Cinaclov

I'd love to play through it, but the original took me a year of concerted effort to beat. That's quite a thing to commit to - I love RPGs, but they really aren't designed to fit round adult life 😔

Playing it on gamepass currently. I think the gameplay is stronger than the narrative, it feel really weird that it doesn't have much to actually say - themes of revolution, sure, but (and this may of course change once you get further in) so far it's got a villain who's evil because they're the villain, and not much much more context than that.

When compared to all the social commentary peppered throughout P5 and P5R, sometimes quite subtly, that feels particularly weak.

I had hundreds of Pokemon on Ranch - I was actively trying to get the Mew you recieve for putting a certain amount in there - and all of them got lost when my brther decided to transfer the Wii to a WiiU.

Clearly no one had tried Pokemon Ranch for a few years since that transfer, as I tried to load it a year or two ago and was told as it's not the ooriginal Wii it needed to do an online check to verify it can be run. Which is awkward, it's been about 5 years since that was possible...

The PS3 version was very disapointing, so even though I love this game I doubt I'll be triple-dipping.

That clears up the "should I get an OLED?" arguement I've been having quite nicely.

All the people complaining here, did you actually read the quote? A line of pastal colours matches AC perfectly and pink rounds out that selection really well.

@eltomo That's been my quiet worry. Anecdotally Japan seems like it's difficult to get visas for at the moment. I assume they're banking on less restrictions by next year but all it'd take is a Covid scare and it'd be very tricky or international players. Not to mention the cost for much of the rest of the world.

Anyway, this years worlds - yes, absolutely brilliant. They went all out and it was absolutely fantastic. It made the last one I went to in 2016 look like a school hall in comparison.

@cyrus_zuo "Not being able to do a crouch then a high jump was a big disappointment that took away from the ease of exploration"

...just backflip then? Backflips, plus wall jumps and FLUDD if you're still struggling. Or spin jump, do that from a Yoshi and you can reach tremendous heights.

The Last Story, without question. I think it got overshadowed by Xenoblade as it's shorter, the world is smaller and the combat isn't as intricate, but if anything that just makes it much more focused - and these days a solid 30 hour RPG is so much more appealing than a sprawling 100 hour one. Plus the voice acting is far, far less annoying than Xenoblade.

It's one of those games that I've been meaning to replay for years but there's always more pressing newer games and I'd have to dig out the Wii, I'd love for a HD remake.

@mariomaster96 I think there's a large majority of more casual players who look at gaming as just another hobby to dabble in, much the same way most people treat going to the cinema or reading a book.

Those are the kind of people who wouldn't ever read a site like this and instead buy stuff they recognise, so CoD, Assassins Creed, FIFA etc, with the occasional forays into GTA, Halo, Pokémon etc.

I think of it like how I go to the cinema - I go and see almost all of Marvel's stuff and things in that general ballpark, which are quite safe things that I know I'll enjoy. Every now and again go and see something a bit more out there but that will always take second place behind things that are a known quantity.

You can bemoan that all you want but at the end of the day my free time and disposable income is pretty limited. If I know I generally like Marvel films or Steve knows he likes CoD and there's no push to look for something else, we'll just keep going for that known quantity. Judging by the performance of Spiderman vs every other film in cinemas currently, I don't think that's an unusual approach.

"The Pokémon Oreos are available to pre-order now"

Is that a thing? Do people preorder food now?

On a separate note, I assume this is US only?

I doubt I'll ever get this (Octopath Traveller took me a year to play through, whilst I enjoyed it I've no desire to commit to one game for that long), though I am really glad the franchise is doing well and other people are enjoying it.

I love that skating has come back over the last few years, that there are visibly more women involved, that it's at the flipping Olympics, that's all brilliant and fills my 90's reared heart with joy.

All of that said, I cannot get my head around how all the skaters outside my work are all listening to grime.

It's like Leia flying through space in SW:TLJ; you can run through all sorts of justifications and on paper it might make total sense, but in practice I just cannot, it doesn't work.

Metroid Prime 2; "Often considered to be the weakest entry in the Prime trilogy"

Is ranked higher than Prime 3

This has 80's b-movie vibes. I think I'm all for it?

They costume certainly looks like it's awkward to walk in

I have definitely noticed that my 'gaming skills' have deteriorated over the last decade since I left education, and that's both understandable and okay.

Having half terms/school holidays and only working a six hour day, combined with a limited pocket-money-sized budget, of course that means you'll spend a lot of time absolutely mastering a specific few games.

Then you fall out into the world of full time work and other commitments, where you've got an hour or so for gaming on occasional evenings and a couple of weeks holiday a year - again, with other commitments demanding your time.

RPG's are one of my favourite genres, but I've had to start being really selective about what I play these days; Octopath Traveller took me a year of sustained play to finish, whilst Witcher 3 took me 6 months (during lockdown, so I had my extra hour a day from not commuting).

It makes me so glad that games have started adding 'Story mode' to the difficulties list, it means I'm much more likely to be able to get through an experience.

Yes!! Chamber of Secrets was even better - not just in that Ron and Hermione joined to actually create a party for you to manage and the other QOL adjustments you'd expect of a sequel, but also (and I may be misremembering here) I remember it being so hilariously self aware.

Not a huge fan of either tbh. If I had to choose it'd be Japan though, it avoids the look of a tired 70's childrens novel.

Looking forwrad to the top two positions going to Pokémon Crystal (GBC) and Pokémon Crystal Version (GBC). With Gold and Silver in third.

I dabble with it on mobile and whilst I kind of enjoy it I really don't know what it's about how what I'm meant to be doing. I hope I'd get more out of it on a console because you're more committed to a play session, which translates to more of an understanding of it. Not exactly hyped but quietly looking forward to it, I'd say

Loved Four Swords. A friend and I played two player of this and FF:CC whenever we met up, roping in other siblings and friends as we were able to. Really brilliant stuff.

The biggest crime though is why the Wii U had neither Four Swords Adventure or Crystal Chronicles ported to it. It could have been the most accessible version; wireless, working using both DS and 3DS, with the console itself shipping with a screen in the controller!!!!

Whilst there are of course things I'd swap around a bit, generally speaking this is a really solid list and I'm delighted that the two Golden Sun games are as high ranking as they are. Nice one everyone! ^_^

Love things like this, will definitely listen to later.

One of my absolute favourites for listening to whilst going on walks was Zelda Re-orcestrated's last big project, the 3 1/2 hour Twilight Symphony. Would definitely reccomend;

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLsKZQISBMfcYt-WR-0_y0anBCgSgqBHgp

10 minutes or so every morning whilst eating breakfast.

Just a quick once around the island to check the daily event, recipe bottles on the coastline, dig up any weeds/fossils (which at this point are basically just buried lumps of money to cash at a later date) and say hi to any animals in passing. On occasion I play a bit longer, usually if there's an event on or something, but most of my substantal playtime is just those really short daily chunks.

Was all set to do my duty and vote for Persona 5, only to have "Questionnaire time: Approximately 45 minutes" appear. Sorry, but ain't no one got time for that.

"Its DX re-release for Game Boy Color turns the game from a perfect 10 to a 9 with an unenjoyable extra dungeon and a garish lick of paint that doesn’t do the visuals any favours"

I know nostalgia plays a big part in things like this, but really? The visuals are great, holding up much better than the B+W originals, and the extra dungeon is short and easy but ultimately it's a nice bit of extra content; it literally just adds an optional extra to the existing content, how does that detract from the experience (unless you had played it before and were expecting more)?

As for me, I played LA:DX retroactively and I have to say, as unpopular an opinion as it seems to be, I think the Oracle games hold up better. LA feels quite clunky in comparison, however many cute references and moments there are.

It does look like they've already stopped taking any of the 3DS family that can display the 3D effect :/

https://www.nintendo.co.uk/Support/Contact/Repairs/Nintendo-2DS-New-Nintendo-2DS-XL-1872790.html

I bought and loved the first two, but I think they were exactly what I was looking for at that time in my life - solid, portable, turn based RPG's with good quality of life improvements and a few interesting new ideas. Not to mention the beautiful watercolour 3D dioramas that every town basically was (and in 3D on the 3DS of course!!).

That is of course not an option here, so we're already down from the first two. Then the reviews seem to be that this is largely more of the same, so a large but unsurprising JRPG. It took me a year to get through Octopath and I've barely touched FE:3H, I'm really not feeling another big RPG just now.

If I were furloughed or at school with the associated holidays I'd probably be all over this. As it is I'm struggling to muster any enthusiasm, which is an odd feeling considering I really enjoyed the 3DS outings.

Mario needs to be at least twice the size in the Japanese cover, and frustratingly there's the empty space next to him to achieve that with no other alterations.

Majora's Mask is one of my absolute favourite games and a big part of what makes it is the time loop.

It's a brilliant example of what videogames can do with story that no other medium can match; whilst of course the main narrative can be transcribed (there's a manga adaptation of Majora's Mask proving that) it loses all of the nuance. Playing those three days repeatedly allows you teh chance to not just get to intimately know all the residents of Termina but also how they react under different circumstances as your actions affect their world. It's really brilliant.

I'm not a big MH fan, but that looks fantastic and if I didn't already have a pro I'd definitely look into this

My view is that if you battle every enemy as you go through a game you should never have to grind.

Epic Yarn is just such a perfect, adorable distraction of a platformer. I think you have to ignore how easy Kirby games are when ordering them like this, so with that in mind Epic Yarn is hands down my favourite.

Lapras, seemingly echoing everyone else. Once I realised you'd begun rotating them it was easy for the rest, but that one caught me.

See? When you did the games of 2021 and include MP4 but didn't include Snap?

I got this about a week ago. So I guess I must have done about a week or time travel?

I play Pokemon Go on all my walks at the moment.

I'd be going on the walks regardless - they're the only exercise and change of scenery I get and litterally the only thing that breaks up the day, especially crucial when working from home.

There is a lot of context missing from the tweet; if there were a group of people meeting up to play raids then absolutely, send them home. Equally, if someone is walking by themselves with their phone open, that's no one elses business and well within the rules.

But perhaps more importantly, what's with the shaming tone of the tweet?

I only managed to get hold of a copy retroactively (during the game drought towards the end of the Wii's lifespan iir). It cost me something like £30 which at the time I thought was outrageous for a nearly three generations old game, but I absolutely got my moneys worth from it. If you approach Stadium/S2/Battle Revolution as competitive 3D expansion packs for the main games they are really solid games.

There's part of me resisting the WiiU ports, just because it would render my existing WiiU almost entirely unused.

That said, an updated Collectors Edition wouldn't go amiss. Even HD versions of the 3DS titles, I'd double dip on those.

£140 is a cheaper than I was expecting as well. Really cool.

I started replaying New Leaf at the start of lockdown 2.0. That game holds up really well, especially as so much of its content either isn't yet or is unlikely to make it to New Horizons.

That's like four and a half months of solid play? o_o

@Darknyht I know. It's reasonably clever, but my point was I'm so glad they're the only studio on Switch that seems to take that approach; otherwise it would end up like mobile stores, just clogged full of guff

It's an interesting business model they have at Qubic. I'm grateful for the free games, though I'm equally glad they are the only studio on Switch that seem to have this "churn out loads of inexpensive games, then give them away toward the end of the year so we top the downloads chart" approach.

Micro SD cards are definitely the piece of modern tech that blows my mind most.

Yes, PCs, Xbox Series and PS5's are all very techncally impressive but they are kind of what I expected hardware to do as they go forward. On the other hand, having hundreds and hundreds of GB of storage on something that's physically sized smaller than a postage stamp. Everytime I think about that is just, wow.

But I digress - why would anyone sensible pay extra for a branded Micro SD that you're only ever going to look at one or two times?

I think it helps that it's a BotW prequel, as opposed to Zelda FanFiction: The Officially Licensed Game

"Chickens know things. It's obvious. They have that look in their eye, the slightly disdainful squint of someone who knows what you did and why you did it."

I'm going to go out on a limb and say that Stuart has never owned chickens.

I love how they're trying to describe the glitches they fixed without giving any spoilers.

"You know the thing you can do with the person in that location, where it sometimes causes the other thing to do a thing it shouldn't? We fixed it"

That's cool if your phone supports it I guess, though I'm glad I stopped playing of my own choice before this kicked me out; trying to use the Pokemon Go AR features causes my phone to freeze, based on the comments here I really doubt this would load at all now. Hey ho, life goes on.

It was a "Interested and I'll get it eventually" title, then I saw that Nintendo store had all those freebies for preordering, plus the competition to win the figures. And of course the ladle dlc

The lesson being that marketing works?