EvilLucario

@ShadJV I find that hard to believe since honestly the Adventure games + Heroes could all go pretty damn fast too. Stages like Final Rush, Speed Highway, and Egg Fleet especially show that off wonderfully. But even then what makes Sonic tick is not simply the fast speed, but being able to keep up a good momentum while going as fast as possible. It's what Sonic far superior to Tails and Knuckles in the 2D games despite seemingly lacking options compared to them, because Tails and Knuckles' special abilities completely destroy any momentum to just slowly advance. Meanwhile, Sonic can utilize elemental shields to blitz through the levels faster, and in Mania can Drop Dash for even quicker maneuvers.

Every single Sonic game, even the bad/average ones, are best played when you can go as fast as possible while maintaining that sense of flow and momentum. Pure speed like Unleashed and Generations are still fantastic games, but they still focus on maintaining that sense of keeping the momentum. Still though, then you have Forces where keeping that momentum is so much easier due to bland level designs, therefore not making it as engaging or fun.

In short, it's not about the speed (because I'd argue that's still very well kept), but in a lot of other problems like padding out game time (Werehog, fishing, treasure hunting, etc) or just a lot of jank/glitches or simply the level design not being built around Sonic's core identity.

@Paraka Tbh 3D Sonic has many problems, but control was never one of those problems until Shadow the Hedgehog. Adventure 1/2 and Heroes all controlled very well and especially Adventure 1/2 really showed how they could take the 2D game physics and translate them to 3D. It was jank and especially feels extremely jank now, but all 3D games back then had jank so it's forgivable.

Predictably, the comments section is going to turn into "hur dur 3D Sonic was never good" in some form or fashion, I can guarantee that. But the Adventure gameplay from Sonic Adventure to Sonic Heroes was always super solid and had a pretty good foundation. Nowadays, games like Mario 64 can be a bit buggy and rough by today's standards, and have received some improvements to game feel and such with Odyssey and the like.

I think it's finally time to rethink Sonic in 3D by going back to basics and really going back to the Adventure gameplay and seeing what worked and what didn't work. Why did people not like certain stuff like Adventure 1's Sky Deck or Adventure 2's Crazy Gadget? Why are levels like Speed Highway or Green Forest loved? Etc. They absolutely need to take the RIGHT notes and not just "oh they like it because NOSTALGIA" which has been a problem festering since Sonic 4.

@NEStalgia He only just recently took over from Kimishima, right? It's not an overnight process, to be fair. I know he was trained behind the scenes, but it's not like he had that much say on stuff before he really took over. It took Phil Spencer a few years to completely overturn everything Don Mattrick did for the original Xbox One.

Wow, that's a direct yet also indirect way of saying "we're not going to give you all the basic features you want". I hate being cynical, but that's what it feels like with regression of online since the Wii U days.

I do think that Reggie is secretly knows deep down why the online isn't as good as it should be, especially for a paid service, but he's (mostly) powerless to change the course.

Hopefully the new president changes course quickly.

@RadioHedgeFund At the end of the day, pushing aside all notions of "being politically correct" or tasteful or whatever, it'll just lead people to not buy the game on their system, so if anything Sony's still just shooting themselves in the foot there and they're still getting heat over this. I'd maybe understand it for Sony IPs for self-censoring, but these are third-parties that Sony/Nintendo barely have much to do with anything. I don't see this game or similar other games attracting much people outside of the target demographic. It's only one thing with sensual content, but if it escalates to a slippery slope along with the crossplay thing still not 100% embracing where Sony wants more control at the expense of everything else, that's not going to look as good for next generation.

Then again Sony is the golden goose of the games industry. Compare the reactions to Sony bowing out of E3 2019 entirely to the reactions of Nintendo bowing out of E3 live presentations for example, where people spelt doom and gloom for Nintendo while a select few were saying it was smart for Sony without realizing the ridiculous double standards.

@saintayu I mean... yeah? Those are kinda separate things I'd think. I don't think there's much overlap between homophobes and people that these types of games attract. Or maybe I'm out of touch with bigotry.

@RadioHedgeFund Being serious here, I'd agree there. Honestly I don't care about the whole "maturity" thing though. Video games are video games and while I'm all for looking at games as art like Super Metroid's expansive world (and how pretty much every game is trying to replicate that world even 20 years on), they're still entertainment to appeal to all sorts of people, even the "immature" guys. I don't care about maturity when I'm playing as some silly plumber jumping on mushrooms and plants or some well-endowed girl doing whatever.

Which is why I don't get Sony doing some censoring stuff since that'll just mean no one will buy that stuff on their system while facing vitriol against people, since one of the bigger selling points would be gone.

@RadioHedgeFund M-rated games are immature, true maturity is in E-rated games :^]

"Nintendo is for kids"

Man the rights for Final Fantasy must be a mess.

It's not like Final Fantasy is THE RPG anymore though.

@Yogsoggoth imagine getting a PS4 over a good PC lmao. If you wanted to bag on Switch having no games, where were you when the PS4 and Xbox One had nothing to offer until 2016? Even the Wii U was better.

Get ready for Stone awards later down the line :^]

@Dalarrun Artorias of the Abyss's bosses were all good (except for the optional double Sanctuary Guardian fight), but in the base game I didn't think too highly of them. Nearly all of them are extremely simple (Gaping Dragon, Pinwheel), annoying (Gravelord Nito, Centipede Demon), too easy (Ceaseless Discharge, Seath the Scaleless), literal copy-pastes (Stray Demon with Demon Firesage), or just plain bad (Bed of Chaos, Dark Sun Gywndolin). There's only a few base DS1 bosses I'd consider good, like Orestein & Smough, Great Grey Wolf Sif, and Chaos Witch Quelaag.

I'd imagine that a bunch of people that say Dark Souls sucks probably couldn't even get past the Asylum Demon. :^]

On a serious note, get Dark Souls 1. It's not terribly hard since every enemy has telegraphs so wide it's extremely easy to read and retaliate. I have a lot of problems with Dark Souls 1, mainly the second half of the game not being anywhere near as good as the first half while most of the bosses suck or are just average (haha Bed of Chaos haha Gravelord Nito cluster****) and some REALLY bad balancing (Dark Bead haha, Black Knight weaponry haha), but damn is Dark Souls still fantastic because the overall gameplay and world is that good. It's literally a 3D Castlevania and I'm all about games like Castlevania.

While it's cool that it's going to be finished, the 250 Telltale employees still need to find a way to land on their feet. What happened to them, being uprooted out of nowhere, is simply appalling. I don't understand how it's ethical to hire people as late as a week earlier before doing the massive layoffs. That just reeks of bull**** and I honestly do not blame people who think that upper management are a bunch of con artists.

@Wexter Yeah Xenoblade 1 didn't have the Zohar/Conduit at all, though it makes sense since it wasn't intended as a Xeno game at first. It still has some Xeno archetypes like Zanza = Deus, but the Zohar didn't appear until Xenoblade X with the Lifehold.

I'm excited to see what this'll mean for future Xeno lore.

@Wexter Oh absolutely. Rip-off is the wrong word to use. It's just that Xenoblade and Xenosaga still took ideas from Xenogears and you can't really get around that. But I still agree in the end, it's really interesting to see how Xeno takes the same basic concepts and story structure (rise of humanity, hubris leading to humanity's destruction, repeat and the Gnosticism elements) applied in different ways.

@FX102A Xenoblade 2 isn't really a rehash of Xenoblade 1, the overall story and motivations are separate. But do you know what Xenoblade 1 is a ripoff of? Xenogears. The entire endgame of Xenoblade 1 is literally Xenogears endgame with very similar villain motivations and sequence of events but massively simplified. Xenoblade 2 also rips off of Xenogears, but less on characters and more on background details like the World Tree compared to the Eldridge.

Pokemon Go to jail

@greengecko007 Autoattacking is only a small facet of the games. By midgame if you need to use autoattacks very often, there's something wrong you're doing.

And it's not like other games like Ys VIII and Final Fantasy XV aren't mindless at times where you just spam the same attack button.

@Tyranexx Was really cool. It was during the time The Battle of the Labyrinth was coming out, and I remember him talking about his inspirations for creating the series, mainly stemming from his disabled son who helped inspire Percy Jackson in the first place.

Man, I miss that series. Too bad the second series' last book was just a disappointment though. I wonder if the third series is any good.

@greengecko007 Xenoblade X and Xenoblade 2 are already very different from Xenoblade 1 forging their own path, so this isn't anything new. They all have wildly varying gameplay, stories/characters, and worlds. The only thing they have in common are religious/philosophical connections as well as the same basic story beats and concepts from Xenogears.

That's really cool of him. I remember as a kid when Rick Riordan visited my elementary school to have a speech, which inspired a lot of my interests in writing and reading.

That said, luck does exist in the field. Yoko Shimomura famously gambled by saying she knew how to compose video game music for Street Fighter II when she only had experience with other types of music, but it actually worked out fine for her since she composed amazing tracks anyway. She took a big risk but it paid off very handsomely.

@YoshiAngemon Sakurai has no input on Kirby anymore. Hasn't been for years.

@Folkloner Did you not read the rest of what I said lol? I said native VC is a standard and that it should be a thing. Read before you make yourself look like a stupid.

And yes, people can have smartphones without a microphone in their earbuds or whatever.

When people complain about the app, no one ever thinks of the bigger picture since everyone has a smartphone, but not everyone has a headset/earbuds with a microphone.

Yes, native voice chat is more convenient and a standard that should be there. But having the app as an option for people to simply use their phone as a way to talk compared to buying a microphone is actually fairly smart.

THE DEEPEST MARIO LORE

Hey he likes what he likes. I generally don't like 3D Zelda or Final Fantasy all that much and that's fine. There's reasons why people don't like Odyssey as much as the other 3D Marios.

Shame. Guess they flew too close to the sun and got burned.

Oh well.

Why in the **** do people do **** like this? Do people not realize that they are indeed not smart enough to get away with theft?

This guy is probably boned for the rest of his life for such a trivial thing. What a waste.

@bratzdoll The person who designed Dahlia also designed Ursula who's the complete opposite of Dahlia in almost every way.

Don't be so close-minded.

@SlippingBack Takahashi wants to put X on the Switch, so it's only a matter of time until that gets rereleased.

I'm perfectly fine with the anime artstyle. If people didn't have a problem with the anime artstyle back when Xenogears or Final Fantasy VII (after Amano's watercolor artstyle) came out, they shouldn't have a problem now.

Thanks for the interview by the way. Confirms pretty much everything we already knew from past interviews.

Be very careful if you plan to do this with randoms. I'm doing this with friends I know well enough both IRL and on the Internet, and splitting the cost is indeed really nice. But if you are paranoid about getting scammed, you may as well not pay the family plan unless you actually have a family.

Make sure the admin isn't some power-hungry idiot and you'll be fine.

@mikegamer The engine didn't support Switch until recently. It's also why Hyper Light Drifter was "late".

@AlternateButtons In practice, the RPG mechanics are extremely limited, and there is little depth to combat. Money and EXP are pretty much worthless too. It is an RPG by checking pretty much every box off the list, but also an extremely shallow one that's only held up by the story, characters, and writing, which are all pretty good but once you beat the game there is very little reason to go back to it as a game in of itself because no matter if you go Pacifist or Genocide, it's all boring gameplay. Genocide bosses are the only time when the combat gets fun if you ask me, but there's only two of them.

Xenoblade 2 DLC. Only thing I'll be playing for the next few weeks.

Rest in peace comments section, we knew ye well.

@RupeeClock Might give it away, yeah. It won't unlock the actual expansion story though, I'd imagine.

We'll see when it releases though.

"Choice"? I'm getting both. Already have the DLC, and I will be buying the physical edition because I'm a mindless shill for the series.

Ah, I admittedly skimmed through and assumed it would be handled like the DLC. Sorry.

Regardless, if you miss it you miss it, no big deal.

@Jezebel95 No. Every new file can use these items. If you start a new game, you can get the items again.

If you start NG+, you won't. But by then you can get Legendary Cores out the ass.

@boop22 Probably you, because he looks really good in Xenoblade 2's artstyle. This is the same guy who designed characters for Xenogears, Xenosaga I and II, and Xenoblade X as well as redesigning KOS-MOS, Fiora, and Elma for Xenoblade 2.

He might be under an NDA tbh. Just like how the VA for Xenoblade 2 were on an NDA for Torna: The Golden Country between the base game and development for that.

Plus, almost every bit of Ultimate's trailers have absolutely no voices. There's only a few like Ike's voices from Path of Radiance/Radiant Dawn, Simon yelling "Grand Cross" during the last Direct, and maybe a few I can't remember, but perhaps they're still finalizing things for the final release.

Regardless I am desperately hoping for a replacement that's like the codecs or Palutena's Guidance.

@MoonKnight7 Put it that way, yeah. But with the whole "drought" of games for 2018, Octopath also launched at the right time, clear of mostly everything else. The stars were aligned with the game, and it being another safe RPG with safe visuals (retro art, even if it's in a $60 game, is still safe art because everyone loves retro art) backed by Square Enix guaranteed it will do well, even if Square Enix thought otherwise because they have extremely weird mindsets at times.

@MoonKnight7 I wouldn't say it's an unexpected hit. The writing was on the wall that it was going to do very well from the start. The demos gave good press, it had a very safe artstyle (the 2D sprites on 3D environments is not a new nor novel concept, Xenogears did it long ago), and turn-based combat has been clamored for by everyone else ever since even Final Fantasy ditched it. It was also looking like another stab at said combat from Bravely Default, which was proven to be decent. Plus, it was an exclusive that had a huge amount of hype behind it, and even normie gamers that don't play RPGs got into the game, as evident by the people in this website and if you compare this to the other big RPG, Xenoblade 2 which people really seemed to want to hate despite that I think being a better game. And we all know how well pretty much every exclusive sells on the Switch (except Sushi Striker, rest in piece).

Xenoblade 2's DLC is looking to be the next gold standard for DLC in JRPGs, adding a new campaign with different mechanics from the main game (so it's not completely more of the same) and multiple new modes to take part of for endgame stuff. If these guys ever go back on their word to make DLC, they should take cues from Torna: The Golden Country because that is DLC done right. Especially if it's a standalone expansion that can be purchased separately for a cheaper price than the base game.

But a sequel is far more likely. They've got the engine already, so what they should do next is tell a better interwoven story between characters with more character interaction.

GameXplain had the right idea long ago when they ditched scores for simple one-word descriptions like "loved)", "liked-a-lot", "meh", "didn't like", and "mindblowing". They make no effort to hide bias in their preferences in their reviews and even wear it on their sleeve. A score is arbitrary, but a description of "I liked it" goes a long way.

@ReaderRagfish I have that URL memorized for everywhere. You can't fool me!

Even with my Switch I still have my Wii U plugged in. I still love the thing unconditionally. Even when I get my PS4 this Black Friday, I'll still just keep it plugged in because that thing really is great.