DemonKow

Continuing on Trails of Cold Steel 3, wherein I'm caught the trademarked avalanche of lore and side quests and figuring out how I'm going to build out my party. I still like the legacy party members much better but damned if I'm not making the new class into a force.

I was also thinking of trying Ori and the Blind Forest for a bit here and there as a change up. It gets hard to go all in on an expansive JRPG at times.

Happy gaming everyone!

Just hit chapter 2 in Trails of Cold Steel 3. Still waiting the cast to grow on me, but I've been playing LoH long enough that I'm already starting to break the battle system, a proud tradition in JRPGs.

Otherwise working on things around the house and engaging in life this weekend as well. It's spring and I'm at a brief lull so I'm taking advantage of that to fit in what I can. Might also fit in a couple rounds of Ultimate Chicken Horse or Mario Kart 8 with my youngest.

I have a pretty high tolerance for lengthy games, but Chrono Trigger is the platonic ideal of RPGs for a reason. The gameplay doesn't allow endless fiddling, you just keep driving forward. On the other end of the scpectrum, I have never played an Atlus game that didn't feel like another job for the final 15-20 hours, and I am a fan of the Trails games.

I like single-shot stories like Gris and Oxenfree, and I really enjoyed the way Hades could have limited length in runs but the story somehow keeps going well after you "win."

Maybe they need more NFTs or whatever it is generative AI would get them.

I'm concerned they're conflating "quality" with "cost," which isn't quite the lesson to take from it. There's a lot to be said for a successful AA game (your Octopath Travelers and Secrets of Mana). This strategy would not have prevented Forspoken from tanking them the year prior. I think both they and Sony overestimated how much someone is willing to drop $500 to pay another ~$200 for a three-part remake of a 27 year old game (for example) if they weren't otherwise inclined to get a Playstation.

After a move, travel for work, and a brutal end to a semester, things settled down and I'm playing Trails of Cold Steel III. Still fairly early but enjoying it a lot. It feels good to rest, gaming is a stress relief and also the first thing to get cut when I get stressed 😅

Happy gaming everyone!

@Spider-Kev agreed. The movie will be wasted potential if they don't have Link find all 900 Koroks

In all seriousness tho, I just hope he's played enough of them to get the point but not enough to obsess over the multiple heroes multiple timelines thing

Kinda feels like Tales of Symphonia. I was looking forward to it on Switch, but it was unplayable at release and I haven't heard a lot of people talking about it anymore if it actually did get fixed. Disappointing, but my backlog is big enough without a broken afterimage of Suikoden.

Blaming the hardware might be more plausible if it didnt look like a game that could have come out more than ten years ago.

I would expect this is less about branding and more about pushing all the bad debt on one company and torching it. This was really the only logical outcome of having your entire plan hinge on getting investment money that fell through.

For the rest I'll withhold judgement for when actual games get released, although that does not appear to be a prioritized goal at this time.

Picked up Ultimate Chicken Horse at a discount to play with my daughters a bit this weekend, but mostly in the end stages of classes so I'm not even getting as much of that as I'd like.

Decided I'm finally going to play Trails of Cold Steel III when I free up a bit. After the Crossbell Duology, I figured I can just play Sky games as prequels, and I'll deal with I&II if they're ever localized on a console I own. Onward!

The words of [redacted] will not pass my lips. And yet...

I'm also super excited by Neva if it is coming. Gris was almost bordering on life changing, so I'm eager to see what's next.

Still trying to tie up Octopath Traveler II, which is really a matter of stepping through Osvald's story and whatever comes after that. I'm catastrophically overpowered and the battles are trivial, but finding the time with work, school, moving, and family has been difficult. The woes of a balanced life, I suppose.

I also want to play Oxenfree II: The Lost Signals if I get the chance, but I likely will not 😅

It doesn't make a lot of sense to say you're pricing for the veneer of quality and that it's not sustainable - that's direct acknowledgement of being the problem. What amazes me is that companies know by the time it's priced whether it's worth it - TotK was, a number of other titles most certainly were not but went forward anyway.

I don't particularly care if your company dumped nine figures if you ended up with a mid game. That's not a great case for handing over a premium.

@Grail_Quest I dare say it might also be the last time Capcom pushes those words out in a release 😐

Mostly finishing off stories in Octopath Traveler II, although I might have made the progress I'm going to make for the weekend already. Taking my wife for a modest getaway and I have some homework to do as well. Still, I'm close enough to be thinking about the next game, I'm waffling between 13 Sentinels and Persona 5 Royal for my next overly ambitious time commitment, even if that's probably a week off.

Happy weekend everyone!

@Rayquaza2510 if they did a full rebuild in a new SDK, that could have potentially been a major undertaking under the hood even if it doesn't show much on the user side. There can be some nightmarish nuances switching tool chains, even just to a newer version.

I like a good JRPG to kind of meander through some unstructured time, especially in the winter. If there's one that feels like that to me, it'd be Earthbound.

Right now I'm plinking single chapters in Octopath Traveler II. I haven't had much time to play but managed to get most of the team to the point that I'm taking late-game bosses down after a single break (I inadvertently faced the Deep One back to back and the Scourge of the Seas three times in a row without an issue). On one hand I'm ridiculously OP, on the other, at least they seemed to have fixed the grindiness of the original.

Also, my youngest is starting up Undertale and going in blind. I'm enjoying hanging out with her while she laughs boisterously at it (the inventory dog bit made me laugh harder than I have at a game in years).

Happy weekend to those that can observe!

@Bobb I've checked out of most online game spaces because of reactionary tantrums. Not every game needs to be Elden Ring, and shockingly, a lot of people prefer that to be the case.

Heavens to Murgatroyd, some sites review this like Kirby games haven't been successful for decades.

Super Mario World arguably perfected 2D platforming, so objectively it should be the pick. But there's something about what SMB3 captured, introducing secrets and powerups and weird one off level concepts that just weren't something we even imagined from games before. And there have been so many great games since then, so there aren't a lot of wrong answers.

I'm into the third chapters in Octopath Traveler II but I've been relentlessly exploring the world and have encountered a large number of Caits and Octopuffs. As a result my party has near endgame leveling and a full loadouts of powerful weapons, so I expect I'll probably blaze through the rest of the story within the next week or so.

Playing Octopath Traveler 2 and appreciating it being somewhat episodic so I can play in chunks while going to touch grass from time to time. The exploration is way more interesting than in the first.

Also finished AI: The Somnium Files, which was really good but by the end I was really over the Psych sequences. Worth the $8 or so on an eShop sale.

Still need to finish the Erebonian arc and Reverie and I do not at all have the time to even do that this year, and maybe not the next either 😵

@imadeanaccount the stories in the original are wildly varying in quality, and you only get hints as to the greater events as you get to the end of each route. If you miss out on a couple of sidequests you won't trigger the true ending, and it's a grind fest to get to that.

I liked it a lot overall, but I also have a hard time recommending a game that takes 30-40 hours to get good to someone who wasn't already receptive (except Dragon Quest XI).

I wonder if it's any more difficult to have to deal with being an adult putting aside a game you love for your grownup responsibilities if that's for another game that is now your job.

That's how I got out of doing electronics as a hobby.

I loved the battle system of BD II but man the story could have used some rewrites. A remaster announcement would still be cool tho.

I mean, I kinda get why Nintendo doesnt have the appetite. The Mother series, despite its cult status, has always been niche and the only major western release was an immense flop. I don't think it's reasonable to expect anything other than:

1. Sales are still tepid as the most dedicated audience already has it
2. That fanbase goes ballistic over any change from what they expected after the fan translation

I've been a casual observer of the Starmen for almost 20 years, and I can tell you as a business decision I wouldn't touch any of that with a ten foot pole. Coming from someone who would buy it day one.

I haven't spent a lot of time gaming, I kind of stalled on Octopath Traveller II after everyone's first chapter. It's great so far I'm just not able to spend the time I want on it at the moment.

I'm enjoying AI: The Somnium files but I want something with meatier gameplay from the backlog. I'll try Transistor since Supergiant hasn't been wrong yet and it's been sitting since I got it on sale.

Hard pass. If it's a standalone route, I don't know why it can't be done like Torna (XC2)... if it's that big make it a standalone smaller purchase. I'm not repurchasing a 2 year old game.

The obvious ones are fine, I guess. I do love to speculate on dark horse types in order of increasing absurdity:

• DQ8, Chrono Trigger, or other lesser known back catalog ports from S-E
• Hades 2 Switch announcement
• New Mega Man (X?)!

I still believe Silksong is eventually coming, but is certainly not going to get mentioned tomorrow.

@HeadPirate I think you're definitely on point with how its going to go, and it could also be argued that it could very easily be mistaken for a Tales of game by a casual observer, which is totally why trademarks exist to begin with. I actually think Bandai would be in the right here.

Have some family in and I've been super busy cooking and studying, so right now just a little AI: The Somnium Files at night. It's probably best I'm between major games at the moment 😅

Happy gaming everyone!

Finally brought Xenoblade Chronicles 2 to a close after a week otherwise occupied with life. For all its flaws, I thoroughly enjoyed the game, although I'm not quite ready to dive into Torna: The Golden Country just yet. I've got a monstrous backlog and I'm trying to figure out the next game to dive into.

Thinking Octopath Traveler II or Persona 5.

Playing Xenoblade Chronicles 2 and absolutely consumed in side quests. It's therapeutic to have little diversions to go on about when thousands stand to die if I don't act immediately (but they won't!). I don't know that I need to collect all the rare blades or get them all to S rank, but when I do get them I feel the need to go through their quests.

Also bits and pieces of AI: The Somnium Files while trying to get to sleep.

I'm excited. I probably would have grabbed it by now but they announced physical so early, and my backlog is long enough I'm not exactly short on stuff to play.

I mean I get what they're saying, there's been a mixed bag of AAA disappointments, AAs that were fabulous but maybe a bit niche, and some experimental titles that were very hit or miss. I'm just concerned the conclusion they're drawing from it isn't as much "give each game in development sufficient time and resources to be good" and more "we will focus our resources only on safe games." We may just end up with better looking equivalents to Bravely Default 2.

Also, how about Chrono Trigger on modern consoles guys?

@TempestStotm with the Black Mages version of Darkness and Starlight for the Ultros fight at the opera!!!

Not terribly concerned, MicroSD cards even at the TB range are cheap. I'd rather the console be affordable and very widely adopted.

Furiously trying to finish up Xenoblade Chronicles 2 before I go back to school(!), which is 100% not going to happen. I can't stay on task to save my life, and I don't think I'd enjoy it so much if I actually could. It might have to wait for the semester break.

Also a few rounds of Vampire Survivors which is feeling how NES games used to feel way back when (I'm thinking Gauntlet and Castlevania). And not necessarily like those games, but like how it felt in the 80s when my brothers let me stay up way too late hopped up on Mountain Dew and blasting Iron Maiden. My youngest got hooked on it too, so we're having a grand time discovering things and dealing absurd DPS.

...I think I might need to go to the store to get some Mountain Dew 😁

Happy gaming everyone!

I'm maybe halfway into Xenoblade Chronicles 2 and getting into Blade quests. I rather enjoy the mannequin witch with what could reasonably be described as an unhealthy attachment style. Loads of fun if you don't take it terribly seriously.

Also, I've been playing Vampire Survivors and figured out how to stay alive for reasonable amounts of time and I'm now addicted. Please send help.

Brilliant. I was looking at all my old Square classics and thought "but couldn't I have something more derivative and worse?"

Main game is Xenoblade Chronicles 2, which is proving to be cringy with a dense and endlessly fiddly blade system that I am thoroughly enjoying. I'm going back to school in January and may not have time to finish before that starts between that, work, and family, because there's just too much to do.

Also playing AI: The Somnium Files and finally checked in on the hype for Vampire Survivors, for which my first thought was "O no. This is brilliant and will take over my life."

I gotta say, I'm still working on it. But the first chapters are so much better than the original - OT1 was one of the best games I couldn't recommend because it's difficult to tell someone "you just gotta play 30+ hours and it gets good!" Especially when the stories play out with inconsistent quality and you gotta do an endgame grind and a series of side quests to get the full story.

Looking pretty set with Xenoblade Chronicles 2. Its story can be a bit cringy and there are layers of near impenetrable systems but I'm really enjoying it so far. With all that going, the big sales are drawing my eye, and I may pick up something shorter like Oxenfree II: The Lost Signals or Kentucky Route Zero.

Happy gaming everyone!

I do appreciate the game design that goes into intuitive learning of the systems without tons of reading. While MMX wasn't super complicated, I do agree it was user friendly NM in ways the original never was.

And the soundtrack was a banger start to finish too. I still get the Armored Armadillo song stuck in my head.

@BodkinDQ I feel you on Triangle Strategy. I loved the story and the game play overall, but it doesn't really get out of its own way at times. When it gets grating, I usually switch the voice acting to Japanese (as with Octopath Traveler). For all I know, it's equally stilted, but I don't have any way to pick up on that so it seems easier to deal with.

After finally completing Tears of the Kingdom at a whopping 150 hours, 148 shrines, 110 light roots, and 297 Korok seeds, I closed the book on it and said I needed another 100+ hour game tomake my life feel complete, so I got underway with Xenoblade Chronicles 2. I'm going in fairly blind beyond knowing the battle systems are ridiculous and the character models are... interesting. And it's big.

My big counts were TotK, Triangle Strategy, and Trails to Azure. Pretty good year, but my backlog is Neverending. That's not a bad problem to have.

@awaltzforvenus I remember updating the MIDI player and the music absolutely blew me away - I could tell exactly which songs they were riffing on and it could get you pumped to wade through Hell's legions. It was a magical moment in gaming that I don't think I ever really recaptured.

And I remember the stern warning that those pirating the game would go directly to Hell 😅. I've purchased it no fewer than three times now so I'm probably safe.

As more and more money gathers in the C suites of major gaming companies, it almost seems like they want to be doing anything but making video games. It's almost like the other execs will mock them unless it's "but we've got a movie coming out, that's REAL media!" Or NFTs. Or the next not games thing.

I get it, they've got a big non union workforce of people who do require some pretty intensive skills. But that's another reckoning they should know is coming. It's hard to accept that your pay is weak compared to other industries and you've been laid off when you're hearing about record profits and an amazing year in the quality of gaming.

Bring back Altered Beast you cowards!!!

...kidding. It was a game that worked in its time but probably has past. Golden Axe may fit that bill tòo...