first. This hack is ugly, poorly laid out, and sometimes confusing. The books are almost entirely black and white with a plain font. Only do the location books get anything in the way of images, though the actual maps tend to be weak. The hindrances added to the game are actually quite good, representing traits from the game quite well. The edges on the other hand...are extremely poor. Anyone who has played a lot of 3.5 or Pathfinder will start having flashbacks as they see edges boasting +1 to two skills with no flavor text. Compared to some of the later Savage Fallout stuff, it’s pretty sad. My final complaint is the Weapons Cache book is a supplement that details out things like Alien weapons, Chinese weapons, and a few other unique items from the games. However, the book is not more than a bunch of paragraphs and stat blocks.

Now onto the good stuff; both the Wasteland Survival Guide (Player’s Handbook) and Overseer’s Manual (GM’s Guide) are well made, new mechanics are introduced well, and the items will bring back fond memories of Fallout 2. The location books are a fun homebrew addition. I have not read all of them, however, they are good for brainstorming if nothing else. If you’re looking for a hack for Fallout for Savage Worlds, this is not a bad first place to start.

Wild Wastes

This one won’t come up right away, but I was quite pleased to have discovered it. If I was going to run a Savage Fallout game, I’d probably be referring to this book the most. To start, it is a beautiful two PDF set, barely clocking in at over 20 pages. The backgrounds and fonts fit the Fallout aesthetic and the layout is pleasing to the eye. It uses some licensed Fallout art in it, which helps it for sure.

By contrast to Savaged Fallout, the edges in this book are fantastic. Now okay, mechanically they aren’t much different than Savaged Fallout, but they at least look nice. There are less hindrances, but the ones that remain hold up on their own. Also the race options are fleshed out well, and there are two options for Super Mutants, if you are so inclined. This hack also introduces the Psyker. Basically this is adding psychic powers into Fallout, which may seem out of place to those who don’t know about Fallout Tactics. Truly it’s a fun idea, but whether it stays is up to your GM.

The second PDF that goes along with Wild Wastes is a 9 page add-on for equipment. There isn’t a lot to say about it besides that it is extensive. While it isn’t 5e Fallout extensive, it does have weapons, armor, and items from every game and more. If you are looking for items for your Savage Fallout game, look here.

Fallout: And How to Survive in the Post-Apocalyptic Wasteland When Your GM is a Total Dick.

Quite the mouthful there. So this hack is similar to Wild Wastes in that it uses a lot of licensed Fallout art...also it is only about 16 pages. That said, it is much more dense. The inner workings are black and white, but more well laid-out than Savaged Fallout. The font is a better choice and while tiny is laid out in a way that’s not hard to follow. This hack also stands out because it essentially works stand alone. You’ll need the core Savage Worlds book for more in-depth rules, but the character creations process and most hindrances and edges are included in the book.

One of my only gripes with this particular hack is its approach to weapons. Similar to GURPs, weapons are more or less divided into categories of damage, and then just given flavor for their look. While I can see the plus in this way, it tends to leave your players and GMs in the dark if they aren’t used to doing so. The armor is also truly wimpy (a +4 bonus for power armor??). That also extends to the races which get one trait a piece before being forgotten.

To circle back to something positive, this hack does include “tinkerin’”, a skill for customizing weapons and armor. It’s a simple enough system and more than welcome for those who like having to craft unique weapons.

Gunrocksgaming Savage Fallout

This isn’t a PDF like the previous three hacks. This one is a blog that includes very little but is worth mentioning for a few reasons. It has rules for character creation, which include playing robots, a first for these hacks. There are little in the way of hindrances but the edges are good. The equipment is sparse but well done, as are the setting rules. This hack does have another plus which it is the second of these hacks to have a bestiary. It’s hard to compare how these monsters compare to their in-game counterparts but with two hacks it probably wouldn’t be easy to make one that satisfies you.

Aaaaand that’s all for now!

While there are no doubt other Fallout hacks for other games, these were the best I could come across. I’ll cover it more in a future post, but another excellent post-apocalypse game is Apocalypse World, as well as the system it is built on. It can also be used for Fallout, with some modifications.

I hope you all enjoyed this and found it informative. Feel free to comment, send feedback or ideas for later posts. Next week I’ll be back with a different kind of post. This week was all about hacks that already exists. What if there’s a game you want that doesn’t have a hack though. Well, you’ll have to make it up yourself then! So next week we’ll tackle another Bethesda brand favorite, Dishonored!!

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