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bethanythebogwitch · 1 year

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I like Pokémon and as my post history can tell you, I like fish. So why not combine the two and talk about fish Pokémon? I’m going to go over the real life inspirations for every fish Pokémon, discussing their biology and cool facts about the real inspirations. I’ll do this in parts so it doesn’t get too long. Today let’s do generation I and II.

The first fish we get in national dex order is the Horsea line and these aren’t too hard to figure out. They’re seahorses, some of the weirdest fish out there. Seriously, real seahorses are way weirder than Pokémon. We’re talking about fish that can barely swim, have prehensile tails, mate for life, the males get pregnant, and they have no stomachs but have the highest hunting success rate of all fish. Horsea has nothing on that. Horsea can also shoot water and ink from its mouth. This seems to be a reference to squid ink and water guns, though Horsea’s RB dex entry says they use precision shots to shoot down flying bugs. This was likely inspired by the archerfish, which does exactly that. This won’t be the only time that archerfish come up in this series. Their category as the dragon pokemon and Kingdra’s dragon typing references the Japanese word for seahorse, tatsu-no-otoshigo, which means “dragon’s child” based off of a myth that a seahorse who lives long enough will become a dragon. Kingdra also seems to have some weedy sea dragon influence, but there’s a better example of a Pokémon based on that much later in the series.

(image description, a seahorse)

So many recurring archetypes in the series can be traced back to gen I. Archetypes like the early game bird, the early game bug, the early game rodent, the mushroom, the three-stage rock, and more came from RBY. Another, probably less intentional archetype is the incredibly forgettable fish. Meet Goldeen and Seaking. They’re based on goldfish and koi and the only thing that makes them stand out from real fish is the horns. There are a truly absurd number of goldfish breeds but the one that looks closest to Goldeen is the tosakin, which has a curly tail like Goldeen and is popular in Japan while Seaking looks most like an azuma nishiki.

(image description: a tosakin Goldfish)

Since goldfish and koi are both members of the carp family, I wonder if there’s a close ancentral relationship to Magikarp. They are also said to swim upriver to spawn and Seaking gets redder during mating season, which seems to be a clear reference to salmon. In addition, male Seaking uses its horn to make a hole in a rock for the female to lay her eggs in. many male fish will make nests or other structures to woo females and provide a a safe spot to lay eggs. The horn is interesting. At first I thought I was just there to make them look less like normal fish, but there might be more to it than that. There are fish with horns, the cowfish, but they look nothing like these two (and barely look like fish for that matter) so I don’t think that was an inspiration. The unicornfish has a horn-like protrusion on its head that could have been an inspiration. I also found refences to Hinduism with Matsya, an avatar of Vishnu that looked like a horned fish in some depictions which could also be a reference in the line’s design (sidenote, a India-based region would be really cool).

(mage description: an artistic depiction of Matsya as a horned fish)

These fish are found in a ton of regions despite not being all that interesting. In real life goldfish have become invasive or introduced species in many areas due to irresponsible pet owners releasing them into the wild. As these two are sometimes kept as pets, I wonder if their wide distribution in the Pokémon world is due to the same thing. Also, why is fresh water fish named Seaking?

Next we move on to the mon, the myth, the legend: Magikarp. I’m only going over Magikarp as I see Gyarados as a sea serpent/eastern dragon rather than a fish. Magikarp is, as you might guess, an Asian carp, though it also seems to have some koi features.

(image description: a common carp)

The common carp is somewhat golden in color, which could explain Magikarp’s shiny color, and mirror carp and koi have been specially bred for appearance, which might be why Magikarp is red. Magikarp is famous for its splashing and jumping, something Asian carp are also known for. Silver carp in particular can jump clear out of the water, which makes them a hazard for boaters.

(gif description: a silver carp jumping out of the water and hitting a boater in the head)

Most pokedex entries focus on the splashing and how weak Magikarp is, but some go on to say their survival in the Pokémon world is due to them being able to live in very poor water quality and reproducing like crazy. This is very true of real Asian carp, who can thrive in terrible conditions and produce millions of eggs per spawning. This has contributed to them becoming invasive species in many parts of the world. Considering Magikarp can be found in every region, the same is probably true of the Pokemon world. Magikarp evolving into the draconic Gyarados is a reference to the legend of the dragon bridge: a waterfall that, if a carp jumped over it, would turn the carp into a dragon.

Chinchou and Lanturn are weird little fish. The glowing lures and their described deep-sea habitat make them deep-sea anglerfish, specifically football fish, but they also look very different than their inspirations.

(image description, a footballfish that washed up on the shore)

Some deep-sea anglerfish have multiple glowing lures like these two, but I couldn’t find any with Chinchou’s orientation. I think Chinchou may be a reference to alien bug-eyed monsters, with its body looking like the head and the antennae you sometimes see on said BEMs. Chinchou being able to walk on its fins may be a reference to shallow water anglerfish, who are often bottom dwellers who have modified their pectoral and/or pelvic fins into legs.

(Image description, a frogfish. note the fins that have been modified for use as legs)

Chinchou’s name is the giveaway to it identity. It seems to come from chōchin (lantern) and the related chōchin-ankō (deep-sea anglerfish). Lanturn looks more like a fish, but it still doesn’t look much like an anglerfish as it’s cute and they’re usually ugly as hell. A lot of people say it has dolphin influence. I don’t really get dolphin from its design, but if it is a dolphin, it may draw from the Greek god Apollo, who was associated with light and whose sacred animal was a dolphin. Chinchou having fin legs but Lanturn lacking them seems to indicate that as they mature, they go from bottom-dwellers to free-swimming fish. Since real anglerfish use symbiotic, bioluminescent bacteria in their lures, the Chinchou line may be one of the few cases of a mutualistic relationship in Pokemon and maybe the only one with a non-Pokémon lifeform that isn’t a plant. Interestingly, Slowbro, Slowking, Remoraid, Mantine, Tatsugiri, and Dondozo also have mutualistic relationships and they’re all water type. That’s a weird coincidence.

Qwilfish is certainly an underdog (underfish?) story. From being a completely forgettable single-stager for multiple generations until a regional form and evolution pulled it from obscurity. Both it and its Hisuan form are pufferfish or porcupinefish. Both are closely related and have the ability to gulp in water or air (though gulping air is bad for them) to inflate their spiny bodies as a defense.

(image description: an inflated porcupinefish)

Unlike their counterparts, Qwilfish is always inflated, but can grow even bigger where in the real fish, inflation is stressful and only done when in danger. The line’s poison typing comes from real pufferfish having some incredibly potent poison. It’s called tetradotoxin and it’s an extremely dangerous neurotoxin. Fugu fish famously has to be prepared by a well-trained chef who knows what parts to cut away to avoid poisoning whoever eats it. Pnlike real puffers, Qwilfish can inject the poison into others through its spines, making it venomous as opposed to the real ones, who are poisonous. Overqwil also seems to have some sea urchin elements with how huge its spines are. Some urchins are also venomous and can inject poison through their quills. Finally, the whole line seems to be based off of naval mines what with their roundness and ability to explode.

Remoraid is a fish of many talents and has a lot of origins. First things first, it’s a pistol. This is more easily seen in its unused older design, but you can still see it. This is also why it evolves into an octopus. Octillery is an artillery cannon. Also the animals they’re based on both use suction and squirt water. Remoraid also has major inspiration from the archerfish (remember them?) in that it is a master at spitting water with precision and the pokedex says it can shoot targets out of the air just like an archerfish.

(imager description: a spitting archerfish)

The archerfish inspiration and pistol design are why it learns so many shooting moves. Finally, Remoraid is a remora, even though they really look nothing alike. Like the remora, it has a modified dorsal fin shaped like a suction cup that it uses to suction onto larger animals. Both remoras and Remoraid will get carried along by the larger animal and will eat scraps of the larger animal’s meal. The remora benefits by getting a free ride, water over the gills, and food while the larger animal may also get some benefits from the remora eating ectoparasites and dead skin. A remora attaching to an animal would either be a commensal (one party benefits, the other receives neither benefit nor harm) or mutualistic relationship. In Pokémon, the only animal we see Remoraid attaching to is Mantine and they have an explicitly mutualistic relationship as Remoraid fights alongside Mantine and its presence allows Mantyke to evolve. Speaking of which…

image description: a mana ray with two remoras attached to it

Mantyke and Mantine are stingrays, specifically manta rays, one of my favorite animals. They truly are gentle giants and these Pokémon are too, being primarily special walls. Like mantas, Mantyke and Mantine are intelligent, social, and playful creatures. Mantas are one of if not the smartest fish, smart enough to pass the mirror test by recognizing their own reflections. There is a correlation between animal intelligence and playfulness. The smarter an animal is, the more likely it is to play for fun rather than for hunting practice and other purposes. This can be seen in primates, corvids, canines, and yes, rays. Those antennae on Mantyke and Mantine are based on the cephalic flaps of the manta, modified fins that help direct plankton into its mouth. Of course these two have the flying type and unlike Gyarados, there’s a good reason for it. Mantas are part of the genus Mobula and all 9 species of the genus are known to leap out of the water before splashing back down.

(image description: a Mobula ray jumping)

Nobody really knows why they do this, but there could be several reasons: cleaning parasites, herding prey, finding lost members of the school, or maybe just for fun. Mantine’s flying abilities are highly exaggerated and it also has some airplane design features, with the Remoraid on its wing looking like a plane engine or wing-mounted gun. As mentioned above, Remoraid and the Mantyke line have a mutualistic relationship. Not really relevant but still a fun fact: mantas give live birth and the babies come out folded up like burritos.

That’s it for part one. Come back next time for generations III and IV

#fish #fishblr #biology #pokemon #pokemon biology

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spinningbuster98 · 3 months

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Castlevania Symphony of the Night Part 4: Nocturne in the Moonlight

Up until now I’ve been singing this game’s praises and, to be fair, I will continue to do so in future videos. However I believe the time has come for the other shoe to drop so to speak and ask a very simple yet tricky question:

Is this a Castlevania game?

Some may think this question to be stupid but others may understand what I’m getting at here

Sotn marks a major departure from what had previously been established in this series. Keyword being MAJOR

Nowadays we live in an era when popular game franchises are applying drastic changes to their formulas, often taking elements from other more popular series, in other to gain more appeal. Zelda and Sonic have gone open world, God of War has gone The Last of Us with RPG mechanics etc

And honestly? Sotn is not different in this regard

This game not only has barely anything in common with the previous ones but it’s also their complete opposite in many ways

Gameplay wise? The classic games were linear, level based, tough as nails and gave you limited movement and resources that you had to make the most of

Sotn is non-linear, it’s one big map, it’s FAR easier and it gives you a ridiculous amount of movement options and items, 90% of which you’re never even gonna use

Story wise the Classics were very simple, Sotn and onwards will try to be more story focused (well relatively speaking) and melodramatic. Some future stories also jump the shark according to some fans but we’ll get to those in the future

Even its artstyle! I love Kojima’s artwork don’t get me wrong, ESPECIALLY her work in this game which I think is her strongest, but I absolutely hate it when people talk about her as if she was the one responsible for creating the series’ visual identity, as if the previous games had no art directions

I know people joke about Conan the Belmont Simon but...that was the series’ artstyle! Gothic, drawing a lot from classic horror but with super macho barbarian men dressed like He Man! We only chuckle at them now because Kojima’s bishonen artsyle replaced them. And no: I am not bitching about “muh yassification of muh manly men” or anything like that, mine is an issue of visual identity: the series literally flipped the switch from one extreme to another

Some poeple may say that at least narrative continuity is kept with the previous entries but that’s not fully true either, as this game retcons Alucard and Dracula’s backstories in order to introduce the stuff with Lisa, when both characters already had a backstory as told by the japanese manual of Castlevania 3! And yeah I do prefer the version introduced in this game, as I feel it creates at the very least more narrative contrast between Alucard and his father, for them to draw their opposite resolves from the same tragic events. But the point is: rather than trying to fit into the established canon, this game’s story forces its way into it by erasing the parts that don’t suit it

For as beloved as this game is, there are quite a few fans who despise it, everything it stands for and everything that followed it, considering it Castlevania in name only, something that killed the actual series and then went around wearing its skin

And honestly?

These people are...not exactly wrong

At least when other series change, even drastically, you can usually tell that their later games are supposed to be part of said series. Yeah Frontiers is a BOTW knockoff, but it still fundementally plays like a boost game, a formula that, while divisive, still derives its most basic idea from the general concept of “hedgehog goes fast and busts up robots” of the first few games. Yeah BOTW has alienated lots of old Zelda fans due to its hyper focus on open world design vs actual dungeons, but at least said open world structure had already been contemplated in a way by the past titles, not to mention many other gameplay mechanics from older games, like lock on and sword fighting, are still being used

If you take away the ability to get hearts from destroyed candles and the classic subweapons that is it. Gameplay wise it’s got nothing else in common with what came before and for that alone I can’t say that the people who hate this game are unjustified, not to mention that it’s got flaws of its own even ignoring any identity issue, though more on that at a later time

I, however, am not one of them

Let me ask you another question: if this game is not Castlevania...then what exactly is it?

Because, to go back to the earlier comparisons, games nowadays (hell ALWAYS if we’re being honest here, remember all the Sonic knockoffs in the 90s?) tend to quite clearly chase trends and you feel it when they’re just chasing trends because they tend to just adopt elements from what is hot and popular at the moment without actually doing anything truly unique with it

I can’t quite say the same about Sotn

Oh sure it quite clearly uses Super Metroid’s design philosophy as an inspiration, and the devs themselves have stated that Zelda was also an influence (and of course Simon’s quest), but it doesn’t just stop at emulating that formula

Keep in mind that back then there was no Metroidvania genre, there weren’t a million indie games taking a crack at the style, there was only Metroid, which had 3 games and wasn’t super popular. That formula had been established by only 3 games and by a generally strict set of features. Sotn was the very first game to look at Metroid’s general design philosophy and decide to do its own spin on it

Because to say that Sotn is just a Super Metroid clone and little else would be untrue I believe, as the two games, despite their similarities, play very differently

Metroid has a greater focus on mobility and acrobatics, on speedrunning and long-distance shoot em up combat

Sotn has rpg mechanics, close quarters combat using swords, spells and features transformations as a way of getting around fast

Yes there are clear similarities but it’s sort of like comparing Mario and Sonic: the latter was very clearly inspired by the former as they both are in the same genre, and since Mario defined platformers as we know them today, it’s inevitable that Sonic would take plenty of cues from him, but to say that Sonic plays the same as Mario just because he adopts those same base gameplay mechanics that the plumber introduced is untrue

Does this mean that it’s unjustified to criticize the game for how different it is? No. What I’m saying is that I don’t believe Sotn to be a simple case of just shamelessly ripping off another series. It has certainly shed its previous identity in an unceremonious way and that is absolutely a problem, but in the process it also created for itself a new identity that, while not for everyone, is absolutely its own and no one else’s, complete with its own set of positives and negatives, just like the Classic games before it (because yes people: Classicvanias also had issues, which is something that I generally don’t see people talk about a lot, probably because the discourse tends to boil down to “old game bad”, but maybe for another time...). If you wanted to play a Metroidvania game back in the 2000s your options were limited to either Metroid or Castlevania, and there were good tangible reasons to play one or the other. There is a reason why Sotn is considered the forefather of the genre alongside Super Metroid: one founded the formula, the other showed that it was flexible. Of course I have to admit that I’m a bit biased, since I already love Metroid’s core formula so Sotn’s style naturally appeals to me, but generally I’m someone who tries to look at the positive aspects of a game, even when it doesn’t necessarily respect its roots, as I believe that if something is good and fun, at least to me and my tastes, then it doesn’t deserve to get thrown in the trash on principle. But I can totally understand those who don’t think themselves, I myself have my limits on this as well

So to answer the question: no Sotn is not a Castlevania game. But it’s also a Castlevania game, just one that is its own thing that is unique

If you ask me most of this issue boils down to Konami deciding to focus exclusively on this formula while completely ignoring the Classics. If they had tried to keep a sort of balance, to release games of both styles in tandem things would have probably been more balanced. But I suppose this just wouldn’t have ever happened in the 2000s, when short level based sidescrollers not named Mario were seen as old news

#youtube #akumajou dracula #castlevania symphony of the night #my gameplay

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aceoflilies · 10 months

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do you have any interesting pokemon hcs or theories? love your writing btw :]

Hi????? Oh my god, I had to stop and check that this wasn't one of my other blogs getting this ask. Thank you so much, I really appreciate the compliment!!

As for my headcanons/theories... most of them are generally character-based, but i have a few I'd be happy to share! (readmore because this gets long ^^")

General headcanons:

All of the Pokémon Leagues in the world vary on strength and community investment. Near the bottom are leagues like Alola's (brand new, little support), Paldea's (made for multiple Champions, one of their leaders double-dips as Elite 4), Kanto's (prolonged, unresolved absence of one Gym Leader, lack of a Champion until your rival), and Unova's (consistent turnover in leaders, champions, and gym locations; only league to canonically be defeated by a Team). From there, Johto, Hoenn, Sinnoh, and Kalos are all relatively similar in "solid league" territory, with Galar's being the most heavily invested-in and supported league in the series.

Humans with psychic powers, medium abilities, special type affinities (think Iris's "understanding the hearts of Dragons", rather than typical gym leaders), or otherwise inexplicable abilities (whatever the Shadow Triad is doing?) tend to have slightly Pokémon-influenced genetics, as ties back to the infamous Japanese Canalave City library entry. This tends to go many generations back, rather than direct. (No, N is not a Zoroark. Could he be distantly related to one? Maybe.)

The average age for gym challenges varies by region. (Our protags do not necessarily hit that average.) Kanto through Sinnoh skew younger, from 10-12 (since they're all geographically in similar areas). Alola is solidly at 11. Unova and Kalos tend to be somewhere from 13-15. Paldea is literally any age, hence the adults in uniforms. Galar trends older, more towards an average of 16. Yes, this makes Leon's refusal to involve you in any situation ever look sillier. (Leon is considered exceptionally young for the challenge at 10, and all of your potential challengers in the Champion Cup look generally in their older teens. Also, I refuse to believe Marnie's wearing a crop top for her League uniform before she's 16.)

"Official" starter Pokémon are endangered species. Professors generally hope that by giving them to young trainers, they'll encourage species awareness and growth.

Battles follow anime rules more than game rules. Terrain advantages, move combinations to create effects, etc. are all a part of battles. The only exception, for the sake of my sanity when creating content, is that fish Pokémon float. And even I'm aware that's not realistic, even if it's funny.

Character headcanons:

The "main" protags in my mind are Red, Ethan, May, Lucas, Hilda, Rosa, Calem, Selene, Gloria, "Akari", and Florian.

In order of public perception from "weird kid" to "popular kid" for protags: Red, Gloria, Lucas, Selene, May, Hilda, Ethan, "Akari", Calem, Rosa, Florian.

None of the members of either the Galar Gang or the Paldea Gang are normal.

Hop is trans. While his being trans is in no way related to Leon, his attempts at proving himself and trying to live up to his brother's example of masculinity are at least a little related.

Bede's time in the orphanage is a result of parental neglect rather than money or being orphaned by definition.

Nemona is not a stalker, JFC. She's just excited to have a friend equally interested in battling as her for once in her goddamn life. She is very touchy, huggy, clingy without realizing it, though.

Penny is very heavily involved in whatever the Pokémon equivalent of Tumblr and AO3 are. She convinces Arven, Nemona, and Florian to watch anime with her on the regular.

#pokemon #pkmn headcanons #tw neglect #<-mention but still

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alpaca-clouds · 7 months

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I sure miss .hack/

One anime series - or rather multimedia franchise - I have an immense amount of nostalgia for, even though it was never as big of the thing, as some others, is .hack/

Given it has been a while, since the franchise released something new, let me quickly explain:

.hack/ is a multimedia franchise, that features stories set in a VR MMORPG called The World. Originally the story featured the conceit that some players for some reason got "stuck" in the game, unable to log out, while their physical bodies fell into a coma. Just as there was a mystery featuring the AIs, that for some reason had evolved in the game's mainframe - and a mysterious artefact called the Key of Twilight.

I honestly do not know what it was about this, that spoke to me so much. But I was early on very fascinated by the idea of a VR MMO - even though we of course know today that it is something that is probably not easily achievable. (In a weird way, franchises like .hack/ kinda had the right idea by having the physical bodies turn into a near comatose state while playing, which would probably help the motion sickness...)

It was one of the first anime I pirated back in the. xD Even though I did not get to play the game until I was an adult, given that I was not allowed to have a game console as a child.

I know a lot of people, who found .hack/SIGN, the first anime series of the franchise, rather boring as it has a really, really slow pacing. Like, wow, the pacing is really slow. But... to me it really worked. There was an intrigue about the series and how it explored The World. (Not to mention that from today's perspective the main character is easily read as a trans guy.) And yes, of course the Yuki Kajiura soundtrack played heavily into it.

See, one of my big first online memories is playing the browser based game, that Bandai was hosting back then. A game mostly frequented by Japanese players, so I was trying my very best to keep up with where the chat was going. And when we were "playing" (it was not so much of a game, really) together, it was always a headache to find a timeslot, where me and the Japanese folks could meet up.

Most of all, I think, the series weirdly captured that early 2000s online culture quite well. This is especially true for the more comedy heavy and cutsy "Legend of the Twilight" series. (Man, I need to rebuy that manga at some point.) Which just very much captured the feeling of just meeting online with friends from all over the world, who you might never meet, and... yeah. Just hang xD

But also the plot so often kinda had this undertone of "The World belongs to the players, not the company". Because especially in "Legend of the Twilight", but in the other entries too, one of the central conflicts comes from the company hosting The World trying to control the mysteries - especially the AIs. While the player characters are fighting against it and ending up siding with the AI.

Something, that feels strangely accurate to the modern internet, where the big, near monopolistic companies try control the user experience more and more, rather than letting users decide about their own experience.

The franchise of .hack// seems to be long dead and forgotten by Bandai and development studio CyberConnect2. The last game that released was .hack//Link, the last other media was the .hack// movie in 2012, that apparently passed everyone by either way.

To put it differently: It has been 11 years, since some new media released for that franchise. And it does not seem that anything is in the works to keep up with it. Especially as Bandai has taken the official international website off the net in 2020.

Technically, of course, a Switch Remaster of the .hack//GU games released in Japan last year for the franchises 20th anniversary - but it does not seem as if there are any plans to release it worldwide.

Maybe the franchise had its perfect moment in time in those early 2000s, when the internet really felt like an entire World that was there for us to explore.

But man, I miss this franchise. I had so much fun with it. And I just... love The World.

Also I need to leave this banger opening for .hack//Link with you. Because darn, I love this thing.

youtube

PS: If any of you went like "That kinda sounds like Sword Art Online" at this... Yeah, I to this day have the slight suspicion that Reki Kawahara was "lightly" inspired by .hack//. Because really, the entire SAO stuff to me is ".hack// but with less interesting characters and world building".

#.hack//#.hack//sign #dot hack #.hack//link #.hack//g.u.#.hack//legend of the twilight #legend of the twilight #yuki kajiura #2000s #2000s anime #nostalgia #video games #anime #2000s nostalgia #Youtube

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joyce-stick · 3 months

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Works that you think are actually better than more popular entries in the same series?

I think Shadow the Hedgehog is better than Sonic Heroes I guess

I think Sonic Shuffle is better than any of the Game Gear Sonic titles

I kinda prefer 3D Sonic to 2D Sonic generally except Sonic Rush

I think Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness is a better movie than the MCU movies that grossed more than it? I don't know why I'm reaching for this

I think that most MCU movies are mid popcorn fluff but Guardians of the Galaxy is pretty good, not like the best movies ever or anything but among the top tier of that mid popcorn fluff. I liked GotG volume 3's production design a lot.

I think that our video on Adachi and Shimamura is better than our most popular videos (the kanokari and madoka ones)

I think hot sauce is better on everything and everything is better with hot sauce and hot sauce is great by itself

I think that the Japanese Godzilla movies we saw so far are better than the 2014 American Godzilla movie, which is garbage, and the only good thing that came out of it is its commercial success inspiring Toho to produce Shin Godzilla and Minus One and other stuff.

I think that most yuri manga is better than most other more popular manga

I think Bang Dream is better than Love Live

I think girls are better than boys

I think that Spark the Electric Jester 3 is better than Sonic Frontiers

I think the John Wick movies are good

I think hbomberguy's video on the Roblox Oof is way better than his plagiarism video (At time of writing, the former has approximately 10 million views accumulated over a year and change, while the latter has 14 million accumulated over a month and change)

I think that taking HRT is better than not taking HRT

I think that not having depression is better than having depression

I think that our youtube channel is better than almost other anime youtube channels and also better than most trans girl talking about anime youtube channels

I think Tsui Yuri is a better yuri visual novel than Kindred Spirits on the Roof but also that Kindred Spirits on the Roof is a good visual novel and probably better than some other more popular visual novels

I think I'm running out of answers to this question?

Whatever

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theizzifromosaka · 9 months

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Here it is! I'm starting my review series of Monster Girl media, and for the first entry, I'll be reviewing

Monster Musume: Everyday Life with Monster Girls

To be perfectly clear, this review will be foucsed on the Monster Girl aspect of this series. I'm not sure if my opinions on the actual show itself would be worth listening to, I'm not trying to sway anyone one way or another.

Monster Musume follows "Darling-Kun" as he adapts to life with a rapidly growing cast of Demihumans. They learn about Japanese culture, and he finds himself pressured to pursue a relationship with one.

Darling-kun, whose name I don't think we ever learn in the anime, is kind of a weird dude. Throughout the course of the series he sees a LOT of naked girls, and he NEVER gets used to them. Other than that he's mostly just one of those generic anime nice guys, though he's aware the girls like him, unlike most of his peers.

Moving on.

Miia the Lamia

The Classic

The most iconic and recognizable character from this seris, Miia is a Lamia (go figure) with a lot of affection for Darling. She gets jealous easily and can be very clingy but still manages to be one of the most reasonable girls in the roster. She tends to see every new girl as a rival for Darling's affection and at this point you've probably noticed her entire personality revolves around Darling. This is standard for all the girls in this series and any deviation from this is considered strange.

Lamia in Greek mythology was the queen of Libya who, as you do, had children with Zeus and incurred Hera's wrath. Hera killed her children and this drove Lamia to madness, she lived out her days eating children and became monstrous in appearance. The story of Lamia was kinda like the Greek version of the Boogeyman.

I always encourage doing your own research on these topics, and take anything I've said with a grain of salt.

I'll refrain from asking why an apparent reptile has breasts as I could ask that about most Monster Girls, but aside from that, why are her genitals at her waist? They should be at the end of her tail.

Papi the Harpy

God damn it.

Okay, so Papi's name comes from the Japanese pronunciation of Harpy (would be something like Haapi). She's a very childlike adult, which is apparently typical of Harpies. They don't completely physically mature so they're light enough to fly, and she's a "bird brain". She claims to see Darling as a big brother but seems to have no idea what that really means.

Harpies are also Greek, they were birds with features of human women. They were seen as undesirable, ugly and foul and yeah, all the boxes are checked here.

Okay, it's not fair to judge Papi on these terms. We ought to be judging the creator of the series here. Honestly if not for the constant sexualization I probably wouldn't mind her too much.

Centorea the Centaur

Double damn it.

She's one of them warrior women that acts all stoic "but hides the heart of a woman" or whatever. I don't care for her, and unlike with Papi, I think it's her fault this time. I don't like her character, and I don't like her design.

Centaurs, yet again, are Greek in origin. They're half horse half man and are named after Centaurus, the first Centaur. Pop culture depicts Centaurs as being a Warrior Race, probably stemming from Chiron, among the most famous Centaurs in Greek Mythology. It is speculated the image of a Centaur arose from people seeing horse mounted warriors and either misinterpreting what they saw or a Telephone Game effect eventually resulting in what we're familiar with today.

Her design is a perfectly passable Centaur besides her Serious Honkers. Her real set of Badonkers. She's packin some Dobonhonkeros. I'm sure you don't need me invoking a copypasta to tell you she looks ridiculous.

Suu the Slime

Oh baby a triple!

Another child coded character. Suu is a shapeshifter so she doesn't always resemble a child, but her mannerisms are harder to change. Throughout the course of the series she becomes more intelligent and capable, going from a shapeless blob to barely coherent to regularly speaking full sentences. Suu is like... THE Slime Girl too, the first case of the author coming up with a wholly original design.

I'm not actually sure if Suu is the first Slime Girl but her influence can't be ignored. Slime Monsters overall are a pretty recent thing, and hard to track the history of (by that I mean they don't have a Wikipedia article). Their origins can be traced back to many sources, including classic Monster Flick The Blob, the Gray Goo Global Catastrophic Scenario, Tabletop RPGs and Dragon Quest.

(in absence of a Wikipedia article)

Honestly Suu would be cute and endearing if she wasn't subject to so much fanservice. Her personality, as it develops, is very childlike, with no sense of tact and little in the way of a filter. In this case I think I'd prefer it if they made her MORE childlike, and I wouldn't mind one bit if she remained a shapeless blob the whole time.

Mero the Mermaid

it was Big! Scary! and PINK!

Mermaids in this universe romanticize tragedy, and that ends up being one of Mero's most defining features. She states outright to ease Miia's worries that she does not want to marry Darling, she just wants to be his mistress. She's very soft-spoken but occasionally says some weird things.

So Mermaids have a lot of history and multiple origins, ranging from Greek Sirens to misidentified Manatees to just disoriented pent-up sailors seeing a Thicc Fish. The story of The Little Mermaid is very influential, and the in universe reason given to why Merfolk romanticize tragedy so heavily.

Honestly Mero might be my favorite of the main cast, her taxonomy is vague, she states that her skin secretes mucus, she's got tiny little arms on her hips, and in the 11th episode she tries to drown Darling, which if you ask me makes her best girl by default. I lament that most of the time she just looks like a girl in a wheelchair, and I also have to mention the fin ears.

Rachnera the Arachne

Not so itsy-bitsy

Rachnera is perhaps one of the most fleshed out characters in the show, she has a backstory and is capable of a range of emotions. That said most of the time she's just horny. Her initial foster family greatly disliked her but tried to "put up" with her, and after an incident resulting in their daughter being injured they sold her to a shady man who wanted to sell her silk on the black market. She starts off not exactly fond of humans but in typical fashion a single interaction with the main character all but changes her opinion.

The Greek story of Arachne is about a woman who challenged the Gods and was turned into a spider by Athena. She won by the way, the moral of the story is the Gods are jerks I guess.

This girl is a mixed bag. On one hand she has motivations that don't involve the main character, but on the other hand she very quickly becomes a vessel for bondage fetish pandering. As for her design, I like her eyes, it's a bit overdone to represent spider eyes like this but that's for good reason. I also don't really like how if you erase her human parts you're left with kind of a dumb looking spider. Overall I'd rank her pretty low, but not the worst.

Lala the Dullahan

So no head?

Lala is only in the show for about one and a half episodes, plus gets some screentime in the OVAs. She's a Chuunibyou who claims herself to be Death and gives the rest of the cast quite the spook.

The Dullahan is from Irish mythology, originally referring to any headless spirit, but eventually invoking a Headless Horseman, said to use a human spine as a whip. The image of a Headless Horseman can actually be found in various parts of Europe, and even in the Americas thanks to The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, which is apparently where the Jack-O-Lantern head thing comes from.

This is probably gonna be a recurring point of friction throughout this review series but you can't just paint a girl blue and call her a monster. Given the monster she's supposed to represent in this case I suppose I can't fault them too much, but in my opinion painting her blue somehow makes the design feel MORE lazy. Other than that I could criticize her inaccurate scythe for not having grips but that seems to be an anime thing.

Overall I'd say this series has surprisingly competent worldbuilding, reason is given to why most of the infrastructure doesn't accommodate demihumans and, though shallow, the different cultural origins of the girls play a part in how they interact with Darling and each other. That said the girls' designs are all very safe and same-y, with the most out there design being Polt, a character that only shows up in one of the OVAs. If I had to pick a favorite from the main cast though, it would have to be Mero. Her little arms really sell her design for me, and her gimmick of wanting to live out a tragedy actually got a chuckle or two out of me.

Overall, would I recommend this series? It depends. If you're a fellow Monster Girl Connoisseur then the sheer influence of this series earns it a watch, and if you're the kind of person that enjoys a good hate watch, or if you like ecchi (no judging) then you could probably get some enjoyment out of it. Outside of those spheres, nah it's not worth it.

Next review:

#Monster Girl Reviews #monster girls #Monster Musume #Lamia #Harpy #Centaur #Slime #Mermaid #Spider #Dullahan

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blankd · 4 months

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People are very familiar with how konami utterly fucked the Silent Hill IP and in that vein my personal franchise that "got SH'd" would be Breath of Fire.

Certain fans assigned the 5th game (Dragon Quarter) as being what killed it, but I'll defend that game for being a fairly unique RPG (and good!!) in its own right. I feel like if it came out now, people would appreciate it more.

It's relatively short (if you're fast you can legitimately beat it in <8 hours), brutal (flavor/setting + finite resources, finite enemies) and there's a simplicity to it that people seem to mistake as a problem rather than a choice.

read more of me rambling on about how one mechanic can uniquely define a game

One of the loudest fan criticisms of DQ is that it didn't have the dragon gene mixing/summons people loved and that there was !!only one dragon form!! But I'd say it was a worthy sacrifice for doing more with the dragon mechanics.

Your dragon/"I win" button was strapped to Ryu's/the MC's lifespan- sure you'd get devastating dragon powers, but it would also eventually kill him and could deadlock* your game if you abused it. Even walking around would (slowly) tick up the death counter which generates a good sense of urgency *without* condescending railroading.

As a result of this, DQ features something most of the other BoF games generally lacked, meaningfully dangerous encounters.

Other entries would be more typical random encounters that could be snuffed out or eventually grinded out of being a threat.

Meanwhile DQ has finite enemies (and EXP). Battles would take place on a 1:1 map, terrain, enemies, hazards, and items were retained from the normal map and vice-versa.

The game also cranked up the stakes by having limited hard saves (it required a consumable item), but still allowed you to have a soft save anywhere (the latter would be deleted upon reloading the game). Retaining your progress was always on the line and properly framed the dragon option as a temptation with consequences.

*note: the game wasn't so unfair as to leave you without any recourse, you could get a Restart+ where you carried over some items and EXP from a failed run to start the game over again, but leave it to gamers to puzzle out a way to exploit this courtesy to grind/farm, kudos on figuring it out but newspaper whap for going against the spirit of the game

This sort of decision working mechanically, playerwise, AND as a story point was a unique experience. Most games get bogged down in complexities and convulsion but DQ kept to a simple and sweet execution of "this power comes with a terrible price" and is a stronger experience for you.

As a game designer, the cohesion of story and mechanics is a solid inspiration.

Anyway did you know that there was a BoF 6? It was a mobile game and it shut down in about a year. Yes it is was soulless as it sounds. Yes the art is as bad and generic as it sounds.

---

Bonus Round! BoF Game Rankings + Misc.:

BoF:DQ (in case it was not obvious) is my favorite of the series, it's an RPG I can easily revisit and enjoy, truly a lean game. My ideal remake would tidy up the graphics to be nicer and to tweak some fiddlier bits, but the best I can hope for is a lazy port just because I don't think there are many copies (and more people should play it!). The NA box art is a crime though, horrible, 1000 years dungeon.

BoF 4, I like the overall plot and what it tried to do, there's some dodgy TL but I like the weird dragons and the art. Unfortunately it suffers from being in that PS1-PS2 transitory era and from RPG trappings of the time.

BoF 2 (GBA) has a a soft nostalgia spot in my heart. The TL work was incredibly jank, but is what defined JRPGs for me with its funny little freak party and the whiplash of weird goofy shit and Horror that Just Works.

BoF 3 and 1: I never really got around to properly playing either of these and have no real motivation to fix that.

I actually own the BoF artbook (in Japanese) and if you happen to enjoy them, I rec the the purchase even if you know nothing about the series. It actually contains *art from all 5 games* and having a consolidated timeline for how the art evolved over time is fascinating.

#blankd's blabbies #breath of fire

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gamerswift13 · 9 months

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Need for Speed Unbound!

Or as I like to call it, High-speed Head-on Collision Simulator 2022

Kia ora, friends!

This is gonna just be a short one this week due to ongoing mental and physical health issues, but on that front I have some news: I think I’m slowly but surely getting better!

But anyway, I wanted to talk a little bit about Need for Speed Unbound this week because I have been playing it a lot over the last few weeks (when I have had the energy) and I can’t think of a game in recent history that has made me rage quit and want to throw my controller so many times but still is able to pull me back in. I love a good arcade racer; my favourite series in this genre is obviously Forza Horizon (and to a lesser extent Forza Motorsport, which I am still excited for in October), but I have been known to dip into Need for Speed now and then. This latest entry, launched last year, recently came to Xbox Game Pass, so I decided to check it out.

My first dive into this game was via Xbox Cloud Gaming and y’all, that service is great for some games, but for a game as fast-paced as Need for Speed Unbound, I absolutely do not recommend it 😅. Playing it this way, I was constantly crashing into things that I didn’t see because the frames fell out, so it didn’t take long for me to decide to make some space on the tiny Xbox Series S internal storage and download the game to play locally. Once I got that out of the way, I started to have a blast… for a while. My TV, which was 1080p, died a couple of months ago, so since then I’ve been using a TV I borrowed from my sister, which is 720p, and let me tell you, again for a game like this, it’s… a less than optimal way to play. Once I started getting into faster and faster cars, I started crashing into things again. A lot. This isn’t a failure of the game itself, I don’t think, I’m just playing it in a really stupid way 😭.

Apart from all the technical stuff I just mentioned, Need for Speed Unbound is really fun. I think my favourite part, though, has been customising my character, as well as the paint/wraps on some of my cars.

I wish I had more pictures of the different outfits I’ve had my character wear, (I haven’t had the time to go back to the game before writing) but I still really like this look. And oh boy do I love that car. It’s one of the cars the game gives you in the beginning, a Nissan GT-R from I want to say 1997 (or thereabouts), and it’s fast, great at drifting, extremely hot, but the best thing of all: I made it look queer and non-conforming as fuck.

The game limits what you can write on your cars, I assume because it’s possible other players could see it, so it wouldn’t let me write ‘queer’ or ‘gay’ or ‘bitch’ or ‘fascist’ - those first two are kind of bonkers considering the amount of queer representation this game contains, but I digress. So I substituted ‘fascist’ with the succinct ‘fash’, and instead of ‘basic bitch’ I wrote ‘basic beach’, which the latter is honestly kind of better anyway.

The racing is fun, though frustrating sometimes thanks to the game only giving you a maximum of retries per in-game 24-hour period, but what really stands out to me is that there is so much queer representation here - like way more than I’d have ever expected from a Need for Speed. There’s one NPC racer you meet and race against named Justicia who is from Mexico and is openly transfem. There are signs around the city that say things like ‘love is love’, or simply have the pride flag on them. And as you may have noticed on my car in the pictures above, you can just put the pride flag and trans flag all over your car if you want - and not just that, they have every single type of pride flag I could think of, which blew me away. Seriously, more games need to be this open about supporting queer communities. There’s also a bunch of representation for people all over the world - the music in Need for Speed Unbound includes tracks in Arabic, Japanese, Spanish, French, and a few I couldn’t nail down just by listening, and it’s honestly super refreshing.

Anyway, that’s all from me this week. Sorry if it feels a bit like it was put together at the last minute because, well, it was, but I wanted to make sure I had something for you.

Thanks so much for reading, y’all, I appreciate it. As always, if you have any comments or questions, hit me up on the social links at the bottom of the page, or flick me an email! If you want to read more stuff from me, you can check out my Letterboxd reviews! This week I reviewed Robot Jox (1989), which I believe may have inspired some of the aesthetics of things like Neon Genesis Evangelion and Pacific Rim.

Stay safe and warm out there (or safe and cool, if you’re in the northern hemisphere!) y’all, and I’ll talk to you all again really soon. Ka kite anō au i a koe. 💚

Rebecca

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shoppncarticles · 1 year

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BONUS: Gen 2 Beta

Game development is anything but a streamlined process, and it’s rare for a game to be created without a few hiccups in development, and seeing quite a few features and pieces of its design getting tossed during the process. This is probably fairly obvious to anyone who’s played a game, let alone anyone who’s created anything, but I need these articles to start somewhere y’know.

One particular case of this is the development of Pokemon Gold (and Silver), the sequels to the original Pokemon Red and Blue games. Following such a massive success, Game Freak had quite the task ahead of them, and part of that involved making a whole new set of Pokemon. Now, they did have some designs lying around already, but they still needed to recapture the magic of the first Gen with even more wacky Pokemon creatures. We all know that they succeeded and ended up releasing a second pair of games with 100 new creatures, obviously, but what about the ones that were lost along the way?

Thankfully, a few years back, the playable demo of Pokemon Gold from SpaceWorld 1997 (a gaming convention that preceded E3) leaked online, and all the implemented Pokemon of that build were revealed to the public. A fair number of the final Johto designs did show up among the roster... but an even larger amount were designs which fans had never seen before. Since there’s such a plethora of these unseen designs, and this demo is the most documented of any of Pokemon’s found betas, I decided to dedicate some time to talking about some of these missing critters. I won’t be covering every single lost ‘mon, but there are still plenty I think are worth mentioning.

Lost Evolutions

First up are some evolutions (or pre-evolutions in the hatchlings’ case) of some Pokemon that I’ve already talked about, and then some. As a reminder, the evolutions are for Farfetch’d, Pinsir, and Tangela on the top row, with the nest of chicks on the bottom being a baby form for Doduo. Interestingly, the beta Pokedex also has what appears to be a Grass-type evolution for Eevee, and a new evolution for Lickitung, preceding Lickilicky in Gen 4. I find this pretty noteworthy since it reinforces that Game Freak isn’t completely opposed to revisiting their older ideas when designing for new generations, or at least they weren’t during Gen 4′s development.

Anyways, in terms of the first four designs here, you can check out what I said in their respective family articles. In summary, though, I find them all to be pretty interesting additions to their previous members’ designs, and usually taking things in a different, though unique direction. The baby Doduo is a bit odd, though, since not only does it have three heads as opposed to Doduo’s two, but Doduo also has pretty poor stats itself and doesn’t really warrant having a baby form.

The beta Leafeon and Lickilicky though, if you want to call them that, are quite strange given their belated entry to the series. Leafeon here looks a bit more inspired than what we ended up getting, since while parts of its body extend into leaves like the final design, its legs and feet are more gnarled and uneven, like tree roots rather than mammalian legs. This is a lot more creative to me, and helps strengthen its plant theming just a little bit. I’ve seen other people interpret the pattern on its body as being like the texturing of a tree or leaf too, which is a good touch.

Lickilicky, though, is pretty distant from the final design we got, and to me it feels like the designers were aware how much it likely would’ve clashed against Pokemon’s style and trimmed the thing down to fit better. Lickilicky’s turban-like shape on its head, mustache, and multiple rings around its body make it feel like some heavily stylized Japanese caricature, like something you’d see in the original Starfy games. In that respect, I think it’s a pretty charmingly goofy design, and I suppose works well to play up Lickitung’s sillier elements, but I do agree that it doesn’t really mesh with the rest of Pokemon’s style.

WIP Johto ‘Mons

Here’s a collection of beta designs for Johto ‘mons we did get that I already covered in their respective articles. Admittedly, the designs for beta Ariados and Mantine come from later demo builds rather than the SpaceWorld ‘97 one, evident by their more colorful sprites, but I still wanted to mention them again anyways. These designs are all pretty rad, and while I do like what we ended up getting for most of them, I still miss what we could’ve got too. Especially Ariados.

You can’t beat how silly straight-up-gun Remoraid is, too.

Beta Noctowl I also covered before but forgot to include in the set of six above. Oh well. You can’t make a clean set of rows for seven anyways.

Hanēi (Haneei)

Believe it or not, Haneei here was the very first implementation of Mantine in the game, or at least that’s what fans have decided on. It looks so different by comparison though, appearing as a much more feathery, angelic creature rather than the manta ray it ended up becoming. It’s still a Water/Flying type however, which is likely what makes people think it’s a Mantine progenitor.

What’s really special about Haneei though is that it has a completely dark false face on its backside. This too kind of strengthens its connections to Mantine, since its baby evolution Mantyke has a smiley face on its backside in a similar fashion to this. Haneei though seems to embody a sort of yin-yang dichotomy thing here, with its underbelly being all pure and fluffy while its backside is dark and ominous. That’s a really cool effect, and I’m surprised it’s been a relatively untapped idea given how popular intimidating eyespots are in the animal kingdom. Masquerain kind of takes up that mantle, off the top of my head.

Shibirefugu

Would you look at that! As it turns out, Qwilfish was originally supposed to get an evolution, in this much dopey and nubbier pufferfish. Despite the lightning bolt mark on its head, Shibirefugu and Qwilfish itself in this beta remain as pure Water types. I really have to wonder why it ended up getting cut, though. Could Game Freak not decide on a way to fix up its design any further? Did they decide that they needed to add a clean 100 new Pokemon, and Shibirefugu was just unlucky enough to be on the chopping block? Why keep Qwilfish and not its evolution?? Truly a mystery for the ages.

The Manbō1 Family

A whole line of cut designs, the Manbō1 family (it is really called that) is a bit all over the place, but has the consistent theme of being fish, I guess. Manbo, the first form, seems to be some stylized for of an angelfish given its shape. It also resembles a line of beta designs for sunfish Pokemon from Gen 1, so perhaps this was Game Freak trying to reuse leftover designs they had laying around. It’s not bad as far as Pokemon fish go, but it is a bit silly just seeing this angelfish with anime eyes among the roster.

Ikari, the first evolution, is extremely interesting, and another great loss in my book. It seems completely unrelated to Manbo before it though, which is likely part of the reason it was ultimately cut. This Water/Steel type is, for whatever reason, the head of a shark chained to an anchor. I don’t know exactly where the idea of this thing came from, but if you know anything about me you’d know that I would’ve LOVED to use this thing if given the chance. The shark head looks perfectly scummy and gnarly, and the chipped dorsal fin it has is a great touch to its design. Alas, the closest we have in Pokemon is Sharpedo, which keeps the sort of shark head idea, but sadly drops the anchor.

The final evolution though is Gurotesu. It seems like a combination of an anglerfish with its little lure and a gulper eel with its body shape and large jaw. It too is a Water/Steel type, though the Steel part seems kind of removed from its design. Given its resemblance to abyssal predators, people have speculated that the Manbō1 family were the precursors to Chinchou. That’s not an impossibility, since nothing else resembling Chinchou is in the SpaceWorld demo. Gurotesu makes a much better evolution than Lanturn in my mind, since it plays up the goofiness of deep sea fish much better than its final design does. Its overall design would be revisited in Huntail in Gen 3, kind of, but no dopey big-chinned eel like this has ever been seen in Pokemon again, sadly. We’ve got a crucially untapped market here, Game Freak!

Animon

Ditto, surprisingly, was slated to get an evolution too. Why, I couldn’t tell you, because I don’t know what Ditto would apparently be doing once it evolved since it’s supposed to only do one thing.

That thing could very well be screaming, since Animon here is just. Screaming at all times, I guess. Since Ditto is so simplistic in terms of both visual and mechanical design, it’s hard to say what Animon could’ve done, besides maybe the fact that it evolved with used of a Metal Powder item - the precursor to the Metal Coat. While Animon remains a pure Normal type, maybe it could’ve incorporated Steel into its attacks or transformation process?

The Rinrin Family

These two have no clear parallel in the final game, being a pair of Dark-type cats themed around little bells. Why they decided to drop these ones is beyond me, since they seem pretty interesting and make a nice addition to the new Dark type. A malicious little black cat would’ve also done well for the type. They’d likely be easily accessible early or mid game options too, something Johto is severely lacking.

Unfortunately they do also kind of suffer from another problem rampant in Gen 2′s design. The first form, Rinrin, is a cute and nicely put together little cat ‘mon, with a bell-ended tail and collar, with more little bells or baubles around its ears. It’s sufficiently cute, and I could see it being a marketable mascot for the Dark type if it made it in. The evolution, Berurun, is kind of flat and uninteresting by comparison. It plays things a lot more simply, which I suppose works well enough for a sleek, evil little cat design. The contrast between the two isn’t as bad as Meowth and Persian, nor Hoothoot and Noctowl, so they’ve got that at least. It’s not really bad by any significant means, though, since it at least has a proper theme going on that it keeps from the pre-evolution unlike Persian and Noctowl.

Tsubomitto

Would you look at that, old Bellsprout was supposed to get a new evolution too! It makes sense, since Oddish and Bellsprout were originally meant to be version-exclusive counterparts, but Oddish went and got a new evolution in Gen 2 where Bellsprout did not. Y’know, even though Bellsprout got a whole tower temple dedicated to it in Johto too. Speaking of Bellossom, it was originally going to be Grass/Poison too, but the second type was dropped for whatever reason.

Anyways, Tsubomitto here also remains a Grass/Poison type, and is the result of exposing a Weepinbell to a new Sun Stone rather than a Leaf Stone. Unlike Bellossom, it actually still resembles Weepinbell, and most importantly Bellsprout quite a bit, returning to its bipedal plant route rather than sticking to just being a pitcher plant. Nothing else is really known about it besides that, though. I won’t lie... the design isn’t exactly the best. I mean, it’s great in that it returns to Bellsprout’s classic roots, but what else is it supposed to be exactly? Is it like, a Bellsprout that became a tree and is still hanging a pitcher plant from its branches? I think Tsubomitto could’ve used some work still, but axing the whole thing seems a bit mean.

Bomushika

Surprisingly a Fire/Water type, this seal would apparently juggle balls of molten rock on its snout before launching them at opposing Pokemon. The concept of a magma-dwelling seal that does that sort of thing is certainly quite interesting, but the rest of Bomushika’s design is rather flat and simple as a tradeoff. How come all the seals in Pokemon so far have to be so simplistic in design and color? The whole back-turned thing is cool though, and predates the inclusion of Turtonator by about 19 years or so, who also has that stance as a main gimmick. Good for you and your unique little traits, Bomushika.

The Kotora Family

Aww, talk about another big loss. These little Electric types also lack a clear parallel in the final game, since they exist alongside the Mareep family as simplistic mammalian Electric types in the demo. Thunder-powered tigers are a nifty little idea, given the cat’s iconic striped pattern, but making them be cute little balls of cartoony goofiness is something I wasn’t exactly expecting, but do welcome with open arms. Just look at how SILLY Kotora looks sitting their with its big smile. Adorable.

The two members of this family even have jagged lightning bolt-shaped tails, as if mimicking Pikachu’s style. I wonder if they were meant to sort of take Pikachu’s role in Johto, especially since the evolution is similarly named Raitora. Raitora isn’t nearly as dynamic of a change in evolution as Raichu was, though. The only major difference is its change in size and apparent new fangs.

Alas, though, Kotora and Raitora were dropped during development and nothing too similar has seen the light of day in the series since. A real shame, since a little staticky ball of a tiger would be a wonderful addition in my opinion.

The Norowara Family

An even GREATER loss, though, is that of Norowara and Kyonpan, two Ghost types in a Generation which sorely missed their additions. Norowara appears to be a little straw doll with a huge pin permanently stuck through it, clearly representing Pokemon’s version of a cursed voodoo doll. With the addition of the move Curse in Gen 2, I assume it was initially given to this pair as their signature move. Norowara also makes me a bit confused and bitter since it shows Game Freak were willing at one point to give their voodoo doll ‘mons big pins to carry around, and yet Banette has NOTHING. What GIVES, you guys.

For some reason, though, when Norowara evolves into Kyonpan, it goes from a voodoo doll to a... jiang-shi panda? Jiang-shi, for those unaware, are Chinese vampires struck by rigor mortis, unable to lower their arms which always stick out in front of them, and are usually hindered with a paper talisman stuck to their bodies. Kyonpan even has a little Chinese hat too to make the look even more apparent. It feels almost on the level of parody, really. I can definitely see why Kyonpan was dropped, it feels like the beta design for Lickilicky in that it’s more like a cartoon caricature rather than a Pocket Monster design.

The Urufuman (Wolfman) Family

Oh come ON. It’s not even FAIR at this point. Urufuman and Wāurufu, or Wolfman and Warwolf respectively, are believed to be distant precursors to Swinub and Piloswine, as they’re a two-stage family of Ice types. They lack a secondary typing though, and share nothing in common visually with the shaggy pigs. I do enjoy Swinub and Piloswine and all, but these two little freaks are simply divine. The pair are meant to be arctic-dwelling hunters wearing the shaggy skinned coats of beasts they’ve killed to both keep warm and camouflage. I suppose maybe in there lies the problem with this family, that Game Freak didn’t want to have little Pocket Monsters who were wearing the skinned pelts of other animals, but I don’t really see any harm in it.

There’s just something so charming about Wolfman, being a shaggy little ball of beastliness with the ever classic and appealing eyes-in-a-void type of design. Warwolf ain’t too bad either, since while it has normal anime eyes like a lot of Gen 1 Pokemon, it also has beastlier claws, a more intimidating pelt, and remains pretty round in shape, keeping a key part of Wolfman’s perfect design. It really bugs me, once again, that nothing similar to these designs have ever been included in the games since this demo. Farfetch’d and Tangela ended up getting evolutions eventually, Pinsir got a Mega Evolution, Sharpedo fills a similar niche to Ikari, several other mammalian Electric types play similar roles to Kotora, and Banette exists to parallel Norokawa, but Wolfman and Warwolf stand alone in the void of unused ideas without a clear reflection keeping their memory alive in the modern day. And that’s a damn shame. Even as ultimately simple as these two designs are, they’re just so effective in execution that I can’t help but stay bitter at their lack of inspirational presence in the series today.

On that note, I’ll wrap up this article on Gen 2′s beta designs. It is quite interesting to see what goes on behind the scenes during development, especially seeing on designs that did end up in the game started and how they ended up by comparison. Pokemon is no exception, and luckily similar beta leaks have been found for the Gen 1 and 4 games as well, so if you enjoyed seeing this collection I’d recommend checking those out online as well. Until next time, let’s all hope that Wolfman will find his way into a new Pokemon game someday.

[Gen 2 Archive]

#pokemon #pokemon review #pokemon gold beta

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zerochanges · 1 year

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2022 Favorite Video Games

Another year, another instance of me not really putting in the time I used to for this favorite hobby of mine. Yup it’s true, 2023 was once again a year I really did not play a lot of games in. I found myself fairly busy and not having as much time as I would have liked to play games. Sadly it has been really difficult for me to manage time in my adult life as of late, and often I see what free time I do have going towards other hobbies with more immediate pay off. With all that said though I really wish I could be back to gaming like I used to be when I was younger. I like to think what I did play was at least of high quality but with my taste that might not quite be true. I suppose I should let you be the judge of what I wasted my 2022 on. What I did play I wanted to talk about , so although it’s not really much, I hope it still makes for an interesting read.

AI the Somnium Files: nirvanA Initiative

The first the AI the Somnium Files was a revolutionary title, no it didn’t do anything to change the landscape of visual novels, and no the narrative wasn’t ground breaking, it was revolutionary because of one thing: Kotaro Uchikoshi finally got a game with a good goddamn budget! Woo boy, you dunno how good that felt, the man is a legend and has created some of the best visual novels in the industry but the last couple generations seemed like no matter what he just couldn’t get major backing.

I’m really glad the first AI happened, and I generally had a lot of fun with this second entry in the series as well, but I couldn’t help but feel a lot of the magic was gone from the first game. That isn’t to say, AI Ni, as the game has been dubbed, is a worse game; just that the first AI was exciting and I didn’t know what to make of it but now I have certain expectations from a sequel and AI Ni more or less met them all just as I thought it would. The game play is a bit more polished, and some puzzles felt a little more fair this time than in the first but besides that, under the hood it’s just what you’d expect.

I definitely did enjoy a lot of the new characters introduced in AI Ni, it was a smart decision to really center about half the game on an all new cast--and I thought they were just as dynamic and interesting as the characters from the first game. It helped that their interactions with the original cast made for some material that we couldn’t have see in the first AI game too. The main premise and murder behind the game is also some grade-A fun Uchikoshi, the man is always able to write great sci-fi goobly gunk in such a fun way that I just will always love the his work. Basically, if you liked the first AI you’ll like this one. And that’s all I have to say about AI Ni for better or for worse.

Chaos;Head: Noah

The year was 2008 and I was nearly finished with High School. I was in the peak of my youth, and at the time couldn’t be a bigger weeb if I tried. I stumbled across this one interesting anime, based on a game I never heard of. It’s a visual novel and I had only just recently got into those games because of the many excellent ones released on the Nintendo DS. I can’t wait to try this out. That anime was Chaos;Head and oh boy did it begin a new chapter of my life.

I don’t know how to stress this enough, there was no market for this stuff back when it came out. Fan translations were incredibly slow too, and often involved having to run some Japanese's version of windows and even then only certain routes had English patches and the other parts of the game were still in Japanese and it was a mess. I can’t even fathom that I finally can own this! And that it is in English!

Chaos;Head is the original and progenitor of the science; adventure series otherwise known as that series that Steins;Gate was in. In a way it makes a lot of sense why Steins;Gate took off to such explosive levels of popularity and overshadowed this game, but that also is kind of what makes Chaos;Head special.

It’s so much grittier and more violent, it has a lot less mainstream appeal to it than Steins;Gate with an immediately lovable and quirky cast. Instead you have an incredibly flawed protagonist like Takumi who is an insanely flawed individual that manages to grow into somebody better. He has no self esteem, agoraphobia, and chooses to run away into fantasy from anything difficult. Plus he exhibits all the toxic traits of the fandom at that time but that makes sense since he completely devotes himself to said nerd culture in his attempts at avoiding reality. He’s a difficult character but honestly one of the best examples of a flawed protagonist and unreliable narrator in video games, hands-down.

Light Fairytale Episode 1

I ended up stumbling upon this game completely by accident. Being a love letter to the classic PSOne era JRPGs and essentially being made by one guy really endeared it to me. Episode 1 is pretty short, maybe only 2 hours or so but it’s a brisk well produced vertical slice of a realized game, and I had my fun with it. No, it’s not fantastic or anything, but it really helped to entertain me one weekend and I ended up playing it twice even, the second time with the perspective of the main heroine. There’s a lot of personality in the game and it’s obviously a passion project which really shows. Trust me, I buy Kemco RPGs I know the whole “cheap profit off nostalgia” grift better than anyone, so when true passion is there, you really have fun with the game.

Pokémon Violet

It’s really easy to dunk on Pokémon Scarlet and Violet. I know I did. These games are a mess!!! What a glitchy and bug ridden, unfinished, and lacking polish game. And this is one of the most profitable and beloved IPs the world has! What even is going on?! It’s easy to feel jaded and hate the game for it. Honestly the game does nothing to win you over when you start playing it. But if you give it time, damn, they really did deliver a good game after all. I know that’s a bit shit, right? “Oh the game is bad, but if you play it enough it becomes good!” I know, I know. If anyone told me that about any old random game I wouldn’t want to bother with it and think they’re an obsessed fan that doesn’t want to admit the shortcomings of their fave series. But in Pokémon's case, it’s true! Or shit, maybe I am an obsessed fan that doesn’t want to admit the shortcomings of one of my fave series. One or the other.

Honestly it’s a tragedy the development was so rushed and that it runs as poorly as it does with so many glitches. By the end of the game you can really see how creative and inspired GameFreak was. They begin to do stuff I always wanted to see them do in Pokémon games. The story begins to really take shape and becomes one of the best plots the series had since Sun & Moon. The game play loop becomes even more fun and rewarding, and worth all the bugs to get through for just one more minute. Just one more! I found myself utterly addicted by the closing hours of the game. It’s a shame all this great stuff is tied to such a poorly made game.

Sega Genesis Mini 2

The model of Genesis I grew up with was actually the Model 2, in fact I was so accustomed to the Model 2 I legit never saw the Model 1 Genesis in my entire life until the internet came along. It’s weird, I owned the Model 2. My best friend owned the Model 2. My cousins owned a Model 2. I just thought this was what a Sega Genesis was and that was how they all looked. I didn’t even know it was a Model 2. So naturally, another Sega Genesis Mini console after the incredibly well made first one, and it’s shaped like the Model 2? Sign me the funk up, brother!!!

It also helps that this time around the mini console is packed full of tons of Sega CD games, something the original was lacking in. If anything you might even want to call this the ‘Sega CD Mini’ instead. The game list is pretty solid, though I am bummed about the lack of Lunar games which the Japanese version got and which we didn't. That shit is whack. Also no Snatcher is just downright infuriating, c’mon you negotiated the rights to Castlevania Bloodlines, get off your asses and go back to Konami for Snatcher, it’s only the most prized and expensive Sega CD game ever made, like you know, an easy console seller. I usually never hack my mini consoles and just keep them stock, but yeah if a hack ever comes out I’m adding Snatcher, screw it.

Okay, enough complaining, I love this little guy, it’s a gorgeous mini console, and I know I’m going to end up playing it tons when I can. I love how well it emulates the game, the borders look snazzy on it and the selection has some truly great choices like Crusader of Centy a game I definitely need to play one day. I also appreciate the extra mile M2 went just to get this thing made and how they gave us some quality of life improvements like the ability to switch from the North American and Japanese soundtracks of Sonic CD in menu and a new easy mode for Phantasy Star II.

Shenmue

Like I mentioned in my anime thread, the recent Shenmue anime had me replaying this game again this year and man was it a blast! I really appreciated the insane amount of details the game had and in general the less-than-stellar elements that haven’t aged well only make the game more charming–especially the voice acting. But at its core is such an engaging and ambitious title that really just screams Dreamcast. This was an era full of experimentation and doing things like no one else had. It was an era where companies threw insane money at projects that they would definitely never make it back but who cares, it was now or never. Shenmue encapsulates all of that.

It’s at times a really dumb game with some really jank controls. But it’s also at times a game that feels alive. The sandbox world it represents is tiny, hell even its sequel makes Shenmue 1’s world feel like a joke, and today we have sandboxes the likes of which they couldn’t even dream about when this game was in development, but still somehow everything feels so alive. Interacting with the cast is so good. Learning new martial arts or just about their day, it doesn’t matter, seeing all these NPCs grow and change over time is still special, even today. There’s an insane amount of detail to everything and the amount of interaction the player can have is just stupid at times. You can open cupboards to pull out shelves to pick up an item to turn side item around to read the bottom inscription on said item. It’s a whole lot, games today don’t do that amount of detail, I really appreciate it so much today in 2022.

Who knows if Ryo’s journey will ever find its ending, the future looks just as bleak now as it did when Shenmue 2 originally flopped, but I think anyone who enjoys this era of games should definitely experience the start of this journey.

Xenoblade Chronicles 3

Xenoblade 3 feels like the crowning work of Monolithsoft. It is as if they perfected almost every aspect of their core identity as game developers in this one title. It’s a masterpiece and I don’t mean that lightly. The game provides easily the best combat in the entire Xenoblade series, hell maybe even all Xeno games, I am feeling just that bold. It manages to be just so incredibly fun to play and yet constantly finds ways to keep evolving, even towards the tail end of the game after 60 or 70 hours or so, the game still throws plenty of new elements and refreshes the system and how combat works. It never gets stale and on the flipside never feels overwhelming. Xenoblade 3 is the cumulation of years of work all coming together, even if that wasn’t intentionally so, as a third in a line of games, and as how well crafted as it is, it feels that way--it can’t help but to have that impact. If it weren’t for the staff working on the game being vocal that it isn’t an end to their Xeno games I could even swear this was some grand finale.

Oh and also did I mention you can combine and transform into giant robots?! Like hell yeah, what isn’t there to love about this game?!

The game has one of the most realistic and personal feeling cast in the series. I personally related a lot to the character Taion all throughout the game, but every character manages to be fleshed out and brings an interesting perspective to what we are seeing. At times the plot can get a bit heavy, I kind of swear Tetsuya Takahashi really wanted us all to check out his pretty sweet Gundam fan fic, but this is the kind of stuff I love with these games. The return of super long and well animated cutscenes like the Xenosaga games had really surprised me as well. I know some people aren't crazy for 30 minute long cutscenes, but I dig this stuff.

Overall Xenoblade 3 is very easy for me to call my favorite game of this year. I know I didn’t play many but at least with all the hours of this game behind my belt I feel I can say I chose quality over quantity in this situation. The entire game just feels like a magnum opus for Monolithsoft and Tetsuya Takahashi. I honestly don’t know how they’ll top this one any time soon.

#new years #video games #ai the somnium files #ai the somniun files nirvana initiative #chaos;head #chaos;head noah #light fairytale #pokemon scarlet and violet #pokemon #pokemon violet #sega genesis #sega genesis mini #sega genesis mini 2 #shenmue #xenoblade #xenoblade chronicles #xenoblade 3

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dynamite-derek · 2 months

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Final Fantasy: Mystic Quest: Another Side, Another Story

Please note, this is the latest entry in my series of Final Fantasy retrospectives that I write for a website called vidyathoughts.com. I am not able to post every single one of them on tumblr due to image restrictions, so please consider checking out the site and reading my other reviews in full. This post was edited slightly to remove some images that put me over the limit, so I apologize for the occasional long block of uninterrupted text. Thanks!

Here’s your new Final Fantasy, bro

Final Fantasy IV had come and gone and Square was very intent on making a push into North American markets. They had released SaGa games and redubbed them as spin-off Final Fantasy titles (The Final Fantasy Legend, Final Fantasy Legend II and Final Fantasy Legend III.) The first Mana title had also made the journey stateside, rechristened as Final Fantasy Adventure. The franchise seemed ready to really spread its wings with Final Fantasy V set for release in Japan in December of 1992.

Let’s revisit a quote related to the release of Final Fantasy IV in North America.

“I guess the biggest change is that they made it a little bit easier for the U.S. market, but that was because we already had Final Fantasy I, II, and III in Japan, whereas Final Fantasy I was the only one released in the states,” Final Fantasy IV lead designer Takashi Tokita said in a 2007 interview with 1up. “Final Fantasy II and III had some experimental elements to them, and so for U.S. users to suddenly dive into IV… it just seemed a little bit difficult. So we balanced it out to present it as a follow-up to Final Fantasy I. And, you know, the NES platform had a very wide range of users where the bottom end was very young, and we took that into account as well”

The difficulty issue was weighing heavily on the minds of those at SquareSoft. Final Fantasy V was the most difficult Final Fantasy title yet and the West was comprised of RPG babies at the time. They didn’t get to experience the other two Famicom titles and grow with the franchise, so they could not be expected to handle the hardcore gameplay of V. So a decision was made to release a Final Fantasy game specifically for North American audiences in order to get them more accustomed to the genre. Final Fantasy: Mystic Quest was born.

Despite being made for an American audience, development for Mystic Quest was handled by an internal Japanese SquareSoft team led by Kouzi Ide. Ide’s most notable work to this point was as the lead for the third SaGa title, which North American players would receive as Final Fantasy Legend III. Ide would only direct one more game after Mystic Quest, Treasure of Rudras, which only saw release in Japan. I would normally say that since it’s been nearly 30 years you shouldn’t count on ever getting a version of that game in North America, but they released Live-A-Live over here eventually so I guess anything is possible.

Mystic Quest is also the first game credited to Ted Woolsey, who was the lead localizer at SquareSoft during the SNES era. His translations are known to be a tad bit more colorful than your typical works of the time. This leads to a lot of his writing quirks being referred to as Woolseyisms. This ranges from his take on Frog speaking in olde English in Chrono Trigger (despite nobody else in the middle ages knowing what thees and thous are in that game) to Kefka’s infamous “Son of a Submariner” line from Final Fantasy VI. Most of his work has been retranslated over the years, but odds are if you played a SNES game made by SquareSoft, you’ve experienced his work in some way.

Woolsey at his finest, in my opinion anyway, is Super Mario RPG. I think his quirky style helped give that game a lot more of a life than it could have had. SMRPG was my very first role playing game and I credit it with getting me into the genre. It accomplished what Mystic Quest was trying to.

Here is what Woolsey said about the prospect of moving Final Fantasy V westward in an interview with Super Play Magazine in 1994:

“The Final Fantasy series basically has two separate tracks: the odd series (FFI, FFIII and FFV) are controller command drive games, whereas the even series are more story line driven games. As for FFV though, well, although we’re sure it’s a great title it hasn’t been a hit with too many people in our focus groups, although experienced gamers loved the complex character building – it’s just not accessible enough to the average gamer. But we’re determined we want to release it so we’re going to wait and introduce it once there’s a larger audience for that particular style.”

Now obviously Woolsey isn’t a major decision maker at Square. He didn’t pull aside upper management and warn them about the dangers of the Job system. But he would certainly know of what games are being localized and why certain ones are being skipped over.

Mass appeal

From the above quote, we can guess that Final Fantasy V’s fate might have been determined by focus groups. Before I even sat down to write this retrospective, the feeling I had while playing Mystic Quest was ‘this is a focus grouped Final Fantasy.’ It’s nice to have the lead localizer sort of confirm that there might have been a little truth to that. The original plan for Final Fantasy V would have seen it released as a spin-off title of some sort, but I will get more into what they did with V later (Spoiler: not release it in America at all until the next console generation.)

Mystic Quest would release in North America just two months before the Japanese release of Final Fantasy V. It would later go on to release in Japan as Final Fantasy USA: Mystic Quest in September of 1993. Final Fantasy VI was released in April of 1994, so expectations probably weren’t too high for the spin-off title in Japan.

The first time I saw MQ was as a middle schooler. I wasn’t terribly interested in playing it, I was too hyper-fixated on the PS1 Final Fantasy games I could not play for myself at the time, and for some reason a shard stuck in my mind that correlated Final Fantasy II (IV) with it. So for a long time I knew the first four mainline Final Fantasy titles North America got as: Final Fantasy, Final Fantasy II: Mystic Quest, Final Fantasy III and Final Fantasy VII. The 90s were a different, more confusing time.

In discussing how Mystic Quest differs from your standard Final Fantasy, let’s explore the focus group idea a little bit. Allow me to pretend to give feedback to SquareSoft as a non-RPG playing fella on Final Fantasy IV and talk about how these concerns were addressed. Remember: Square wants Final Fantasy and role playing games to be a massive hit in North America. They want what Enix had with Dragon Quest where Japanese police officers beg them not to release the game during the school week. Final Fantasy definitely had a host of hardcore fans in North America, but an absolute mainstream fervor would not encompass the west until Final Fantasy VII’s release.

“Five is a lot of party members, I can’t keep track of all this stuff!”

Mystic Quest trims your party down to only two characters and if you so choose, you only need to control one character. The game defaults to your secondary character acting automatically, though you can press a button to change to manual commands. MQ also utilizes the Final Fantasy II and IV approach of having characters constantly entering and exiting your party. The secondary character is always a fair deal stronger than your main character when they show up but by the time they leave, your protagonist should be equal to or greater than them. It’s an easy way to determine whether someone is going to leave your party soon or not. Are you their level? If so, prepare to say goodbye!

I find that if you play on auto, the computer will cheat for you. At some point I switched to auto mode because I wanted to move this along. The combat system isn’t terribly deep with two people so the battle-to-battle strategic decisions didn’t matter so much. I would notice on certain turns that sometimes my main character would get hit with a big critical by an enemy and then my partner would heal me back up before it became time to input moves again. My character gets stoned – no I do not know a better way to word this – and my partner would cast heal. In manual, I would have had to plan ahead for that. I guess they try to give you every leg up that they can?

There were a couple of times later on I had to switch back to manual combat for my partner to do something specific, but it was very seldom.

As a result of having only two party members, battles don’t have a lot of strategy. Towards the end of the game, some encounters will feature minor hurdles with enemies that will reflect your magic or give you a status effect if you attack them physically, but outside of that most encounters feel the same. The only real differences come down to the sprites. You either both attack or one of you heals. There are status effects to manage but there’s no buffs or nerfs. It’s very straightforward.

“This ATB system is so hard to figure out. I was browsing that old guy’s spells looking for meteor and some random bad guy called Red Eye swooped in and killed me while I was looking!”

True turn-based gameplay is back. So if you were getting sick of holding it in while you wait for battles to play out, you can once again tell your main character to act and then run out to the bathroom while everyone takes their turn. Given that you only have to put in your main protagonist’s commands if you’re on auto battle, this can lead to some very repetitive encounters. For a large portion of the game, I was just having my two characters attack. I know I said in my FF1-3 recaps that I spend most of my battles just physically attacking but at least there were four party members to choose from. Like if I wanted to attack enemies in other ways, I definitely had options. It felt a little more in depth.

“What’s the deal with all these status effects? How do I cure them? What’s the difference between confused and charmed?”

Status effects remain, but dealing with them is a little simpler than it was in the past. Up to this point, each status effect could be cured with a specific item. There was also the ‘cure all’ item, remedy. These are usually rare and expensive, so it encouraged the player to only use those in emergencies. Better yet, use Esuna! Forget items!

In MQ, there is only one item that heals status effects. It is pretty easily obtained and ensures that status effects will never really hamper your playtime unless you just outright ignore them for some reason. Which you can certainly do because I tackled the first major dungeon of the game poisoned for at least 3/4 of it. Your rotating secondary party member almost always has some white magic, so they’ll usually be able to heal you too. And if they can’t heal you, they’ll probably have the Life spell which will revive you. They also very generously make Life the equivalent to Full Life in Final Fantasy IV, i.e. you respawn with full health.

I will say that with two party members, encountering enemies that throw around status effects willy nilly can be slightly frustrating. There were a couple of times where both my party members were confused or asleep or something and I had to wait for the enemy AI to smack me before I could do anything. I also had a couple of unlucky battles where both of my fellas would get stoned right away, which is an instant game over. It doesn’t happen enough to be annoying but it does happen. Generally if you heal status effects as they come, it’s no big deal.

“Why are there so many spells? How do I know which one to use? Is Fire 2 better than Blizzard 2? Why does Fire need a sequel? It takes me forever to see my spells!”

Your total spell count is really low. Observe.

The spell book on the left is the main character’s magic and those 12 spells represent your entire catalogue. You have four white magic spells, four black magic spells and four wizard spells. For white magic you get Cure, Heal, Exit (for leaving dungeons) and Life. Black magic gets Quake, Fire, Blizzard and Aero. Wizard magic gets Thunder, White (holy, or as Kingdom Hearts fans know it as, Pearl), Meteor and Flare.

First, as you can see the magic charge system is back for some reason. I don’t understand the logic behind it because it’s far less user friendly than MP but whatever, maybe they were operating under the assumption that Americans were scared of big numbers not tied to their health pool. The game defaults to having a lifebar instead of HP numbers, you have to opt in to seeing more precise health statistics. Second, the limited number of spells really lowers the number of strategies you can use in battle. No buffs, no debuffs, just the basics on white magic. Black magic? In what could be described as a series tradition at this point (not counting IV), black magic isn’t very useful. There are some enemies with elemental weakness out there, but usually you can just hit them every bit as hard as you can magic them. It’s also really weird that the first spell you locate (we’re back to finding our spells, the main character can’t learn anything) is quake. Quake! That’s endgame shit! Well, not here, but you know what I mean. But there is another reason black magic isn’t useful.

Wizard spells just eat their lunch. It’s black magic but good. I have no idea why thunder was upgraded to a wizard spell away from its blizzard and fire brothers but good for it I guess. If you’re ever in an argument over which basic magic spell is the best one, I guess you can just point to Mystic Quest. Every single wizard spell hits hard. Yes, you have fewer magic charges for those, but they can get you through battles very quickly.

Now you might be thinking having fewer magic charges for wizard spells helps balance things. You might feel desperate enough to actually use quake or something! But no, because…

“This item conservation business is hard work. I run out of MP or mana or magic or whatever weird thing halfway through a dungeon and it sucks. Why can’t I just buy ethers easily? Rydia should be able to nuke at will. Also why are there like eight different potions? What’s the difference?”

MQ offers you the ability to purchase MP restorative items called seeds. Seeds are fairly cheap for how effective they are. You only need to spend something like 25GP to get one and there really isn’t much to spend your money on so it’s pretty easy to get a whole horde of them to carry you through the majority of the game.

By the time I unlocked White, which was immediately my best spell by a country mile because it targets every enemy and hits them for a respectable amount of damage, I basically exclusively used that ability. There was no reason not to because why would I conserve? Yeah I only had like four wizard spell charges but the second I run out, I can just pop some seeds and go right back to town. It makes battles go blazingly fast but it just lowers the already low difficulty level. I am not kidding when I say I barely used black magic. I do not think I ever ran out of black magic charges. Wizard charges though? Wewie brother, I was popping those seeds like mad to keep it up. I think by the end of the game I had eight charges, which felt luxurious. I could make it through eight battles without opening the item menu!

There are other consumable items, but just like with seeds, you don’t ever have to second guess using them. You only have one type of potion that cures something like 300 HP. They are littered all over the map and you can also buy them. You get bombs and arrows but around every other corner there is a treasure chest that contains 10 bombs or a merchant that will sell you a bomb for 10 GP. It’s so wild going from playing Final Fantasy I, a game that demands the player horde their items like some sorta dragon, to playing MQ, a game where you have such an embarrassment of riches that tossing out an item here or there just doesn’t matter. Nothing matters! Why I could say this is a commentary on the haves and have-nots in society but I don’t have enough brain power to activate a think piece like that.

“I keep getting lost. I don’t know where Mysidia or Myst or Riven or whatever is and it’s seriously driving me insane.”

The world map as you know it is completely gone. Instead, you get what looks like a Super Mario World map.

You just guide your little protagonist to the next area and go from there. You usually go to a town and talk to a bunch of NPCs and one of them will say something like “hey bro, go to the bone yard to get the earth crystal” and then a new map will open up for you to explore and you go from there. There’s no fear of getting lost or deciphering NPC dialogue to determine where certain towns are. I mean, as someone who gets lost all the time in real and fictional life, I certainly appreciate that there are people looking out for me. But this format really hampers this era of Final Fantasy where world exploration really feels like it’s part of the experience. A map of this style wouldn’t come around again until Final Fantasy X and X-2, where I feel it’s handled a lot better for what those games are going for.

Part of the leveling process of old Final Fantasy titles was running into random battles while you desperately searched for where to go next. Since that’s no longer the case, Square implemented 10 encounter long “battlefields” throughout the map. You just fight 10 battles, one at a time, and at the end you get an award…sometimes. Other times it’s just a bunch of EXP. So if you ever feel underleveled, just do those. I did them all because I hate myself and try to do every objective that comes across as long as it’s reasonable, but the average person can just skip these. I do not see ‘being underleveled’ as a problem many people will have with this game.

Probably the strangest part of this title is when at the very end you need to backtrack for an item called the Thunder Rock. Since you don’t need to get into an airship to fly to a different part of the world, you just move your character across the map city by city until you get to where you need to go. Then you go into the city, talk to the NPC, and then go back. There isn’t a boss battle, the NPC doesn’t give you any narrative, there’s no trick – you just get your item and that’s that. It takes like five minutes and I can’t understand the purpose of it. It’s like in a modern game when you need to flip a power switch but oh no! The power is out! You need to flow power to it in order for the switch to work! It just comes across as pointless padding.

“I never know when I’m going to get into a battle. Cecil will just be walking around and POW I’m in a fight. That’s so annoying, I’m just trying to become a Paladin.”

For the first time in the franchise, random battles are completely gone. Instead, you just see enemies on the world map. They are always in the same spot no matter what you do and they will always reload if you exit the dungeon or whatever you’re doing, but you can avoid excessive battles if you want to. Even though the implementation of encounters is kind of basic and makes the world feel very artificially created, it’s still nice to see this in a SNES Square game. They would later go on to do this better in Super Mario RPG. Really if you look at the basics of how this game operates and then compare it to Super Mario RPG, it’s very similar. One is just way better and actually did convince people to try this strange turn-based genre and the other is Mystic Quest.

For mainline Final Fantasy titles, non random encounters would not appear for quite a while. I don’t count XI in this because an MMO with random encounters seems absurd, so the first single player game you see this in is Final Fantasy XII. Encounters have been not-so-random since then. It’s interesting that they kept that staple of the franchise in for so long since other Square games like the aforementioned Mario RPG and Chrono Cross both ditched them.

“Why are there so many weapons here? Should Cecil use a sword? A bow? No weapons? It’s a little overwhelming.”

Early Final Fantasy games were pretty lenient with what they would allow your characters to use. With I and III it makes a lot of sense because those characters are just avatars for the player, but II and IV were pretty loose with it too. If you’re more familiar with later games in the franchise, you’ll know that they eventually migrated to a system where each character has a weapon dedicated to them. You can’t have Squall equip one of Quistis’s whips for example.

Mystic Quest dumbs this down to the point of just removing the ability to equip things entirely. Yes, you will find new weapons and armor, but they will just stack onto your character and replace what they had beforehand. If you get a sword upgrade, you can’t switch back to the old sword. You just have your new blade. Going to the equipment screen is just for reference. Your character has access to four weapons (sword, axe, a grappling hook-like thing and a bomb) and you can switch between them as much as you like by pressing R and L. In old Final Fantasy titles, flying enemies were often weak to bows but not very many other enemies had weaknesses related to physical attacks. That is not quite the case here, with multiple enemies having weaknesses to your various weapons. I would like to think this is to make up for how shallow the magic system is.

To me, the way this works comes across like an old Zelda game. I’m thinking Link’s Awakening here. You get your seashells and then you get your fancy new sword and the old one just vanishes. That works pretty well for a more action-focused game but in a turn-based RPG, I think it takes some of the player agency away. What if I wanted to have a challenge run and equip really weak items? I guess you could just avoid all treasure chests if you really wanted to but…oh who am I kidding, who the heck would try a challenge run of Mystic Quest?

“The overworld is so boring. All you can do is walk and talk to people. You can’t even swing your sword out there!”

Speaking of Zelda, I feel this part of Mystic Quest was probably designed with games like Zelda in mind. In the overworld, your character can take various actions. You can swing your sword or axe, you can blow up certain rock or bone formations with your bombs or you can use your grappling hook-like-thing to climb up walls. You can also jump! This leads to some dungeons having some very light puzzle elements. Combined with how massive some of these places are – seriously the dungeons here are about as long as Final Fantasy II’s and definitely longer than most of IV’s – you have some really annoying levels.

My least favorite was probably the ice temple. This might have been my emulator legal SNES playing tricks on me, but this was the one place in the game where random encounters were turned back on. Enemies were still stationary but I couldn’t see them, so it felt like an older game. That dungeon was like a giant maze where you had to jump carefully over things, fall down multiple floors and flick switches with your sword to open new paths. Combining that with the non-random battles, it was probably the most miserable I have felt playing one of these games so far. I was trying to figure out where the hell to go and then every fifth step I’d have to fight some battle and it’d really break the flow of things.

The jumping thing leads to some really unfun positioning puzzles that require you to leave the area and come back in some way. They aren’t hard by any means, but with the glacially slow walking speed it sure is annoying putting blocks in the right place. This game would have been a lot more tolerable if it kept things simple. But hey, it’s neat that jumping made its debut here. The next Final Fantasy title to try that was X-2 and it was in very limited quantities. You couldn’t jump on will until XV. No, MMOs do not count.

“This story is too wacky. Some moon guy hypnotized some guy named Golbez and also Golbez is your brother? A little kid fell into some weird dimension and aged into an adult? What the fuck is a Namingway? Also those fakeout deaths had me sweating.”

MQ is like a meeting ground between NES-style Final Fantasy storytelling and the FFIV style. The overall narrative is very straight forward – the crystals have been shut off and the world is fucked and you need to fix everything. You go to four distinct areas and fight your new version of the four fiends and then you find out the true master behind it all and deal with him. NPCs have more dialogue here than they do in the older games, but it’s more flavor text than anything.

You don’t actually learn anything about your character though, he’s just a plucky brave kid trying to save the day. There are no character arcs to be seen here, but your entire cast is still well more defined than the main cast of II I suppose. It’s not bad or anything like that, it’s just exceptionally dull. It feels like a giant step backwards from Final Fantasy IV.

Now you might remember IV had a lot of fakeout deaths. I would like to think this was based on feedback from Final Fantasy II, but whatever. Some characters are gone for hours of game time only to pop back later.

Here, there is exactly one time a character is seen to be in mortal danger. You’re walking along a bridge and some bad guys attack you. Your party member of the hour, Reuben, bravely sacrifices himself so you can escape. You aren’t even allowed to think he’s dead for a millisecond as the screen pans down so he can assure your protagonist that he’s okay and you just move on. Come on Reuben, the enemies in this area were kinda weak, I probably could have just cast White and finished them! There was no need for that kind of bravery!

“So if I lose and I didn’t save, that’s it? I lost hours of progress?”

Here is what the game over screen of Mystic Quest looks like:

If you click no, it just restarts the battle from the beginning. It’s a convenient feature because you will waltz your way into an accidental death or two, but it makes marching into any battle feel bereft of consequences. Going into battle and just mashing on the A-button over and over again will usually get the job done anyway, but if you blindly do it and get yourself killed, it’s cool. Just try again.

I think retries are fine. It’s just that this game is already so devoid of challenge that placing a little player inconvenience there wouldn’t really hurt. You can already save whenever you want, so even if you did die to a random battle, odds are you wouldn’t lose a whole lot of progress. Still, a feature like this is console generations ahead of its time. Very few games just send you back to the title screen anymore. It’s just a little weird to see such convenience in a 90s RPG for the SNES.

“That music sure kicks ass”

You’re damn right it does and I can say that Mystic Quest also has an excellent soundtrack. The main composer credited is Ryuji Sasai and he turns in a performance that is different from what you’d hear from Nobuo Uematsu, but is still one that you won’t want to mute.

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I’ve mentioned the walking speed very briefly before, but let me reiterate: it’s slow. Like, heinously so, to the point that I think most players would probably drop this game without utlizing an emulator’s fast forward function. If this game had a bad soundtrack, I truly believe most people would bail in order to play something a little more fast paced. The music here truly carries MQ and in some ways saves it. This is a game almost nobody talks about anymore and yet it earned a place in the most recent Theatrythm (Final Fantasy rhythm game) title. That’s impressive! I don’t think it’s a top-tier Final Fantasy OST by any means but it could have been so much worse. Like, have you played Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood? …If not, please don’t.

While I may have come off as slightly harsh on this game, please understand that there are things I do like about it. It’s not one of the worst games ever made, or even close to it really, but it’s painfully boring and slow. It feels like a weird missing link between the Famicom titles and Final Fantasy IV, even though it was released AFTER IV came out. The cover art does say “Entry-Level Role Playing Adventure” so I guess they do try to warn you a little bit.

Notable characters

For the playable characters, this title does not include character portraits like the mainline games do. So I grabbed character portraits from the instruction manual (thanks to the Final Fantasy wiki) so you could get an idea as to what your heroes are supposed to look like. The chibified character art is pretty common in the series up to this point, as seen in the Super Famicom cover for Final Fantasy IV.

I like that the art style can at least be tied to the original series.

Protagonist

Here is the very first screen you are greeted with in Final Fantasy: Mystic Quest

It starts out totally blank, implying that there is no true name for this fella. However, if you open the instruction manual, you will find out that his name is Benjamin. Very cool. I decided to just name him after myself, like any good middle schooler would do. “Benjamin” is the only character in the game that you get to name. So if you wanted a group of you and your best bros to take on the Dark King, well, too bad. I have referred to him as ‘the protagonist’ up to this point in this retrospective, so I will continue to do so. Though if I accidentally call him Benjamin, Benny, Ben or Benmothy…I apologize.

The journey starts with your main character’s village getting destroyed by an earthquake. A mysterious old man shows up and tells him that this is because a group of villains called the “Vile Four” stole the power of the crystals and locked up the Focus Tower, which is at the center of the world and basically brings everyone together.

The old man says that there is a prophecy that states a hero will show up and save the world and wouldn’t you know it, the old fella thinks you’re that hero. Exciting!

The protagonist is the only character you have complete control of for the entire game and yet he spends a lot of the game being outclassed by your other party members because they always join like five-or-so levels above what your protagonist currently is. This changes in the late game when your protagonist has the best magic, but until that point your buddies will often be more useful than you are. Some legendary hero! I guess he’s by far the most useful character by the end of things, so it all works out.

Kaeli

Early on in the game, the protagonist travels to the Level Forest – a bad name for one of the first areas in the game, made me think the fire area would be called Level Lava or something – and discovers it is in bad shape. He takes a withered branch and presents it to Kaeli who is something of a nature lover and vows to go to the forest and help you fix it. It’s unveiled that an evil minotaur is poisoning everything in the vicinity and he also poisons Kaeli, but that doesn’t stop her from helping you send the Minotaur packing to save the forest. She still collapses from all this and your main character must now focus on saving her! Wouldn’t you know it though, the cure for her illness is in the BONE DUNGEON which is also where your first crystal is. How about that! Her illness leads to one of my favorite exchanges in the game.

It gives me some serious “LOOK MOM IT’S A DIGIMON, IT’S NOT A POKEMON, THEY ARE DIFFERENT.”

Kaeli’s defining combat characteristic is that she has an axe. It makes her very useful against creatures of the forest, like evil trees, because they are weak to axes. She comes back later in the game with an even better axe to use against even more evil trees. Heck, you enter a giant tree during her return to root out the evil in th…wait a minute, did Ocarina of Time steal from Mystic Quest!?

I think they hint a couple of times about her having romantic feelings towards the protagonist, but I might have been trying to find a character where there wasn’t one.

Tristam

Your mandatory ninja companion! You meet him while trying to save Kaeli and he agrees to let you have the elixir if you help him clear out the BONE DUNGEON. This works out because, as I said, the earth crystal is there. He sells you explosives once you get there, which will go on to become one of the most important items in the game.

When you get your single fake death in the game, Tristam rejoins you very briefly. Like 20 minutes later you run into another character who says he might have found a treasure somewhere and Tristam immediately takes him at his word and fucks off for the rest of the game. Well until the credits. I had a good laugh at him leaving you at the mere suggestion of treasure though. Maybe this fella was inspiration for everybody’s favorite Final Fantasy ninja, Yuffie Kisaragi.

Tristam uses ninja stars, which are not an infinite resource. I never ever came close to running out of ninja stars so I don’t know what happens if you ever do, but the number ticks down every time you attack so I figure it’s worth noting. He teases you early on with a grappling hook only to just give you one for free later on, which is very nice of him.

Tristam is probably in your party less than any other character in the game and that probably makes him my favorite one. As they say, absence makes the heart grow fonder!

Phoebe

You meet Phoebe while you are trying to find your second crystal. Her hometown, Aquaria, has been frozen over because the water temple has been taken over by an evil Ice Golem in the Ice Pyramid. Killing the golem frees Aquaria. Phoebe is the character you probably have in your party the most, simply because she is your companion for the final boss of the game, the Dark King. You’d think it would give her more of a character, but no. The only thing you need to know about Phoebe is that she loves her town and that her grandfather likes to dig a lot.

From a gameplay perspective, Phoebe hits really hard with her arrows and has the highest magic stats in the game. She has access to a wizard spell in thunder, which is extremely useful when you recruit her. During the final stretch of the game, she gets access to the White spell and has 10 wizard charges which is really nice. But for me, she was basically just around to heal the protagonist if he got put under a status effect or something. He has access to more powerful skills, so even if his magic stats are technically weaker, he still is more valuable than Phoebe because Phoebe can’t cast flare.

She’s also your partner during the most annoying part of the game, which most definitely put her in a negative light in my eyes. I cannot stress how much I hated the Ice Pyramid.

Reuben

Your final party member! Hey you make four friends and the main bad guys are called “The Vile Four.” Do you think there’s a correlation there? Who can say. You meet Reuben when you’re trying to find the fire crystal. He tells you his dad knows where it is, but his dad is trapped behind a boulder somewhere and he needs your help to save him! So everyone wins by this alliance. Reuben is the first party member you get who doesn’t seem like he wants to ditch you, so the game invents a reason for him to ditch you by giving him the half-a-second fakeout death I mentioned above. How rude. He comes back later to help you reach the final dungeon but quickly leaves again.

Reuben hits really hard but his magic skills aren’t terribly useful. The first time you get access to him, the only spell he knows is Life. Life is handy in case an emergency happens, but it’s not something you would get a use out of in every encounter. He returns with White much later on, but much like Phoebe, by the time he returns to the protagonist, your main character is just too strong. He’s there to support and keep ya moving. By the end of the game, I was pretty ready for it to be over so maybe I’m being unfair to these guys, but if the protagonist can solo most everything so efficiently, why would I shake things up?

Spencer

When grabbing screens for this game, I forgot to grab some for characters I thought were important. Every single stinking picture of Spencer I have in my FINAL FANTASY: MYSTIC QUEST folder is from a side profile, the end of the game with the entire main cast that would be really weird to use here or from the back like this. So I went ahead and attached my favorite Spencer screen and just hastily placed front-facing Spencer on there. There might be one or two more guys I do this with. Plus I just love this dialogue exchange because Spencer just likes digging. Dudes rock, ya know?

Spencer is Phoebe’s grandfather. He is trying to dig a tunnel from underneath Phoebe’s hometown of Aquaria all the way to a lake where another important character, Captain Mac, is trapped. The goal of this is to get Aquaria’s water into the dried lake where Mac is stuck. A one man digging operation seems like the most efficient way to do this, sure. Unfortunately Aquaria is frozen over when you reach that area and Spencer is trapped down in his little tunnel. Not to worry, his plight is why Phoebe joins your party, so his suffering is your gain. When Spencer gets free, our good friend Tristam lures him away from his work with the promise of a treasure hunt. He bails and then in the best scene of the whole game, Phoebe gets frustrated and throws a bomb in an effort to complete the tunnel really quickly but this fails and just destroys this guy’s hard work.

Despite not really needing his zany tunnel anymore, he goes back to it at the end of the game to continue digging. Even though Spencer doesn’t get a ton of dialogue, he came across as a crazy old coot (kinda like FFIV’s take on Cid) to me and I found him very charming.

Arion

This Indiana Jones looking guy is Arion. He is Reuben’s father and a major reason why that particular rapscallion joins your party. Just like with Spencer, the crystals going haywire has trapped him somewhere. In Arion’s case, he’s trapped behind a boulder that can only be destroyed by mega grenades (an upgrade for your bombs that Tristam so nicely hooked you up with). Once you save him, he just tells you where the Fire Crystal is, which allows you to finish up your journey through the fire nation.

Arion is also the NPC that you have to visit for that garbage fetch quest I mentioned above regarding the thunder rock, so I am inclined to dislike him a little bit.

Otto

This guy’s full name is apparently Otto CID Bekenstein. That’s right, even Mystic Quest has a Cid! Now I didn’t encounter this anywhere in the game myself, but I read it online and I choose to believe it. It also makes sense because Cid is a mechanic which falls in line with every single incarnation of Cid ever up until this point.

Otto operates a machine that generates a rainbow road, which would help the party get to the wind crystal that is located in Pazuzu’s tower and doubles as a sick go-kart track. Pazuzu is one of the Vile Four, for the record. His daughter just so happens to be trapped there too, but unfortunately there is a lot of wind disturbance going around and his machine is broken so he tasks your crew with fixing that and then saving his daughter. He’s also involved with the thunder stone fetch quest I mentioned earlier, so I can’t say that I’m a fan.

Since this is the last time I’ll mention it, I’ll just explain it real quick. The thunder stone is used to power up the rainbow bridge machine so that the bridge extends to Spencer’s zany tunnel, which allows your party to get to Captain Mac and his boat, which then allows you to get to the end of the game. Cool? Cool.

Captain Mac

Mac is Kaeli’s father and goes on an expedition at the start of the game to learn more about the prophecy that states a warrior will take down the Vile Four and restore the crystals. Unfortunately while he is sailing, crystal shenanigans occur and his boat is stranded in a dry lake. Using the powered up rainbow machine, your protagonist proceeds to set off another bomb in Spencer’s place which floods the lake Mac’s boat is stuck in. Whenever you reach the captain, he informs you that there was more to the prophecy than anybody realized. He states that the true fiend behind this is someone who is commanding the Vile Four: The Dark King. You then can take his boat, head to Focus Tower and finish the game.

Mac is strange because I feel like the game talks a lot about him before he shows up, but when looking over my notes while writing this section, I have towards the end “I still don’t really know who Mac is.” He’s important because he unveils the mastermind of everything, but I’m not sure how everybody in the world knows who he is or why Spencer is trying desperately to save him. I guess all we need to know is 1. he’s an explorer 2. he’s Kaeli’s dad 3. he has found some neat information and 4. he gives you his boat.

White or "Mysterious old guy"

Throughout your journey to save the crystals and the world, a weird old guy will pop in and give you vague information and then go away. He seems to know a lot about the workings of this world and he shows up a lot to sort of guide you along. You might even briefly think that he knows too much, but at the end of the game the nature of the mysterious old man is revealed.

He’s a crystal! Like, you know, one of the tentpoles of the franchise at this point? Kind of an interesting idea for a character reveal because it makes sense that a crystal would be interested in saving the crystals, but I wish this idea had been explored in a Final Fantasy game that actually has an interesting narrative. Wait…I activated and rescued all four crystals. How could he contact me while deactivat-

The title screen hinted at this. Five crystals! It’s right there! Well played.

The Vile Four

The Four Fiends return again and just like in the Famicom titles, they even come back from the dead at the very end of the game as part of a little boss gauntlet during the final dungeon. In the above compilation, the original bad guy is on the left while the revived one is on the right. The little fella in the middle is the overworld sprite of the original encounter. The final dungeon is probably my favorite dungeon of the game because it reminds me of Hyrule Castle in Ocarina of Time. What I mean by that is it’s comprised of tiny bite-size portions of the major dungeons you’ve encountered so far. This part of the game is pretty straight forward, so even the annoying ice pyramid isn’t so bad when it only lasts two screens. I’m just a sucker for when a game puts you through a microcosm of itself. It’s a trip down memory lane!

As for the boss fights themselves? They all kind of run together. The only one that requires any strategy is Pazuzu because there is a brief period during battle where he will counter your magic abilities. It is one of the few times the game outright forces you to ‘strategize’ so it stands out. The rest are just ‘cast a big spell and heal’ so I will take what I can get.

The Dark King

Here’s the final boss of the game. He’s the only baddie in MQ with multiple forms. He has four of them and in the little grid above they are ordered clockwise starting in the top left. There doesn’t seem to be any differences in the four forms as far as combat goes, so just look at it as a way to tell your progression. My favorite one is his second form because he looks like a poor man’s Gilgamesh from other Final Fantasy titles. Just like every other non-Pazuzu boss, all you need to do is hit him hard and heal and you’ll be fine. Somehow he is harder than the final boss of Final Fantasy II, but to be fair I used a blood sword when dealing with that boss so I might have had an unfair advantage.

As our good friend Captain Mac told us, the Dark King is the one behind everything. He’s the key to all of this. He has basically no personality outside of “boss of the bad guys.” It’s not quite a Necron situation because you’re explicitly told he’s the main bad guy by Mac before the final dungeon even starts and wait shouldn’t White have told you about him? He should know about this guy! Oh whatever. He’s evil and you need to kill him. Simple as that.

It started here

I’m not going to pretend later Final Fantasy games pilfered ideas from Mystic Quest, but I still wanted to point a couple of things out. Think of these as an early cameo.

No overworld, retries instead of a game over

Both mentioned above. The no overworld thing is interesting because every mainline Final Fantasy title would have one until Final Fantasy X. Then they just kinda vanish until Final Fantasy XV. That’s not to say other SquareSoft titles evaded an overworld, the other beginner friendly Square title Super Mario RPG also chose to go with a level select screen, but it’s definitely interesting to see a SNES title with Final Fantasy branding just not have that.

Battle damage

I would like to think focus groups were bothered by how you just can’t tell how much health random enemies have (without casting magic that explicitly tells you), so their solution to this problem was having enemies have different sprites based on how much health they have. It’s fun when you one-hit a bad guy because their battle damaged form will pop up very briefly before they vanish entirely. It’s actually admirable how they gave every enemy multiple sprites because not even later Final Fantasy games do that, usually the only characters to show a ‘weakened’ state are boss monsters. Going back to Final Fantasy X, a lot of bosses show fatigue when they’re close to going down but I can’t think of a single regular encounter that has enemies acting differently when they’re about to die. Mighta been kinda nice for when you’re fighting Sand worms or a Zu, ya know?

My favorite sprite in the game is the werewolf as seen above (you thought I forgot about that in my character recap? hah!) He’s CLEARLY waving a white flag. He’s surrendering to you! And yet the protagonist must wail away on him anyway to get that sweet EXP. My second favorite is the little Edgehog because it looks like he got a bad haircut. It’s cute.

Bosses have multiple damage sprites, which helps give character to those battles and helps those characters stand out from the rank-and-file. Hey man, the battles themselves aren’t that interesting so they gotta do something, right? The Dark King seems to eschew battle damage to give you forms, which I think is a poor substitution because it just makes the Dark King stand out as the only bad guy in the game who doesn’t show proof of your prowess.

Spin-offs

Now you might try to take me to task by claiming that Final Fantasy Legend or Final Fantasy Adventure count as the first spin-off titles but I disagree. Those were SaGa and Mana games that got rechristened so a North American audience might be willing to try something new. Mystic Quest, from the ground up, was designed to be a Final Fantasy spin-off title. It may not be the greatest game ever, but there are roughly 83,000,000 Final Fantasy spin-off titles now and this is where they start.

Before you ask, no, I’m not going to do retrospectives on every Final Fantasy spin-off game. The only other one I plan on doing right now is Final Fantasy Tactics. I will be doing select sequels (like X-2), but I don’t consider those spin-offs. I chose to recap Mystic Quest because it was the first major spin-off title and it is also what Westerners got instead of Final Fantasy V.

In conclusion

This is likely a game many people wouldn’t even bother with (myself included) if the words FINAL FANTASY were missing from the title. It’s a game that would probably be forgotten to history if it wasn’t for those two simple words. It’s not absolutely horrible by any means, it’s just dull and forgettable. A middling title in a sea of more interesting Super Nintendo games.

I think if Square’s aim was to get Western children into RPGs, this was a bad way to do it. They would eventually figure it out with Super Mario RPG, but I don’t think a playthrough of Mystic Quest would convince anybody to try out Final Fantasy IV or the relatively soon-to-be-released Final Fantasy VI.

#Final Fantasy #Final Fantasy: Mystic Quest #Final Fantasy retrospectives #video games #vidya thoughts #opinion #super nintendo #squaresoft #square enix #retro gaming

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bethanythebogwitch · 7 months

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Intro to Digimon

In my previous posts about Digimon, particularly my overview of all aquatic Digimon species, I god some comments from people who liked the designs and were curious about the franchise, but didn't know much about it. I decided to write this introduction to let people know more about the basics of the franchise and give suggestions for where to start if they're interested.

What is Digimon?

Digimon is a Japanese multimedia franchise owned by Bandai that focuses on the titular creatures. It is a monster collection franchise that started as a series of virtual pets. Think Tomagatchis aimed for young boys who like their virtual pets to be badass monsters. Digimon media includes virtual pets, toys, a variety of video games, a trading card game, multiple animes, mangas, and more. Unlike some other franchises, Digimon exists in a multiverse with most games, mangas, and animes existing independently from each other. Each setting can follow its own rules and variations of the lore and universe, though most follow some common rules. The Digimon Reference Book lists official Digimon species and gives setting-neutral lore for them. Many entries in the franchise involve the bonds between humans (known as tamers) who bond with one or more Digimon and go on adventures together.

Ok, but what is a Digimon?

Digimon, short for Digital Monsters, are creatures born from data and exist within Earth's internet and computer systems. While born from computer data, most settings say that Digimon are more than just AIs and possess souls and free will. A few newer entries in the franchise say that Digimon have existed since long before the internet and computers and data are just the most recent method humans use to interact with and influence them. Digimon come from the Digital World, a world that exists within the network but is also often depicted as being another dimension parallel to Earth. It can be thought of as a universe influenced by data, but that exists on its own. Again, each setting will have its own take on the Digital World. The Digital World is often depicted as being maintained and ruled over by a supercomputer named Yggdrasil or King Drasil. Other entries (usually early in the franchise) say that their Digital World is ruled by an enigmatic God heavily based on the one of Christianity who may be a human programmer.

There are many species of Digimon that can evolve through a series of levels. When evolving to a new level, a Digimon will change species. How similar Digimon are to humans varies depending on setting. In many, Digimon do not reproduce on their own, instead new Digimon are born from new data. While individual Digimon can appear masculine or feminine, different settings will differ on whether Digimon have sexes or genders. In most settings, Digimon who die will have their data reconfigured into a Digitama (Digi-egg), allowing for a form of reincarnation. Whether or how much Digimon can remember from past lives depends on the setting.

Each species has an attribute. The attributes are Vaccine, Virus, Data, and Free. These attribute comes form how the species behaves and affects the Digital world. Vaccines benefit the Digital World, Viruses harm it, and Datas have no real effect either way. Free attribute Digimon are rare and don't fit any other category. Generally speaking, Vaccine Digimon are good, Viruses are evil, and Datas are neutral. This isn't set in stone and it's perfectly possible to have a villainous Vaccine, heroic Virus, or Data that leans either way. Attributes in some of the games also have a rock-paper-scissors lineup where Vaccine beats Virus beats Data beats Vaccine. Free is neutral to everything.

Evolution

Evolution, dubbed in English as Digivolution, is the process by which Digimon grow stronger and reach new levels. The levels, listed in Japanese/English are Baby I/Fresh, Baby II/In-Training, Child/Rookie, Adult/Champion, Perfect/Ultimate, and Ultimate/Mega. Some entries have an addition level called Super Ultimate/Ultra. Yes, the fact that Ultimate is used for two different levels in different languages has caused quite a bit of confusion. Another from of evolution is Jogress(join+progress)/DNA Digivolution. This occurs when two or more Digimon will merge to become a new Digimon of a higher level. Related to evolution is mode changes. A Digimon that mode changes will change to a new form, but does not actually change level (with a few exceptions). Mode changes are denoted by adding the name of the mode to the Digimon's name. An example of a mode change is Jupitemon mode changing to Jupitermon Wrath Mode.

Evolution in Digimon is much more varied and open-ended than in other franchises like Pokemon. In many of the the video games and especially the virtual pets, Digimon will have multiple possible evolutions that are not necessarily thematically related to each other. Evolutions are not necessarily mutually exclusive. Multiple different species of one level could evolve to the same Digimon of the next level. Digimon can also evolve back to a lower level and not necessarily to the same species they started as. An example is Agumon (a little orange dinosaur) evolving to Centalmon/Centarumon (cyborg centaur), then evolving backwards to Patamon (flying hamster). Many species have a "default" through line that is considered the standard for that species. These default lines are usually either designed to be thematically consistent with each other through every level or were depicted in one of the animes or mangas. Non-virtual pet and game media, such as the animes and mangas, usually give Digimon much more linear evolution lines with few if any branches.

Evolution often work differently between wild Digimon and those with tamers. Wild Digimon cannot evolve freely. As they live and battle, they will gain experience and power until they evolve to the next level. Once at a new level, they stay there until gaining enough power to evolve again or being wounded badly enough to be forcibly reverted to a prior level but not enough to be killed. Digimon partnered with a tamer will instead stay at a default level, usually Child/Rookie, but can evolve to a higher one with help from their partner. These evolutions are temporary and the Digimon will eventually revert to its default form.

Where do I start?

If you're looking for a way into the franchise, there are a few options. If you want to start with an anime I suggest Digimon Adventure (original, not reboot), Digimon Tamers, or Digimon Ghost Game. Adventure is the original anime and one of the few that goes for more than one season. Adventure is followed up by Digimon Adventure 02, a few movies, Digimon Adventure Tri, Digimon Adventure Last Evolution Kizuna and the upcoming Digimon Adventure 02 the Beginning. Adventure set the standard for how most Digimon stories work. It features a cast of human children, each with a Digimon partner, being lost in the Digital World and going through adventures as they encounter villains and try to figure out how to get home. It is heavy on plot and character development and is a lot of fun. Digimon Tamers was the first anime not set in the Adventure universe and goes into darker and more adult themes while still being fun. It's a lot of people's favorite season for a good reason. Be aware that the english dubs for Digimon Adventure through Digimon Tamers added a lot of jokes and other silliness that weren't in the original. The dubs are very hit or miss and pretty contentious in the fandom. I like them personally, but watch the one you prefer. Digimon Ghost Game is the most recent season and thus you will find a lot of people still talking about it. It is more focused on monster of the week episodes than running plotlines and has a strong horror vibe. Ghost Game, like many recent entries in the franchise, is aimed toward adults who were fans of the series as kids.

If you want to start with a game, I suggest one of the ones on Steam as they're easily available in English. Steam has Digimon Story Cyber Sleuth, Digimon Survive, and Digimon World Next Order. Cyber Sleuth is an RPG that is probably the best entry point for people familiar with the Pokemon games as they function similarly. You catch and assemble your dream team of Digimon as you evolve them through higher levels and move through the story. Digimon Survive is a hybrid visual novel and tactical RPG which tells a more horror-based version of the classic "kids trapped in the Digital World" story. Your choices in the game affect the outcome and there are 4 different endings. The true route and ending is only unlocked on a new game + so play it twice. Next Order is a real-time RPG where you raise a pair of Digimon from egg to final form repeatedly as you move through the story and unlock new forms.

If you want to start with a virtual pet, the current one available is the Vital Bracelet BE. It is a fitbit-style health-tracking bracelet that pairs with an app and allows you to raise Digimon, with more exercise giving you better results. The VB has multiple DIM cards with more coming out regularly. Each DIM card unlocks new Digimon and evolution lines.

If you just want to see the different species and read their lore, there are two wikis: wikimon.net and the Digimon Wiki on fandom.com. I prefer wikimon. Wikimon uses Japanese terminology while the Digimon Wiki uses English terminology.

#digimon #introduction #introductory post #beginner's guide

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futuresconnected · 5 months

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Dec. 17th 2023: Yakuza Kiwami and Granblue Fantasy Versus

Happy Sunday everyone, and welcome to my inaugural journal entry in this project! Lets get into it.

First up! Over the last few weeks I have been playing through Yakuza Kiwami, the 2016 remake of 2005's Yakuza by Ryu Ga Gotoku Studios. I am still very much new to this franchise, but by the nature of being in and around many internet spaces that talk about Japanese games, I have come to know Kazama Kiryu (the main character of most of these games) as if he were a friend of my own.

I played the 7th game in the series, Like A Dragon, back when it came out in 2020, having played at that point half of Yakuza 0 in 2018 and enjoying my time with it even if I fell off and only just recently went back to it. I loved my time with Like a Dragon, and felt that despite a lot of the growing pains of that franchise moving from action-based to turn-based gameplay, RGG really had something on their hands with their new protagonist and game structure. However, I sure was missing a LOT of context, half-remembering playthroughs of Yakuza 4 watched on Youtube and the half-explained recaps of the other games that game provided. With that, I am endeavoring to make my way through this series before I play the upcoming Infinite Wealth. I have absolutely no aspirations to do it all before that game comes out, I think trying to shove six relatively similar games into a few months would be a fools errand, but I am setting a goal for myself to try and get through them all in the next year.

So after finally finishing my 5-year (on and off) playthrough of Yakuza 0 recently, I kept the momentum up and immediately booted up Kiwami. Without knowing much of what has been changed or updated from its original incarnation, my main thoughts at this point are that I am enjoying the combat in the game more than I expected, but I find that this game has a bit less of the heart of 0, at least as far as the substories are concerned. I feel that there were more memorable side characters and side plots in that game than in this one, while the main plot is still full of that same deeply dramatic goodness that I found in 0 and Like A Dragon.

However there are still some heavy hitters to be found in the side cast! The one that has been sticking in my mind strongly is the story of Rina, one of the cabaret club girls that Kiryu can "date" in this game. Rina comes out the gate swinging by letting Kiryu know that the main reason she took the job of cabaret hostess is because she's gay and gets to spend all her time surrounded by cute girls, while Kiryu (friend to all) is a bit confused but ultimately enjoys helping her sort out the joys and frustrations that she experiences as she tries her best to put herself out there and date some ladies.

Her story really gets to the heart of what I have enjoyed about these games so much, and what makes Kiryu such a fun character to play. For as much time as he spends in the criminal underworld avoiding death at every turn, he's just as happy to make a new connection and do his best to help them get (or keep) their life on track as best he can. (Its also very funny that despite the above screenshot, you do get a gravure video of her as a reward at the end anyway, video games!)

My main other thoughts on this game are that I'm enjoying finding Majima around the city and beating him up, and the character progression feels pretty good once you get the ball rolling on new Heat Moves, more health and meter, and all that good stuff. I think I still feel that the combat in these games is distinctly OK, especially when I've played plenty of other combat-based RPGs that felt much tighter, more intuitive, and satisfying to pull off. However, seeing Kiryu absolutely beat the shit out of someone in a new way when you get a new Heat Move is always going to be fun, that ain't going away.

I'm a bit over halfway done with the main plot of the game, sitting in chapter 8 of 12 or so, and I'm certainly not going to try and go for full completion, but I plan to hit up the Pocket Circuit and do more of those quests, as well as getting more of the Dragon Style moves back from Majima's old mentor in West Park, so please look forward to my continuing adventures in this game.

FGC Corner!

I'll be wrapping up each week with a brief look at how things are going in my journey to be a competent player of Fighting games.

As we speak I am a Plat 3 Cammy in Street Fighter 6, the result of months of hard work and daily play, and I can see the path ahead of me to keep up that grind. The goal is to get to Diamond and eventually Master Ranks, and attend my first National Major at Combo Breaker 2024.

But for now there's a new guy on the scene, and his name is Siegfried.

This guy has everything I want, which is mostly heavy armor and a big-ass sword to swing around! I've been greatly enjoying Granblue Fantasy Versus Rising, and can already feel that this is gonna be a game i'm gonna devote some serious time to. I'm gonna start by learning Siegfried here, and also want to spend some time learning Cagliostro and Narmaya, two other characters that are in new archetypes for me. It's a real saucy game, and I can't wait to see how it develops!

That's all for now, thanks for reading through this. Let me know if you have any thoughts you'd like to share, and I'll see you next week!

#futuresconnected #dec 2023 #ryu ga gotoku #kazuma kiryu #granblue versus

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eri-blogs-life · 1 year

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Fire Emblem: How Engaging Really Is It?

Fire Emblem: Engage has been out for two weeks now, and I just finished my first playthrough, and I figured it captured my attention enough that I wanted to write up some of my thoughts about it on my blog. And that’s what this post you’re reading now is! :o

So, first off, I am not gonna avoid spoilers, if anyone cares about that, just as a heads-up.

Second off, tl;dr: if you don’t wanna read what’s probably gonna end up being a lot of paragraphs about this game, then here’s my short answer: It’s a good game! Probably one of the best games in the fire emblem series... in certain respects. But it’s also got some big issues which may not be issues for everyone but which did cause me to have a hard time getting into the game at the beginning. If you want to know whether I’d recommend it, I’d say it’s absolutely worth picking up if you have liked any other FE games before, but as an entry to the series I think Three Houses is probably a better first pickup on the Switch.

Alright, so let’s break it down. Broadly speaking, I think the game is really good. It also serves as a nice love letter to past fire emblem games without overdoing the callbacks

But let’s start with probably the most obvious aspect of the game, the aesthetics:

(Alear, the protagonist of FE: Engage)

The main character of FE:E is Alear. Alear has very striking features. And mind you, there is an understandable story reason for it. (As you might guess, basically she lies halfway between two states of being in the story and so that’s represented by her blend of red and blue.) (Also, you CAN play as a male Alear instead but I play with female avatars and will likely continue to refer to Alear as a she throughout cause that was my primary experience with Alear in my playthrough.) (Also also, my friend mentioned they might’ve colored her red and blue specifically because as a reference to the switch’s default joycon controllers? But IDK about that.)

Toothpaste-chan, as Alear was affectionately called by the community after her original reveal (among other nicknames), has a very striking design with those two colors mixed like that. It looks weird as heck at first glance, and continues to look weird as heck throughout the game. But you get used to it.

As I understand it, the Fire Emblem team hired a notable japanese visual artist who’s done a lot of vtuber designs before, so when Alear was first revealed people were all “oh you can TELL this was made my someone into vtubers” (said in a derogitory kinda way), which does kinda suck. It’s a real offputting design at first, but it also is a design that kinda works in a nice way to capture a big part of what Alear IS. Alear is the bridge between Good and Evil within the setting and story of Engage, at least to some degree - the bond that draws together people from all over the wartorn world to unite together and work as one.

Though, if we look at that as a piece of political commentary it gets kinda weird. Alear unites all the people of her world to fight against a common threat, the evil Lord Sombron, but that threat is revealed to come from outside the world. He’s a foreign entity and Alear as the hero units the people of her part of the multiverse to kill that guy who came from elsewhere. But I guess they do also ally themselves with the Emblem, people from other worlds, so it probably is more intended as a story to be about fighting for the world alone vs together.

(Vander, one of the early characters, when you speak to him in your hub area)

The other characters of Fire Emblem: Engage range from being relatively mundane in their appearances, to even more out there than Alear. And a lot of the really weird designs are front-loaded, and relegated to story-significant characters (looking at you, Timerra).

And... I get that. From a character design perspective, you want your main characters of your story to really stand out and stay in people’s minds, as well as making them easy to identify what they’re all about at a glance. And Engage’s designs certainly do stick in your mind! BUT not all for good reason.

The game also puts a lot of the weirder characters early in the story, and the story early on really isn’t all that strong, being a kinda generic forgettable adventure until about a third of the way through the game, but I’ll get to the story later.

I REALLY dislike a lot of the character designs in Engage (and I really like a lot of the others), but I’m absolutely willing to put up with the weird ones. Because...

(The greatest Override I have ever or will ever accomplish)

Fire Emblem: Engage’s gameplay is AMAZING. As a long-time Fire Emblem fan, who’s been into the series since it came to America in the GBA era and has played every game save for a couple of the older ones, I have to say... FE:E may be my new favorite game in terms of gameplay. There’s a decent variety of maps, lots of mechanics both old and new that blend together really well, lots of different objectives on maps both required and not, which push you in different directions and do what I think any good strategy game should do - make every turn its own puzzle, custom-built by the decisions you and your opponent (the computer) have made over the course of a fight.

The big new mechanic is obviously Engaging - there are twelve Emblems (kind of? There are twelve main ones, but then there’s also like some shenanigans late in the story that change it up, plus you can also get extra emblems from the DLC too). These Emblems are heroes from previous Fire Emblem games, though within the world of Engage, those emblems are known to be something like effigies of the spirits of heroes from another world - not the hero themself, but a representation of them. During combat, characters who have an emblem’s ring equipped can Engage.

This mechanic lets them fuse with the emblem to become something new, getting a new costume and new abilities. The new abilities a character gets depends both on which emblem they’re using, and how strong their bond with that emblem is, with bond being mostly built up from fighting together in previous fights. Bond can also be built up with training in the Arena, or with another new mechanic you can do in your home base area, the Somniel.

You know that mechanic that got cut from Fire Emblem Fates where you would invite allies to your home base and you would have to pet them with the touch screen and that would increase your relationship with them? Engage has something like that, but it feels even creepier somehow, and this one didn’t get cut for censorship reasons

(Technically, there’s nothing perverted about this scene, but it still feels off)

You can have different characters polish the rings, thus increasing their bond. But it’s a mini game where you have to move the cursor around and press A to polish, and the emblem gives you words of encouragement along the way and it just feels... off. It feels perverted somehow. I don’t know that I can elaborate how or why, but it is one of many Somniel activities I just stopped doing entirely like 2/3 of the way through the game.

There were a lot of those.

Like in a few recent FE games, you have a base that you can run around between missions, called the Somniel. In the Somniel you can eat meals with your team to increase your supports and get buffs for the next fight, work out to get Alear temporary buffs for the next fight, farm animals to get eggs and stuff (or exclusively ingots once you realize putting dogs on your farm gets you ingots), and all kinds of other activities. Honestly, it just got to be too much for me. I was spending way too much time in the Somniel and not doing the fun strategic puzzle gameplay that I WANT to be getting up to in a game like this.

So eventually I just stopped polishing rings, eating meals, and just about anything else. I’d just come back to the Somniel between missions to restock on healing items, inherit any emblem skills I had finally unlocked for a character, and check out any new Bond and Support conversations.

The Bond conversations, between characters and emblems, are all pretty lame. They’re usually a two-sentence back-and-forth, with just some pleasentries exchanged that don’t really say much about either character in the exchange. Supports are better than that, at least. A lot of them feel really light, though, in my opinion. Short. And they are REALLY poorly animated, using a lot of repeat stock character animations that don’t feel like they fit the mood of the scene at all.

But, to be fair, there are definitely some cool characters in the game, and even if the support conversations feel kinda short, and even if their designs visually sometimes leave a lot to be desired.

(one of the bests of the bests in terms of characters in this game)

One big appeal about the Fire Emblem formula definitely is digging into the personal lives of all your characters and learning about what makes them all tick and what they get up to outside of the ongoing war, and even if most characters will appear on the surface to be pretty tropey and one-note, being just a class and a gimmick, supports usually flesh those characters out into being much stronger characters overall. And Engage certainly does a decent bit of that, in my opinion.

One aspect I really liked about a lot of older FE games was seeing how a character’s supports you’d built over the game changed their ending in the epilogue. Unfortunately, Engage doesn’t seem to have any characters pair up if you max out their supports in the ending, at least as far as I saw on my first playthrough, which is a bit disappointing. Like, I think Celica and Alcryst would make a great couple, for example.

But you can get a special relationship with a character of your choosing and your protagonist in this game, which is pretty cool. And you can be gay!

(i obviously married best girl Yunaka. my assassin wife <3)

(there’s even unique CGs for which character you marry, apparently! which means I’m going to have to replay a bunch of times to see all of them I guess lol)

And that’s cool. Cause relationships is definitely a big part of Engage. Not just romantic relationships, though. Bonds, Supports, the Pact Ring (the marriage item), they’re all part of trying to tie into what seems to be the narrative core of the game:

At least, that seems to be the narrative core of the game once you get up to the final battle. Before that... well, I didn’t really pick up on any specific themes that really felt strong up until you get to that last third or so of the story.

But yeah, let’s talk about that story a little.

Fire Emblem: Engage’s story is definitely FUN, I’ll say that. It starts off really weak, though. The first third or so of the game is fairly slow, mostly just introducing you to the world and a lot of the major characters, but having a fairly generic story about going to fight against some guys who stole your cool rings from you. Which isn’t necessarily a bad story on its own, but its execution does feel like it leaves a lot to be desired.

(Also, quick side note, in like the second chapter Alear’s mom dies, but because of the way the story’s set up neither us nor Alear really got much time to spend with her, so what feels like it SHOULD be a big dramatic moment in the story rings REALLY hollow as the player. Like, why is Alear crying over someone she basically met, like, yesterday?)

But things really pop off about a third of the way through the story, when we start getting some good character development from Alear. Alear starts out fairly bold and confidant, but gets her ass handed to her about a third of the way through the story, and we get to see her rebuild up her army and her confidence.

And about two-thirds of the way through the story, we get some reveals about the nature of the world, and things really start to pop off. This is when it goes from being a solid story that’s enjoyable as a backdrop for the amazing gameplay, to being a point where I was REALLY invested in the story.

And then we go to what is basically a fucking meteor in space and fight an epic final battle against a dragon and it’s amazing

(Sombron, the big bad, summons Dark Emblems that represent the big bads of previous games, but they’re subtle enough as references that it feels like a nice nod to past games while still letting Engage do its own thing. This also makes the final fight into a really cool puzzle challenge of its own that isn’t just all about wailing on a lonely old guy)

(Also, if you do Game Over during the final fight - which is hard to do since you can normally use your Time Crystal to reset to a previous turn of the fight - you actually get a Bad Ending, which surprised me when I was expecting to just go back to the title screen)

So... I think that sums up most of my core thoughts. Here’s just another fun set of screencaps I took. I started the game taking like <10 minutes per map:

Then through the midgame I took roughly 30-50 minutes per map, until we get to the final fight:

Almost 2 hours. Damn.

Anyway, I think I gotta wrap this up. I enjoyed the heck out of my time with Engage, even if it felt really weak at the start. I’m looking forward to my next playthrough, just gotta decide what to do with that playthrough (maybe if I can do the new tumblr polls I’ll make one of those).

I’ll just end it with one last screencap. My feelings for Engage overall I think:

#eri blogs games #fire emblem #fire emblem engage

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