#replaying control now knowing all the lore and stuff is so much more fun

[hollowmoon-art]

Dynamite

[musicfeedsmysoul12]

Review of Dragon Age the Veilguard

First off, right off the bat, I’m putting out there I am foremost a story person. Give me a good story and I’m happy. Then it’s graphics, gameplay (by which I mean do I think it is very replayable), then combat.

So positives first for me:

Story: I love the story. It’s a little cliche and a bit silly but it’s so much fun. Besides it’s not like Dragon Age has ever not been a bit cliche. Secret bastard son of the king saving his homeland. Frosty witch with a secret sensitive side. Assassin who wants out. These were in the FIRST game. I very much enjoyed it and the lore we were given. I actually went ‘WHAT THE FUCK’ out loud multiple times and had a blast through the whole thing. I actually dropped my controller in shock during the final battles because of several moments.

I’ve seen complaints about the writing being ‘MCU’ but honestly I just recently replayed the first three, and this is the same to me. It’s actually better to me then Inquisition which I found so boring. No really, Inquisition was the weakest to me character and writing wise. It felt so flat but Veilguard brings back the spark that Origins and DA2 had. This sort of ‘we need to get people together and save the world despite the odds’ spark.

Characters: I love every single one of them and am already starting more playthroughs so I can ROMANCE THEM ALL. Some may not be your cup of tea but honestly a lot of the hate I notice tends to be the weird feminist ‘you have to be serious’ tone, the ‘I don’t like anything cheery’ type, transphobes or racists. The actual critical takes I find tend to veer on the usual bullshit of the writers in general. (Such as Taash apparently having to choose between two cultures and how their gender is handled. Which fair. I love their gender storyline but it isn’t the greatest story)

The characters are very dynamic and fun to get to know. I didn’t care about Harding in Inquisition but I love her here. It’s just so much fun.

Character Creator: This is honestly the best one I’ve seen yet. I know everyone loved BG3 and how they do it but Veilguard BLOWS it out of the water. Just so many options and things to do.

Plus as a side note you can choose to be nonbinary or trans and it has an affect. It is so cool. I loved my Rook talking about their gender.

Combat: Oh man this is weird for me but I love this combat. Let’s be real- tactical stuff in the past games were clunky and off. A lot of Origin purists say DAO was the best but who ACTUALLY used half the stuff? Like traps? Maybe a fair few but the majority didn’t. The whole series so far had been button mashing for me. Here? Nope! It’s a lot more complex for me and makes me actually think. I love it.

Puzzles: One person I saw said they were to simple. My response is that the early ones were but they sure ain’t later on. Took me forty minutes to figure out one. It’s awesome.

Gameplay: FUN! Just everything about it is so nice and I love it. It’s not annoying to do, it’s simple once you get used to it and honestly I like how the missions are set up. I do think it is very replayable as a whole.

The Ending: I FUCKING LOVE THE ENDING IT IS SO DAMN COOL. I dropped my controller during it, I gasped, I cheered (totally guessed one plot twist but DAMN did not expect the very end) and HOLY SHIT it was SO GOOD.

Now the negatives.

Story: There’s a lot of sanitization of the Crows. The Crows are canonly assassins who buy a lot of their recruits and brutally train them to become Crows. It is not nice unless maybe your family are Crows and you’re treated nicely. Even then, Lucanis canonly was beaten by his grandmother during training and other things.

Also, I did not like how my Rook Laidir suddenly talked about being a galley slave. It was confusing as that was never brought up before. If they’d included it in the description it would have been better. So I’m headcanoning something different for Andy Laidir. I think this is just an over sight, but it is off putting for me that it’s suddenly said once then vanishes.

There's also a few things with how story progression goes. It feels a bit to fast in some moments, and to slow in others. I think that they had to many ideas, but I'll talk about that in the factions section.

Characters: While I love their story line I think Taash could have done better if there was less ‘choose between being Rivaini or Qunari’. Like having a disconnect from your culture is understandable but I felt it was to… ‘you must conform or reject’. That’s not how it goes.

As well the discussion of gender was fairly Western specific which isn’t true across all cultures. It would have been interesting to explore it more and with Taash also wondering about the Qunari version of gender as why they don’t feel right.

I’m also semi kinda upset with how Davrin kept getting the same ‘intro’ scene to his quests a bit. Just him carving something. It was recycled to me and compared to the others… kinda felt off.

Also, while I love him, Lucanis' romance isn't my favourite. It's very slow burn and while nice, I felt that it was to much of a slow burn in the end, where it's just them kissing and a few words of love. I haven't been spoiled about the others too much, but he feels very lacklustre. But it might just be me there. I will defend it saying it isn't bad, but for me? Not my cup of tea.

I'm also disapointed with Isabela's cameo. While YES WE SEE HER, I do romance her with Hawke often and I can't believe any of my Hawkes who did (and lived) are't with her causing chaos. Plus for fuck sakes she gets some generic outfit but Morrigan gets a super special one? Really?

Combat: While I love it, I think they made the dragons to OP. It’s really hard to get close and fight them. Of course I am not a combat person so it may just be I’m bad at it. I do think some of the 'being shoved backward' moments could have been done better as well.

Gameplay: Okay so… I think the choice to have Varric narrate things wasn’t ‘bad’ but they really went to spoiler filled in some. Like dude, don’t SAY that?!? I don’t get to eagerly wait in suspense now, I know what’s going on. That’s not fun. Boo!

Also the animations for opening chests was annoying.

Factions: I feel this is another kinda let down. I truly believe the only four that mattered were Veil Jumpers, Shadow Dragons, Crows and Grey Wardens. Plus I felt again a lot of this is sanitized. The Crows are not a good organization. Sure they basically are the Antivan military but they’re assassins who buy their recruits half the time. Lords of Fortune are pirates and treasure hunters. They're not 'good' people.

This really ties into my thoughts on progression: we could have done away with the Lords and the Mourn Watch to focus only on the four factions and it would have been amazing. Probably would have had better pacing for the plot to. While it was so cool to see these places, in the end it would haven't taken away from the main plot by just not having them be around.

However- despite my negatives, and despite my issues?

This game is a solid 8.7/10. It was truly 9.5/10 for most of the game, but by the end, I did find that I was a bit dissatisfied with some things. However, the game is genuinely amazing. It's a call back to the original 'rag-tag bunch of losers go and save the day' and has elements of Mass Effect 2 I adore.

Solid game, if you loved Origins, DA2 and even some elements of Inquisition, go for it. It might not be everyone's cup of tea, but it sure as hell is mine.

[off-mozzarella]

Ty for the tag! You have made the mistake of asking me, the post says how you got into it but here's the full long ass story bc I never get to yap about the things that occupy 99% of my brain space. Grab some popcorn, you'll need it 🍿

I think my actual first exposure to Zelda was seeing a cousin playing Oot lul.

As for actually playing, I don't know how young I was, probably around 8. We had a Wii, and I saw my sister play TP, I think it was the ending lol, so I wanted to play it. Aand, I did, and I was terrible bc ofc I was a kid, I used guides so much and would get nervous and yell for my sister at the smallest monster sighting xD. But it's an amazing game and I got really obsessed with it because I can't be normal about things, I love the story, the vibe, the characters... So I made some drawings of it (which I still have), would yap about it to any unfortunate soul that would listen, and for the next good years I would replay it to the point where I basically memorized most stuff.

Yeaaars later, my sister shows me a botw trailer, I was like oh cool 👍 because I didn't expect to ever lay my hands on a switch, but we actually got one around 2018 I think. Ofc first thing I played botw on it, even having played TP so much I didn't have much of an idea of what a loz game was supposed to be like, so I got in not knowing what to expect. And, you guessed it! I got so obsessed with it. The mechanics, the story, the giant world, it all just left me in absolute awe and did something to my brain lol (totk could never). I would use the guide so much because I have like 2iq for puzzles but I somehow still enjoyed it a lot.

I made my Tumblr acc in 2018 bc I wanted to see stuff from other fandoms and I don't even remember how but I guess eventually I stumbled into LU. I read the comic and all the stuff in the archive, this is where I started to learn a lot more about the loz lore and I was like damn this is so cool!!! Yes I got obsessed. I read some stuff about the timeline, story and the games bc I thought I could never play them but luckily I forgot a lot of it xD. Basically here I started getting rly into loz.

When they made Skyward Sword HD I told my sister we should buy it, I thought she had ignored me but she gifted it to me on my birthday, so that made it a bit special for me xd. This was a turning point, I got a better idea of what a traditional loz game was and even if there's some stuff about the game that I really don't like it was overall a really cool experience. Oh and the lore. And the implications. This was the first time I played a loz game without relying on guides (only when I got really stuck), so I was extra proud and it was fun when I wasn't fighting the motion controls xd. I was back to being a Zelda kid and yapping about it, and I decided to try and play all the loz games I could get.

So. I thought I was ready for Oot - the N64 version that is on the switch. It was so hard 😭. I felt bad bc I did need to use the guide more but still, a greaat game and the final boss left me shook bc y'all weren't lying the game is so good wtf. Random but it was a cathartic moment for me when I had to defeat it using a broken biggoron sword and a shit ton of deku nuts after hating on them the whole game for being useless 🤧.

Thennn clearly I had to play Majora's Mask. Girl, TP made me edgy so I could love this game. I do think it is a bit worse than Oot in some aspects but generally I felt it was a much more solid game and oh lord it's so atmospheric. The existencialist stuff was too much for my tiny brain but it's still cool.

I think (?) I got back into LU around halfway of my MM playthrough, I then reread the whole comic with more english and loz knowledge and understood things so much better now, and it's what is on my mind all the time now XD.

I never finished totk bc I didn't feel very motivated, making progress in the game felt a bit like a task 😬 (I do love you, Tulin). No words lol.

I'm now playing Minish Cap and!!! Love it, so much cute stuff that brings literal tears to my eyes lol. I was a bit scared bc it is my first 2D Zelda and I didn't want the Oot experience repeating itself but xD it's fairly easy and has some pretty cool stuff, it makes me feel childlike wonder idk.

So! Next on my list is alttp and the oracle games, though my friend said she could play FS with me so that may happen first 👍. I currently have no interest in playing eow or zelda I & II, I opened those last two for like five minutes and noped out, but maybe one day 😅.

SORRY FOR THE LONG YAP but tagss:

@dragkbluire @final-fantasy-xiii-fan

A question!! Maybe a chain?

When did you get into LoZ, and how?

For me, I played BotW years ago and really enjoyed it but couldn’t get really into any of the other games. About a year and a half ago (I think?) I happened upon Linked Universe. I didn’t know who half the cast was but I was SMITTEN. After that I started ALBW and it was all over for me.

No pressure tags

@starwolfie @kilgoreontralfamadore @chibinur @raven8224

[reimahowaido]

I’ll get to those Magic Crafter Dragons I sweeeear But first, fun stuff from Discord. Dunno who made the original, it was just posted on a server, but yeet I did it anyway First of all, I don’t play a lot of games. I like games and the idea of them. I enjoy people playing stuff, I love watching others play. It’s that little sibling culture. But lemme toss a word or few about all of these. Though first of all, I only own 4 of the 8 games listed and even still I’ve only played 3 of them xD R.I.P. Pokemon Cafe Mix - The game is just Super Cute. Like oh my god Aesthetics! Adorable, every pokemon looks so nice and I just want to go to the cafe and taste everything and just chill. Please. It looks so cozy and relaxing. Gameplay is fairly simple too. Sometimes things seem a bit BS but in one way or another I’ll get through every stage etc. so it’s not too bad. Most of the time relaxing, can be addicting because of how simple things are. But really I love the game and I hope one day they’ll add more of the pokemon I like xD Buizel is my current favourite <3 It’d be nice seeing Mienshao or Mienfoo for one, maybe Glameow as it doesn’t get a lot of attention. We got Gogoat, but I wouldn’t mind a Sawsbuck or Deerling Pokemon Black 2 - To keep the Pokemon trend going, this is my fave out of the mainline games. I’ve been a fan ever since the first generation, I’m older than Gen 1 at that. But yeah, we did buy games but Nintendo stuff was too expensive and so I never really got to play those growing up. Black 2 was the first game I ever bought, for myself, with my own money. It was my first game and I loved it dearly. Still do and man I’d Love to replay it, but the curse of only 1 save file is cruel. I don’t want to restart my first ever save file. Currently I have no way of transferring anything over and I even have a Shiny Gothorita there (as underwhelming as it is, it was my first ever shiny). I love these games~~ Lots of different pokemon to choose from, great story, the fact that it’s a sequel is so freaking cool and unique I Love It So Much. Of course it’d be cool to have some extra things to do in it, like cleaning my badges, contests would be cool, I loved the mining stuff in Gen 4 when I got to try it on my friend’s Platinum save file as a kid. Speaking of, Gen 4 games would probably be my favourites, if I ever had the chance of owning and playing any fully. They have soooo much to do in them! Gen 5 is good and certainly up there in faves, but bruh, Gen 4 had all sorts of extra stuff, especially Platinum, and in HG/SS you had Pokemon following you like bruh that’s Crazy and I’d love to have that for a game I own, it’s like a dream Honorable mentions to Mystery Dungeon and Gen 6′s Pokemon Y for some grand memories. Firstly Pokemon Y, the second game I ever owned I think, great fun. I played that game for hooooooooours and it’s the only Pokemon Game that I’ve both played as a Nuzlocke and actually reset to play again. Also the first gen where I actually really got into competitive stuff, breeding for natures and stuff, and I’ve caught so many shinies in Y and Omega Ruby (mostly Y, OR has 1 shiny in Pidove, while Y has Ninetales, Pachirisu, Burmy, Gligar, and perhaps some other ones I caught/hatched myself). Mystery Dungeon games get a mention for having cool stories and I like the idea of the personality test and stuff. I’ve never played or owned any of these games, but I’ve watched Marriland play a handful of the games and currently am enjoying MDB playing through the first games in the series. Also a quick bloop on Colosseum being Cool as heck, and Battle Revolution gets a shoutout for looking so freaking good, having amazing music and making me search up videos with my favourite pokemon and just looking and watching hundreds of videos just because they looked so nice

Fire Emblem has to be the 2nd series of games I’ve gotten the most into. Although I’m a fairly new fan and my experiences and knowledge are limited, I do still enjoy the series and games - both old and new - a bunch. I only own Awakening, Conquest and 3 Houses, but I’ve again watched others play the past games a bunch, so I have some knowledge and memorable moments from those games too. Now I haven’t actually gotten myself to play 3 Houses yet, I’ve seen playthroughs of the game already and know the story etc. But yeh. Still, I’d say that I’ll probably like 3 Houses more than Awakening and Conquest. Awakening is nostalgia galore for me, but it does have its things with the story and characters and stuff. It’s nice, but I dunno, I just feel 3 Houses has an edge on it in some way. Maybe it’s just... Less controversial? Less Flame Wars? Maybe? Fates games, well, we all know the big glaring thing here. The story. And some of the characters suffer from this too. I kinda do wish that the Player had a biiiit more control in how the story went and played out, like I feel you definitely could have saved Scarlet in some way still, and all that. But eh, there’s enough stuff for me to go and prefer 3 Houses over it. And yes, I like choosing the members of my team and playing however I like, so giving me the ability to class my characters however I want is going to be a mistake as I’ll just make everyone a mounted unit and get destroyed but hey! Options :2 Variety :22 Great tiiiiimes~ Also it’s Blue Lions for me, Golden Deer Second Now for the games I don’t own. I chose Radiant Dawn because the Tellius games are just so good. I love the character in them, the story is pretty solid and the worldbuilding is cool too :2 I like both of the games, and while Path of Radiance is more coherent and doesn’t give split the characters up a bunch, Radiant Dawn has More of the great characters :2 Yes I know, not all of them are as fleshed out and thought out as the first game’s characters, but yo I still love them. I love a good continuation to a story. I love a ‘hey maybe it wasn’t as Black & White as we were made to believe’ twist. Also just hella good memories from watching BigKlingy play these games. The audience memed Aran to the final levels. We did it, he did so well, Aran deserved to be there xD Radiant Dawn also brings us Nailah, who is just. Yeah, you speak to me on so many levels, I’m easily readable. But also, woman, wolf, strong, yasss~~ Also I love the idea of the Jaegan character being a Thief/Assassin. That’s just so different and cool to me after all these Horse Units. And I’m the one guy who likes Levail and would love to see more of him. Give us more of Levail, the man who almost made it to being playable. Man. Levail is probably the one reason I’d pick Radiant Dawn over Path of Radiance xD The other game I’ve watched BigKlingy play through (and that’s my only experience on that game) is Sacred Stones. Pretty solid game all in all. Story, characters, but speaking of that story, if you really think about it, it’s Hella Dark, and that’s actually kinda cool in a way. I’m not that into dark stories, but here it worked. Also watched PhoenixMaster1′s playthrough on the Echoes game. I do like the game, if i find it one day I Might buy it but I’m not like in a hurry to get it. It was cool though, different for reasons but hey~ Also, Berkut, yes. I’m one of those people who like this angry man. But come on, he was really good xD Spyro I’ve already talked about in my lengthy little thing that I’ll get to continuing eventually xD But yes, I freaking love Spyro, my childhood, still very enjoyable experience full of great memories Metroid Fusion - Oh boy here come the nostalgia~ I’ve actually never played any Metroid games myself. I got introduced to the series in the early 2010s through youtube videos. I’m fairly sure it was me looking through dozens and dozens of Top 10 videos, several of which were on ‘the scariest bosses’, either unexpectedly scary or something else. But guess what, Nightmare from Fusion was in there, and I Think the person in the video said something on not wanting to even show the final forms of Nightmare’s face because it was that horrifying to them. And honestly? The fact that they didn’t show how bad it got, mixed with my morbid curiosity and woop, here I go~ Down the Metroid rabbithole where I watched a lot of videos on people fighting Nightmare and the other bosses in the game, eventually going into watching full run-throughs of the game and enjoying my time. Game looked pretty good, soundtrack was really nice too. And so I ended up on listening to a lot of the game series’ music and getting more familiar with the other games and the lore too. Learning to know that Samus was a lady was also hella badass. Fusion started it all for me, and while Super Metroid is cool, people also just play it a loooot, especially the Speedrunners, there’s also plenty of hacks based on that game and yeah I get it the game is Good, but that makes Fusion all the more special to me~ Devil May Cry 3 - Ok so again, I’ve not played any DMC games myself. This one again though is nostalgia ocean for me~ 2010 or such, I’m on some forum, said forum has a forum game based around songs or such and someone links one from this game. I Think it was the Doppelganger battle theme, or then I just found that one and listened to it for hours among the other battle themes these games have because they’re soooo gooood~~ DMC 4 was fairly new at that time, but I remember Gredo’s and Agnus’ themes being up there in songs I listened to a lot too. My experiences and stuff on this series was fully based on the songs, images on said songs, bits and pieces of the cutscenes of these games I saw and comments I read. I didn’t get too deep into DMC back then though, but I did have a bit of knowledge here and there, even if my idea of the stories in all the games was, well, I wouldn’t call it warped, but I definitely had imagined the story going differently to how things actually went xD Still, as a few years back I returned to DMC out of that feeling of nostalgia, and discovered DMC 5 had Just been released, boi, I was In. And I watched through cutscene compilations, playthoughs and what have you on all the games (Except for DmC, boot to you ReBoot), and it was quite the hype time~ I enjoy the chracters, the story that there is around them, and just how carefree and fun stuff can be. The party sure did get crazy~ Lost Dimension - The last game I have on the list there. This might be a weird one and I get that yeah. How many have even heard of this game? I sure wouldn’t have ever known of it without BigKlingy’s playthrough of it. But that playthrough was full of memories, I should really rewatch it one day~ I may not remember an awful lot about the game, but I do keep coming back to it in one way or another. I liked the character designs, the fact that all of them were unique and had their own abilities, there was a bit of story around all of them, the traitor system had you thinking & made each run a little different... That’s some Cool Stuff! The game might be a bit obscure and seriously not known at all, but for what it was, it was great and I enjoyed it a bunch! And now for stuff that wasn’t on the list but I kinda still want to mention. Because why not~ IB - This Almost made it onto the list, but I felt a little closer of a connection to the other games on it. But IB is one of those games from the early 2010s that I also got introduced to through the wonderful world of Youtube. I have forgotten the name of the person whose playthrough in the game I watched. But I watched a ton of people play this game. It was just. So cool. The puzzles in this game were nice and the fact I myself could solve and understand them too was pretty nice to me, and for some reason I just enjoyed watching other people react to the game and try solving stuff. It also had a couple different endings so watching and seeing what the other people got was also interesting. Great memories~ Witch’s House / Ao Oni / Mad Father - And all sorts of other horror games that kinda fall under this grouping and style and stuff. Yeah, IB kinda opened a bit of a thing for me as I realized I greatly enjoyed the horror games with puzzle elements to themselves + a bit of story here and there. There’s definitely much much more than these 3, I watched soooo many of these games being played by others. Ao Oni I may have discovered through my Hetalia phase though, HetaOni, if any of you still recognize that name. Daym. Although at first I didn’t want to watch HetaOni because of the portraits. Pfffff I thought the person who made them was being mean to some of the characters, but nah, I’d later learn that those were simply just mimicing the ones from the original game. But yeah, Ao Oni had a dozen variants and things inspired by it so those kept me busy for a whiiiiiile Hades - Now here’s a cool recent game! Again, haven’t played it, but it looks cool. The story is nice, character designs are God Like (hehe), soundtrack is super cool, aesthetics and oh my god everything is voice acted oh my gooood. This game is just. So cool. And the team who did it seems really cool too and are seemingly full of nice amazing people. This is definitely some great example work on how things should be done :2 Definitely something to look up to, I love everything about them~ The only reason Hades isn’t up there is because of its recentness and my brain not managing to think of it somehow even as I struggled to come up with stuff (I was mostly trying to think of stuff I had played, so that’s one thing. I even struggled to remember DMC because my current hyperfixations are elsewhere and that’s freaking Wild considering how much I enjoy DMC) But yeah, Hades is Super Freaking Cool Crash Bandicoot - These games I did play as a kid actually, the 1st one was way too hard and the 3rd one was my favourite. I like Crash, these games were nice too and I have plenty of good memories with the game, just not enough to make it up there on my list. Yeah it sounds stupid that I’d take out a game I actually played and replace it with stuff that I didn’t, but... Hey, my list Minecraft - Watched several videos on other people pllaying this game, I know of it, I respect it, but I’ve never played it myself and stuff. It’s cool but didn’t make it on the list Animal Crossing - Riiiiiight, these games seem adorable and I wouldn’t mind owning an AC game one day. I’d probably reset continuously though to get Skye in my town/village/island, she’s my favourite xD If the recent game had cost lest I might have gotten it. 60-70€ is just, a lot of money Persona - I guess I’ll mention these too. My experiences are through Bigklingy’s videos again. 3 is a fave, 4 seems cool, 5 I don’t know a lot about but it seems nice too. I probably wouldn’t be able to play these games myself, since some fights kinda need certain things and strategies and you can’t really just pick whatever and whom ever and roll through with brute strength. I mean, I Guess you could, but that might not be as fun in the long run? Who knows, but it’s not exactly like Pokemon or Fire Emblem in those regards you know The big conclusion is that I like all sorts of different aesthetic looks, mostly probably natural with some brighter colors in it. Stories are good, I love stories! Good characters with nice designs and backstories are really nice too. Things being thought out and built nicely is great you know? A little bit of strategy, fantasy here and there. Nothing too dark and gloomy or ‘hyper realistic’ or what have you. I guess no first person shooters either, though combat is fine. Games where I can pick and choose what to use and what kinds of ‘teams’ I build and the ‘members’ I use in them is nice. I do love watching others play, but with games like Pokemon & Fire Emblem I have that drive of choosing who to use and having my own unique experience kinda gets me to buy the games.

[sillyfudgemonkeys]

i havent been here in a hot second is there a reason for the makoto hate specifically? like the rants go back to p5's writing issues but the spite for makoto seems very specific did she kill someones dog in one of the spinoffs or what?

You're all good. So here's the thing, she did kill my dog-I'm joking.

When I say “I’m the residential #1 Makoto Hater” it’s a joke, partially cause it probs looks that way (and probs cause it might be true, who knows if you could quantify hate then maybe I’m at the top of the leaderboards 8U but you can’t so we’ll never know). But I’m saying it at as a joke, to own myself and everyone here that knows what I think of her, rather than wear it as a badge of honor or some silliness. It’s just a “oh haha yeah there goes Silly, dunking on Makoto again! She’s basically Makoto’s #1 hater haha oh she’s so silly.” (so please don’t look too deep into it, I just want to have fun).

Anyway, me hating Makoto isn’t new, but I do hold a similar ire towards Futaba, Goro (tho I have camaraderie with his fans, I relate to their struggle in terms of my own brown hair and red eye fav and Atlus screwing them over u_u I may hate your fave but I respect you and will be in your corner), and Yukari (as well as Chloe from LiS if you want a non-Persona example). Makoto might be talked about more because 1) She hits my buttons that much faster (Futaba/Goro are more like a festering wound, and when I talk about them it’s hard to pick a starting point), 2) Her fans tendency (early on in the fandom) bringing her up frequently.....was a bad combo with #1 (overexposure+pushing all my buttons really fast=disaster). Obvie not blaming her fans, but it was hard to curate how I was able to curate my content online (esp with gaming news websites calling her “best girl” when showing off a figure announcement or some BS when I just want to know what new games have been announced >.> I can do without you trying to start a waifu war in the comments Siliconera -_-)

Anyway, I think I’ve made my reasons for hating her very clear (you just have to search her name on my blog and you’ll get a ton of essays I’m sure, too many to count). And a lot of it is the failure of P5′s writing. “So it’s just the writing you hate, not the character.” No. Because that doesn’t make sense. Except under certain circumstances (which I’ll provide examples of below with Luke Skywalker), you can’t separate the writing from the character. The character IS the writing, the writing IS the character. If you can’t hate/dislike the char because “of the writing” then you also can’t love/like them either. The character and the writing/writing choices for that character are connected. The writing embodies that character. They are the same.

Now I said there was an exception, and that’s....”different writer/director,” tho it’s not ALWAYS the case (sometimes the new writer really gets the original writing, like Saito for MM.....they are very good at emulating the clusterfuck of P5′s writing). P5′s writing is the original basis for Makoto’s character, that’s her. You can’t separate it from her. Same thing with say....Luke Skywalker from the OG trilogy, that’s him. But then we get to the sequel/Disney trilogy, new writer/director....and yeah that’s a mess (from what I understand OG trilogy=Hopeful and tries to see the best in people, 2nd Disney=Cynic and tried to kill a child, 3rd Disney=Hopeful again for some reason). There’s character development, then there’s just straight up changing the character just cause you need them to be this now. 

*writes how this can apply to Persona spinoffs but deletes because I was getting too off track* Look at me exercising control. It’s probs best I save that for a meta after I’ve replayed all the spinoffs again.

But....if you want me to boil down my issues with Makoto, I hate the message we get from her. I hate the lesson we learn from her. What is supposed to happen vs what happens.  It’s supposed to be about a girl who is blindly following authority and becomes disillusioned with it after being burned by it, on top of “immense pressure” she has as well, and then comes to our side (we know this because Atlus told us). We don’t get that (we know this because we saw the execution). We get two adults, yes TWO ADULTS, one of which is her sister and wants her to do well in school (but isn’t like.....a tiger mom about it, because Sae can’t be TOO horrible because we need to like her later), who in retrospect seems very busy with her job (which gives Makoto freedom), but also feels burdened by her younger sister (in which she has one shitty slip with her and then NEVER again). And the other is a dumbass principal who asks a really strange and stupid task for Makoto that snowballs into bullshit. That’s IT! THAT’S IT! That’s all we get from Makoto and “authority.” Strawmen. We don’t really get much of her personality either (I’m not saying that cause “she’s cardboard” I legit just.....don’t get her? Like I don’t get enough of her to get a solid foundation, you get me?) Like as the player, what we see of her is she’s just studying in the library (Kamo arc), then the principal calls her in, she mentions the rumors about Kamo, he asks her to look into the PT in exchange for a recommendation (to which she’s surprised and says thanks, not no, she looks like she’ll accept JUST BASED ON THAT) but before she can even say Yes (OR NO) he threatens Makoto with her sister, to which Makoto hardens and then agrees. Then she acts like an asshole and yadda yadda stuff happens.

But if she’s supposed to blindly follow authority, she’d say yes, but then they don’t let the character breathe so she can make the “wrong” choice because the Principal goes STRAIGHT to threatening her.......so now the message is muddled, or really it’s non existent. The whole Sae thing is a nothing bag too, it’s just family drama. Her sister is, no HAS to be absent a lot for her work, just so Makoto can have the freedom to be a PT....which means....it hurts her lack of freedom and other stuff associated with Sae being a big pressure on Makoto’s life. You know, I’ve said before they’ve squandered Sae, and that Makoto’s presence really harmed Sae (iirc it was this post). But at the same time, how they handled Sae really screws up Makoto’s character. Neither are allowed to breathe. Neither are allowed to make a true, horrible choice...and then learn from it. They aren’t allowed to have an actual arc. Altus played it safe, took choice away from them, didn’t want to take risks with either character and have meaning. Instead we just have this nothing contradiction thing dicking around until they join our team. 

What really sucks about that....is we got that with the Kamo arc. With Anne, Ryuji, even Yuki and Shiho. Kamo was manipulative, and his manipulation caused people to make....not the best choices, all out of a means to survive. Ryuji physically acted against Kamo, and he got his leg broken, team disbanded, and outcasted. Anne was trying to protect Shiho’s position on the team, which lead to her almost getting harmed by Kamo, Shiho getting harmed, her not seeing the truth about what was going on around her, and she didn’t tell Shiho (because she didn’t want Shiho to think she didn’t get on the team for her own merits), and so on. Shiho didn’t tell Anne what was going on because she wanted to protect Anne from Kamo (and was afraid Anne would, very much blame herself), and her and Yuki and the rest of the teams helped keep quiet about Kamo so they wouldn’t be next on the physical chopping block. This isn’t me blaming them, this is me showing their choices, their attempts to fix their (hopeless) situation, to help themselves or others, and the dramatic irony being it just made everything worse. BUT, even tho Kamo was the real one to blame, each character is aware of the actions that were made, and the consequences of each action (esp Anne/Ryuji/Shiho). And in their CoOps, they identify this, and take strides to learn from it so it doesn’t happen again. That’s an arc. That’s character development. They were allowed to make errors, mistakes, decisions that negatively impacted themselves/other’s. We see a solid foundation of their character from the get go, and how it changes over that small time. We don’t get that with Makoto. The group is like solid concrete to Makoto who is like shifting sand. 

Sorry got a bit off topic, anyway, I hate her message of boasting about her fighting ability but she only harms her friends (outside of shadows, but that’s not special) WHILE ALSO being a damsel that needs someone else to rescue her! I hate how when she gets called out, she wants to drop it, and gives gaslighty apologies, even tho she really ROYALLY screwed lot of people very badly. I hate how she demands us to help, only to literally be a detriment to our investigation. I hate how she gets to fly off the handle without repercussions (despite needing to be cool calm and collected for her job, especially since she miraculously can do that when needed so what the hell????). I hate how the text has her be shitty, say shitty things, be bad at her job, but will turn around and reward her time and time again. 

Sure she doesn’t break the lore like Futaba, or unravel P5′s plot like Goro. But as a character with a message attached to her, even ones that the creators surely overlooked (I’m sure they didn’t intend for her to only hit her friends), it’s simple but very annoying. Fast and easy to see, doesn’t require me to think of P5′s lore as well as the grander Persona lore. Doesn’t require me to dig through text for Goro bread crumbs and then unravel the entire basis of the P5 plot thanks to him. Makoto is easier to get into, it’s smaller scale and more personal I guess. 

[murasaki-murasame]

Oh boy that sure was a whole lotta stuff going on in the 1.5-year anniversary digest video, huh?

I was hoping to post some of my predictions and hopes for it beforehand but life stuff got in the way so here we are, lol.

Anyway there’s a lot I wanna talk about across the board so it’ll go under a cut.

When I saw that this digest was like 20 minutes long I figured it’d be padded out, but lol it’s actually even more dense with material than the last one we got. This really makes up for the recent drought of news and content.

Firstly, they immediately showed off Gala Alex, since she’s a given at this point and we all knew it was gonna happen. Funnily enough she actually seems like she might more or less be bait for the banner happening afterward, which also seems to be a shadow element banner.

In general Gala Alex is a weird and complicated character and I’m not sure what to make of her. At first glance she doesn’t seem super essential or game-breaking, but she has poison infliction and buff dispel, so I’d probably benefit from getting her since I don’t really have good units with that sort of utility in my shadow team yet. But I’m not gonna bother doing more than the free daily tenfold summons on this gala, since as a whole she doesn’t interest me much and I think I could live without her.

On top of her weird skill chain mechanic which I’m struggling to wrap my head around, she also introduces the chain co-ability feature, but I’ll get to that later since it’s a whole big thing.

Hopefully she’ll at least let people start accepting sword units into eKai, lol. That fight has a very open and accepting meta, unless you’re a sword unit in which case you’re fucked because there’s currently no meta shadow sword units people want for that fight.

We’re also getting two separate platinum summons for this gala that cover the past gala units, which is honestly kinda tempting to me since I still don’t have Gala Elly, but I’d just have a 1/3 chance of getting her instead of the other two gala units on her platinum summon, who I already have, so it wouldn’t be worth it.

Then there’s a whole bunch of free summons and wyrmite from new endeavors and co-op rewards getting reset. Which will be helpful in building my stash back up, but I’m probably still gonna avoid spending any resources on this gala.

I’m happy that this gala seems like one I can skip, since I went all in to get Tobias, and I didn’t want to end up regretting that.

Anyway, we also got a look at the next raid event, which will start at the end of this month. It looks like it’s another shadow element one, which just reminds me even more how much we need another wind element raid event, but it looks cool. Aldred has a fun, edgy design. I hope he’s actually worth using. As a shadow unit, he’ll at least be competing with the most stacked element in the game. It also looks like the event’s story is gonna involve the Syndicate, which we’ve actually known about via wyrmprint lore since the game came out, but they’ve never come up until now, so that’s interesting.

They also showed off the banner units, who look cool, but it’d take a lot for me to want to summon for them since I have so many good shadow units as it is. They also said it’ll be another two-part banner, which is getting really annoying.

We’re also getting a rerun of the FEH collab event, along with some sort of a new part two event for it, so that’s cool. I started playing the game at the tail end of the FEH collab originally, but I didn’t actually take part in it since I had performance anxiety about doing any of the co-op stuff, lol. So this means i’ll at least finally be able to get Alfonse.

I think the part two event is probably gonna involve more Fire Emblem characters who’ll be on their own banner, but like with the existing FE units, i don’t really have any attachment to that franchise so I probably wouldn’t be interested in pulling for them.

Though on that note, they did say that all of the four existing FEH units will get mana spirals, which might be interesting. But since I already have Euden and Xainfried at 70MC, as well as Gleo, I don’t think I’d be interested in pulling for Marth, Fjorm, or Veronica, lol. It’s at least interesting to set up this precedent, though. I guess we can assume that if Megaman ever gets rerun, he’ll get a mana spiral too.

If we get new FEH units in a part two banner for the event, I feel like they might end up being a bit underwhelming, since they probably won’t come with mana spirals built into their kits, but we’ll see how it goes.

We also got teasers for the next three main story chapters, which isn’t what I expected at all. We already knew when they’d be coming out since they’re on a fixed schedule now, but I didn’t expect actual teasers of the story content in them. Though tbh the thing that intrigues me the most is the gameplay clips of chapter 14 that involve unique maps based around the Alberian capital. I didn’t think we’d get to actually do stuff there, so that’s cool.

Also, them teasing at Leif showing up in chapter 13 is making me think that either he’ll be the next gala unit, or a welfare unit. Hopefully the latter, since he’s obviously a light sword unit and we already have Gala Euden as a light sword. If he’s a welfare unit, though, I hope he’s not super weak like Laxi.

We’re also getting the event replay feature, but sadly it seems like there won’t be any raid events in it at first, and the facility events included from the start are ones that have gotten reruns relatively recently. So that’s a bit lame. I’m glad they said that they plan on adding raid events to it, though. It looks like you can at least get the facilities from the facility events, so I hope we can also get the welfare units from raid events.

With the new version update they’re also apparently introducing a new currency called fafnir medals which can, to some degree or another, be exchanged for different materials. There’s a whole list of them, but let’s be honest here. The only one that actually matters is the gold testaments, lmao. Unless there’s a really rigid cap on how many of them you can trade for each week/month, that’ll probably be the main thing people trade for. Hopefully it can help address the need for more testaments [especially now that co-abilities are a bit more important]

Then there’s a few bits and pieces to the 1.18 update that they didn’t even mention in the digest. Like how there’ll be adjustments to daily endeavors, the addition of normal endeavors related to using skip tickets on your daily stages, and the ability to check your summon history. But the biggest deal they didn’t mention is how they’re standardizing drop rates in e/mHDTs, and adding horns to the weekly bonus chests for eHDTs. Which is basically exactly what people had been asking for.

We’re also eventually gonna get our encyclopedia feature, which will be nice, especially since it apparently comes with rewards based on how much stuff you have. Which will probably provide a huge batch of rewards to old players right off the bat.

They also showed off two more Agito bosses, who will probably be the next two ones. They didn’t say which would come out next, exactly, but we at least got their names and full designs, which also spells out what elements they are. I can’t actually remember their names at the moment, but the Sylvan lady is water, while the twins are flame. Since wind units have been getting some attention lately, I think the Sylvan lady will be next, and then the flame twins afterward, but we’ll see. One way or another I think the final Agito is gonna be the shadow element one. Which is a bit lame, since my light team really needs a boost. Oh well.

Oh, and they also teased at the Agito, or at least Volk, being formally introduced in chapter 14 of the main campaign, so that’s interesting.

And of course one of the biggest things in this whole update is the huge changes to co-abilities in general. Chain co-abilities are the main thing, but I’m also really intrigued by how in co-op matches, you’ll now take on the effects of your own team’s co-abilities, rather than the co-abilities of the main units your team-mates are using. On the one hand it means you can more comfortably run multiple units of the same weapon type in co-op without feeling like it’s a waste, but I feel like it’s also gonna introduce new ways to cheese some fights, like how 4-Gleo comps can now benefit from stuff like defensive co-abilities from AI units. I think that sort of situation was an intentional choice on Cygames’ part, though. It seems like their way of helping to make end-game content easier and more accessible. It also means that you have to depend less on your team-mates if you need stuff like defensive coabilities to survive an opening blast or something. So you can control that yourself and not worry about what co-op room you end up in.

But the real star of the show, whether or not it ends up being more game-changing than the change to how co-abilities are applied in general, is the chain co-ability feature. Which basically just seems to be a straight up second co-ability that every unit gets, but with the unique quality that they can stack with each other. I don’t actually know how often you’d bother stacking them, though. I looked through all the units I own and what chain co-abilities they have, and it seems like in each element, it’s usually units of the same weapon type that have overlapping chain co-abilities [like Mitsuhide and Fritz getting combo time]. So most of the time I don’t think you’d bother. It also looks like they’re kinda under-tuned, stat-wise, probably to compensate for them being stackable, so I think they might ultimately not be a huge deal, but hey, it’s just a straight up bonus set of stats on top of everything else, lol.

It’s a bit overwhelming since literally EVERY character has a chain co-ability now, and there’s way more variety in them than with regular co-abilities, but there are a few that stick out to me.

-Water seems to be the only element with units that have buff time chain co-abilities, from what I can tell, with Renee, S-Estelle, and Cibella having it. I think this might make S-Estelle a more valued AI team-mate for water teams, since buff time is a pretty big deal, and she also brings the skill damage coability.

-Light seems like one of the main cases where you might stack chain co-abilities, since S-Luca, Annelie, and Fritz have the same one that gives a strength buff whenever you get an energy stack [with a cooldown]. Which I think has a lot of potential, depending on how exactly it works.

-On a similar note, Lucretia has one that gives her a chance to get inspiration stacks when she gets energy stacks [I forget if it applies to just her or the whole team, though], which is interesting. I had a feeling they’d start adding inspiration mechanics to light to complement the amount of energy mechanics going on with them.

-OG Xainfried gets Dragon Claws VI, which seems like it’ll probably be a pretty huge deal for him. Pipple also gets about 18% dragon haste when he’s maxed out, which seems like it’d complement really nicely with Xainfried’s kit.

-Mitsuhide and Fritz’s combo time chain co-ability is gonna be REALLY nice for Gala Luca, since he kinda struggles to keep a high combo, but part of his kit relies on it.

-There’s a whole lot of units who get defensive chain co-abilities which will probably help people get by in HDTs even more. Including units with offensive co-abilities like Mikoto and Valerio.

All in all it seems like a really overwhelming and potentially game-changing mechanic. I also think it’s gonna be just about impossible to properly reflect the implications of it in the DPS sims, lol. This introduces way too many variables. And even then, the DPS sims won’t account for any of the more defensive ones, which have their own value.

Since the chain co-abilities seem to be tied to the regular co-abilities with how they get upgraded, it sounds like this is gonna incentivize getting more people’s co-ability nodes, which will also involve more use of testaments.

The chain co-abilities are one thing, but there’s also some interesting uses for how you benefit from your own AI members’ co-abilities in co-op. Mainly for characters with unique co-abilities like Tobias, H-Mym, and V-Melody. I think Ezelith is gonna basically always want to have an H-Mym on her team, Lin You is gonna want V-Melody on her team, and any wind buffer other than Tobias is gonna want a Tobias on the team to give them more buff-time.

Oh, and I almost forgot that they also casually mentioned that they’re gonna be bringing back defensive battle event types in the future. They didn’t go into much detail about it, but I assume it means that we’ll get more random events once in a while with the same sort of format as the FEH one. Hopefully that’d help alleviate the feeling of stagnation that comes with constantly alternating between raid and facility events endlessly. Since I didn’t actually participate in the FEH event I don’t know what that whole event type entails, though.

I’m probably forgetting lots of stuff they talked about, but they talked about a LOT of stuff, lol. It’s hard to keep track of it all. I wasn’t expecting such a substantial update for the 1.5-year anniversary, but I’m happy with it.

[demoiselledefortune]

Dragon Age Inquisition final play-through session!

So finished Trespasser

Overall that's a pretty amazing ending. I'm not sure if it's as interesting if you're not playing a Lavellan/romancing Solas; but it's densely packed with lores and things that'd make a replay (I mean I was spoiled enough to view Solas with hefty dose of suspicion from the start, and I did know he was an immortal of some kind from the beginning; and then got more spoilers as I progressed in the game -- but I expect there's still a whole lot of things to catch better now that I have full context). Trespasser is very well structured and paced overall, between the interludes in the gorgeous gardens of the Winter Palace (although I wish we had better to do in there that those silly and rather frustrating quests), and coursing through the Eluvian (which in itself is great, still allows a few fun sidequests; and lots of great lore drops). The political mess of a situation is a pretty logical follow up from the rest of Inquisition, and that the main choice in the end is deciding the future of the fate of the Inquisition in the political landscape is something I appreciate. I'd have liked if the end choices weren't quite as binary, but I guess that's simpler and ok, it's not like we have that many options. The Viddasala makes a decent minor villain; and of course the whole thing turns the whole Inquisition as an awesome set up to Solas as the kind top tier antagonist that I would put asides to my favourite video game villains. And hey, we even get a dragon fight! Except for once, we had an option of not killing her, which I took because I like getting an option not kill stuff (even though I of course slaughtered eagerly all 10 optional dragons the game provided before -- :3) which resulted in a pretty Hawk-esque fight by which I mean I ended up with all three of my companions down while I was running around trying to figure out how to manage to release the creature; which made for a very fun epic experience in a way that I seldom got from big boss fights in Inquisition apart from that. (I did solo fights due to companion death with Hawk on the first two dragon battles of DA2. Which ended up as good prep for the Arishok fight :3) The end game mechanic of your Mark running out of control, forcing you to release it at close interval was also a pretty great gameplay experience to make the last battles interesting and convey viscerally how dire this shit on your body is becoming...  and almost makes up for how shitty the focus mechanics were overall. That we don't get a third round of discussions with the Companions before the last time in the Eluvians was a bit disappointing though. I guess they kinda ran out of material to discussion. It's also a bit odd that they drop us off at the very end to be solo before meeting Solas without a last framing discussion. The way they did banter spots to trigger though was great. (and a huge improvement on the way banter worked in Inquisition). In term of roleplay my character was the most shaken by the reveal of the Evanuris as False Gods. I always saw her as someone with a huge mystical bend, although not necessarily something that affected her choices a whole lot (besides, say, the Well of Mythal) and someone who values genuineness a lot so that reveal turning out around false premises hit hard; and trying to rebuild a sense of identity and view of the world out of that is going to take her time. She's not even the sort of Dalish who is the most focused on the past (obviously it's important, because it's one of the baseline thing that the Dalish care about; but it's not her main focus compared to trying to work with people, building consensus and exchanging viewpoint. My Lavellan is a diplomat and a community organizer at heart.) The reveal from Solas in contrast was less shattering. She'd figure out that Solas had to be involved somehow with the Fen'Harel organization (from the Vallaslin bit, especially) but expecting him to actually be Fen'Harel was a bit too huge a leap to make on her own... yet something that fell into place when it came and the feeling of catharsis of finally knowing what the fuck was up with him stronger than the feeling of betrayal. In the end I think she had a sense that nothing he could turn out to be would surprise her. She was saddened, bitterly disappointed, horrified; but she never felt like the person she'd fallen in love with wasn't the person in front of her, and she's not giving up on him. She kept the Inquisition as the Divine's guard, of course she did. As I said after Solas left she was sure something bad was coming, and knowing more about exactly what that something bad was only cemented that. And of course, the Inquisition is what she has left, in term of something built up. She has too much emotionally invested in it to discard it when the foundation of her world believes are shaken this way. As far as the other characters go: - Vivienne wasn't the person my character ever got along the best with; and while the epilogue frames her as a big pain in the ass, I think Ireya actually approves of it... what she held the most against Vivienne was always that instead of building herself up as a leader by gathering support from like-minded mages, she'd tried to grasp it parasitically from others in power, and it seems she finally started to do otherwise. Perhaps it's not so bad either for the future of the mages for there to exist multiple competing models... (well it also could result in disaster but what can you do) - I don't have much to say about Blackwall, he was one of my least favourite character and probably mostly for shallow reasons (I never got over that he's such an unattractive character for a romanceable option). His story is interesting yet unsatisfying in term of story integration. My character does have a higher opinion of him than I do and she was happy to see him fulfilling his purpose in the Wardens under his true identity in a way that made him feel better. - Ireya never felt very close to Cullen, but she always respected and relied on him a lot; and is happy to see him continue to work in the Inquisition as well as continuing to work on helping out Templars. - In a way my character and Varric are very similar people (in term of being caretaker at heart) that nonetheless never properly connect (they work on a very different register and of course Varric's feeling of awe at the Herald even though he works at it is a barrier). Still a good friend. I do love seeing him becoming the Viscount of Kirkwall (and annoying poor Bran) which I'm sure will make him happier (he was so depressed during Inquisition). - She always kept a little bit wary and careful with Cole while still valuing him a whole lot, except towards the end, he ended up being the only source of input on Solas' outlook and she's going to miss that. She hopes he will be able to help, somehow. - Iron Bull always impressed me with his emotional intelligence and savviness. He was never someone to underestimate and also someone who brings a lot of things to a group which Ireya valued a lot. Keeping the Chargers alive is a very rewarding choice in term of what that means for Bull's outlook (as well as the Chargers themselves being around) even though I expect you'd only see the difference at the very ending. My character also ended up very invested in his relationship with Dorian, and delighted to see what it brings to the both of them. - It was a joy to realise that Sera has grown up a lot, and reacts with much more tact and sensitivity (in contrast to how she was right after the Temple of Mythal/Vallaslin removal in the main game) when my character felt very shaken about the Evanuris reveal; as well as touched to see they continued being very good friends with the offer of getting into the Friends of Jenny. Keep on being awesome, Sera! - My character started being a bit in awe of Lelianna (she was something of a Fifth Blight stories fangirl XD) but also distrusting her emotional turmoil. She feels very proud of having helped her find an emotional peace once more, and in that context her becoming the Divine is something she's glad of. - While she was sometimes infuriating, Cassandra was always someone whose honesty and willingness to criticise herself earned great respect from Ireya. She was also very fun to tease and someone to bond over being sappy sappy romantic. A very good friend, and I'm glad she's rebuilding the Seekers into something better. - Dorian wears his heart on his sleeve and was a great friend. His ending gives my character great hope for the future. - Josephine was probably Ireya's best friend in the Inquisition or at least the one she felt was the most of the same wavelength, and she's glad to see her fulfil her ambition for her family; but sad to see her go far away. I also really liked Josephine's outburst towards the end of Trespasser, I don't agree with all the points she makes in term of having doubts about the kind of organisation the Inquisition is becoming, yet having some kind of doubts about it is warranted and to have Josephine work her role as moral centre by being worried about it worked very well for me. Overall Inquisition is a bit... too spread out with a lot of things; but still a very entertaining experience as a game!

[mamthew]

On FFXV’s Episode Ignis

I played Final Fantasy XV's latest story DLC today, and it affected me enough that I want to write a review or something on it real quick. I won't include spoilers for either it or the main game; I just wanna organize my thoughts on it.

So this DLC, Episode Ignis, is the third DLC chapter based around a party member and the fourth (or sixth, depending on your perspective) story DLC release. FFXV is structured in such a way that you can play it on its own and understand it perfectly well, but the story's full impact is much improved by absorbing all of its side projects (with the exception of A New Empire, the terrible strategy mobile game that has literally nothing to do with the story at all).

Basically, this means you could just play FFXV - and enjoy a very good story about some fun characters - or you could play it, watch the movie, watch the anime miniseries, play the platinum demo, play the 'A King's Tale' arcade-style beat 'em up, play the three DLC episodes, play the multiplayer 'Comrades' DLC, play the free Assassin's Creed tie-in story DLC (which is surprisingly both really fun and absolutely canon), play the special extra addition to chapter 13, play the two mobile games based on games that exist within the universe, and play the VR fishing game - coming away with a very different understanding of the story and universe of the game. I'm a sucker for stories that are spread out over tons of different mediums, so I'm all for this.

Over the course of two hours, this particular DLC - like Episode Gladio and Episode Prompto before it - shows us what happened to its titular character during a particular point in the story that we couldn't see while playing the main game. Noctis, the protagonist, is unconscious for the events of the DLC, and Ignis is doing everything in his power to save him. Of all the DLC episodes, this one is probably the one with the most bearing on the main story, which makes it a little frustrating that it's the last one to drop.

But before I get into that: the gameplay of this DLC is super fun. Like...really fun. Ignis has three elemental weapon types, so you can easily switch between dealing heavy fire damage to a single enemy, fighting off a clumped group of enemies with ice, and zipping between and electrically shocking several spaced apart enemies. Comboing racks up both a damage multiplier and a super attack gauge, rewarding players who don't let up the heat. Dodging and then countering enemy attacks with the right timing keeps enemies from interrupting combos and successful counters also heal a good chunk of the health bar. The DLC is broken into three chapters, and the first chapter has a fairly good-sized overworld where you can collect letters and other lore, or clear enemies out of sectors in a simple but entertaining territory control system. Ignis also Macgyvers himself a sweet grapple gun, giving him the ability to Batman from rooftop to rooftop through the dilapidated city where much of the DLC is set. The second chapter is a fairly linear run in which Ignis and another character stealth past some enemies and absolutely ruin some others. The third chapter is all cutscenes and a few visually stunning back-to-back boss fights. Also the DLC has an almost entirely original score, written by Yasunori Mitsuda, who did the score for Chrono Trigger and has agreed to work with Square again for the first time in almost twenty years because he loves Ignis so much. Just...this DLC is absolutely worth the five bucks they're asking for it.

Okay but story stuff. Ignis was possibly my least favorite character in FFXV, and now he is my favorite. Straight up. Like the other two character episodes, this one includes some flashbacks to the character's life before the events of the game and fleshes out some of his relationships with the other characters, but it also successfully does something both of the other DLCs came short of achieving: it recontextualizes everything Ignis does in the story from that point forward. Ignis discovers some information that no one else in the party knows or ever finds out, and he keeps it to himself, and the fact that he has this knowledge completely changes the meaning behind every line Ignis says and every subtle motion he makes in every cutscene. It makes him a vastly more interesting character, and it also adds a new layer of dramatic irony; you, the player, now know that all the assumptions the other characters make about Ignis's motivations are entirely wrong.

The DLC also comes with an alternate ending to the game itself. I think they included this because some people didn't like the real ending, but as someone who loves the real ending, I'll say that this new ending doesn't suit the story of the game but functions marvelously as an example to players of just how much Ignis would have been willing to do for his friends if he had been given the chance. It's a mediocre ending, but it's a great character moment and definitely worth looking at. Though definitely wait to look at it until you've beaten the game or it'll spoil you pretty good.

My biggest issue with this DLC is just how spoilery it is. It takes place during Chapter 9, and I want to tell people to play it directly after that chapter, but the main story has several huge flash forwards to the final cutscene, and the end credits includes a (beautifully cut) montage of scenes from throughout chapters 10-15, reshot from Ignis's perspective. This means anyone playing it chronologically will see a good chunk of the ending, and then every major story beat leading up to that ending, while anyone playing it right at the beginning of Chapter 15 will still see the ending too soon. But anyone playing it after they've beaten the main story will have to then go back and replay a good five chapters of story (During which Episode Prompto and the Comrades multiplayer DLC take place) just to see Ignis in this new light. It's a bit of a conundrum, and one for which I don't think I'll ever have a good answer.

That being said, I'm off to replay the last five chapters of FFXV, including Episode Prompto and Comrades. I'm a loser like that.

[alexilulu]

10 Games I Played in 2017, Roughly Ranked

This is wildly long lol so have fun, idiots

#10: DESTINY 2

This is sort of awkward. Destiny 1 was a game I enjoyed with small reservations; it was obvious how hampered they were by their own backend in creating new content and design spaces to explore, prior to The Taken King. Even then, it had shining moments of joy for me. I adored the goofy dead ghost hunting like halo 2/3 skullfinding, using every trick at your dispoaal to find another morsel of insane, well-crafted tidbits of lore for this world that the game itself rarely even touched on, let alone explored. Destiny 2 was supposed to be the "we listened and we're fixing it" for that game, and a needed jump to a new backend that would free them to create the things they dreamed of.

The grimoire was removed wholesale, those bits of lore still true presumably but inaccessible in the game again. Instead of finding ghosts, you examine objects in the world, getting a 2-sentence Nolan North quip that usually is more funny than it is educational about this sprawling world they created. And it doesn't save that anywhere. We actually moved backwards in term of the lore's accessibility to the player, somehow. The game itself is still Destiny, helmet popping and aiming down sights and kicking balls around the tower, and it's storyline was ambitious in a way the original was not, actually making you feel at least a little weak for about 10 minutes before you're back to killing Fallen and then doing donuts on your Sparrow on top of their corpse. The game treats itself as both too serious and totally unserious in the same breath, a monologue of serious consequences punctuated by Cayde cradling a chicken and petting it gently. It's good, but it remains to see if it'll reach the same comfortable spot Destiny 1 got to by the end of it's lifespan.

9: NIOH Here's where I admit that some of these games I've played, in that I played it for a few hours and haven't had time to return to it. I have it on good faith that Nioh is an incredible game, and from the bits I've touched I know that to be at least probably true. I've heard it described more as a Diablo-esque loot-game pretending to be a Dark Souls ball-busting difficulty monster than vice versa. It's something I'm hoping to come back to, and if I'd been able to spend more time with, I likely would have put much further up the list.

8: Dishonored: Death of the Outsider Another game I fuckin' haven't had time to complete, Death of the Outsider is the thing I and several friends have wanted for years; Billie Lurk fucking shit up. And her powerset rules. I'm only like 2 missions in, but I'm looking forward to finishing the rest sometime before Christmas, hopefully. Dishonored 2 was definitely a game I was thrilled to play, and I know this will be more of the same.

7: Resident Evil 7 What could be better than the creeping horror of a deranged family out in the Louisiana Bayou? Resident Evil 7 was honestly so unbelievably effective at learning from the last 5+ years of immersive horror games while still, at it's heart, being a goofy Resident Evil game under that. That style clashes at times; The moment when you go outside to the courtyard of the mansion and find a double-keycard locked door when the most advanced thing in the whole house before now has been the goofy projector-doors that hearken back to the ancient history of the series. I think it sticks it's landing well, with a good lategame twist and plenty of goofy superscience in between. I've been meaning to go back to it for the Chris Redfield DLC, but I don't know if I actually want to, to be honest. That game was a fun ride, and they did their best to add the usual replay stuff like a NG+ gun and such, but I think I'm okay leaving it where I left it, on good terms.

6: Tacoma I bought the hoodie that came with a LUNAR TRANSFER STATION TACOMA patch Fullbright sold long before that game had it's transformation following feedback from beta testers, and I never stopped looking forward to it coming out. Gone Home was like a...I won't say formative, because it isn't true, but it was definitive for me. A story about two girls falling in love together doesn't come around that often, and the attention to the setting and feel of being in this old, deeply lived in house. Tacoma shows that same love of character and place in spades, giving you an even more intimate look at the world the crew of the Tacoma lived in together. I honestly lost it when I noticed during a scene that next door, their cat was asleep on the shelf above the laundry machine. Just the smallest details and love shown for everyone involved broke my heart and put it back together in a different shape. A vision of a world utterly fucked by corporatist greed such that they are essentially their own extragovernmental entities, and people live on anyway, just being people. It's so sad, but still sort of hopeful? Even if the world is garbage, people will keep on living as best as they can. It's very millennial of myself to find solace in that idea, honestly, but that's this game for you, one crafted based on the excesses of the last decade spiraling out of control.

5: Final Fantasy XIV: Stormblood In any other year, this game would be #1. You're gonna hear me say that a few more times here before we're done. Final Fantasy 14 has been a constant in my life for the last 3 years, delivering again and again the sort of joy that only comes from a game lovingly made by people dedicated to their own love of the genre, the setting and their playerbase. That's the only way I can describe it, lovingly crafted. Naoki Yoshida loves this game, and so does his team, and every inch of that game radiates this. The storyline itself is a little meandering, jumping from a failed revolution to formenting a successful one, to returning triumphant with new armies and allies at your back. Everyone in that game is, again, a joy to be around. It has a somewhat similar roadtrip feel to Heavensward, but never treads the same ground in the same way. It's more like...taking your friend abroad to another country, while Heavensward was a road trip across a state that stops and starts in fits and spurts. I don't know if this expansion will hold my attention in the same way that Heavensward did, or that A Realm Reborn did. I don't know if I have that part of myself that's willing to ride with an MMO across the lifetime of it's expansion this time. I want to support this game, and the people who make it, and my friends who do still ride with it. But this might be my last expansion.

4: Tales of Berseria If this came out any other year, it might be my game of the year. You'll hear that 2 more times before we're done. I've never been a Tales person. I know people who are, and I understand the mystique, but I never Understood it until repeated praise (and some very cute lesbian ship art) forced my hand into buying it. I don't know if I'm gonna be ok when I finish it. The game is very baldly about doing bad things. The protagonist is a demon on a blatantly self-destructive revenge quest against the self-appointed savior of the world, aided by a demon swordsman who wants to kill his brother, a witch with existentially depressed ennui, a boy who barely knows who he is, a pirate cursed to bring ruin to those around him, and a pure maiden with a tragic backstory trying to do good in the world who has fallen in with them through a series of missteps so comic they're mostly just sad. Together, this totally uncohesive group of misfits abandoned by the world, rejecting it and destroying everything that stands in their way. It crushes my heart on the regular. This is definitely a 60+ hour JRPG because I just got to hour 20 and there's absolutely still so much left to go. They've introed villain after villain, placing the shotgun on the mantelpiece for Velvet to mangle herself with just to kill them in the blast. This game breaks my heart. The world it's in is awful, every party member has been utterly ruined by some facet of it that happened to conflict with a totally normal thing they wanted. They're the devil's rejects. And I love every single one of them.

3: Butterfly Soup Remember all the praise I gave Gone Home back there? This game is like that for me this year. You can just make a game about some queer girls playing baseball and being in love, and I'll love it with all my heart. It's not hard for me to peg why I love it; Akarsha is like a fucking mirror pointed directly at my face with a moustache painted on it, Diya's anxiety and gay panic is so deeply relatable that I very nearly cried the first time she said the word Lesbian to herself and immediately tried to convince herself she's not gay. Brianna Lei's depiction of young, messy, goofy girls living with all the problems that happen to kids their age; insane parents, abuse, self-discovery, a lot of bad jokes and getting all too real at a moment's notice. I honestly cannot wait to see what else she can bring to the table.

1 (TIE): NieR: Automata If this game came out any other year, it would be #1 without effort. The original NieR did something at just the right time, with just the right amount of feeling. A rejection of the trend of father figures rescuing their child and getting the good ending, NieR was a quest to protect a girl to the detriment of everyone around the protagonist, including the girl herself. The final ending of that game ends with you erasing yourself from the world so that you never existed, to save someone who deserves to live and would have if not for you. NieR's destructive quest to protect his daughter literally destroys the world around him, disrupting millennia of careful planning and manipulation by people far smarter than him. All because they took his daughter. Damn the world, he wanted what was his. NieR: Automata follows another 10,000 years after that, in the same world, scarred by a war that broke out centuries ago. The game frequently lies to both you the player and you the protagonist, but the protagonist already knows better, and simply doesn't let on. The game focuses, instead, on the ways that something built by humans craves to become like its long-gone masters. Androids are built to be physically ideal, sexy and at times loving to one another, because that's what humans did. It's unclear if they chose this for themselves or if humans did it to them (and obviously Yoko Taro chose for them to be like this, human choice or no), but it's how they live. The machines they fight do the same, playing a phone game across millennia of what humanity was, trying to fill the holes in their life with gender binaries, sexual intercourse, children and family and love. What separates them from us? Are we any different? Do we deserve to be different? Do they? I don't know how to talk about this game coherently. There's so much there. People recently have been talking about it again, as lists like these come up, and so many bad takes are floating around that it crushes my heart. 2B's sexy, so the game is horny. It's bad because you have to replay it 5 times (no, wrong, bad). It's bad because 9S is a softboy and 2B could have been a lesbian with any of the women throwing themselves at her (come on, dude, at least try). I'm not gonna try to rebut any of these, because the game itself doesn't need my defense. It stands on its own. It's the best game I've played in the last 5 years, in all likelihood. It's definitely my favorite of the last decade.

1 (TIE): Persona 5 If this game came out on any other year, it would be #1 with a bullet. This game had an insanely tortured development cycle. Pushed back again, then again, then again. Remember that February 2012 graphic that used to go around, and likely will right around Valentine's Day? Characters were revamped, removed, redesigned 5 times in the case of Haru (who started out as a boy, somehow). But it's exactly the game I needed in 2017. I was a transplant in Texas in 2004, going into high school in a new state where we knew no-one and nobody. I was quiet, spending most of my time outside class reading the 6th Dark Tower novel, Song of Susannah, a 2 inch thich hardcover beast. Because it's high school, rumors started about whatever they thought I was because I was quiet and wore a hoodie to school regardless of the weather, hiding guns or knives or what have you. Akira's experience touched me, in ways I never thought I would be a decade after graduating. Shit, everyone touched me in some way. Yusuke's quiet acceptance of the abuse and labels applied to him by his teacher and his fellow students. Futaba's isolation in the wake of her mother's death hit me in the heart; I dropped out of college when my own mother had a spinal cord fusion in her lumbar spine that ruined her life, left her with 10% her previous mobility. I mourned for years. Haru's quiet demeanor and the immediate, effusive joy she displayed whenever she could be with her friends, no matter the context. Ryuji's bristling rage at authority that ridicules him. Even the side cast struck me in ways Persona 4 and 3 never did. Kawakami's tiredness with the world, her exploitation she brushes off as a fact of life. Takemi's cool acceptance of being forced from the job of her dreams into treating bruises and being blackballed by the world she worked to survive in. Sojiro's struggles with cruel family that would destroy the daughter he loves as his own. Persona 5 is a game about the ways that society is designed to strike down the odd man out, casting them aside as worthless or ridiculous. The simple girl run into a cult, the daughter of a model forced into a role she never asked for, the typecast and the downtrodden, who deserve so much better than the world they've been given. This is a deeply flawed game. Within hours of Ryuji standing side by side with Ann to defend her from the casual sexism of Kamoshida or any other number of aggressions, he becomes a slavering hound doing the same thing to his best friend. The writing, when it's not inconsistent, simply isn't there; Haru's final and rather grand entrance peters off into maybe a dozen lines she has in the main story following her introduction. 6+ years in development can do some bad stuff to a game. But I love it, despite all of that. I can see what this game could have been, with a less tortured development, with a director who didn't ask the character design to make all of the female confidants "cuter". With a more focused vision, a clearer goal, and a better route there. All of that said, I still love my satanic crime ring. And I probably always will.