Einherjar

@CharlieGirl Excuse me, what?
Where did you get that from? O.o

@CharlieGirl There are entire mainstream music genres that died out with their respective era.
People divide music into distinctive eras because they all have a unique approach, style and sound across all genres.

Zeitgeist, available technology, societal momentum. It all plays into the musical fingerprint these eras left behind.

Music is incredibly subjective.
When people say that, for them, music stopped being good after the XX's, then it is just that, their subjective view.
Saying "No, they're wrong, it's still good" is rather ignorant if you ask me.

IP law demands you to protect what you own or else you lose your claim to it.
Either get in touch with them beforehand, send in demos whatever or use your talents to create new games.
Publishing games has never been easier before.

@the_beaver No, it has been quite a while since i played it actually. I'll eventually give it a second chance though.

It was definitely not a horrible game. But precision platforming and soulslike shenanigans really don't mix well with clunky controls ^^
But thanks for the headsup! I'll look into it.

The game never really clicked with me.
I love its presentation and and its approach of combining souls-like elements with a medtroidvania core are solidly done.
But it can be a pretty clunky game at times.
Like everything involving the wall climb mechanics is just super frustrating.

Bundled with the already frustrating soulslike aspects, it eventually became too much for my taste so it was shelved again.

I wonder how they worked around using CD's to summon monsters.
Other than that, i'm not too enthusiastic about the games pretty much being upscaled PS1 games.
It has so little 3D models, making some new ones (or textures for that matter) would have been nice.

But we'll see. Two really fun games for anyone into these tamagotchi-esque things!

Yup, that looks fun! Mine!

@Spiders And again, you see how well that worked out.
You're free to think whatever you like.
All i can say from professional experience:
Do business on paper or don't do business at all.

@Spiders And you see how well that goes...
You don't need to "lawyer up" either...you need a printer and a pen...

You create a written contract, sign it and presto, you have something to refer to later. It really isn't rocket science and prevents amateur mistakes like the one in the article.

Because ironically enough, forging a proper contract would have prevented the need to lawyer up now

Ok, i don't believe it.

@MegaVel91 Sure, but here in Germany, we have a saying:
"Bei Geld hört die Freundschaft auf"
(Friendship ends when money is involved)

These people are professionals, they should act like one.
"Verbal agreements" never replace contractual obligations and "values" don't make money.
And at the end of the day, that's why they're there.

As cruel as it is, this is business. You either play all of your cards right, or someone else does.

"Verbal agreement"
Yeah, sorry kiddo, welcome to the real world.
Physical contracts or bust

Who even is that and why is this clown getting attention? O.o

@shanatenay Yup, i found RCU a lot more appealing stylistically.
It was a modern take on these iconic sprites.

The first one never really appealed to me if i'm honest.
For me, much of the charm of the Kunio games came from the doofy looking sprites. And while WayForwards pixel art is phenomenal, said charm is completely lost for me.

Plus, i always thought that its presentation was pretty "Hello there, fellow kids" cringy...

Probably a great game like the last one, but not my cup of tea.
I do hope it's as successful as its predecessor though!

Oh boy, i love these celebrity news articles!
They are so genuine and relevant!
Who knew that famous tennis player Serena Williams loves to play the smash hit videogame "Mario Tennis Aces™" on the Nintendo Switch™!

All sarcasm about this blatant ad aside, i think the weirdest is, that she apparently "mains Mario".
She's famous for her super aggressive power play.
I guess mentioning characters associated with that playstyle would have caused the tabloid readers to snap...

"Think you can still catch 'em all?"
I know i can't, which is why i quit the series...

With more and more "Timed event exclusives" and "Drop everything you do because you need to play pokemon now to not miss out" nonsense, the series became more and more unappealing to me.

I'm a big fan of revisiting games years later to take in the nostalgia. And why bother if a good chunk of the content will forever be lost to time? No thanks, catch yourself.

Another completely insanely overpriced ININ release, shocker.

As much as i usually like WayForeward's work, that art style is just incredibly unappealing.
It has some serious Newgrounds flash game vibes...

Also, i'm growing incredibly tired of hearing Baily and Baker.
Not because they're bad, they're fantastic, but they are in freakin everything.

So have fun, but not my cup of tea ^^

"Powered by android"
Eh...no, thank you.

Man, i am so in love with this character design!
And that pouch is just gorgeous in general!

@countzero Possibly, but i honestly doubt it.
The palettes picked for fore- and background are simply too close together, foreground tiles don't have gradiants to separate them etc.

And truth be told, i'm not paying money to try if a system wide setting i usually don't require will fix an issue like this.
I simply skip the game.
If people enjoy it, cool, but for me, the visual design is simply a complete bust.

Pass for me.
The color choices and the lack of contrast work make the game pretty much unplayable for me from what i've seen so far...or rather not seen...

But wishing everyone else a heckin good time!

To be fair, it can't be worse than Sonic being voiced by a YouTuber in our German localisation...

I want to see Dragon Quest stay Dragon Quest.
It's a series that has never really changed its core formula (Spin offs not withstanding).

Where Final Fantasy for instance is barely recognizable anymore (and mind you, that's not necessarily bad) Dragon Quest always remained Dragon Quest.
And every now and then, i like to see something familiar and almost nostalgic ^^

@Expa0
"It's all part of the grand plan to replace everyone besides Mario with different colored Toads."

Please don't say this aloud T.T
You know full well that they listen to stuff like this...

"Adjusted the difficulty level of the goal to clear XC Golf at Ridgerock Lake.´"

Huh, maybe now i can actually progress in the game...

I have to admit, probably my least favorite so far.
I haven't played much, but it has way too many bullet sponge enemies during on foot dungeons and the tank part enemies are just annoying...
Maybe it just rubbed me the wrong way and it just isn't my day and i'll certainly finish it, but yeah, first impression wasn't great :/

I hope you have spend plenty of money on a game you will never be able to play again ^^ /s

But seriously, this is my personal No.1 reason to not care about mobile titles.
Why invest time, let alone money, in something with a planned-obsolescence killswitch built in?

I would have voted yes blindly and bought the entire stock...
Until i heard that these version apparently omitted every bit of extra content that was added over the years.
So, no extra dungeons, no extra boss fights etc.

And frankly, i take content over a new pixel look although i would have loved the entire 2D series to be together in a unified look and feel.

But oh well, i guess it wouldn't be Square if there weren't any pitfalls...

@Damo And said person is representative of all Indian people?
Most of SF's evil military types hail from Germany (The Dolls Juni and Juli, Falke) and that i find that offensive, would that make these characters offensive?

Genuine question by the way,

@Damo
Hakan has short temper, considers his traditional fighting style to be the best there is and he looks down on others.
A short-fused, arrogant egoist.
All traits often awarded to Turkish men around here.

And said group of friends loved him for exactly that, because he was such an out there cliche.

But to be quite frank, if we're at the point that Blanka might be offensive to Brazilians and yet, everyone loves him, then where is this all heading? What's the point?

Is he really offensive if everyone adores the design?
Would it be better to redesign him, even though people might not like him anymore but at least he wouldn't be possibly perceived as offensive?

The original comments regarding Poison you pointed out were almost exclusively mean spirited. I can see that being a major issue as well.
But i still fail to see how something can be "offensive" when no one really takes offense to it...

@Damo I mean...fair enough?
The Tekken X SF example is indeed quite troubling, but they apparently also listened to corrections and suggestions.
And it's a single instance in the characters and meta-series history.
Some devs on that particular project being clowns doesn't really change the fact that the community is holding the character in high regard.
And wasn't that the point here?

As for Dhalsim, i still fail to see how the shrunken heads are offensive to Indian people.
Or better, i fail to see how this aspect of his design even relates to his origin.
Wouldn't this line of thinking also lead to Blanka being offensive to Brazilians because he's designed malformed and brutish?

Again, i'm not trying to start a heated debate here. This is not meant as some "gotcha" take or anything.
But Street Fighter 2 (and the entire Meta-Series really) is one of these instances where its entire cast of characters seems to be universally loved and adored, and all of them are stereotypes in some regard.
Like i said, it's anecdotal, but in it's 30 years of existence, i personally haven't heard anyone ever complaining about any SF character.
Quite the contrary in fact. Couple of Turkish friends celebrated SF IV's Hakan and his characteristics could be considered offensive as well.

@BloodNinja I still can't play the game at that point though...
Where is it bragging rights to ask for a fighting chance?
Difficulty modes don't alleviate handicaps.

But alleviating handicaps can allow any person to face challenges on equal terms.
Is this really such a difficult topic?

Difficulty =! Accessibility.
If something that could be easily changed is preventing me from playing the game like everyone else, even a baby mode won't make that more inclusive.

@BloodNinja
"Unless you are competing in a tournament or an online match, you don’t need an equal playing field. It’s just you and the game, otherwise."

I completely disagree with this sentiment.
I want to be able to face and overcome the exact same challenges as everyone else, regardless of what difficulty mode is offered and picked.
Offering me the easiest difficulty doesn't compensate me being potentially unable to play the game... Battle Garegga, a pretty famous Shmup comes to mind. Can't play it due to poor color contrast, even on its lowest settings, because i simply can't see things.
And that is not "just me and the game".
It's me not been given a fighting chance, and difficulty had nothing to do with it at this point.

@jowe_gw
"people of colour characters are bad because are done with inclusivity in mind and nothing else"
But that wasn't the argument.
The argument was, as you say yourself, that these characters can end up just as badly written as any other character as well.

The thing is, this "But at least the character was X, Y and Z" mentality doesn't necessarily create the "pressure" of doing better. This hyper-focused attention on these traits often lead to applauding characters just for these traits, completely ignoring blatant shortcomings.
It leads to these characters always being judged by completely different metrics.
"Yeah, they might be X, but at least they are Y".

To put it slightly hyperbolic:
In my opinion, these traits should not be used as shield to hide poor effort behind.
A bad character is a bad character, and that is all that should be judged.

I completely stand behind the message here, i just want it to happen organically and on a universally level playing field ^^

@XenoShaun @BloodNinja
"Why can't we have both"
That is exactly the point. I don't care about difficulty settings because, as you said, they are optional and there is seldom a situation where they are not a good idea.
But they don't put me on an equal playing field either, they don't make the experience "inclusive".
But they are often the only thing that is talked about when it comes to inclusivity...and it's not helping at all.
And that is all i was saying: Don't conflate the two.
Having difficulty options should be its own topic.
Because if difficulty = inclusivity and you don't want a difficulty option for whatever reason...then inclusivity just falls of the table most of the time.

@Damo "The fact that straight white males love these characters doesn't automatically mean they're no longer offensive to transgender or Indian people, sadly."

Not trying to fan any fires here, but are they though?
In all those years, i've only heard adoration form both characters from all sorts of different people.

@BloodNinja Disingenuous? Might want to elaborate?
I'm a massive Shmup fan, it just so happens that i can see badly.
Inclusivity would be to offer me options to lessen my handicap:
Color contrast, layer brightness adjustments etc.
I would find a difficulty slider so i would not have to deal with so many things i can't see insulting.
I want the same challenge as everyone else. I want to be included, not have my own kiddy pool.
If you ask me, inclusivity and difficulty should be two entirely different discussions.

@jowe_gw Yes, and? That's exactly my point.
Focus on good characters first and foremost.

@BloodNinja And then, please don't conflate accessibility with difficulty. As someone who greatly benefits from visual acessibility options which are rare, this "Games need an easy mode" talk is highly condescending.
I want a level playing field, not getting pampered.

Genuinely couldn't care less.
Color of skin, gender and even less sexual orientation are the last things that matter when it comes to fictional characters in my opinion.

Far too often do you end up with a completely underwritten, underdeveloped character, because the "inclusivity checklist" was all that mattered.
And this blatant tokenism is just disgusting.

But as long as trends like "Look, it's well established character X, now with inclusive traits Y and Z!" get applauded instead of demanding proper, original and well written content, i don't see things changing anytime soon.

A pass for me.
Lost interest in Pokemon, don't care for MOBA and i care even less for mobile nonsense.
So, a perfect mix of nope and avoid.

The same is true for the Mother and F-zero collections.
Both are finished, Nintendo simply couldn't decide what color the word "Collection" on the box should have.
They have been carefully considering it for years now. You can only make one first impression afterall!

All jokes aside, whoever runs XBOX's social media account is the only one who actually got what gaming's all about...

And of course, at the end of the day, it's a PR account, but following a PR MO that doesn't aim to lower competitors and instead simply reminds people that having fun is more important in this day and age...
That's remarkable.

Ahhh, poitivity...
Those were the days...

With TikTok just having confirmed the "conspiracy theories" that they do in fact collect biometric face and voice prints for the Chinese government, i think it's a valid worry that Tencent, a company with direct links to the CCP, acquires a company who provides software solutions to the US military...

But you've heard the folks in the comments, since the CCP is already spying, it's ridiculous to care about more spying!
Just don't worry about it, just continue to consume!

@Sirloto ProTip:
There are several ROM hacks that restore everything that was changed from its original Japanese release "Elnard" (So many changes, it makes Working Designes blush) and actually makes the game quite playable and enjoyable ^^

Almost everything that makes The 7th Saga a bad game was done by the localization team.

@Topic
I genuinely likes and enjoyed "Two Worlds".
In our German localisation, the main character was voiced by one of my favs, Dietmar Wunder, which also helped a lot!
But there was a certain charme about its clumsiness, like the big bad waiting for you in a sheep cave right next to the starting village.
But it also had plenty of brilliant ideas. It's magic system (Basically you build your own spells by stacking magic cards) or that you could simply stack the same pieces of gear to make them better, completely avoiding clutter in your inventory.

Saw this on the eShop and usually, i'd just ignore drivel like this, but i was curious enough to look up what's ASMR about this.
And from what i've seen, it's the marketing team understanding search terms and YouTube trends ¯(ツ)/¯

From stock "EnvironmentalSounds.wav" to video gamey boops and beeps, there is very little ASMR about it and this thing apparently lives from weird kiddies with ear shaped microphones who discovered a fetish that is marketable on a child friendly platform and who can now show video footage of a jigsaw puzzle game that mentions ASMR to be topical...

This is one of the weirdest trends in recent years...

In a way, this is almost brilliant...

@Arckadius Yup, i rarely, if ever, have any issues with bad framerates, but MCD's stuttering is exceptionally bad.
It's not unplayable (I played the 360 port or Warriors Orochi 2 back in the day, my tolerance for bad framerates is pretty high), it's just a frequency that actually makes me sick.

And from what i've heard, it's stuttering on Xbox as well. Haven't heard anything about the PC port so far.