#2023 game journal

[stevetown]

Signalis

Playtime: 8h50m Completed: October 27, 2023

My initial impression of Signalis was...mixed.

Its classic survival horror PS1 aesthetic was exquisite in its presentation. The UI and blocky character models were all spot on, retaining the chonkiness of CRT-era games of yore while making the whole package just more accessible and smoother to play. The lighting in particular is masterful, bringing bloodstained hallways and derelict spaceships to new horrifying light in ways original hardware couldn't.

All the pieces of a survival horror classic were there, which is why the game frustrated me with its neverending references to other horror titles. The rugs in The Shining making a few appearances. Direct dialogue from Silent Hill 3 was injected into the game that served no purpose other than to be a reference. Some sound effects come right from Alien. The game can be anchored down by being a homage to everything that came before it.

I suppose this had a purpose. Like the mangled memories of the anime androids we were unearthing, these references are made to reflect the memories of the players back at them, intentionally invoking a feeling of "wait...have I been here before?" I'm sure there's no shortage of spilled ink about these references and the games overarching themes of cycles and memory, but I had very little interest in that dead-end commentary as I was playing the game.

Instead, when the game does attempt to make something new, it almost always succeeds. The radio-based puzzles were fresh and unnerving, and the handful of boss encounters are clearly well thought out. The presentation, which almost too often had an air of unearned pretentiousness, still manages to make the game stand out and resulted in a few chilling sequences.

When I think back on the game after it's distilled in my mind, those unique moments are what float to the top. Signalis is overall great, certainly one of the best survival horror games of the last few years. I just wished that it pulled more on its own unique style instead of being stuck in the past.

Also it made me lose it every time the game would cut from gorgeously rendered 3D scenes like this:

To C-tier anime art like this:

Just took me right out of the game...

[dogstomp]

Dogstomp #3183 - September 18th

Patreon / Discord Server / Itaku / Bluesky

[chussyracing]

thank you @presdestigatto for tagging me 😚

tagging @balaclavacharles @never-looked-so-good @ferrariprince16 @dobbiamo-capire @charlescherie @caffeinatedlovergirl @debushit and anyone who would like to do this - you are legally obliged to say i was the one to force you to do it

[fancyschmancyopinions]

MAISIE WILLIAMS at the 2023 Fashion Awards on December 4th 2023 wearing SIMONE ROCHA

[breadknight-likes-things]

Bread's Game Of The Year 2023: Alan Wake II

Alan Wake 2 is a miracle, and Remedy are miracle workers. I have vivid memories of buying Alan Wake, on recommendation from a friend I don't see often enough anymore, with money from my terrible summer job from a local theme park I think about too much. In 2010, Alan Wake, warts and all, felt like a revelation. It had a clarity of vision that few games could boast of at that point in video games. In an industry dominated by straightforward shooters and down the middle action game, it was a weird, confident, psychological horror game with more personality than most other games at the time put together. Alan Wake 2, meanwhile, is a masterpiece. I could say so many things about Alan Wake 2 and fail so miserably to properly explain what it is that this game does so right, but I'm going to try. I mentioned that Alan Wake had a clarity of vision, but Alan Wake 2's supreme confidence in it's frankly insane meta-narrative nightmare that it's two leads are trapped in, makes the original game look like, no pun intended, a first draft. From its bold, unsettling opening, to sections as supremely silly as Coffee World, Alan Wake 2 knows exactly what it is. Alan Wake 2 swings wildly between a thrilling mystery to solve, a homage to every weird TV show you've ever watched, a damn fine survival horror game, and the most wildly creative use of meta-fiction in the history of mainstream video games. By now, many scenes from this game, even if having not played it, are common sights on the internet, and for good reason. Set pieces like "Herald of Darkness", "Dark Ocean Summoning" the cursed halls of the Ocean View Hotel, and the aforementioned Coffee World put the creativity of some other games this year to shame, all on their own. I can't even get too into specifics in this post for fear of spoiling the experience for anyone else who wants to play this, and I beg people to do so. Alan Wake 2 is one of the single best video games I've ever played. In a year drowning in high quality releases, everything from new instant classic CRPG's, perfect remakes, and indie darlings, Alan Wake 2 stands tall. A force of pure creativity that seizes and capitalizes on the unique ways video games can draw us into a story, and play around with what we expect that story to be. In the original trailer for this game, Alan himself's voice over describes this game as "Not the story you wanted", but I wouldn't take anything less. Alan Wake 2 is my game of the year for 2023.

[ecargmura]

My Love Story With Yamada-kun At Lv 999 Is A Romance You Should Definitely Watch (Anime Review)

If there’s a studio that can capture romance well, it’d be Madhouse. The way they animate romantic scenes in anime is immaculate. I absolutely loved My Love Story!! And how romance was animated in Cardcaptor Sakura and Bibliophile Princess (which I still need to finish). My Love Story With Yamada-kun at Lv. 999 is a prime example of well-animated romantic scenes and fluffy, colorful animation.

My Love Story With Yamada-kun at Lv. 999 is a shoujo romance story between gamers. 20-year-old college student Akane Kinoshita gets dumped by her boyfriend one day as he fell for another girl over the internet. In an attempt to get him back, she attends a game event, trips and meets a handsome guy named Akito Yamada who picks up her shoe. Akane learns three things about him: 1. He’s Afro Yamada from FOS, the game she plays and the focus of the event she is attending; 2. He’s a well-known gamer that her ex-boyfriend ignores her when he sees them together; 3. Yamada is an 18-year-old high school student. Does that stop Akane from falling for him? Nope. She falls for him because that is the point of the story!

I’ll address the elephant in the room first. I’ve seen people on social media berate the age difference between the two leads because one is a college student and the other is a high school student. 18 and 20 isn’t a big gap, contrary to Twitter’s belief. A two year age difference is nothing special. There are a lot of pairs with a two year age difference. There’s no difference in maturity levels as both characters are mature in their own ways. There is nothing problematic with this story or the characters. If you think a two-year age gap is weird, then maybe you’re the weird one…

In all honesty, I really like the premise of having gamers fall in love. In today’s society, gaming is the trend, so it was clever of the author to ride on that and to make a romance out of it. I think the way this story was written is actually crafted well from a writer’s perspective. Akane isn’t shown to be a nerdy gamer; she plays games casually and is fashionable and pretty. It shows that anyone can play games and it shows in Episode 3 where Akane meets up with her guild members that aren’t Yamada in real life. They range from a handsome bespectacled 19-year-old college student Eita who catfishes as the guild master Rurihime, his gremlin younger sister Runa who’s in middle school and strawberry farmer Takezo Kamota who’s much older than all of them. It shows that anyone of all ages can enjoy games and that there’s no shame in doing so.

Sure, there are conflicts every now and then like Akane not being over her boyfriend, Runa getting jealous and protective over her circle of friends that she had to trick Akane, and Yamada’s classmate Tsubaki having a crush on him, but they all get resolved efficiently and without the need to drag out time. I actually like that! Sometimes, shoujo and romance animes can be hard because some conflict drag out and ruins the flow (I’m looking at you, Kimi ni Todoke with your Kento/miscommunication plot point). 

The characters are all nicely written for a romance anime. Akane is a twenty-year-old girl and a college student. While she is the older one in her relationship with Yamada, that doesn’t mean she’s mature. She has problems and issues that most young girls face like not getting over rejection, being overly trusting and overthinking. People would think, “Oh, you’re an adult, you have to start acting like one”. Adulthood isn’t all sunshine and rainbows as people might expect and Akane proves that. College students are dumb and a mess; I would know because I was dumb and a mess at that age. I also like the fact that she does have dating experience. Akane, in general, is a fun character and a good shoujo lead; I think wasted/drunk Akane is the most hilarious thing ever. I love that she has different outfits! They’re all so cute and a few look like something I’d wear casually!

Yamada is rather mature for a high school boy. However, as a gamer, he’s rather unrealistic because most gamers I’ve seen are loud, constantly online, and probably lacks a love interest. How often do you see a tall, handsome gamer who treats women well? How often do you meet such a gamer guy outside of gaming? Despite his rather unrealistic qualities, I do think that he and Akane match well because of their personality differences and just how kind and respectful they are to each other. Yamada is only awkward with romance and girls because he had hurt someone in the past and doesn’t want to step out of his boundaries to hurt anyone again. I guess my only gripe with Yamada would be that he’s voiced by Kouki Uchiyama who’s voiced dozens of characters similar to him so it’s to be expected that he’d voice this guy too (this is the fourth anime I’ve seen that has him in the cast; three of them are the same character with black hair and one is a marmot); it’s not a bad thing to be typecasted since it is a job for voice actors. I do like Uchiyama a lot! I just feel like it’s to be expected in a way?

I do like how Eita has the qualities to be the second lead, but he’s not. He’s mainly in the story to be supportive and help our main duo get together. He’s a long time friend of Akito’s. Eita’s probably my favorite character in this anime because of how entertaining he is. When his identity as Rurihime is revealed, he goes on and on about his relationship with Rurihime (he just likes playing as a female character in general) and doesn’t think him being a catfisher is weird. Yeah, you do you, Eita! I do like how he’s a good big brother to Runa; he scolds her when she does something bad, but he is generally caring and supportive of her. He’s also somewhat of a big brother to Akito since he’s a year older than him. Eita is a vital character in this story because he’s the reason why Akane is in the guild and why Akane and Yamada eventually got together.

Runa looked to be a romantic rival at first, but she’s just a lonely girl with no friends. She’s protective of Yamada and such because she doesn’t want change in her life and just wants things to be the same. Although the prank she played on Akane was bad and dangerous, she does get Akane’s forgiveness by becoming her friend, which Runa enjoys and appreciates. She’s a definitive younger sister character with her snark and sassiness. She’s also a very timid character as she gets nervous easily. I’m glad that she is someone that I got to warm up to in the anime and that she doesn’t continuously play pranks on Akane to kick her out of the guild. My only gripe with Runa is that her game avatar doesn’t appear once in the anime. What does it look like? I want to know!

Kamota is the last of the major Chocorabbit guild members (before Tsubaki’s arrival) and is the oldest. He’s such an adorable character. I think the fact that he’s an older character, thus has so many connection makes realistic sense. If you don’t know, being an older Asian person means you know practically everyone in your community; my parents are like this as they practically know a lot of people in the Korean community where I live. He was yelling at the creepy suit guy in Episode 5 (voiced by OnoD) and telling him that he has a lawyer friend was peak. He’s also hilarious in the FOS world where his character is a tiny fuzzball, but when in battle, he grows ten times bigger and becomes the OP-est member. It’s a waste to not see what his avatar’s powered up self looks like.

Of the side characters, I think Momo is my favorite because she’s so supportive of Akane. While she does envy Akane at times, it’s more of a friendly kind. She’s always supportive of her and is her biggest emotional support when things look bad for her. I do hope she gets the boyfriend of her dreams.

Okamoto and Tsubaki are Yamada’s friends from school. Tsubaki’s role is that she has a crush on him, but is also a gamer. She joins Chocorabbit a bit later in the anime and does get along with Akane. Okamoto is comic relief. I do want to see more of his friends, honestly. They do seem like good people for Yamada to hang out with them constantly.

The voice acting is pretty good since they get a good mix of well-known voice actors in the cast. Inori Minase and Kouki Uchiyama play the leads while Natsuki Hanae, Ai Kakuma and Nobuo Tobita are the supporting cast. That’s pretty solid all around. I think the two most standout voice actors are Ai Kakuma and Nobuto Tobita. Kakuma has two roles in the anime: Rurihime and Runa. The fact that she voices both characters differently shows off her talent. Rurihime has a cute tone befitting an avatar while Runa is soft-spoken with a lot of snark and grouch. Tobita’s voice as Takezo is really good. He voices him adorably but when things get dire, he changes his tone to a deeper one. I really liked the way he voiced his avatar character the most.

The music in the anime’s good. The music used in the romantic scenes is so soothing and brings out the vibe so well. The opening and ending songs are good too! You can’t go wrong with Kana-boon!

There’s nothing I particularly disliked about this anime, which is good! I totally recommend this anime to anyone wanting to watch romance animes. Heck, this has become one of my favorite romances now. I’m glad I was able to watch it and enjoy it! I think there should be more college-themed romances or even gimmicky ones like gamers falling in love. This is the last of the Spring 2023 animes I’ve watched, so I’m glad to finally be able to review this. What are your thoughts on this anime if you have seen it?

[outeremissary]

Word Search Game

Tagged by @arendaes- I appreciate the tag, and apologize for taking over a month to get to it (I hadn't reorganized my writing folder yet). Because 2023 was not a year that I wrote regularly and I'm trying to get back into the habit, I think all or almost all of these are actually from 2022. It's still a WIP as long as I intend to loop back, right...?

The words I was given were MOMENT, STAR, and BLUE.

MOMENT: This was from Between Death and Dreaming, a small oneshot and my one and only one Wrath fic.

Every part of her body screamed to push her luck, to make some move she didn’t know to comfort Carmen. To assure her that she wouldn’t go. Something to finally bridge the gap between them and make it clear that she could be relied on even if she could never be loved. She couldn’t imagine what that move was. So instead she stood stock still, desperately hoping the moment wouldn’t end. “You’re lying.”

STAR: I had to cheat a bit for this- I seriously was struggling to find the word. A travesty!!! Maybe it was buried in something I didn't check...? It's from a chapter of a Kingmaker prequel fic I've recently returned my attention to (though this old bit is marked for rewrite in revision for various reasons).

They trailed after the creature down long starry corridors lined with mismatched doors or paintings that stretched from floor to ceiling and moved like captive moments of time. Here and there they cut randomly across empty parlors or ballrooms- in one especially cobweb-strewn stateroom the starlit sky gave out a few feet in and revealed cracked and faded tiles arching listlessly over the abandoned space. They wandered in lonesome spirals until the angel was sure that they would never be able to retrace their steps unassisted. Nowhere did they pass window or skylight: the great complex only looked inward on itself and upward at a false sky.

BLUE: And this is from an old draft of a oneshot- I don't think I'd reached this point on the second draft I worked on in late 2023.

Tristian also noted the way the baron’s wings still pressed uncomfortably against the back of the chair: a troubling continuation of the baron’s new habit of imagining them away. Ever since they appeared Balthazar had awakened to a vendetta against his own body- one which had made him even moodier than before. There was a faint twinge of something in the pit of Tristian’s stomach as one of the wings stirred ever so slightly. The split second it took to quash that something was enough for the baron to shift just enough to crush the flicker of life back against the chair. “Tristian.” Balthazar’s eyes flicked over Tristian in lightning-fast assessment before he smiled his customary pleasant smile- the one that was all in mouth and body and gesture, but never reached his frigid blue gaze. “I didn’t expect to see you again. To what do I owe the pleasure?”

If you're interested, I'll tag @mountainashfae with the words TIME, HAND, and DARK.

[gamesline]

Dood! How does NIS America do it all?

Nick Odmark and Gina Kilcup gave us some insights on the PAX West 2023 showfloor schedule to talk with us in depth on how the Disgaea and CRYMACHINA publisher organizes its busy catalog!

[futuresconnected]

Welcome to my Blog!

Thanks for being here! I'm going to start off this blog with a bit of info about me, my history with games, and my plans for this blog. Come in and see!

Meet The Blogger

You can call me Wham, I've been playing games since i was child with a Gameboy Advance and a well-loved copy of Pokemon crystal, but its really only in the last five years that I've come into any sort of gaming community and had the desire to explore gaming as a hobby and video games as an art form.

Let's start with the kind of games I've enjoyed (and you can check out my Backloggd link in my profile for more)

JRPGs are the big one, and a perennial favorite of mine. Heavy hitters here include the Final Fantasy franchise (X,XII, and XIV especially), the Xenoblade games (especially 3), and the Persona series. I'm currently trying to explore more series that I've missed over the years, like Star Ocean, Trails in the Sky, Tales of, etc.

Rougelikes! Not quite as much these days, but ever since The Binding of Isaac came out, I rode the wave of the indie roguelike scene for a good seven or eight years and have a deep love for where this genre has gone over the years. Notable games for me here are Isaac, FTL, Risk of Rain, Hades, Inscryption, and Darkest Dungeon.

Diablo-style loot RPGs, I've had a long history with these games starting back when I would play Diablo II LAN games with my friend and his dad back in middle school, and games like this have always had a soft spot in my heart. I spent years playing Path of Exile, and I routinely come back to games like Titan Quest and Grim Dawn as well.

Fighting games! This one is pretty new for me, back in 2020 one of my good friends decided he was gonna try to get into Street Fighter, and that caused a small revolution in my friend group that has led to me playing a whole hell of a lot of Guilty Gear Strive, Street Fighter 6, and other assorted games. I'm by no means good at them, but I've been committed to learning and improving at them bit by bit (you'll see in the weekly FGC Corner :) )

Visual Novels/Narrative Games. This one is very much a less cogent genre space, but some of my absolute favorite games can all be loosely put together around these terms. Games like 13 Sentinels, 999, Virtue's Last Reward, Umineko, Misericorde, Perfect Tides, things of that nature.

There are many others out there, so I'll end this section by listing off a bunch of other games that are classics for me: Outer Wilds, Neon White, Just Cause 2, Devil May Cry 5, Blasphemous, Dark Souls/Bloodborne/Elden Ring, Pillars of Eternity 1 and 2, Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous, Rimworld, Disco Elysium, Monster Hunter, and many many others!

The Big Idea

What I mostly want from this blog is to be a space where I can get together at the end of a week and think back about what I've been playing, what I think about it, and whatever else is connected to those feelings. Over the years I've enjoyed seeing other folks thinking and writing critically about the media that they enjoy, and while I hold no aspirations of turning this into anything quite as specific as that, I want to give myself space to spend more time thinking about this hobby which means so much to me. I have no idea how its going to go, if I'm going to like it, or how consistent I will be able to be, but for the time being this is my plan all laid out!

If you've read all this and it sounds interesting to you, or you think you might have tastes that align with mine, feel free to follow along! I'd love to have more people to talk shop with, or even just knowing that some other folks out there might think my words are interesting.

So let's get into it!

[meganthepagan1]

Watching Game of Thrones for the first time after all the hype is over has been enjoyable. Feels a little more personal since no one is talking about it as much. I loved the books years ago and don’t mind the differences the show has taken on. It has been a nice little escape when I’ve had time to myself.

[stevetown]

Armored Core

Completed: April 30, 2023 Playtime: 8h0m

Yeah, yeah, I'm one of those Souls fans who jumped on board because the Armored Core VI trailer got me hyped. Sue me.

I don't have time to play them all, but I want to play enough to see where the series came from and where it's going. My goal is to play Armored Core 1, 3, 4, and For Honor. We'll see how I do.

First up is the original Playstation title. And you know what? Fuck yeah. I'm in. I really, really did not expect to get so into the first freaking AC game. I love everything about it.

Work as a mercenary bouncing back and forth between two rancid corporations? Check!

Get a bill at the end of your missions for the amount of hard ammo you used? Check!

Mech customization that feels actually impactful and not just incremental? Check!

Sick moments where other Ravens show up mid-mission to kick your ass accompanied with their own special music? check!

Mysterious lore dump emails after beating a Raven explaining how NO ONE HAS SEEN THAT GUY IN YEARS HE WENT AWOL, SOME SAY HE WAS LOOKING FOR A PLACE TO DIE? Check!

Hidden system where if you fall too far in debt they just replace your body parts with better one as a guise to let players have an easier time? Hell yeah that's a check.

I played until I was bleary eyed.

Just the worst kind of bosses.

Things do get a bit frustrating by the end - some of the missions are very janky and long, which made me thankful for the save states on the emulator. It also ended a bit abruptly. I was just starting to really customize and experiment with crazy builds when the game came to an end.

The final build.

Onto Armored Core 3!

[dogstomp]

Dogstomp #3187 - September 22nd

Patreon / Discord Server / Itaku / Bluesky

[thejaymo]

Accessions 02.Apr.23

Whilst I was in Berlin earlier this week I popped into Trust and got handed the Autonomous Worlds book. Gutted to have missed the deadline for my essay to go in!

I received my early bird backer copy of Paul Czege's Ink That Bleeds. A zine about immersive journaling games. Can't wait to read this.

[fancyschmancyopinions]

HOYEON at the 2023 EE BAFTA Awards on February 19th 2023 wearing LOUIS VUITTON

Hoyeon really looked amazing at the BAFTAs. This dress was really gorgeous. The color looked amazing on her, and her red lipstick really complimented the look. I love the big skirt. Hoyeon just looks effortless and it’s a fantastic look.

[breadknight-likes-things]

Bread's Game Of The Year Honorable Mention #4: Star Wars Jedi: Survivor

I'm pretty burnt on Star Wars. Since the Disney era began there's been five movies, an ever increasing amount of TV shows, and an endless parade of circular arguments of what Star Wars is supposed to be, and it all drives me near to madness. The video games though? Those have been plugging along at a high quality, and somehow, it feels like it's easy to miss that. I'm generally of the mind that video games, by their very nature and existence, are better than movies and TV. Usually, if some big media property has a game version, that's going to be the one I gravitate towards, because playing video games is more fun for me than passively watching something. Enter: Jedi Survivor, a fairly iterative and not all that revolutionary sequel to 2019's Jedi Fallen Order, but a good one nonetheless. In a year full of bombastic, 10/10 video games, it's so easy to overlook something that's just good, maybe not super remarkable, but good. Jedi Survivor has a fairly similar setup to Fallen Order. Cal Kestis is still on the Empires most wanted list. Still running missions that he thinks will further the cause of bringing down the empire, and still, frankly, being endearing as hell. The story is a bit of a surprise this time, as instead of diving further into the fight against the empire for the bulk of the game, as would be so easy, a lot of it is largely focused on the recently introduced High Republic era of tie in media. As such there's a lot more Jedi mysticism, old feuds and lost temples in this one. Not that there weren't those before, but they really get the limelight here. The gameplay itself is fairly similar, but they make some key changes that I do think results in this one being the better of the two "Jedi" games. There are more combat styles to chose from, resulting in more varied gameplay that can range from fast and furious strikes with dual lightsabers, to a two handed claymore type weapon that favors high risk with slow moving attacks. While it wasn't my favorite, there's even an interesting combat style that straight up favors Cal firing a gun with his left hand while using the lightsaber in his right. Alongside the new combat, the game takes a piece of advice from the last game that I personally had hoped for, and increases the frequency of the boss battles by quite a bit. A big improvement from the first games relative lack of them. even if some of the bosses are obvious repeats of ones that had come before, or souped up normal enemies, it still provides a fun end cap to bigger moments that sometimes that original game failed to provide. All in all, Jedi Survivor is, as I said, a fairly iterative sequel. In a year where the frequency of good games is frankly absurd, that doesn't exactly stand out. Still, it deserves a shout out, It builds on and improves the foundation set up in Jedi Fallen Order, and makes a really solid action adventure game from that. It's one worth playing. Also this game has Turgle in it. I won't spoil who that is, but this game has them in it. 10/10.

[helldidntwantme]

Games I wanna play in 2023:

Cult of the Lamb

Infinity Nikki: My expectations are not super high because of my relationship to insert game that IN was clearly inspired by here and just the current state of ha ha gacha games, etc, but I still wanna see what it’s like edit: corrected autocorrect haha to gacha. Tickled my funny bone though

Our Life: Now & Forever: I’ve been hype for this since the demo dropped and will wait patiently for it to be completed

Disco Elysium: I expect to die, a lot

Nier Auto Tomato: Same as above.

Hylics 2

Whatever text based game that grabs my attention on Itch or whatever

A couple games that aren’t out yet

Probably more visual novels

Games I will continue to play in 2023:

Tailor Tales: I like the dress up :)

Peglin: I am a simple Goblin and fun puzzle games enjoyer

Flight Rising: Dragons

Animal Crossing Happy Home Paradise

Games I plan to finish in 2023:

Our Life: Beginnings and Always: Almost done with Cove’s Route

Pokémon Legends Arceus

Miitopia (Switch Port)

Kirby and the Forgotten Land: The ability challenges were honestly a turn off for me? Like I would get through the main levels but then see how many challenge stages I had to do and turn the game off khhcffgb

Monster Prom: Trying to get all the endings and polaroids

Lisa the Hopeful: So far I like it more than Pointless but shhhhh

Hylics: I had to watch a speed run to figure out what to do because I got stuck when Act 3(?) started and I didn’t know where to go with the ship

Games I got for Christmas that I either just started or haven’t started yet and don’t know what category to put them in:

Clannad: hype

Fishing Paradiso: I played the mobile version during my pandemic crisis and it was nice

Katamari Damacy on the Switch

Dropsy: hype 🤡

Monster Road Trip: I in fact do not have Monster Camp but I have the games right before and after 🤡

Here Comes Niko: Every single time I say or type this game’s name I want to say “Let’s Go Niko” but that is. In fact. Not its name. Also hype