AstroTheGamosian

@jesse_dylan Eh, I wouldn't know. I don't know how bad the situation is in Japan, but I know that I can never seem to get in with any doctors to save my life here in the U.S., even when I really need to, such as if I am sick.

If that ends up happening, I have to go to an urgent care clinic and wait for several hours in the waiting room before finally seeing someone. The only way I can ever see someone in a timely manner is if I get to the urgent care clinic right when they open, but even then, there will be a line of people.

To be honest, I have mixed opinions on this. On the one hand, it's nice that they're giving their employees the day off to play the game. On the other hand, what if someone desperately needed to be seen by a chiropractor, and this clinic was the only one in the area? Should a patient be made to suffer agonizing pain just because people want to play a game?

Personally hoping for Amy Rose or Rouge the Bat.

Or, if they want to delve into the Archie Comics series, Sally Acorn. Never did like how that storyline was rebooted and then abruptly cancelled in favor of a new storyline by IDW Comics. I so badly wanted to see Sonic defeat Eggman once and for all, restore Sally to her original form, and then finally have the two of them get married and live happily ever after.

@anubisvel I second that. A recent example of this is Stellar Blade for the PS5. The gameplay was fun and challenging, but the story was frankly generic: humanity trying to reclaim Earth from monsters that have overrun the planet, and you have to defend the last bastion of humanity from these monsters.

About the only thing I didn't see coming was that the monsters were actually former humans themselves, mutated into grotesque forms out of a need for sheer survival, and what you think are humans are actually advanced androids whose creator and deity (which was itself created by humans) declared war on humanity for unknown reasons.

Now, don't get me wrong: the story has a lot of potential. But I think they need to delve into more existential topics, such as what it means to be human. Maybe if they ever decide to make a sequel, they can flesh out the story a bit more. Here's hoping.

I've been saying for the last few years or so that the most important aspect of any video game is the story and world-building. Gameplay is also very important, but it's the story that really sets is apart from the rest of each game's respective genre.

Frankly, my favorite Zelda games are the ones with a rich, in-depth story. Twilight Princess tops that list, because its story is so deep and complex, but balanced it out with the gameplay. It's the only Zelda game I ever care to go back to. That is the kind of direction I would love to see Nintendo take the series again.

Outside of Nintendo, the big reason why I love Genshin Impact so much is because of its story. It has a deep, rich lore, a mystery waiting to be unraveled, and that story is always expanding with each new update. Even their flagship events have a story attached to them. If anything, I like it more than Zelda now because of that.

I also love Shantae much for the same reason. Despite being a Metroidvania series (and those are a dime a dozen), it created its own unique world and lore, the characters are fun and memorable, and there are twists and turns in the plotline for each game, making it fun to learn where the story is going.

Similarly, Undertale draws heavy inspiration from the Mother series in terms of gameplay, but it created its own unique world, and we ended up coming to care for the major characters in the game like they were our own friends.

So I must respectfully disagree with Aonuma-sensei here. Story is vitally important to any game, maybe more so than the gameplay itself. If you don't have a good story with the game, people will eventually get bored with it.

@AmyTheBrawler Actually, from what I heard, she was 16 when Star Fox Adventures was still known as Dinosaur Planet, but when the game was reworked into a Star Fox game, they bumped up her age to 19, making her a legal adult at that point. She'd then be 20 by the time the events of Assault rolled around, and about 22 by the time the events of Command happened.

That being said, there is still a seven-year age gap between the two of them, because Fox was 18 years old in the events of 64; and since eight years passed between the events of 64 and Adventures, he would be 26 in Adventures, 27 in Assault, and 29 in Command.

And according to Dylan Cuthbert, none of the endings are canon, because the game takes place in an alternate timeline. However, the 261st issue of Nintendo Power stated that the default ending, The Anglar Emperor, is the canon ending.

Personally, I hated that that had to be the default ending. I would have preferred the one where she and Fox got married and had Marcus, the one where Krystal rejoined the team along with Amanda, or the one where they all celebrated their victory and Fox and Krystal worked reconciled.

We'll see if Nintendo decides to make another game, though. I don't know if they will, considering Zero was a commercial flop (selling less than half a million copies) and got mixed reviews over its wonky control scheme. Star Fox 2 doesn't count, in my opinion, because it was completed back in 1995 but never released until 2017, and was more or less included as a bonus on the Super NES Classic Edition.

But if they did make something that served as a sequel to Assault, they need to go bigger in terms of the main villain. Maybe something like a dark matter entity that threatens all of existence. Gameplay-wise, maybe do something similar to Starlink: Battle for Atlas, but also include gameplay modes like that in Assault (i.e., on-foot and Landmaster).

Now we just need the Zelda expansion, the Metroid expansion, the Star Fox expansion, etc. Personally, I think it would be really cool if they did an Arwing flight simulator and a VR experience in the style of Metroid Prime.

My girlfriend will be happy to hear this. She has Android and is having trouble starting the app. I have an iPhone, so I have no trouble.

I actually got to meet her in 1996 and got a Little Mermaid book signed by her (Ariel Finds Treasure). Sadly, since I was only three years old at the time, I don't remember it.

Little fun fact, though: she personally knows my mother and aunt, since they all went to the same university together (Millikin University in Decatur, Illinois). She and my aunt were even in the drama club together!

In fact, that's how we met: she was speaking at an event, mentioned her university, and my mother shouted, "Go Big Blue!" Jodi got all excited, asked who was from Millikin, and my mother said her maiden name. Jodi asked if she was related to my aunt, to which my mother confirmed, and Jodi said that she wanted to talk to us after the event.

I'd love to meet her again, ask her if she remembers that encounter, and tell her that I am now interested in voice acting myself.

@AmyTheBrawler Yeah. I'd also love a remake of Adventures that adds in the cut content (such as rescuing Krystal halfway through the game and being able to play as her, but also fighting General Scales).

But above all, I want a sequel to Assault that ignores the canonicity of Command. The reason being is because I want Fox's and Krystal's relationship to deepen further (instead of them breaking up like they did in Command, which I hated), and the game ends with them getting married.

@AmyTheBrawler Oh, totally. Assault was the first Star Fox game I played, and easily my favorite. I would be so happy if Nintendo remade the game, but making certain changes to it (not making it a straight-up remaster with a fresher coat of paint).

For example, adding new levels to the campaign mode, such as the multiplayer-only maps of the Great Fox, Titania, and Zoness, but also originals like Venom (where you infiltrate the ruins of Andross's base to acquire the schematics for the computer virus weapon that they used to defeat the Aparoids), Papetoon (where we would see Fox's homeworld for the first time in a Star Fox game), Aquas, and Macbeth.

On the multiplayer side, include Leon, Panther, Pigma, Oikonny, and even General Pepper in the multiplayer mode, and have online functionality where you can play with others.

Gameplay-wise, tighten up the controls (as the on-foot and Landmaster controls could be quite touchy; one wrong move sends you tumbling off a ledge), and allow us to play as other members of the Star Fox team during the campaign mode, each with the abilities that they had in multiplayer mode.

And the app is also great. But again, since I can't have my phone on me at work, I'd love a browser version, much like how Apple Music, Spotify, and Pandora all have their own browser versions.

@Mando44646 Especially Xenoblade Chronicles X. I got the Special Edition of the Wii U version so I could get the music tracks off of that USB drive that came with it, only to learn that it was DRM'ed, thus preventing me from being able to listen to it, much less import it to iTunes or Apple Music. I would love to listen to "The Key We've Lost" (which was in the gameplay trailer for the game) any time I want.

I hope that, at some point in the future, we will get the soundtrack for Star Fox: Assault. I loved the music in that game, such as the music from the first half of the first level (what is titled "Space Battleground" in Super Smash Bros.), as well as the music that played when Peppy rammed the Great Fox into the energy shield on the Aparoid homeworld, seemingly sacrificing himself in the process.

What would also be nice is if Nintendo released a browser version of the app, like just Apple Music, Pandora, and Spotify. Since I'm not allowed to have my phone on me at work, there's no way for me to listen to the app. But having a browser version available for when I am on a work computer (they do allow us to use Spotify, Pandora, and Apple Music using the computers) would enable me to listen to my favorite game soundtracks.

Frankly, I don't think it would be possible. As flawed of a gameplay mechanic as it was (to the point where one reviewer refused to assign a score to the game because they were so miserable playing it), having the third-person perspective on the TV screen while having the cockpit view on the Wii U GamePad was integral to the experience. You can't really separate that from the game by putting it on the Switch, which has only one screen. At that point, you'd be better off porting it to the 3DS. That being said, I have heard some rumors that the successor to the Switch will have a dual screen mechanic, so it could possibly be feasible then. But the Switch as it is now, I just don't see it.

Personally, if they were to bring back a previous Star Fox game, I'd rather they bring back Adventures or Assault. But make some changes to address the complaints from their original releases. For example, with Adventures, have Fox save Krystal halfway through the game, then have them work together to stop General Scales and Andross. With Assault, add more levels (especially using the multiplayer-only maps of the Great Fox, Titania, and Zoness, plus some originals like Venom, where you have to infiltrate the ruins of Andross's base to acquire the schematics for the computer virus weapon to destroy the Aparoids), and tighten up the controls.

But above all, I would love a sequel to Assault that ignores the continuity of Command, we see Star Fox combat a new threat (something even more dangerous than the Aparoids, maybe something that threatens all of existence), and we especially see Fox's and Krystal's relationship deepen further, with the two of them getting married at the end of the game.

@graviton In a way, it's a bit like the controversy surrounding Stellar Blade for the PS5. There were apparently changes made to some of EVE's outfits, and people were up in arms about censorship. While people blame Sony for allegedly demanding that SHIFT UP censor some of her more revealing outfits, I have heard that SHIFT UP said that those outfits, which were teased before the game's release, were always going to be changed before launch.

Of course, we'll see what the case is when the game comes out for the PC in the near future. If the more revealing versions of the outfits are in the PC version versus the PlayStation version, we'll know for certain that it was Sony who demanded that the game be censored for the PS5. If the PC version also has the less revealing outfits, then it's confirmation that it was always the plan on SHIFT UP's part for them to not be as revealing, and so it's not on Sony.

What would be really nice is if they made a web browser version of the app. Since I cannot have my phone on me while at work, and I can't download these soundtracks to my Apple Music library, the only way for me to listen to these soundtracks would be via a web browser version. That, or if they also released a version of the app for Apple Watch.

Personally, one soundtrack I would love to have come to the service is Star Fox: Assault. I love the Space Battleground theme from the first level, plus the music that played when Peppy crashed the Great Fox into the energy shield on the Aparoid's homeworld.

An official version of the Star Fox Adventures soundtrack would be nice, too. I downloaded an unofficial version that was distributed via a Star Fox fan site through the Krystal Archive back in early 2019 (since that was the game where we first got Krystal), but despite having 119 tracks, it's not a perfect rip; there are still sound effects in the main theme, which was taken from the intro cutscene, and possibly in other tracks, too. So an official soundtrack would likely have a clean rip, without the sound effects. And hopefully there would be more tracks, including unreleased ones.

And of course, official soundtracks for the Super Smash Bros. games would be most welcome. I don't know if it's still on there, but someone did upload an unofficial version of the soundtrack for Melee onto Apple Music. But again, it's not a clean rip, as the sound effects from the intro cutscene are there as well. I do, however, have the official soundtrack for SSB4, which I got via Club Nintendo, back when it was still a thing.

I should probably stop there with my wishlist, though, as this comment will become too long.

HECK YEAH, BOY!!!! Immediately downloaded the app before I even finished the article!

But since I can't have my phone on me while working, what would be nice if they could integrate this with other music streaming platforms like Spotify, Pandora, and Apple Music, which I can use via a computer, or have a web browser version of the app. I would love to listen to these soundtracks while on the clock!

@ikki5 Even if the product is sold for a premium price, if the materials used in its manufacture are cheap, you'll end up with a poor-quality product. This is true for everything, not just frying pans. But that's how businesses expand their profit margins, especially in recent years: manufacture goods with cheap materials but don't drop the price (in some cases, the price even goes up). Easy money.

I'll admit, as much as I loved Xenoblade Chronicles X on the Wii U, I never did beat it. I have been hoping for it to be ported to the Switch for years now. But if it's coming out next year, possibly around the time that the successor to the Switch launches (launch title, maybe?), I may hold off until any announcement as to whether or not it will be coming to the successor.

I just wonder if certain features that were in the Japanese version but were taken out of the North American version during localization will be restored for this Definitive Version.

Hey, what do you know? My team won for once! But yet again, the winning team carried it on Clout alone. Was Team Ninja just that good? It did seem that I was winning more matches than I was losing, at least initially. Still, I'd love to know exactly how Clout gets calculated to the point where it ends up winning the entire Splatfest alone.

@Ironcore It's been years since I've played my own save file (I have played the game in the last few months, but I was playing my girlfriend's save file because she was having trouble progressing). The last time I played my save file I was trying to execute the glitch to get the Bow of Light, but I just can't get the timing down. Maybe I'll try again someday if I have time, but when that will be is anyone's guess.

Well, if it's got that smurfing good of a smurfing review, I may just have to smurfing check this smurfing game out.

(Felt a bit like Monty Python with their Spam sketch while writing the above sentence)

Or, instead of adding an entirely new costume, how about giving us the ability to raise and lower the hood on the Hooded Zelda costume? But I do agree that we need to focus on things like the Echoes menu first, before we even think about cosmetic changes or DLC.

I was at work when the applications went live, so I naturally didn't manage to fill it out in time. I'm a little bummed, but it's not that big a deal in the grand scheme of things. Hopefully the nature of this playtest will be revealed once it's all said and done.

Jeez, with a code that long, the Angry Video Game Nerd would have a field day with this!

Didn’t get a chance to do it last weekend like I wanted, but I’ve finally started playing Arzette: The Jewel of Faramore last night.

Didn’t get very far, though, because I had to grab dinner for my mother, who was waiting with my father in the ER, and that took an hour or so off of the time that I would have spent playing the game.

Tonight won’t be much better, either, because I have to attend a birthday party for a couple of my aunts right after work, and that will take up the entire evening. Hopefully I’ll be able to play more tomorrow.

@CazSonOfCaz Him, and Bob Hoskins.

@Goat_FromBOTW In all fairness, 30+ years of voicing a character is a long time; he's been the voice of Mario since before I was born. The guy is also 69 years old, which is well into retirement age here in the U.S. He probably wants to spend his golden years with family or working on personal projects.

I might actually get this. I have the game guide for Reshef of Destruction, but I don't have the game itself. So I'll finally be able to put that game guide to good use, after all these years.

Got a few volumes already, but I am so gonna buy this box set! In fact, I'm also gonna buy a box set for my girlfriend as well, since she also loves Zelda.

Honestly, I don't even remember this photo. I think I've seen memes of it since then, but the original context for this photo escaped me.

Genshin Impact and Arzette: The Jewel of Faramore, the latter of which finally arrived on my doorstep yesterday.

@HeadPirate I totally get that last paragraph. I personally like Genshin Impact for its world-building and story (for me, the most important aspects of any video game, even more than the gameplay itself), but I can't convince my friends to play it because they don't like the gacha component. To me, Genshin is a fantasy adventure RPG game first and a gacha game second.

@HeadPirate Which is why I try to be as F2P in Genshin Impact as possible. I don't want to blow my wallet trying to get all the characters and weapons. I say that as a Westerner. Again, I really only do the Blessing of the Welkin Moon and the premium tier of the Battle Pass; I couldn't tell you the last time I spent real money on Genesis Crystals (and even then, the last time I did was to buy the new clothing for one of the characters).

And at least Genshin has a pity system where you are guaranteed a 5-Star character or weapon after a set number of pulls (I've heard it was usually between 60-90, although I've had it to where it was within 10-20 pulls of the last one; I got lucky). You may lose the 50/50 on a banner the first time you pull a 5-Star, but if you pull another, you will be guaranteed the character or weapon you are pulling for on that banner.

I'm not a big fan of gacha mechanics myself, but at least you are guaranteed something. It may not be what you are pulling for, but it is at least something. If you ask me, it's a far cry from actual gambling (such as slot machines and the lottery), where you can actually lose money and not get anything back at all.

About the only game I do the gacha on is Genshin Impact, and on that, I try to be as F2P as possible. I save up my Primogems from events and normal gameplay, but I do spend real money on the Blessing of the Welkin Moon (which gives you 90 Primogems a day for 30 days), and I will purchase the premium tier of the Battle Pass once I max it out. But beyond that, I try to spend as little real life money as possible in-game.

I'm personally hoping for a remaster of Xenoblade Chronicles X, or even a sequel that delves deeper into the lore of the world and Elma's past. Or both.

@ottoecamn I'm not so much worried about them pursuing a DEI agenda as I am making sure that customers are given quality goods and services, and that the employees taking care of them are properly taken care of themselves (especially when it comes to workload, wages, benefits, and scheduling).

I won't go into too much detail (lest this become a Lewis Black-style rant), but many of us at the Kroger I worked at were overworked, underpaid, and in many cases verbally abused by our managers; if anything, I likened the store to what the Japanese call a "black company".

In fact, over two-thirds of all Kroger employees make poverty wages and have to rely on side gigs or government assistance to make ends meet (even those who made salary, not hourly wages, such as my old supervisor before she was wrongfully terminated).

And hearing from people who used to work at that store who made their way to where I work now, employee morale sinks lower and lower with each passing year. It's all about how much they're being worked, how little they are being compensated, and how random their schedules are (meaning no work-life balance). DEI's got nothing to do with it.

@ottoecamn Well, it is good to hear that they ban BlackRock from investing in them. They just need to do the same with The Vanguard Group (which I believe already invests in Nintendo). Those two shareholders, in my experience, seem to force companies that they invest in to maximize profits by cutting costs, which results in mediocre (at best) products and services.

I used to work for Kroger, and they were two of the largest shareholders in the business. Any attempts to suggest new ideas to improve quality were shot down because it would have cost money (which would have meant less profits and dividends for the shareholders). And look at what has been happening with Boeing in recent years. Vanguard and BlackRock are both two of the largest shareholders in that company, as well. Even Microsoft is under their thrall, and they have been laying off people left and right.

So it says to me that there is a common denominator here with all these layoffs and decreases in quality of goods and services, and that is The Vanguard Group and BlackRock, Inc. Nintendo is wise to keep BlackRock from investing, but they need to go a step further and force Vanguard to divest if they truly want to maintain control over the quality of their games and systems.

@DennyCrane If memory serves me correctly, that was one of the chapters in the third Ace Attorney game. You had the "master thief" being tasked by the "ace detective" hunting him down to commit crimes.

@ScalenePowers It's also possible that they focus on rehabilitation instead of punishment, with the goal of reintegrating people back into society, like they do in European countries such as Germany and Norway.

Compare that to the United States, where we focus more on punishment than rehabilitation, which is why we lead the world in arrests, convictions, imprisonment, and recidivism (the propensity for convicts to reoffend).

Definitely add more lines to the quick swap feature. Maybe make it more like it is in the Start menu.

@Mana_Knight I'm not certain about that, but it is possible that the game she was playing in the photo was either Super Mario Land or Tetris, as those two games often came bundled with the original Game Boy. As it is, the Game Boy in question belonged to her daughter, Chelsea.

According to a Snopes article about the photo, a news reporter by the name of Sara Williams tried to do some digging to see what kind of games and consoles that Hillary Clinton enjoyed, only to be told by people at the White House that it was a state secret, as revealing that info could be considered an official endorsement of one product over another.

@Not_Soos And in regard to how you thought the Crown Prince seemed genuine, that's actually how dictators get you to like them. They come across as genuine, lull you into a false sense of security, and then they take absolute power. By the time you realize anything is wrong, it's too late.

I remember seeing a photo of Joseph Stalin holding a little girl (her name was Engelsina Markizova) in his arms. In the photo, he seemed kind and grandfatherly. It became widely used for pro-Stalinist propaganda. The girl's father was later executed on false charges of being a spy for the Japanese, her mother was imprisoned and deported to Kazakhstan where she passed away from unknown circumstances, and the girl herself was shunned by her classmates and sent to live with relatives in Moscow. Furthermore, the identity of the girl in the photo was deliberately misattributed by officials to be someone else entirely. The photo began to fade into obscurity after Stalin's death and the resulting de-Stalinization of the Soviet Union.

So it is possible that the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia is being genuine, but it is also entirely possible that he is just appearing so in order to lull people into a false sense of security so that it makes his power grab all the smoother.

@Not_Soos That actually is quite interesting. And if you weren't aware, here in the United States, Hillary Clinton also likes games (at least she did back in the day; no idea about today). There's actually a photo from 1993 of her sitting on a plane playing a Game Boy.

If I ever got the chance to meet her, I'd love for her to autograph a copy of that photo for me. I don't agree with all of her politics, but it's not every day that you meet an influential politician who shares the same hobby as you.

Genshin Impact and Echoes of Wisdom for me. But that won’t come until tomorrow. Gonna be driving back home with my girlfriend from a wedding. We could be looking at a 12-hour drive, give or take.

@graviton I consider myself an old fart (31 years old, but still), and I am not well-versed in the latest slang and music. But I always try to stay on top of the latest gaming trends.

And having just beat Echoes of Wisdom a few minutes ago as of this writing, I thoroughly enjoyed the new direction Nintendo took the series in with this entry. I can’t wait for the next game where we play as Zelda!

Still, it would have been nice if Shigeru Miyamoto got some sort of credit for creating the series. Even Gene Roddenberry (the creator of Star Trek) got credited as the creator of the franchise in every series from Deep Space Nine-onwards.

Even the President of Nintendo (be it Hiroshi Yamauchi, Satoru Iwata, Tatsumi Kimishima, or Shuntaro Furukawa) gets credited in every Nintendo game, even though they might not have any active role in the development of the game. Makes me wonder if Shigeru Miyamoto is going to be retiring soon, if he hasn’t done so already and they have yet to announce it.

I've only got a couple dungeons left to beat myself; I'm way farther in the game than my girlfriend (she was floored that I am as far as I am, saying that I am so much better at playing video games than her).

It is definitely a welcome return to form for the series. What is also fun about it is trying to figure out which Echo to use to progress past a specific enemy or puzzle. And I also let the Echoes do the work when it comes to the boss fights (for the most part).

9/10 for me. I do have some issues with the gameplay (such as having to scroll through dozens of Echoes to find the one I want), but it has been an enjoyable experience for the most part. I hope Zelda becomes the playable protagonist in another mainline Zelda game soon enough!