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thatgamefromthatad · 4 years ago

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Mobile Life Simulators, Ranked (Part 1)

I downloaded a whole ton of mobile life simulator games over the past couple weeks and I realized it wouldn’t be plausible to rank all of them in one go so I’m breaking it up into parts with more similar games grouped together (can’t say when the next part will be made but I’m definitely planning on doing more at some point). Thank you to @creativeghost51 for recommending I cover the Sims games and other life sims!

It’s hard to define what ties these Part 1 games together (as opposed to some other groups like idle life sims and text-based life sims) but I guess the biggest similarity would be that all of these games involve your sim characters living in a home where they can freely walk around, and can interact with objects and each other. With the exception of Virtual Families Lite you can also decorate, customize and expand your home.

Something I noticed about all of these games is that you don’t really have as much freedom to experiment and build your own storylines and such as you do with, for example, the Sims computer games. While the games aren’t completely linear and there is a variety of things you can do in each of these games, they don’t really have the same sandbox quality that I think about when I think about the Sims. Which is understandable - these games are free to play and they’re made to be played mostly on people’s phones so they are expectedly more on the casual side. But I just wanted to point that out in case anyone was looking for something like the Sims to play on their phones or tablets. I haven’t really seen a mobile game in existence yet that is going to give you that same life sim sandbox experience.

Anyway, here’s the ranking rubric for these games (I’ll go into more detail about all of these scores under the read more):

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1. Home Street

Developer: Supersolid Ltd

Release Date: Oct. 10, 2017

I was actually really surprised by this game - while it is more marketed as a home design game than a life sim it has a lot of similarities to games like The Sims Mobile; you have a character you can customize and dress up in a wide variety of outfits, you can interact with and build relationships with other characters/players (although only friendships, not romantic relationships, and you can’t have kids) and you do hobby-like activities such as painting and cooking.

While there aren’t personality traits or careers in this game, you save up “ideas”corresponding to different emotions or attributes, which function as crafting materials to go toward your hobbies. Through your hobbies/crafting abilities you can complete jobs for other characters, like selling them vegetables from your garden or giving them something you’ve cooked.

🏡 Character Design: 3/4 (while the ability to customize your character’s facial features and such isn’t as advanced here as it is in The Sims Mobile, it still has a wider range of options than The Sims FreePlay and I prefer the art style of Home Street compared to FreePlay; there’s also a wide range of outfits and accessories and you can set different outfits for different activities)

🏡 Home Design: 4/4 (although you’ll probably notice from my screenshots that I’m not exactly a home design aficionado, I found placing decorations, walls and floors etc in this game to be a smoother and easier process than in any of the other games and I like the art style of the objects as well. There’s a good range of items, including ones your character can interact with in different ways, and I like having the various hobby workstations embedded into the home where you can place them wherever works best for you, which is also how it is in the Sims games. There’s a lot of potential for someone who’s more adept at home design than me to create really fun themed rooms and whatnot)

🏡 Gameplay: 9/10 (I really loved the gameplay concept in this game more than in any of the other games, I love leveling up to get new workstations and crafting items to fulfill tasks for other characters. The task concept kind of reminds me of Animal Crossing in a way. While the main screen can be a little busy at times, overall the game is really easy to navigate and does a good job of guiding you with goals and tasks without making it feel like you’re restricted to only following those exact tasks. The characters and dialog are also charming and make you feel like you’re progressing through a story as you level up)

🏡 Playtime vs. Wait Time (without paying to speed up tasks): 4/4 (while you do need to wait for your hobbies/crafting tasks to complete, they don’t really take that long and you can save time if you craft things ahead of time; also there are a lot of things you can do while you’re waiting. The wait times might get longer as you get further in the game but I played for about two weeks and so far I haven’t felt really stalled at any point)

🏡 Total: 20/22

2. The Sims Mobile

Developer: Electronic Arts

Release Date: March 6, 2018

I was also pleasantly surprised by this game, since I had played The Sims FreePlay years ago and didn’t really like it, but this one I liked a lot more and had quite a bit of fun with. As I mentioned before, it doesn’t have the same sandbox quality as the computer Sims games, but the character customization is the best out of all the life sims I played and there’s such an enormous catalog of different clothing and home design items to choose from, there are definitely a lot of fun possibilities.

There’s a fairly wide range of things to do although I did feel a little more confined to the tasks the game set out for me - for example I went with the careers that I had objectives for rather than picking careers I’d really want my character to have, plus you need to wait until you level up to unlock careers so you have less freedom in that aspect.

🦙 Character Design: 4/4 (This game actually uses sliding scales to customize different facial features and body types and such, and although it isn’t as advanced as in the computer games it is much more advanced than I’d expect for a casual mobile game and makes it a lot easier to make the characters look how you actually want them to. The catalog of things to dress your sims up in is also enormous and there’s a fun special fashion feature that creates unique clothes that boosts your stats for certain activities, which is why there are hearts floating around my sim in the screenshot. Oh and there’s a social feature to give other people’s sims stickers based on their outfits, which makes dressing up your sim more fun and exciting)

🦙 Home Design: 3/4 (The home design here is pretty fun and there is a wide range of items, and I also like how there’s a score that goes up as you add more items and complete furniture collections. However I personally found the controls for placing a moving things a little wonkier than in Home Street and FreePlay, i.e. I kept moving things on accident or couldn’t get things to easily snap where I wanted them to, and the collections and goals did make me feel a little confined to selecting certain objects or adding things I didn’t need to fulfill the goals rather than going with my own style, although I suppose you could just ignore the goals if you wanted to)

🦙 Gameplay: 7/10 (This game is fun although it can get quite repetitive since one of the main things you’ll be doing is “events,” which mostly involves just tapping things or waiting a certain amount of time for the tasks to complete themselves. The “events” in this game kind of reminded me of the tasks in the Kim Kardashian game which I also played years ago lol. However there are things to do besides events and the events do have a little more to them than just tapping; when I say tapping I mean tapping task options that sometimes have quirky, funny names and there are also “risky” tasks that have bigger rewards but a certain chance of succeeding or failing etc. There are little bits of dialogue as you progress through your career, relationship and hobby chapters and there are also seasonal/limited time activities you can do that add more fun and variety and chances for rewards. However I still wish there was a little more variety and flare to the “events” aspect, which made up the bulk of my playtime)

🦙 Playtime vs. Wait Time: 4/4 (Like in Home Street, there is waiting involved if you’re waiting for events to complete and you run out of energy to do the tasks that speed them up, but you can choose whether to have a longer event or a shorter event and you can also have one sim be running an event while doing something else with the other sim. I was able to choose shorter event times if I wanted to stick around for a bit and then run a longer event when I was logging off for a while so I could reap the rewards when I came back. The amount of time you can spend playing continuously here is much better than a lot of other mobile games that involve an energy system)

🦙 Total: 18/22

3. Virtual Families 3

Developer: LDW Software, LLC

Release Date: Sept. 17, 2020

(Note: Please disregard how barren my home looks here, this was the last game I started playing so I didn’t progress very far but I feel I can still base my scores on what I’ve played so far and what I can see available that I just haven’t unlocked/can’t afford yet)

The Virtual Families games are all pretty similar to each other to be honest, but the most recent version is definitely the most fleshed out and the least ugly. There are more things to do, more variety in the sim designs (here they’re called “adoptees”) and there are actually nonwhite characters which I’m pretty sure there weren’t any or were barely any in the last two games. You still can’t customize your adoptees though, just flip through the options to pick the ones you like the most.

I kind of struggled with the Virtual Families games because they run on real time and my adoptees would end up severely neglected when I just didn’t have time to play, but there is an option to pause when you’re away, I just didn’t want to and wanted the game to progress naturally.

What I do really like about Virtual Families is that the adoptees have minds of their own and you can kind of watch them lives their lives and imagine little personalities for them. It’s a lot more casual than the other games and you probably have the most freedom here to do whatever you want although there are not as many things to do.

👨‍👩‍👧‍👦 Character Design: 2/4 (You can’t customize your own characters but there’s more variety here in the randomized designs and the art isn’t as ugly and janky as in the previous two Virtual Families games)

👨‍👩‍👧‍👦 Home Design: 2/4 (Home design isn’t as big of a thing in the Virtual Families games but there is a decent variety in furniture and objects to put in your house and you could probably have some fun with it if you’re creative. The art style isn’t that great though)

👨‍👩‍👧‍👧 Gameplay: 7/10 (Like I said, what I like is watching the little adoptees go about their lives or dropping them around to pick up the debris on the floor to look for collectibles. In this game there are also a lot of little funny random events like getting random phone calls or being given random choices to make that can have positive or negative outcomes. Occasionally you’ll be given problems to solve like needing to repair or hire someone to repair something, or once I lost the TV remote and had to look around my house for it then send someone to retrieve it. It makes the experience more varied and engaging and makes you feel more involved in progressing)

👨‍👩‍👧‍👦 Playtime vs. Wait Time: 3/4 (You can pretty much play indefinitely watching your adoptees except that can get boring especially if they’re just eating or sleeping. My adoptees kept getting really tired and I would just send them to sleep and exit out, then when I came back they would be out of bed and still extremely tired lol. But once they did get enough sleep I got to spend more time with them until they had to do something else boring like work or eat)

👨‍👩‍👧‍👦 Total: 14/22

4. The Sims Freeplay

Developer: Electronic Arts

Release Date: Dec. 15, 2011

This game was pretty disappointing when I played it years and years ago hoping to be able to play the Sims while on the go, and it’s still pretty disappointing now even though I have more understanding of why they can’t put the actual full Sims game on my phone, especially not for free.

The most disappointing thing about this game is not just the long wait times, which are annoying on their own, but the constant ads that pop up any time you do a task that’s more than like 3 minutes. Some of these ads aren’t even skippable. This made it pretty much unplayable for me up to a point, until I figured out how to strategize to do the shortest tasks possible, and until a limited time special event thing came up that gave me something else to do without having to constantly wait or dodge ads.

That being said, this game does have the unique charm of being a lot more similar to the classic Sims computer games, with a similar art style and even the same or similar music and sound effects. If you have patience (or if you pay to play) I can see this being a lot more satisfying and I’ve seen people do really cool things on this game as far as building storylines around their sims and building really impressive houses. But I don’t think this game really works as a casual free-to-play game, it’s much too frustrating and monotonous for the average player.

💚 Character Design: 2/4 (limited options for facial features and not as many options for clothing as The Sims Mobile, plus the low-poly look is not very appealing; I know it’s an older game but since it’s still being maintained I’d think they would have upgraded it a little and added more variety over the last 10 years)

💚 Home Design: 4/4 (editing your home in this game feels a lot like in the Sims 3 and like I said I’ve seen people build awesome mansions in this game so I think this is definitely one of the best aspects of the game)

💚 Gameplay: 5/10 (I was going to give it a worse score given the insufferable, unskippable pop-up ads but I did give it credit for the limited time/seasonal events which are easier to play uninterrupted and add some variety to the game, at least the one I played did. I was able to find this game somewhat tolerable also by only doing the shortest tasks possible to avoid ads and then exiting out whenever an ad popped so I could just come back a little later, although the need to do that was also annoying in itself)

(Note/Edit: A very nice anon pointed out that you can avoid ads in games that don’t need a constant internet connection by turning off your wifi/internet while playing, and this seemed to work with FreePlay as long as you are connected to the main game before you turn off internet! You won’t be able to do everything in the game but you can still play in the main world with your Sims in their houses and do longer tasks without getting an ad pop-up if you temporarily disable internet on your device. I’m not going to fully change the score and ranking since I don’t think that’s how the game was intended to be played and needing to turn off wifi to play is kind of inconvenience in itself but the game definitely is definitely more like a 6/10 or 7/10 if you do this.)

💚 Playtime vs. Wait Time: 2/4 (Absolutely would have given it a 1/4 but the event saved it from that, you can play for longer stretches of time when there’s an event, but of course that only applies to playing the event and not the main game)

💚 Total: 13/22

5. Virtual Families 2

Developer: LDW Software, LLC

Release Date: Dec. 6, 2012

All of the Virtual Families games are pretty similar overall so I won’t go into a lot of detail for these last two but basically Virtual Families 2 has more variety in things to do than the first Virtual Families, especially in terms of home design and things to unlock throughout the game. It also has a slight visuals upgrade, although the character designs are still pretty janky for something that came out in the 2010s imo.

Also this game has a bug where if you do something the tutorial was supposed to teach you before the tutorial is over, you’re forever stuck in tutorial mode unless you completely start over, just a heads up.

👨‍👩‍👧 Character Design: 1/4 (While the janky character designs do kind of give it a retro charm for me this game really didn’t come out all THAT long ago and the designs and animations are pretty wonky. I know Last Day of Work/LDW isn’t an enormous company like EA or anything but from what I understand they had relatively good amount of success in the early casual mobile games sphere, and since this is a sequel I’d expect a little more of a visuals upgrade than this but that’s just me)

👨‍👩‍👧 Home Design: 2/4 (Same deal as Virtual Families 3, more furniture options and opportunity to expand your home but art style is lacking and doesn’t feel like a central aspect of the game)

👨‍👩‍👧 Gameplay: 6/10 (Just a little less varied than VF3 and a little more than VF1)

👨‍👩‍👧 Playtime vs. Wait Time: 3/4 (Same exact deal as VF3)

👨‍👩‍👧 Total: 12/22

6. Virtual Families Lite

Developer: LDW Software, LLC

Release Date: June 3, 2009

Phew, you know a game is old when it has “Lite” in the title. This is one of the first smartphone games I EVER played (though when I first played it I didn’t have a smartphone, just a 1st gen iPod Touch); in fact, I’m not 100% sure, but this might actually be the first smartphone game I ever played, and I do remember it fondly. I want to make it clear that I’m rating it now on the experience of playing it today in 2021 relative to the other mobile games I’ve played and reviewed, being that the purpose of this blog is to hopefully give people an idea of what games they’d like to play, and hyping up a 12-year-old game as though it holds up more than it does for nostalgia’s sake doesn’t fulfill that purpose imo.

That said, this game does hold up fairly well, but definitely pales in comparison to its sequels and other options now available. This game is still worth playing if all you want is to have a little virtual family to check in on from time to time and don’t really want to do much else. Otherwise it doesn’t offer anything that its sequels doesn’t save for its nostalgic charm and uniquely terrifying art style.

👩‍👦Character Design: 1/4 (Same as VF2 but uglier)

👩‍👦Home Design: 1/4 (The house already has everything in it and you can’t rearrange anything, which is convenient but boring. You can upgrade your work stations though)

👩‍👦Gameplay: 5/10 (Same as VF2 but a little less variety)

👩‍👦 Playtime vs. Wait Time: 3/4 (Same deal as the other two, although watching your family is arguably more boring when there are less things to do, but it’s also more convenient when you already have all the furniture and appliances you need right off the bat so it balances)

👩‍👦Total: 10/22

If you got here to the end, even if you just skimmed through, thank you so much for reading 😍 Follow me for more mobile game reviews, articles and commentary 🥳

#life sims #sims #the sims mobile #the sims freeplay #sims mobile #home street #virtual families #life simulation games #home design games #games ranked #full review

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caden · 5 years ago

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ohhh man okay ive said before i still play and enjoy overwatch (although less often now because the blizzard hong kong stuff is so gross) but anyways so im speaking as a fan and semi-involved member of the “““community””” here. literally no one fucking cares about the story and it’s a mistake to think they do. the game is fun because the mechanics are really really tight and relatively unique in the shooter genre. im cool with a dedicated co-op mode and the characters are... sort of charming sometimes but the writing style is so... fucking... earnest in the most misguided bland way... the world is poorly thought out and uninteresting and the characters are like cool as interestingly-designed archetypes with memorable lines (which is good for a class based shooter) but not as actual three dimensional characters.

In the original game, where the story is completely secondary to the gameplay (even if the marketing says it isn’t, the design of the game is clearly oriented towards a competitive community and deep mechanics over a story since there isnt even a fucking story mode outside of some limited events) the only real purpose of any of the characters having a PERSONALITY is to instruct the player on how that character should be played. Like, for example, Zarya is big and strong because she should be played aggressively at the front line of the team. Every really good character design in the game is really good because it immediately communicates to the player how that character works, and I’m 100% convinced the design team knows this and leans into it-- the character designs probably come after the core mechanics have been developed.

Anyways, the story could be good, who knows. I’ll be the first to forgive plot holes and inconsistent world building (which ultimately are superfluous 99% of the time anyways) if the actual narrative they’re telling ends up being interesting. They at least have a diverse cast and to some extent characters that I’m vaguely invested in already. But hopefully the real purpose of 2 is to revitalize the multiplayer community.

That said, it also would be a mistake to dramatically change the heroes that are already in the game. The muscle memory of how to play them becomes so deeply ingrained in your head that, for example, when they changed the cooldowns on Zarya’s bubbles, or on D.Va’s matrix, I was like totally thrown off for the next few weeks of playing and had to unlearn some of the techniques I was using. And, unless the gameplay is REALLY different, many of the kits in the game really aren’t broken and don’t need to be changed. The whole “customizable character” thing is cool as long as it’s confined to the single player-- putting it into the multiplayer would hugely fuck with the way the competitive scene works and essentially alienate new players because certain “builds” would be more viable than others and probably would reward players who had leveled up more. It would just add a whole new, unnecessarily complicated meta to the game.

Essentially my thoughts are that this would all be better if it was just, like, a 30 dollar story DLC add-on that gave us 10 hours of real co-op gameplay. Which it might literally pretty much be, except they slapped a “2″ on it so that it would actually sell (since the original game is near the end of its life)

#more weird overwatch rants will of course come when the game actually comes out #the trailers make it look relatively far in the development process?

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nomilart · 6 years ago

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Final Thoughts on Kingdom Hearts 3

I’m gonna gush and bash this game in great detail in a sort of rant/ organized essay manner

Spoilers… duh

I’ve been a longtime fan of the Kingdom Hearts series. I’ve played every single damn game. The only two I haven’t finished were CoM (Could never get into the gameplay) and Ux (The story isn’t even finished yet… which I’ll get to). I have lived and breathed KH for most of my life and anticipated the climax to my favorite video game series for so long. Upon finishing Kingdom Hearts 3, I was washed with a tidal wave of emotions. I just finished the game I have been waiting on for 5 years upon confirmation that it even was a thing and anticipating it for even longer. There was so many amazing things about this game. Plot points involving characters I longed to make a return in some form were tied together. Things like the reason for why Xemnas and Ansem have returned were answered or what happened to replica Riku. The triumphant return of Aqua, Terra, and Ven and my personal most favorite the reuniting of Axel, Xion, and my favorite character Roxas! On top of super fun gameplay, graphics that dazzled my eyes even playing on the base ps4, a solid ost as usual thanks to Yoko Shimomura, and Disney worlds that really complemented the flare and grandiose of the rest of the game, this Kingdom Hearts game was shaping up to be my favorite among the entire series. Upon finishing the game, despite trying to overcome my biases of Kingdom Hearts 2, am still unsure of if I think I consider KH3 to be better or worse than KH2.

Story:

Whoooo boy what a STORY. The KH series is (understandably) mocked for its ridiculous and often convoluted approach to writing and storytelling, but I have stuck with every cheesy line and dumb plot point until this very day. I like to think of KH’s story telling as some kind of weird Avant-garde experience that is really just something that the series director, Tetsuya Nomura, comes up with as he goes along. The often awkward yet charming writing definitely comes from this.

KH3 starts off with Sora trying to regain his lost strength from the events of DDD and he is to search for the “power of waking” in order to rescue the hearts tied to his so he can help assemble 7 guardians of light to hopefully overcome Xehanort and his 13 darknesses. All is good until Sora finds out that Xehanort is very close to completing his 13 and just deciding to avoid waiting for the 7 guardians to assemble so he sends his “real organization” to search for the new seven hearts of light instead (these ultimately have little significance to the plot). Towards the end of the game Sora manages to save Aqua because for some reason Riku and Mickey just were too incompetent to go along with their mission even though Sora was allegedly the one who wasn’t strong enough to join them in saving Aqua. After Aqua is singlehandedly saved by Sora they all travel to Castle Oblivion were Aqua reverts it back to the Land of Departure in a really cool cutscene. They find Vanitas and stop him from preventing Ventus from waking up and get ready for the big fight after Sora dives into his heart. Sora and his friends all seem to die but not really after some weird stuff I’ll talk about later goes on. In short the last parts of the game are Sora stopping the remaining organization members and hearing their reasons for joining. Eventually they reach Xehanort and he merks Kairi and screws off to Scala ad Caleum. To be completely honest I’m still lost as to why this place has as much significance as it does besides the fact the Xehanort states it to be the Nexus of all worlds but upon further research, HOPEFULLY it makes more sense (I was caught in the heat of the moment). Xehanort’s motives are revealed and he reconciles after we defeat him and he *seemingly returns to Kingdom Hearts with Eraqus (This is only my theory). Afterwards Sora uses the x-blade in order to *seemingly free Kairi from death. All is well and everyone saved lives in harmony in a really touching scene but we soon learn that Kairi’s return seemingly costed Sora’s life or ability to be enjoy the peace with his friends because he fades away before the credits roll.

Oh boy that was a real basic summary but now I’ll talk about things I liked. I loved Sora so much in this game. He has grown on me more than ever because he displays so many more emotions than just being happy go-lucky most of the time. While that I the core of who he is, I know he has experienced pain (hurt is a silly word in KH) in the past but it was never this serious. He lost one of his best friends because he wasn’t strong enough to save her in time, he kind of understandably beats himself up for losing his strength and having to rely on his friends for strength, dealing with the pressure of being the bearer of a lot of people’s hearts while simultaneously being expected to rescue them, and last but certainly not least, seeming to sacrifice himself in order to save a friend/ potential love interest. I thought I’d hate the way Roxas and every other nobody would return based on the trailers seeming they were going to get all the data versions of them and implant their memories into them. While that is still somewhat how it goes down, it’s handled slightly better. Instead of using the bodies of data Roxas or Namine, they only use a “vessel” which I like to think is basically a human shaped husk that can only be a human when a person’s heart and memories are placed into it. It sounds goofy but I can get behind that. While a part of me wishes Roxas, Xion, and Namine stayed the way they were because I think It’d give the series some seriously needed consequences, I’d be a damn liar if I said I wasn’t glad my favorite character gets to be his own person. While the whole “Vessel” program can be seen as a cop out, I think it could have been handled much worse. I loved the interactions Sora and the gang had with the Disney characters and I 100% feel like this is the best integrated Disney worlds in the entire KH series. My definite favorite moments include Woody roasting Young Xehanort, Sulley yeeting Vanitas out of the world, and Sora going ham on Davy Jones. I also really liked the reveal that Ansem’s guardian was Terra, it was so badass. Although I totally called Xehanort being a villan who had good intentions but went about them in the worst way possible, I still liked the way it was explained how he got to where he was. I loved the ending scene where the wayfinder trio pay their respects to Master Eraqus (REAL DEATH CONFIRMED IN MY KH GAME?!) as well as the sea salt trio hanging out with the twilight town trio and SAIX/ISA. Also the secret reports have some super dark implications and it only makes me wish they were actual cutscenes. I haven’t read all of them but my favorite so far is one where Saix writes about how Lea and him snuck into the chamber of repose and heard screams of children being experimented on. They also mention a girl they were friends with (WHiCh ill GeT INto LaTeR). Pretty content with the story as a whole.

Now I talk about some things I did NOT like very much or at least still don’t understand at the moment. The main thing that REALLY peeved me off was the amount of KHUX stuff that is not only connected to the story of the XEHANORT SAGA but the fact that a lot of it is infuriatingly still not answered like the damn black box or why Maleficent specifically wants it so bad. On top of that there’s a lot of set up for the next entry in the series or what my personal cynical theory is, more backstory for KHUX that will be revealed in future updates. What I’m referring to is characters like Marluxia/ Lauriam , Larxene/ Elrena, Demyx, and Luxord who are intentionally left with super vague backstories. Lauriam and Elrena were revealed to be important to KhUX so I can only assume Demyx and Luxord will follow suit, especially after being revealed to have connections to the keyblade. What’s worse is that Marluxia and Larxene only seem to remember this after Sora defeats them… again… Luxord also gives Sora some assistance with this mystery card and it lowkey pissed me off. Oh yeah speaking of stuff that pissed me off, the “final world” section was super frustrating to me not because it was inherently bad, but because it was blatant setup for KHUX/ next game in the series especially with Sora seemingly* being transported to this limbo like area where the spirits of people who have died roam. One of these supposed spirits seems to be either a friend of Ephmer, Ventus, or Isa and Lea. It is intentionally vague and there only to spark speculation especially after she tells Sora a secret (Or was it the Chirithy? I don’t remember). I’m all for speculation and theorizing, I AM a KH fan afterall, it’s that this is speculation with a character we have no clue who it could be despite our best efforts and they throw her on us like she’s been part of the series this whole time…ESPECIALLY when Saix and Axel bring her up… I have my theories on who this girl might be but it ultimately doesn’t matter or doesn’t feel like good speculation because their might be multiple “mystery girls”. I personally think this mystery girl could be Strelitzia, Skuld, or some new character because Nomura hates us. The problem with it being either Strelitzia or Skuld is if it really IS one of them who is in this world or friends with Lea and Axel, then it leaves us wondering what happened to the other. Ugh. Next this is really a gripe but I’m just lost to be honest. I have no idea what happened to Demyx or Vexen. They both defected and while Vexen/ Even helped out with the “real replica” or “vessel” program, I either missed what happened to Demyx after providing the vessel for Roxas or they actually just forgot to write a conclusion for him. While I liked the interactions between Kairi and Axel I wished they actually showed Axel and Kairi training with their keyblades especially since they don’t do much with them in the final battle anyways… Kairi especially. It’s no secret that Kairi is literally worst girl in the KH series but I had hope that she’d get some much needed character development. My hopes were dashed when I found out she was just as useless and bland as ever and on top of that results in getting our sweet boi Sora sent to the shadow realm or wherever he gets sent to at the end of the game. A lot of annoying ship people really think that Riku and Sora were going to get together at the end of the game, and while I don’t blame them for thinking that way because honestly I would love to see that happen, the setup from KH1 and Com forbids that. I however, DO take issue with Riku taking a back seat in the story and honestly not contributing a whole lot besides motivating Sora do complete his mission. I like that Donald and Goofy were so charming in this game and that they joined us in the fight with Xehanort, but I still really would prefer that Riku also joined us like in KH2. We still have no concrete idea on what Kingdom Hearts itself actually is but as usual, I have my theories. The Kingdom Hearts that Xehanort summons in BBS and KH3 is the heart of all people and I think it’s the KH equivalent of Heaven or the afterlife because that’s where Eraqus and Xehanort go away to. The Kingdom Hearts in KH1 s the heart of all worlds and is apparently “light”. I’m also indifferent to the reveal of Xigbar being Luxu...anything to do with the black box or KHUX honestly bothers me. I know I must sound like I hate the story but I actually think it’s still the best out of all of them, I’m just expressing my concerns because I love the series and take serious issue with some of the choices made.

Gameplay:

The gameplay of KH3 is arguably the best of the series depending on who you ask. The general fan who mostly meanders through the game on the easiest difficulties on each entry might not really appreciate the depth of the combat and just stick to the go-to mash x to swing keyblade or triangle to do cool move. I however normally play on the hardest difficulty not only to seek a greater challenge, but to be forced to see how good or bad the game’s combat really is. I never really liked the argument of floaty combat because neither side really understands the real issue/ consequence of floaty combat. It all really comes down to enemy design, behavior, and placement. When a game has floaty combat and bad enemy design, (Enemies that don’t stagger or randomly stagger, shoot projectiles that do a lot of damage, big and un-telegraphed attacks) it cause the player to play the game in a really uncomfortable way. In BBS spamming dodge, surge moves, and shotlocks was essential in order to stand a chance against some of the bs that the game would throw at you. In DDD, flowmotion was far better than normal attacks because they gave you super armor, did better damage, and could be spammed. Balloonra was also OP AF. In KH1 Sora felt like a rock and while I personally enjoyed how it felt to control him, I can understand why someone wouldn’t like a lot of jumping and attacking over and over. Kh2 however, has the best combat in the series to this day in my opinion because of all the options you have. Your basic keyblade attacks are effective on every enemy in the game but at higher difficulties, the game suggests you branch away from mashing x and experiment with magic and summons. Then you realize how good it is. On top of solid enemy design, KH2 is probably my favorite game to play for action rpg gameplay.

Going into KH3 I set my expectations on the gameplay low based on the 0.2 gameplay and the seemingly super floaty gameplay of the trailers. Although KH3 does have its floaty feeling, I can say that the game is designed to be fun while having the best floaty gameplay in the series. The enemies almost all stagger to your basic keyblade attacks and larger enemies that don’t consistently stagger to finishers and keyblade transformation attacks. Magic feels AMAZING to use and is clearly useful early on. Team attacks, while I feel are still better as limits you can individually choose, are still fun and satisfying to use when provided. Attraction Flow was my least favorite feature not because they are all useless, quite the contrary as the pirate ship and splash run seem pretty good, but because I don’t have the option to turn them off. They fill the situation command slots with too much clutter and I’d like to turn them off since I don’t use them much anyways. As for combo modifiers, it’s pretty subjective what you prefer to run with but personally I only used one air combo plus and no combo pluses for my ground combos, speed slash as my only equipped finisher, and the air launch move to render my enemies useless while I air comboed them Marvel vs Capcom style. Shotlocks while useful, aren’t busted as they were in DDD. I recently found out that the Hero’s origin shotlock, when not fully charged, actually heals you a little which came in handy in the battle gates. Links or Summons, are actually pretty bad except for Simba and Stitch. The reason they are so bad is because they cost a FULL mp bar to use and they all leave you vulnerable to damage, granted you take less damage but doesn’t really matter on harder difficulties or battlegates. Simba and Stitch are good because their damage output makes up for the full mp bar. Links also fully heal you but I think that’s because you don’t have I frames and the devs just hope you wouldn’t notice. All in All pretty solid gameplay. Not better than 2 in my opinion but I wouldn’t laugh at someone for saying KH3 has their favorite combat. Regarding the final bosses they are all designed great but they come in groups which I don’t like and wished there was a way to fight them individually. I know they come in groups because it makes it the endgame drag less but, it result in super short fights that have too much going on in them and abruptly stop when you beat one member one by one. I also wished we fought Ansem and Xemnas in their final forms instead of all 3 in a group (Also they have the best boss theme and it should’ve been the final boss theme but the real final boss theme is still good). Every other boss is SOLID my favorite was definitely the ice wolf and mother gothel’s heartless thing.

Last but not least, Music

It’s Godlike. The end.

#KH3 #kh3 spoilers #kingdom hearts 3 #journal

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blubberquark · 6 years ago

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Pokemon Yellow: Let’s Go

Overview

I got my sister the new Pokemon game for Christmas - except it isn’t new. It is more like a high-definition remastered re-release of Pokemon Yellow, with some mechanics lifted from Pokemon Go to make it fresh, more accessible, and to have something that makes use of the console’s motion controls.

If you played Pokemon Red or Blue on the original Game Boy, you might be in for a surprise because now you can clearly see what the pixel art on that old 160x144 screen was meant to represent. If you haven’t played the original Pokemon games, you might not even know what you’re missing, or what was improved. It’s probably the most accessible - or most forgiving - game of the series yet, not counting spin-off games like Pokemon Go, Pokemon Snap, Mystery Dungeon, or Detective Pikachu.

If you played a Pokemon game before, Let’s Go is probably not reason enough to buy a Nintendo Switch - but Mario Kart 8 totally is, unless you already have a Mario Kart game on your GameCube, 3DS, Wii, or Wii U.

My sister is happy with the new Pokemon game anyway, because the battery in her old Pokemon Yellow cartridge died back in 2004.

Game Design

All the small changes made in Pokemon Let’s Go compared to the gameplay of Pokemon Yellow are connected, and they add up to a significant reduction in depth and difficulty:

You can see wild Pokemon roam the tall grass

There are no random encounters or fights against wild Pokemon

Catching wild Pokemon works like it does in Pokemon Go

You can swap out Pokemon between storage and your party at any time outside of battle

Techniques like “cut” or “surf“ do not take up the slot of an attack

XP are shared between Pokemon in your party

All of these changes make it more like Pokemon Go:

You see Pokemon on the street and can to choose whether to catch them

You don’t fight wild Pokemon

There is no fixed “party“, you can choose Pokemon for each battle

The most obvious change in the dynamics of Let’s Go compared to Yellow is that battles against wild Pokemon are no longer threatening or dangerous: You can avoid them, they don’t damage your party, and if a Pokemon in your party is damaged, you can just swap it out with a healthy one from storage.

You don’t need to grind dozens of common Pokemon to encounter a rare one. You don’t need to carry around a water Pokemon in case you need to use “surf”.

Let’s compare Pokemon Let’s Go to other JRPG games:

In almost every JRPG game ever your player character and party members each have their own skills, HP, mana, experience and equipment slots, but shared inventory. Fights are turn-based many-vs-many, where your starting line-up consists of three or fours out of however many people you currently have. Some attacks, buffs or heals are area-of-effect and affect all fighters on one side. You need some area-of-effect skills to deal with crowds, and some heavy-hitting attacks to take down bosses. Healing during combat takes up one turn for one fighter, healing outside of combat is cheap. There is some amount of strategy in coordinating the attacks, skills, buffs and heals of your party members. When your player character dies in combat, it’s game over and you respawn or have to reload. Other party members can be revived. Expect to grind a lot to level all your party members, until they leave the party for plot reasons.

Pokemon Red/Blue/Yellow has random encounters in tall grass and dungeons, limited PP (power points) for moves, and fights against wild Pokemon to catch them or gain XP. Your player character does not have HP or gain XP, only your Pokemon do. When all your Pokemon are beaten, you “die“ and re-spawn at the last Pokemon Centre you visited. Every fight is one-on-one, and you can swap out Pokemon when one gets defeated, or when it runs out of PP. Since PP are not per-Pokemon, but counting down for each skill, e.g. ”15 splashes left on this Magikarp”, they are very predictable, and make it clear when you should save your stronger attacks for stronger enemies. Healing in a Pokemon Centre fully restores both HP and PP.

To advance, in addition to story events and puzzle-solving, you need a party of Pokemon that can get you through a dungeon area without dying, and that means ending battles quickly, efficiently, and without much HP loss. Before you set out into an unknown area or a dungeon, you need to select the right Pokemon for your party. One of them is probably your starter, because you always have it and it’s overlevelled, but your starter’s PP are precious. You need one or two Pokemon of the type that hard-counters the Pokemon in this area, and maybe you have to catch and/or train them first.

The levelling systems of Persona 5 are too complicated to describe in depth here. There is the “real world“ where you go to school or hang out with friends, and the collective unconscious/”Metaverse” where you fight with your “Personas”, which are like Pokemon based on the Archetypes of Jungian psychology and mythology, except the Shin Megami Tensei series is actually older than Pokemon and did it first.

In the real world, you explore the city after school, spend money in shops, run errands, and hang out with friends. You can level up your “soft skills” to get better at hanging out with friends. Hanging out with friends advances side plots and side quests, and levels up your “social links” with friends, granting them skills in the Metaverse.

In the metaverse, you fight other personas with your own. You gain XP to level up your character, collect money from battles that you can spend in the real world, catch new personas, and level up personas. Unlike Pokemon, Personas are not independent beings, but aspects of our collective unconscious or some other psychobabble, so they don’t have their own HP and mana (or “SP”, skill points) values. Party members gain the strengths and weaknesses of their personas, and take hits to their own HP. Your player character can have dozens of personas, but having more personas is not a health advantage. Because SP/mana are also tied to your player character, more personas are also not helping you with mana. You are only ever as strong as your one best persona. Some persona skills use more mana than others, and mana is hard to come by. While there are loads and loads of healing spells to replenish HP for you and your party, once your party runs out of mana and mana-replenishing items, your dungeon run is essentially over. Fortunately, Persona 5 has no random encounters, and you can often sneak past enemies to save your resources for boss fights.

The battle system is many-on-many, similar to most JRPGs. Limited SP in Persona 5 essentially take the role of per-skill limited PP in Pokemon. The resource scarcity of Persona 5 is exacerbated by the real-world/Metaverse system: You can’t buy healing items is a Metaverse dungeon, only in the real world, but you can get real money from fights in the Metaverse. Entering the metaverse is in itself taking up a valuable resource: time. You and your friends could have spent the afternoon doing sports, finishing your homework for school, or going for a walk in the park. Every time enter the Metaverse, it’s an afternoon down the drain, an afternoon that you could have spent trying to hook up with an older woman. Every time you leave a dungeon you cut your losses.

Compared to Persona 5, Pokemon Red/Blue/Yellow was not nearly as punishing. You can usually just leave an area and go back to the last Pokemon Centre, you can grind random encounters in the tall grass for a bit without losing out on anything (Except hours of your own time in real life that you could spend doing sports or seducing older women, if that’s your thing. Maybe Persona 5 was trying to tell me something.)

If can see that you will you run out of HP or PP before you finish the dungeon, you can just turn around while your Pokemon are still somewhat healthy, and make a beeline for the Pokemon Centre.

This part was longer than I expected: Back to Pokemon Let’s Go.

They could have made a game without motion controls where battling wild Pokemon works the same as it did before, but you can see them and there are no random encounters. That would have made it possible to sneak past wild Pokemon, which would have made dungeons much easier, or at least more predictable.

Imagine the opposite: There are random encounters, but the random encounters have you catch Pokemon with motion controls like in Pokemon Go. That would be annoying, and it wouldn’t add much to the game. In the worst case, you run out of Pokeballs and just flee every random encounter. It’s not difficult or interesting. It’s just annoying now.

Once you decide on adopting the catching mechanics from Pokemon Go, you are locked in into a bunch of design changes that turn trainer battles into the only source of real danger and interesting decisions in the whole game. Now, as long as you win a trainer battle by a slight margin, you can just walk to Pokemon Centre and heal back up. If you run into a big wild Pokemon, it won’t hurt you. At this point, letting players swap out Pokemon remotely becomes a sensible design decision: Walking back to heal your Pokemon would just become another annoyance as a result of perverse optimisation. (I know you can fly back to a city in Pokemon Red/Blue/Yellow with a bird Pokemon, but then you might have to walk back into the wilderness through tall grass again to get back to where you were.)

You can still grind by catching wild Pokemon, it works similarly to Pokemon Go.

TL;DR for game designers: Adopting motion controls had a huge impact on the game design of Pokemon Let’s Go, spanning the levels of mechanics, dynamics, and aesthetics.

TL;DR for players: If this is your first JRPG or Pokemon game, give it a try! Otherwise meh...

#comparative game design #pokemon #pokemon lets go #persona 5 #game design

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jonathanraychapman · 6 years ago

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My Thoughts on Current FGO

I’ve been playing Fate Grand Order (a mobile game) since a few months after it came out. While I don’t want to throw out a monetary number, I’ve spent nearly as much money as Touhou or Shotgun Shogun on this game. I’ve played every event except the first Nerofest - leveling up characters and skills along the way. I’ve been following the anime series since it first came out and that’s first and foremost what got me into this game. I play the game quite a bit. It’s how I start my morning. Sometimes it’s how I spend my lunch (jamming to music in my car and playing the game to get away from the office). I often play the game while watching movies or videos or while hiking. It’s something I can do with my mobile phone to pass the time.

Anyways, here’s some of my thoughts on the game. This is partially to explain my position playing it to people that follow me and partially to give Shotgun Shogun some ideas for talking to the creators at anime conventions.

Things I like about the game:

The Flexible Difficulty: It’s as hard or as easy as you make it out to be. If you’re in the farming mood you can either brute-force the game with your powerful servants or take your time and use the less-used characters in your roster (with more-casual characters that have fun interactions). This customization of gameplay is extended - based on the class system and ability to use command seals. If those archers are too easy, then fight them with a neutral class. Really want a challenge? Bring your sabers to fight the uphill battle. This carries over to events with the different tiers and challenge quests. I do wish the tiers had some niche or reason to play them for flavor or secondary advantage.

The Humor: The translations are pretty good overall and some of the dialogs or in-jokes in the game are fun. Sometimes I wish that - story-wise - FGO would dial things back to scary or dramatic or intense more. You get a little taste of this sometimes (like Liz’s scenes during the Kara no Kyoukai event - where she realizes what she’s done in her lore). While I enjoy my Tamamo/Kiyo memes or Blackbeard lolli humor, I want more balance. The Camelot storyline was a pretty good example of how things should be while the London story was not great. If you were just playing the game you might not get the dramatic story behind characters (it’s like FGO is just the meme version of the series).

The Art: I think the game does a fantastic job on the details in the backgrounds. And I like the different art on the characters and their noble phantasms. The music is great too (especially some of the event music), but I mostly leave the sound turned off (since non-skippable NP animations get really repetitive).

The Lore: The lore of the series is a huge part of the appeal of this game. And it’s not necessarily even done by the game as much as the anime and visual novel games that precede it. It’s fine for the game to ride on the coat-tails of the story as long hints to character lore are preserved out (and they are for the most part). I do get the feeling that the mobile game is sort of a meme of Fate moreso than I would have expected. That might be because half of the events are around holidays and those really are where the game breaks the fourth wall (it’s also mostly what I remember because of all the grinding).

Things I dislike about the game:

Lack of Player Interactions: The only way we have to interact with other players in the game is through the friends list and guest system. Unless you know people in real life, this make the game overall a pretty cold experience. I know the can of worms that having chat would open up, but man it would be nice to let people know what you like and maybe don’t like about their servant lineup. I’d also love to add different kinds of supports. I want to share Tamamo for arts teams to use while having Waver for other teams. I’d like to share my Nero Bride for her skills while letting people use my Okita for stars or for her NP damage (or my Saber Artoria for farming). A friend can only bring one of your servants (and it’s mandatory) so why not give them more options?

Lack of Company/Community Communication: So I have watched the convention events when I could to see what’s coming up, but those are far and few between (and there’s been a lot of problems with news being held back because of a convention). That’s just not how to run things - especially online. The communication just really isn’t there with the player base and it hasn’t gotten better. Often the twitter account will post about events that started days ago so if I had relied on that for news, I would be in a bad spot (I’d be a couple of days behind on farming an event). And the events are kind of odd (like last year’s Thanksgiving banner). When seeing announcements through streams, It’s like watching the event in another country (maybe because there’s a lot of Japanese and a lot of translating and it’s not done very well). I get the voice actors being Japanese and I get that the game is natively Japanese in origin, but this is the US market and a US port/translation of the game. Please get a more-native PR spokesperson that’s also enthusiastic about the game and add more polish to these announcements.

Can’t Skip Noble Phantasm Animations: I’ve read about this being a purposeful decision and I get that the company wants players to take time to watch the art for the experience (and likely psychological reasons), but after seeing the Arash explosion for the literal 1000th time, it’s not adding to my experience. And that’s a quick animation. There’s also the animations that seem to take forever (like the Lancer Artoria one). I wish that tapping the screen would somehow shorten the NP. Also, often when the animation finishes, I can barely see the numbers on the damage before the whole screen wipes. Sometimes I’m trying to figure out if an enemy was demonic by testing it with a NP or skill and it’s just hard to with the NP animation obfuscating things. It would also be great to be able to see the traits of enemies. I’d like to know if a skeleton is a humanoid because my Florence gets a buff against that type. Or I’d like to know if the Skeleton King is considered demonic to use my Rama against. I know later in Japan we get to see the crit star distribution, but I’m not sure if we ever get to see attributes.

Gatcha System Too Greedy (And the Statistics Inaccurate): FGO is a gambling game and I totally get that. The company might not want to admit that too freely out of fear or regulation, but the players know it’s about getting players to spend money to roll for characters. I absolutely enjoy spending money and gambling for characters and I’m fine with it being this way. But the rates are just really bad and the side-rewards (i.e. CE/Character cards you burn) don’t justify the expenditure. I don’t want to dwell on this too much because I’m sure others have called it out, but the game gives too little back while gambling. When you do a 10-spin and get a minimum roll (meaning a 4-star junk CE), it really feels like you got cheated. I also frequently have one five-star character on rate-up - meaning I have a 0.07% chance of rolling them, only to go through two or three other five-star servants before getting the one on rate-up (and the chance of that is extremely low). I know it’s not just my bad luck. There’s definitely something wrong with the rate-up statistics posted (I’ve just seen it happen too many times over thousands and thousands of quartz). Also, the banners could be tweaked to let people have a good chance one one servant or the other. When you put up a banner with two five-stars on rate-up (one of which I don’t exactly like or I already have a NP5 of), it’s not a banner I’m going to roll on.

Farming Materials Too Tedious: I get that you need long-term goals to feel like you’re progressing as a player, but some of the materials requirements are just kind of ridiculous in regards to the amount of time needed. When you grind a free node with a supposed 19% chance to drop crystals for 8 hours to maybe get 10 crystals (when you need 20 per skill), that’s just not fun. It’s also ridiculous when an event drops and gives you easy access to crystals or the rate is now 60% or you can buy 10 from the shop for basically nothing. It just doesn’t feel rewarding and it makes you have to grind the game when you don’t really want to (especially around holidays). That’s just too much of a grind for most players and it takes a toll on me as well. Take hearts for example. Right now, you can spend a whole day and maybe get one heart from a caster daily node. So you basically have to get these during events or from their shops. And there’s a lot of servants requiring a lot of hearts.

I’ll be honest. I’ve either burned or not rolled for characters after looking at their materials requirements (Tristran I’m looking at you). I don’t want that character sitting in my roster with low skills and I don’t want to grind it out to increase their skills if they’re just not good. So I just avoid the whole thing (especially if they’re not someone I exactly care for). The same is true for characters that just have really weak kits but high-end requirements (like Stheno).

Can’t Really Customize Characters: I know we get a few some skins/costumes later-on, but more of this would be a really welcome addition to the game. Maybe just being able to change colors on the outfits or buy skins would do so much to make the game feel more personable. If part of the appeal of this game is the waifu thing, then why not lean into this area more and make some money. And if it was implemented, let it be a DLC type of purchase instead of a gatcha thing. Or maybe it could be a secondary reward for excess servants or gold mana prisms - like something to do with the 11th copy of Fion you’ve picked up. Every character in the game should have alternate costume/skin options.

#fgo #Fate Grand Order #fgona

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ilovedeadlypremonition · 7 years ago

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Deadly Premonition director, Hidetaka “Swery” Suehiro, officially announced his upcoming “Debt Repayment Life Simulation RPG (with Cats)” The Good Life at his PAX West Panel this afternoon!

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We already got a short teaser trailer a week or so ago after the”cat was let out of the bag” but now with Swery’s official announcement we have a brand new trailer, tons of concept art, the game’s crowdfund details, and thanks to the official press release a more detailed plot outline.

THE STORY

Based in an RPG-style town filled with fun activities and fascinating people, THE GOOD LIFE offers a thrilling, twisting murder mystery. At first glance, Rainy Woods looks like a normal country town in Northern England comprised of stone houses built in the Middle Ages, nestled in abundant nature and surrounded by forest. Looking deeper, however, Rainy Woods is home to a bizarre and deadly mystery. Throughout the day, the townsfolk work hard, look out for one another, love their families, and enjoy nightly drinks at the local pubs. Each character has a unique personality and lifestyle. Events change depending on the time of day, weather, and season. Even though some may argue that they live in a video game world, the townsfolk of Rainy Woods still worry, suffer, love, hate, and have fun as any real person would. Rainy Woods and its small English aesthetic exudes a unique sense of charm, fully realized when, in the dark of night, its villagers transform into cats.

Players star as Naomi, a photographer straddled with debt who moves from New York City to Rainy Woods. As an étrangère, players feel both alienated yet strangely comfortable as they must make friends, solve mysteries, and become emotionally invested in Naomi’s quest to make a life for herself in the happiest and most bizarre town in the world. To pay off her debt, she sends reports and photographs on villagers and their town as she uncovers its deadly secret.

THE GOOD LIFE is a mystery tale in the vain of Raymond Chandler or Conan Doyle. Players make a tragic discovery in the town’s river—the brutally murdered body of a young girl, her heart pierced by an ancient, medieval sword. Having first arrived in Rainy Woods to uncover the secrets of the happiest town in the world and payoff her debt, Naomi is thrusted into a bizarre mystery, setting her journalist heart ablaze as she sets her sights on revealing the truth behind the young girl’s murder.

THE GAME

Genre: Debt Repayment Life Simulation RPG Platforms: PC + TBD Console(s) Release Date: Q3 2019 Target Developer: White Owls

So we got a murder mystery/life sim, with cute cats, a cast of bizarre characters with their own 24 hours schedules, AND events that will change depending on the time of day, weather and season?

[More details, pictures and my thoughts under the cut!]

The Campaign

If you are as hyped as I am you can help make Swery’s new game a reality by contributing to The Good Life’s Fig campaign. The development team is hoping to raise at least $1.5M USD to bring a digital version game to both PC and consoles. Fans can lend support via traditional reward based backing or by investing in Fig game shares of the game. There’s a number or different tiers and rewards available for The Good Life ranging from simply receiving a digital copy of the game when it is released for $29 to actually becoming a character within the game as a reward for donating a whopping $35K! Though if any rich fans out there are considering the $35k tier please note that there’s a chance you might end up being brutally murdered in the game. (Yikes!)

Looking at all the tiers though I must say I’m a bit disappointed by the lack of any sort of physical rewards being offered. I mean a real signed message card from Swery is a lot more tempting than a digital one… But there seems to be some hope that this may change looking at the responses to some of the early “backstage” backers. It seems Swery and the campaign team are looking into the possibility of including some physical rewards in the future and are even asking for suggestions!

Personally I would love to see a physical copy of the game or an art/guide book myself! Heck a stuffed kitty Naomi or even a sheep would be pretty awesome additions too!

[Update!] A physical award tier has been added and for $269+shipping you can get a package with some cool game swag! Now if you picked another tier don’t worry you can update your pledge and pick choose to add a number of DLC and physical items!

The Idea

Even though Swery’s announcement of a new game so soon after returning from retirement and opening his studio, White Owls, was kind of a surprise (or maybe it was just me?) it turns out Swery’s been developing the idea for The Good Life for quite awhile now.

According to the “SWERY’S Voice” video on The Good Life’s fig campaign page that describes the game’s inspiration, vision, and story the idea behind the game was sparked after Deadly Premonition’s producer (I assume Tomio Kanazawa) was suddenly transferred to London, England while Swery continued work on Deadly Premonition in Osaka, Japan. Swery was sad to be left behind but the long distance communication between the two ended up inspiring the idea of being sent to a rural English town and being unable to leave.

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Swery’s initial idea continued to refine and expand in the back of his mind over the years even while developing, the now sadly incomplete, D4 – Dark Dreams Don’t Die.

Back in 2015 Swery took a brief retirement from game development to focus on recovering from reactive hypoglycemia and during this hiatus he finished the first draft of a murder mystery novel set in a British countryside town from the perspective of a cat.

I've been eager to hear more about his mystery book for while but now with the The Good Life's announcement I'm beginning to think Swery's novel may have inspired the whole investigating a murder mystery while as a cat angle of The Good Life game.

Now this connection between the game and novel it is pure speculation on my part at this point but given that both are revolve around a strange premise of cat investigating a murder in a rural England just seems way too coincidental. Plus the novel's working title of " I Am Not a Cat " really makes me believe that the main character may have been a human at some point which is very similar to Naomi's situation in The Good Life as she only temporarily turns into a cat during the night while living Rainy Woods!

By the way the characters listed on the campaign page are kind of amazing…and here I thought the residents of Greenvale were a bit strange. I like how Swery seems to be continuing the tradition of a single black male among a caucasian population (who is also named the “totally normal cat” btw lol) and an insomniac who works with the dead. I wonder if the “person name Kaysen” that has occurred in Swery’s last three games (Spy Fiction, Deadly Premonition, and D4) will also continue in The Good Life? It is also kind of amusing that the “Handsome Nurse” is known just as “Gay Cat” I’m guessing this means Naomi won’t be able to make any love connections with that bloke?

Game Mechanics

In The Good Life the story mission focuses on three core points: paying off a huge debt, uncovering the town’s secret, and solving a murder of Elizabeth, the lone daughter of the village pastor.

Photography

Since Naomi is a professional photographer from New York it is no surprise that taking photos is a major gameplay mechanic featured in the game. The monetary rewards for Naomi’s daily reports will heavily factor around the quality and rarity of the photos players take during the day.

Capturing the perfect photo may prove to be a little difficult at first. You won’t actually know how any of your photos will turn out until they are developed them back at Naomi’s house and ranked as either a “success” or “failure” and only successful photos will be sent over to the client for rewards. As players progress through the game there will be opportunities to upgrade and even purchase special cameras that will help the players take better pictures.

Part- time Jobs

But taking photos and sending daily reports isn’t the only way Naomi can cut down her debt. The game also allows players to take a number of part time jobs around town including bartending at the local pub, delivering milk, shearing sheep and other rural tasks.

Some of these part time jobs will give the players opportunities to make a fortune but they can also be exhausting and some can even be dangerous so you have to choose your side jobs wisely!

Any money earned in these ventures can be put towards paying off the ever looming unpaid debt or spent on fun things for Naomi.

Customization

The Good Life is a RPG after all so it’s no surprise that as players progress through the game Naomi stats will improve and fun customizations for Naomi in both her human and cat forms can also be acquired. Naomi’s range of daily activity will expand based on her stamina and movement speed so the more points you earn or temporarily acquire via clothing will allow for more photo taking and fun activities during the day.

Life Maintenance and Stamina

…and speaking of stamina just like in Deadly Premonition and D4 it is important to keep Naomi well fed and rested during her stay in Rainy Woods. I’m pretty excited to see all the English dishes that will be available for consumption… There were a few dishes listed over on the campaign page including one of my favorites, Fish and Chips, which I have a feeling Naomi will end up eat a lot of during my own play through unless there happens to be a lot of smoked salmon…

But eating and sleeping isn’t the only thing players need to keep an eye on during Naomi’s stay they also must balance Naomi’s income so while she’s paying back her debt she will still have enough money left over to not only take care of her daily needs, but also have enough for the upkeep of her camera, the development of photos, and her daily shipments of reports back to New York.

The most surprising examples of one of her special expenses that’s listed over on the campaign page is the need to buy sanitary goods for Naomi once a month. It’s a normal expense in my own life but it’s something I’ve never seen mentioned let alone forced on a player to even consider while in control of a female protagonist before. It’s pretty amazing that sort of detail was even included!

I also thought that way alcohol consumption in the game is handled is really interesting as well. Giving Naomi alcohol will provide some high rewards in the short term as it will alleviate both her hunger and her thirst in one shot but if she continues to overindulge in drink throughout her stay she will develop a dependency for it. It’s pretty neat to see the real life consequence of addiction in a video game... I hope Rainy Woods also has a good 12-step program!

Special Events

The Good Life also features several seasonal events that offer special rewards. The game’s campaign didn’t go into a lot of details but in Spring there will be cherry blossom dance festival, there’s a Tea Harvest in Summer, while during the Fall Naomi can harvest nuts and catch fat river fish, and in Winter find minerals and maybe earn a present from Santa Claus(?)

Being a Cat

During the night while Naomi is in cat form players have the opportunity to investigate places you may not have access to while in human form and a chance to get closer to different villagers while they are in their cat forms by bringing them various trash…er I mean “kitty themed” presents…Some items you find while as a cat may even fetch a high price during the day and unlock some more special story events.

A few of the possible treasures a player can find are seen above...Hmm, I wonder if those “suspicious seeds” are anything like the ones you can find in Greenvale…

Graphics

As for graphics The Good Life’s campaign page describe them as being both “Nostalgic and Modern” using low polygon models with simple textures but also making use of CG-esque atmospheric lighting, fog, shadows, and glare elements well.

The game does look rather simple but it still has a very distinct and unique look. I’ve always prefered a great story over great graphics so I don’t mind the game’s simple design in the slightest :) I do think the sheep are really adorable in this art style though!

Atmosphere

If all of the features above hasn’t already peaked your interest maybe the Fig campaign description of The Good Life’s atmosphere will do the trick:

“THE GOOD LIFE has intriguing elements inspired by Twin Peaks. It will also feature the old-timey British traditions seen in classic shows such as Downtown Abbey and Poirot. This is a Swery Game, so expect a healthy dosage of horror, mystery, humor and taboo topics that helped make Deadly Premonition such a cult hit. Our humor will reflect some of the elements from Hot Fuzz and other classic British comedies.”

Man it was already a give-in that I would be excited for The Good Life since I’m such a big fan of Deadly Premonition (and Twin Peaks) but I can also expect some Hot Fuzz style humor too?!

Guys, Hot Fuzz is one of my all-time favorite films ever so this comparison has me even more excited to play the game!

Hmm… Rainy Woods is described as the “Happiest Town in the World” with the “happiest people on the planet” which is pretty similar to the situation of Sandford always winning “Village of the Year” in Hot Fuzz…I wonder does Rainy Woods have an equivalent of the Neighborhood Watch Alliance?

Hey Naomi, if the townsfolk start chanting about things being “all for the greater good” I would make run for it!

The Developers

The Good Life will be the joint effort between three developers: Swery’s studio, White Owls, along with G-rounding and Camouflaj. Swery and his team will provide the creative and artistic direction for the game while G-rounding will manage the production and game creation and Camouflaj will provide both production support and supervision.

I really hope The Good Life’s Fig campaign is successful as it looks like a whole lot of fun. I’m eager to see how the game will come together and “enjoy my best life” in 2019

#deadly premonition #the good life #swery65 the good life #swery65

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tumblunni · 7 years ago

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Miscellaneous rambling Game Thoughts that I am Thinking about Game Today’s Think: Spice up the calendar stat raising gameplay a bit with ~festivals!~

LONG RAMBLE INCOMING

* Festivals that aren’t just markings on the calendar like in persona, but minigames like animal crossing and harvest moon! Also Oreshika but I only know one other person who plays that, lol. I really grew to like their tournements tho, even if its just a boring samey rpg battle repeated every damn year for centuries. It became oddly more useful in the postgame because everyone’s levels are so high and the amount of Devotion (job class selection points, basically) doesn’t increase as the enemies get buffed. So the twice yearly contests are the only reliable way to get a huge amount of devotion all at once, which is great if you’re grinding out new characters en masse and trying to get a rare inheritance trait! (srsly tho i have got TOTALLY sick of the ‘everyone lives and dies and then you play as their descendants’ thing by now, it just makes me feel extra guilty for grinding. I had to kill like 300 dads!) ...MAN I’M GOING OFFTOPIC LOL Anyway what I mean is that there’s a way bigger incentive to look forward to festivals/contests if the reward from them is something super useful that you can’t get anywhere else! Princess Maker 2 had a similar sort of thing, because money was really hard to make and the prize from a single tournement could fund like four months of combat classes! So whatever these rewards are gonna be, they should be like that and be a big boost that can help power-level your charries. Maybe even a x2 multiplier on experience for a particular stat, until january next year? or maybe this is how training gyms level up, instead of having exp? your fame rises in the tourney and you’re able to buy better equipment! Oh, and maybe the non-combat festivals could give a reward of a big relationship boost with certain characters? Gotta impress all the potential dates with your pie-baking skills! (pie may also contain dates)

* Also there totally needs to be a beauty pageant or fashion show or something. I know in real life there’s barely any of those for men, but this is a fantasy world so we can just say this town’s mayor is Damn Cool! And also it goes without saying that we’re gonna indulge the fantasy of having an unbiased set of judges that aren’t racist or homophobic or pedophiliac or anorexia obsessed or.. well, real life has a LOT of problems that games don’t have to emulate, lol. So yeah! This lil town in jrpgland has a big ol fancy fashion contest and it’s a fun event for everyone! Enjoy making mr grizzled warrior protagonist look cute as hell! * Basically this but What If It Wasn’t A Joke Seriously I hate seeing stuff like that on memes about being progressive, when it was clear within the context of the show that kids were meant to laugh at that male character wearing dresses. Man I was SO damn happy when Steven Universe subverted that trope and had an end of episode twist be Steven crossdressing and loving it and everyone is like ‘wow classic steven’ and cheering for him. Also they didn’t force the socially anxious girl to sing on stage! Generally a great episode for breaking tropes! So yeah more like Basically This But Basically This Man I forgot how much that ending makes me grin, holy shit! It probably doesn’t have the same factor out of context, but just it makes me so happy to have a flash forward and we see Sadie still singing the song, just offstage. So we get to know that even if this whole experience was ruined for her, she hasn’t given up on her dreams, and she’s way more confident with singing in front of other people even if she isn’t ready for singing with strangers. I love her and Steven’s friendship so much, seriously! its such a good big sister sort of thing, and this episode was great for showing steven stepping up to protect her but like.. not in any sort of cliche macho way. By winning back the crowd with a fab dress! * So yeah anyway Where Was I Before I Got Offtopic Lol It won’t be a crossdressing-only pageant or anything, but it’ll be a unisex fashion show and I’m not gonna include any form of homophobic nonsense from real world fashion industry. And I wanna give loads of options so the player can pick whatever they prefer, and I’m writing this character as the sort of dude who would love all of them! Dark antihero trenchcoats are cool but what about also PASTEL LOLITA TOP HATS * Maybe could have gameplay similar to the gen 4 version of Pokemon Contests? With the multiple judges! In those games the judges were all identical and it was just ‘don’t pick the same judge twice’, here it could be more like the three judges have different tastes and you have to coordinate your style and performance to get as many points as you can. Do you gamble it all on super-impressing one judge, or make an unconventional combo outfit that can bank medium level points with everyone? And like maybe the cooking contest could have the same sort of gameplay, cos that’s another festival where you could say the judges could have different tastes. Also maybe friend characters have a random chance of appearing as a judge! You wouldn’t get any bonus points tho, cos they’d get kicked off if they cheated on your behalf. But maybe you can get a relationship points boost if you appeal to them? So it could be like a temptation to risk losing the contest but unlock a new romance scene with your sweetheart. THE POWER OF PIE!

* Other various festivals I have really liked in various cute town time games: * Stardew Valley’s easter egg hunt! * Rune Factory’s weird snowball fight but with turnips instead! * Parents giving you money on new years was also a thing in rune factory, and I’m pretty sure that’s based on a real thing in some country? Was it china? Your culture rules, dudes! * Also its in a lot of games cos its celebrated in japan, but I wish we celebrated it here too! The two day valentines! Seriously I way prefer the idea of having one day where one half of the couple gives a gift and then a later day where the other person gives one back in return. And its less commercialized, they even still make homemade chocolates in that country! Damn i’d love to try doing that someday! (not necessarily for a valentines thing, just in general it seems fun) Maybe could have a fun fantasy variant where people give something different instead of chocolates? or if the conditions for the two different days were different? like instead of the girl valentine and the boy valentine its.. I dunno... a day celebrating some famous social class busting couple so its meant to be for rich people hitting on commoners and vice versa? A bit of a halloween aspect where you’re allowed to do stuff that’s normally frowned upon, free of judgment. (It was like that in puritan times when people were all ‘burn the witch!’ and all) Also I like that japanese valentines has ‘honmei and giri’- chocolates for actual crushes, but you can also give them to friends and family! More holidays need to be an excuse for friend gifts! (also those are really catchy names for such a thing)

* Speaking of which, maybe I could throw in some festivals from my home country? Mostly britain has similar holidays to america with a few missing, but there’s a few ones unique to the different regions which are pretty fun. I don’t know a lot about all of them but here’s some of the ones we have in my are, Wales! * Guy Fawkes’s Day. Official day for hella fireworks! Tho people also do them at christmas and halloween, and this holiday is right in the middle so DEAR GOD I’ve been dealing with my noisy neighbours constantly exploding stuff for three months. Give it a break, guys! The story behind this holiday is actually kinda interesting though, we set off fireworks to celebrate some villainous guy who tried to bomb a castle once and everyone tied him to a tree and set him on fire. There’s even a kids’s song about this weird morbid old thing! “remember remember the fifth of november, the gunpowder treason and plot, i see no reason the gunpowder treason should ever be forgot” Also its my american friend’s birthday, which is funny cos apparantly my birthday is an american holiday too! O+O * Eisteddfod, which is like.. literally a stat testing festival in real life?? Like yknow how you have sports festivals in school, well this is that but for like.. brain. Brain sprints. In mythology the Welsh were basically the Bard class of britain, we have loads of folk heros who are like.. literally able to poetry and then your brain explodes. So poems, songs, and novels are valued a lot here, and this is the biggest day of the school schedule because of it! Everyone gets to dress in ye olden style fancy dress costumes and enter best poem/short story/painting/whatever contests, and it is SURPRISINGLY AWESOME!!! like.. everything is done with MAXIMUM HAM. M A X I M U MMMM There is no amount of hyperbole when I say that the school carves their own wooden throne and there’s a public crowning ceremony for the kids who win. This is a literal actual thing that happens once annually in every school forever. Its called the Chairing Of The Bard! And I won it once when I was 11 or so and it was both the best and worst thing ever, like holy shit i was SO terrified having to stand up in front of 300 people and put on an even more silly costume on silly costumes day... Oh and another strange thing that is actually real! School houses! like in harry potter! Its generally for younger kids tho, its like 100% of all primary schools (grade schools) and then like 1/3rd of high schools? Also the names of the houses are up to the school to decide, but for some reason they almost always seem to be red, yellow, blue and green. In my primary school they were just named for cities in wales, and I always found it really annoying that I didn’t get in Caerdydd house when the school was literally IN Caerdydd! * Also unrelated but I looked up my old high school on google and I’m surprised that so many of the same teachers are still working there seven years later! I’m so happy that some of them got promoted!

* And other miscellaneous festival ideas!!!

* You know what i fuckin love? That nonsense fantasy trope of having to fight thru a giant dungeon and get like the rare crystal feather of the fuckface bird or else you can’t marry the king’s daughter. Its even more weird and weirdly endearing when its just like.. AN EVERYONE. Eveyr marriage. Everywhere. How the fuck do these people actually survive if they have to do this five times a year?? So yeah, I think that’d be a really cool wedding festival to have as like.. a sign of this town being badass, lol But also make it less of a law, cos its not as fun if people are being forced to die on mount terror, yknow? its just a tradition that developed cos of some great adventurer in ye olden times, and goofy bastards dare each other to attempt it as the equivelant of a batchelor’s party. You don’t have to, plenty of people just make faux feather ornaments to propose to their loved one. But it’s considered a powerful good luck blessing to pull off the legendary adventure! Like only one couple every decade manages to do it, and you get a big town festival to make your special day even better! And people won’t be mad if you fail, it’s still a fun bit of entertainment for the townsfolk and a good excuse for Secondary Tradition: We All Get Drunk Instead So yeah, gameplay wise this would mean you have an option to do this festival or not. But it’s gonna be the hardest minigame of all, so don’t come unprepared! Alternatively you can either buy or make your own proposal ornament, and do things the less adventurey way. * Probably different batchelor/ettes would like different things? like Blair is an adventurer herself so of course she’ll go nuts for the traditional feather hunt. And she’d really hate the expensive ornament, cos she’s a down to earth gal who works hard to scrape together enough income in the inn to look after her lil sister. She’d get pissed off at you wasting so much on her, like wtf if you’d bought me a nice sturdy set of furniture that’d be way more useful! (Tho she’s a bit of an outlier and generally most people will at least be flattered by the fancy stuff, even if its not their favourite.) * Oh, and maybe you could actually do the feather festival together?? I actually didn’t think of that, I was just going 100% with the cliche of dude having to do some crazy quest to marry a girl. But it would be a way better test of your luck as a couple if you did it as a couple! That could be SO cool, just the two of you climbing a badass mountain and beating up monsters all lovey dovey~! And it could make the minigame entirely unique on each route, cos each character would have different roles in battle. Most of them aren’t adventurers by trade like Blair, so you could be fighting alongside a mage or a support character. Maybe one of them is actually a weakass that you need to protect? Tho I mean it would be bad to categorize one character as the least enjoyable version of the minigame. So maybe its like one character becomes that in one particular situation, and that’s the sign that you’re getting their Normal Ending instead of the Golden Ending? Someone who has some sort of doubts or a secret they’re keeping, which limits their ability here. Possibly Mortimer? Cos in his case it would be exceptionally hard not to reveal his secret in battle! And I dunno, maybe he tells the protagonist the secret before they get married, and the writing is just framed so that the player never knows but the protagonist does. Now go do his golden ending if you wanna learn more! * I like morty a lot. He’s ended up the most developed even though he’s the most recent character I added, lol!

#test game thing

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intellectuallyawkward-blog · 7 years ago

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Origin of super mario names

Nintendo figures make the VR of theirs (arcade) debut with innovative Vive driven Mario Kart

Bandai Namco showed a virtual reality model of Mario Kart, Mario Kart Arcade GP VR, that is going to make its debut in a VR arcade the business is opening using Tokyo, Japan upcoming month.

The game appears to mark the VR debut of one of Nintendo's flagship franchises, although it is crucial to be aware it is licensed by Nintendo as well as created by Namco - just like its non-VR predecessor, Mario Kart Arcade GP.Not many details are currently available in English regarding the game, even thought it's mentioned about the arcade's site as running on HTC Vive headsets and specially-designed racing seats.

Nintendo has thus far been publicly reticent about the promise of VR - last calendar year frontman Shigeru Miyamoto told investors that for VR wearing specific, we're ongoing the research of ours, in addition to exploring improvement with a mind to how our existing key products are meant to be played for a somewhat long period of time of time.

We are considering the choices of delivering an adventure which gives value when played for a little while, he continued. And how to eliminate the fears of long-duration use.

When I discovered that out I did two things. To begin with, I whipped out the copy of mine (yes, I maintain it which real/nerdy that I still need a well used NES hooked up in the room) of mine and then made positive I will be able to match the game at will. (I can. Childhood not wasted.)

Secondly, I launched down a rabbit hole of reading through Mario websites and Articles and Wikis. In the operation, I stumbled upon the etymologies of the brands of several of the key players in the Mario universe. Consequently, in honor of the video game which often changed the planet, in this article they are, given in useful 11-item describe form.

Mario.

When Mario debuted in the arcade game "Donkey Kong", he was just referred to as Jumpman. (Which also is the generic label associated with that Michael Jordan spread leg Nike logo. Two of the most legendary icons actually equally have generic versions of themselves known as Jumpman. But only one of them has today gotten to a point of remaining extremely impressive that he shaved himself a Hitler mustache before filming a professional and the balls were had by no one to correct him.)

In 1980, as the Nintendo of America team imported Jumpman to raise him right into a franchise-leading star (Hayden Christensen style), somebody discovered that he looked just like their Seattle office building's landlord... a guy called Mario Segale.

Mario Segale did not get a dime for becoming the namesake of pretty much the most prominent video game persona ever, but he most likely isn't very concerned; in 1998 he sold the asphalt small business of his for over $60 million. (Or 600,000 extra lives.)

Luigi.

Luigi actually has one of probably the weakest name origins of most of the mario brothers characters in the Mario universe (once again displaying exactly why, in life that is real, he'd have a larger inferiority complex than Frank Stallone, Abel or that 3rd Manning brother).

"Luigi" is simply the result of a group of Japanese men trying to consider an Italian name to accentuate "Mario." Why was the Italian label they went with? When they each moved from Japan to Seattle, the pizza area nearby to the Nintendo headquarters called Mario & Luigi's. (It has since gone from business.)

Koopa.

Koopa is a transliterated variation of the Japanese rap for the opponent turtles, "Kuppa." Stick with me here -- kuppa is the Japanese phrase for a Korean dish known as gukbap. Basically it is a cup of soup with cereal. From what I surely explain to it's totally not related to turtles, especially malicious ones.

In an interview, Mario's creator, Shigeru Miyamoto, explained he was deciding between three different brands for the high-speed of evil turtles, all of which happened to be named after Korean foods. (The other 2 were yukhoe and bibimbap.) Which means among 2 things: (1) Miyamoto loves Korean food and was looking to offer a tribute or even (two) Miyamoto believes Koreans are evil and really should be jumped on.

Wario.

I sort of missed the debut of Wario -- he debuted in 1992, right around when I was hitting the age exactly where I was extremely cool for cartoon y Nintendo games. (Me and the middle school buddies of mine happened to be into Genesis only. I was back on Nintendo within 4 years.)

Turns out his label works both equally in Japanese and english; I kinda assumed the English fashion but did not know about the Japanese element. In English, he is an evil, bizarro world mirror image of Mario. The "M" flips to become a "W" as well as Wario is created. The name also operates in Japanese, where it is a mix of Mario and "warui," that means "bad."

That is a very high quality scenario, since, as I covered extensively in the list eleven Worst Japanese-To-English Translations In Nintendo History, not every language distinction finesses again and forth that efficiently.

Waluigi.

When I 1st seen "Waluigi" I assumed it was hilarious. While Wario was obviously a natural counterbalance to Mario, Waluigi believed really comically shoehorned (just tacking the "wa" prefix before Luigi) -- including a giant inside joke that somehow cleared every single bureaucratic step and then cracked the mainstream.

Well... according to the Nintendo folks, Waluigi isn't only a gloriously lazy choice or maybe an inside joke gone massive. They *say* it is dependant upon the Japanese phrase ijiwaru, which means "bad guy."

I don't understand. I sense that we'd have to supply them much more than halfway to buy that.

Toad.

Toad is built to look as a mushroom (or perhaps toadstool) because of his giant mushroom hat. It's a great thing the gaming systems debuted before the whole model knew how to earn penis jokes.

Anyway, in Japan, he's considered Kinopio, which happens to be a mixture of the term for mushroom ("kinoko") as well as the Japanese version of Pinocchio ("pinokio"). Those combine being something along the collections of "A Real Mushroom Boy."

Goomba.

In Japanese, the men are known as kuribo, that translates to "chestnut people." That seems sensible because, ya know, if somebody asked you "what do chestnut individuals are like?" you would probably reach something just about similar to the figures.

When they had been shipped for the American model, the team stuck with the Italian initiative of theirs and also known as them Goombas... based off of the Italian "goombah," that colloquially means something as "my fellow Italian friend." It also sort of evokes the photo of low-level mafia thugs without too many capabilities -- like individuals younger brothers and also cousins who they'd to retain the services of or perhaps mother would yell at them. That also applies to the Mario Bros. goombas.

Birdo.

Birdo has practically nothing to do with this particular initial Japanese name. Generally there, he's considered Kyasarin, which regularly translates to "Catherine."

In the teaching manual for Super Mario Bros. 2, in which Birdo debuted, the character description of his reads: "Birdo believes he is a female and likes to be known as Birdetta."

What I do believe all of this means? Nintendo shockingly chosen to create a character who battles with his gender identity and referred to as him Catherine. In the event it was some time to show up to America, they got feet that are cold so they determined at the very last minute to phone him Birdo, although he's a dinosaur. (And do not provide me the "birds are descended from dinosaurs" pop paleontology line. Not shopping for that connection.) In that way, we would just understand about his gender confusion if we read the mechanical, and the Japanese were fairly certain Americans have been either way too lazy or even illiterate to do it en masse.

Princess Toadstool/Peach.

When we all got introduced on the Princess, she was known as Princess Toadstool. I guess this made perfect sense -- Mario was set in the Mushroom Kingdom, so why wouldn't its monarch be called Princess Toadstool. Them inbreeding bluish bloods are usually naming the children of theirs immediately after the country.

Nobody seems to be certain precisely why they went the guidance, nevertheless. In Japan, she was recognized as Princess Peach from day one. That title didn't debut here until 1993, when Yoshi's Safari became available for Super Nintendo. (By the manner -- have you played Yoshi's Safari? In a bizarre twist it's a first-person shooter, the only person in the entire Mario history. It's as something like a country music superstar creating a weird rock album.)

Bowser.

In Japan, there is no Bowser. He is simply referred to as the King Koopa (or perhaps comparable variations, like Great Demon King Koopa). So just where did Bowser come from?

During the import method, there was a problem that the American masses wouldn't see how the small turtles and big bad fellow could very well definitely be known as Koopa. Thus a marketing staff developed dozens of choices for a name, they adored Bowser the best, and also slapped it on him.

In Japan, he's nevertheless hardly ever called Bowser. Over here, his title is now so ubiquitous that he is even supplanted Sha Na Na's Bowzer as America's a good number of famous Bowser.

Donkey Kong.

This's a far more literal interpretation than you think. "Kong" is based off of King Kong. "Donkey" is a family friendly method of calling him an ass. That is right: His label is an useful variation of "Ass Ape."

Super Mario Bros. is a video game launched for the household Computer and also Nintendo Entertainment System found 1985. It shifted the gameplay far from its single screen arcade predecessor, Mario Bros., along with rather showcased side-scrolling platformer quantities. Although not the original game of the Mario franchise, Super Mario Bros. is really famous, in addition to introduced many sequence staples, from power ups, to classic enemies like Goombas, to the basic premise of rescuing Princess Toadstool from King Koopa. As well as kicking off an entire compilation of Super Mario platformer online games, the untamed success of Super Mario Bros. popularized the genre to be a whole, helped revive the gaming sector once the 1983 footage game crash, and was mainly the cause of the initial good results on the NES, with that it was included a launch title. Until it was finally exceeded by Wii Sports, Super Mario Bros. was the most effective marketing videos game of all time for about three years, with more than forty million copies marketed globally.

#all mario characters

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r-2-c-c-blog · 7 years ago

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Name origins for Super Mario Characters

Nintendo characters make their VR (arcade) debut with new Vive-driven Mario Kart

Bandai Namco revealed a virtual reality version of Mario Kart, Mario Kart Arcade GP VR, that is going to make the debut of its over a VR arcade the company is opening using Tokyo, Japan following month.

The game appears to draw the VR debut of 1 of Nintendo's flagship franchises, though it is crucial to observe it's licensed by Nintendo and also developed by Namco - the same as the non VR predecessor of its, Mario Kart Arcade GP.Not many specifics are still available in English about the game, however, it's listed about the arcade's site as running on HTC Vive headsets and also specially designed racing seats.

Nintendo has so far been publicly reticent around the promise of VR - last calendar year frontman Shigeru Miyamoto told investors that for VR in specific, we are continuing the homework of ours, along with looking into enhancement with a head to the way our present main products are intended to be played for a somewhat lengthy time period of time.

We're considering the possibilities of supplying an adventure which gives value when played for a little while, he continued. And the way to eradicate the issues of long-duration use.

When I found that out I did two things. For starters, I whipped out my message (yes, I ensure that it stays that real/nerdy that I still have an old NES connected in the room) of mine and then made positive I can still match the game at will. (I can. Childhood not wasted.)

Secondly, I started down a rabbit hole of reading through Mario internet sites and Articles and Wikis. In the procedure, I stumbled upon the etymologies of the brands of a few of the major players in the Mario universe. Therefore, in honor of the video game that changed the world, right here they are, presented in handy 11-item describe form.

Mario.

When Mario debuted in the arcade game "Donkey Kong", he was simply called Jumpman. (Which even is the generic brand regarding that Michael Jordan dispersed leg Nike logo. Two of the most celebrated icons ever both have generic versions of themselves known as Jumpman. But simply one has today reached the effort of simply being so effective that he shaved himself a Hitler mustache prior to filming a professional and not one person had the balls to correct him.)

In 1980, as the Nintendo of America crew brought in Jumpman to elevate him into a franchise-leading star (Hayden Christensen style), an individual discovered that he looked just like their Seattle office building's landlord... a fellow known as Mario Segale.

Mario Segale didn't get a dime for being the namesake of essentially the most well known video game character by chance, although he most likely is not absurdly concerned; in 1998 he sold the asphalt company of his for more than $60 million. (Or 600,000 increased lives.)

Luigi.

Luigi has among probably the weakest name origins of most of the mario characters list in the Mario universe (once again displaying precisely why, for life which is real, he would have a greater inferiority complex than Frank Stallone, Abel or even that third Manning brother).

"Luigi" is merely the product of a team of Japanese males trying to imagine an Italian label to enhance "Mario." Why was the Italian brand they went with? When they each moved from Japan to Seattle, the pizza spot nearest to the Nintendo headquarters referred to as Mario & Luigi's. (It has since gone out of business.)

Koopa.

Koopa is a transliterated variation of the Japanese name for the opponent turtles, "Kuppa." Stick with me right here -- kuppa is the Japanese phrase for a Korean dish known as gukbap. Basically it is a cup of soup with rice. From what I will inform it is totally not related to turtles, especially malicious ones.

In an interview, Mario's originator, Shigeru Miyamoto, said he was deciding between 3 different brands due to the race of evil turtles, every one of that were called after Korean foods. (The alternative two were yukhoe and bibimbap.) Which means among two things: (1) Miyamoto adores Korean food and needed to provide it with a tribute or (two) Miyamoto considers Koreans are evil and should be jumped on.

Wario.

I sort of skipped the debut of Wario -- he debuted in 1992, right around when I was hitting the generation where I was too awesome for cartoon y Nintendo games. (Me and my middle school buddies happened to be into Genesis only. I was again on Nintendo within four years.)

Appears his label operates both equally in Japanese and english; I kinda assumed the English manner but didn't know about the Japanese feature. In English, he is an evil, bizarro world mirror image of Mario. The "M" turns to become a "W" as well as Wario is produced. The name likewise functions in Japanese, wherever it's the variety of Mario as well as "warui," which implies "bad."

That's a pretty excellent scenario, since, as I covered extensively in the list 11 Worst Japanese-To-English Translations In Nintendo History, only a few language difference finesses back as well as forth quite efficiently.

Waluigi.

When I first read "Waluigi" I believed it was hilarious. While Wario became an all natural counterbalance to Mario, Waluigi felt so comically shoehorned (just tacking the "wa" prefix before Luigi) -- including a huge inside joke that somehow cleared every single bureaucratic phase and after that cracked the mainstream.

Well... in accordance with the Nintendo individuals, Waluigi isn't only a gloriously lazy decision or an inside joke become massive. They *say* it is based upon the Japanese phrase ijiwaru, which means "bad guy."

I do not understand. I feel like we'd have to cater for them much more than halfway to get that.

Toad.

Toad is designed to look as a mushroom (or maybe toadstool) because of the massive mushroom hat of his. It is a great thing the gaming systems debuted before the whole generation realized how to generate penis jokes.

Anyway, in Japan, he's named Kinopio, which is a combination of the term for mushroom ("kinoko") as well as the Japanese variant of Pinocchio ("pinokio"). Those blend being something along the collections of "A Real Mushroom Boy."

Goomba.

In Japanese, the men are known as kuribo, which results in "chestnut people." That is sensible because, ya know, if somebody requested you "what do chestnut individuals appear to be like?" you would most likely get to food just about similar to these heroes.

Once they had been brought in for the American version, the staff stuck with their Italian initiative and also referred to as them Goombas... primarily based off of the Italian "goombah," that colloquially will mean something as "my fellow Italian friend." It also sort of evokes the photo of low-level mafia criminals without too a lot of skills -- such as people's younger brothers as well as cousins who they'd to retain the services of or maybe mother would yell at them. That also applies to the Mario Bros. goombas.

Birdo.

Birdo has nothing to do with this first Japanese name. Generally there, he's called Kyasarin, that translates to "Catherine."

In the training manual for Super Mario Bros. two, where Birdo debuted, the character explanation of his reads: "Birdo considers he is a girl and additionally would like being named Birdetta."

What I think all this means? Nintendo shockingly decided to generate a character that struggles with the gender identity of his and referred to as him Catherine. In the event it was some time to show up to America, they have feet that are cold so they determined at the very last minute to call him Birdo, though he's a dinosaur. (And don't give me the "birds are descended from dinosaurs" pop paleontology series. Not shopping for that connection.) That way, we'd just know about the gender confusion of his if we look at the mechanical, and the Japanese had been confident Americans had been either way too lazy or illiterate to do it en masse.

Princess Toadstool/Peach.

When we all got introduced on the Princess, she was regarded as Princess Toadstool. I suppose this made perfect sense -- Mario was set in the Mushroom Kingdom, so why wouldn't its monarch be called Princess Toadstool. Them inbreeding blue bloods are always naming the children of theirs after the country.

No person appears to be certain why they went that guidance, nevertheless. In Japan, she was known as Princess Peach from day one. That name didn't debut here until 1993, when Yoshi's Safari came out for Super Nintendo. (By the way -- have you ever played Yoshi's Safari? In a bizarre twist it's a first-person shooter, the only woman in the entire Mario times past. It's like the equivalent of a country music superstar producing a weird rock album.)

Bowser.

In Japan, there's simply no Bowser. He is simply known as the King Koopa (or perhaps comparable variations, including Great Demon King Koopa). And so just where did Bowser come from?

During the import procedure, there was a concern that the American crowd would not see how the small turtles and big bad fellow could certainly be named Koopa. Thus a marketing team developed dozens of options for a title, they loved Bowser the very best, and also slapped it on him.

In Japan, he is nonetheless hardly ever called Bowser. Over here, the name of his is now very ubiquitous that he's actually supplanted Sha Na Na's Bowzer as America's many famous Bowser.

Donkey Kong.

This's a far more literal interpretation than you think. "Kong" is based off King Kong. "Donkey" is a family friendly way of calling him an ass. That's right: The label of his is an useful version of "Ass Ape."

Great Mario Bros. is a video game released for the family Computer and also Nintendo Entertainment System contained 1985. It shifted the gameplay away from the single-screen arcade predecessor of its, Mario Bros., in addition to instead highlighted side scrolling platformer concentrations. Although not the very first game on the Mario franchise, Super Mario Bros. is the most legendary, along with launched many set staples, coming from power ups, to timeless enemies like Goombas, to the standard idea of rescuing Princess Toadstool from King Koopa. Along with kicking above an entire series of Super Mario platformer video games, the untamed results of Super Mario Bros. made popular the genre as an entire, helped revive the gaming sector after the 1983 video game crash, as well as was largely the cause of the first good results of the NES, with which it was included a launch title. Until it was finally exceeded by Wii Sports, Super Mario Bros. was the best marketing videos game of all of time for nearly three years, with more than 40 million duplicates marketed overseas.

#mario characters list

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nihilocrat · 8 years ago

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Mod Support in Unity

I wrote this for Ben Porter’s fun #NotGDC “event” on Twitter. I’m taking a year off from GDC but got ALL JELLY reading THE TWETS about people saying smart things at GDC. If you’re wondering how I have any authority to talk about this subject, look no further than the Sky Rogue Steam Workshop!

Let's get this out of the way: adding mod support to your Unity game is a fucking chore.

In most games, with most engines, to modify game files you need to do the following:

Find the archive(s) containing game assets (this might not even be necessary)

Edit the assets

Replace the pre-existing archive(s), or if the game supports it, tell it to load yours instead of the main ones

This is not really possible in Unity, unfortunately. Why is that?

The tools to do this are scarce; here are ones I've found:

https://7daystodie.com/forums/showthread.php?22675-Unity-Assets-Bundle-Extractor

http://zenhax.com/viewtopic.php?t=36

The assets they extract are highly optimized assets for particular platforms, which are often not easily editable

So in the end, you need to add modding support yourself. Bizarrely, there is nothing on the asset store directly related to doing this for you. I SHOULD PROBABLY DO SOMETHING ABOUT THAT, SHOULDN’T I?

There are currently two dominant ways of adding this support to your game. Like with everything, each has pros and cons.

Roll your own asset management system (load assets directly from disk)

Pros:

It works exactly how you write it

Unless you really make a mess of it, it should be the easiest for modders to use. You might not even have to write documentation!

Cons:

You have to write it all yourself

This means asset importers: mesh importers, texture importers, sound, script, everything

You have to write your own editor, or hope your modders are okay fiddling around with text files

Modders will be restricted by the boundaries you give them. Expanding those boundaries will always require more work on your part.

Use Asset Bundles

Pros:

You don't have to write your own importers!

You don't have to write your own editor!

Cons:

Your modders have to learn how to use Unity; from personal experience many are intimidated by it

You need to either write your own "glue" code or share practically all of your code

Sometimes they just don't work and I still haven’t figured out why

I can count the number of games doing this on one hand. Google will probably not help you when you need it.

ROLLING YOUR OWN

If you want to go this path, you should start doing it the moment you start making your game.

Unity has a few tools for importing assets from disk; they don't really seem intended for this but they work just fine.

Import PNG textures with Texture2D.LoadImage (https://docs.unity3d.com/ScriptReference/Texture2D.LoadImage.html)

Import .ogg audio with WWW.audioclip (https://docs.unity3d.com/ScriptReference/WWW-audioClip.html)

Beyond that, it's not hard to find an .OBJ importer for Unity; there are several to choose from. Some are slow. Some don't seem to work with all .OBJs.

You can use JSON, XML, or YAML for "gameplay" assets; several libraries exist for C#. You will not be able to serialize anything but basic types like int, string, and lists, and might have trouble saving and loading highly nested objects.

With these you can get started with your mod support. To reduce the amount of friction between the mod assets and Unity itself, you should probably make your own parallel GameObject / Component system which will save basic transform data and hierarchies, along with the components on an object and their values. You'll need to lean heavily on C#'s reflection abilities for this. If you really want to go "whole hog", I would advise that you implement your own game assets with this system, not only to let modders make total conversions for the game, but also to constantly test the system and expand it as you need more functionality from it, simultaneously adding features for your modders.

ASSET BUNDLES

You’ll want to download the Asset Bundle Manager from the Asset Store (

https://www.assetstore.unity3d.com/en/#!/content/45836

) before you get started, unfortunately it was released before I started adding my own mod support, and is intended to be used with a newer asset bundle API which I haven’t yet upgraded to, so I can’t give any specific advice or tutorials for it.

You get a LOT of things free following this path because your modders are using Unity itself to make the mods and the bundles they export are supported by Unity out-of-the-box. I’ve found it easier for modders if you distribute your SDK as a Unity project directory and not as a .unitypackage, something that they can open in Unity and get started right away with. The extra complexity of Unity itself means you’ll need to actually write documentation, with screenshots, to make it easier for more people to mod your game.

However, you’ve got to create and distribute an “SDK” for your modders to load in Unity to create these bundles. You've got to share your scripts and potentially the source files of other game assets. I would like to point out that this is probably not as bad as it sounds; I doubt anyone would clone your entire game and sell it but I also don't want to be proven wrong. You can build all of your scripts into a .DLL, but without extra obfuscation, a decompiled C# .DLL is practically the same as the source code, without comments and whitespace.

There's a middle ground, but it makes your support a bit more complicated: Write a bunch of "empty" versions of your game scripts, just the ones which modders need to use to create their assets. By "empty" I mean they lack all of the functions and just have the public variables which get serialized by Unity and appear in the inspector. You'll need to write some glue code to convert the "empty" versions of components into real ones when you load in the bundles; use C#’s reflection to read from one component and write to the other.

If you want to support users writing their own C# scripts, you’ll need to do a little extra work, but thankfully Unity has documented that:

https://docs.unity3d.com/Manual/scriptsinassetbundles.html

However, to actually let modders do things that operate with the scripts built into your game, you’ll need to either include those scripts in your SDK or create an API to do that; no small feat. I don’t have any personal experience doing this yet, but Cities: Skylines has such an API and you may be able to figure out what they’re doing by taking a look at their documentation:

http://www.skylineswiki.com/Modding_API

This is still a topic I’m actively developing things for, and I’ve been talking to other devs the whole time so this isn’t comprehensive at all, but I hope it gives you a good starting point. As a bonus, here’s some reasons why you might want to add modding support at all:

Mods add a lot of value to your game. If you have a heavily system-driven, simulationist, or sandbox game, mods practically create several sub-games for you. I bought the original Half-Life specifically so I could play the Counter-Strike mod (before it was a standalone game); this could become true for your game as well.

Mods grow your community. It gives players a path for becoming heavily invested in the game and add a little bit of themselves to the game. More investment means they talk about the game more, then people get invested in the mods themselves and talk about those. People talking about your game is what makes up your community.

Mods let you add licensed content to your game, by proxy, and not get sued. The Arwing from Star Fox looks pretty fitting in Sky Rogue. So does the Swordfish II from Cowboy Bebop. I couldn’t add either of these myself to the base game, and I’m really glad other people have. It sounds trite, but I’ve heard of players specifically buying the game because of these particular mods.

You can just dip your toe in and make some minor commitments for gains which can mean a lot: Guacamelee lets you customize the player avatar but nothing else. The Long Dark crowdsources its localization by implementing each language as a community-created mod.

Modders will surprise you. They will make things you didn’t know were possible in your game. They will break your design and make stuff that’s cooler than you would have made because you’re in too deep. A bomber that can drop 100 bombs at once is broken as hell if you make it. If a modder makes it, it’s silly and fun and awesome.

#notgdc #modding #Unity3D

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jessiegaskell · 8 years ago

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Asphalt 8 : Airborne Review

Get the Scoop on Asphalt 8 : Airborne Review Before You're Too Late

If you are able to stand anywhere between 1st or 3rd you'll be in a position to earn adequate number of credits that will aid you to really unlock cars and purchase upgrades faster. Yes, you can get credits through in-app purchases. Credits are earned over the course of a race for the respective things you do. It is a whole lot simpler to knockout card before you as opposed to card behind you.

Well, you'll discover all of them in Asphalt 8. Asphalt 8 might be the 8th installment in the set of the well-known Arcade racer by gameloft. It looks great, but most importantly, it plays great. In general Asphalt 8 is an excellent racing game with terrific physics, gameplay, graphics and sound. The routes aren't straight forward. Even with a range of game modes, new cars, and tons of branching paths, you wind up soaking in a great deal of the exact same scenery.

You may not have known they hand out awards. All five stars don't have to get earned in 1 race, but every season's event can only award five stars. You will receive stars for your achievements. It is a series well famous for its high-quality gameplay trough all its prior iterations. You work your way by means of a succession of challenges across various international locations. The soundtrack, nevertheless, is extremely fantastic. There's a good mixture of tight urban and off-road driving with lots of chances to go airborne.

Clumsy drivers want to lookout. If the vehicle you own has a decrease rank then you might just need to carry out a near perfect race as a way to stand an opportunity to win the career event. You are requested to decide on a vehicle. As a way to boost the time prior to your car explodes you can hit different cars and consequently infecting them. Make sure to have a great car before you even consider playing multiplayer.

Most races are restricted to a category of car, but after the very first season, increasingly more of them are restricted to an individual manufacturer or maybe a sole model. Various races will ask you to use cars from a sure classification, meaning you'll have to use various cars for different kinds of races. If you want multiplayer, you can race with as many as eight real opponents.

The Argument About Asphalt 8 : Airborne Review

Just take the timeless powerslide, or the drift since it is called in the game. In many instances, the game feels totally different between both devices. It has come up with beautiful graphics and the gameplay has been revamped completely. The game has car level recommendations and automobile requirements that should be satisfied for specified races. You know, like an actual racing game.

If you prefer to unlock seasons without having to spend any actual money (and you truly don't have) you have to invest wisely, and be certain you grab all 5 stars from every race. Each season includes various events. Season one of the career can be found from the beginning, and is a great way to become accustomed to the controls and the various game types.

Android gaming is quite diverse. The game isn't free to start with, the same as all other Asphalt titles. Finally, it has a unique mode called Infection. It is a marvelous game with amazing graphics.

No balancing, no finesse, only one moment you're not, and the following moment you're. It is a decent means to make certain you're switching things up from time to time. If you can locate the moment.

You've got a geo-social aesthetic. It's something which breaks you down. It simply feels gimmicky instead of realistic.

Life After Asphalt 8 : Airborne Review

The most important screen of the game can be a bit intimidating, and it takes some time to work out the a variety of options. At first, Airborne's graphics are phenomenal. The track layouts are an ideal example.

youtube

Career mode includes eight seasons. The digital controls aren't bad by any means, yet this game aspires to be as great as its console contemporaries, and you'll require hardware controls if you would like a console-style experience. For people who hate motion based controls, there are a few touch based controls that likewise work nicely. In-game, there are plenty of effects. You'll need to work out where you're likely to receive the best results. By and large it's possible to trust you'll land safely, if you don't really messed up the approach. My main complaint is the vehicle damage.

#Asphalt 8 : Airborne Review #mobile games #mobile game hack #android game #android game hack #mobile hack game #online game #online games hack

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turntothree · 8 years ago

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Ry& Reaction: “Share the Joy”

To start things off, I think the on-stage performances were pretty good.

Going in I wasn’t sure if opting out the whimsical silliness and backstage skits of standard Nintendo Directs in favour of a lavish Apple-esque event was a good idea, but Kimishima and company pulled it off.

image source - Nintendo

The lighting was good, the music was catchy and the idea of using finger snaps as stage transitions was a clever way to stay on message with Switch’s gimmick. The presenters were great too, with everyone selling their pitches with clarity and confidence.

... And yes, a little bit of Nintendo’s trademark quirkiness seeped in, too.

image source - Nintendo

Editor’s Note: Switch General Producer Yoshiaki Koizumi really impressed me and proved to be the most charismatic salesman in the bunch. Perhaps he could be groomed as the late, great Satoru Iwata’s replacement.

image source - Nintendo

But the skits and props and lasers are all just showmanship razzmatazz and while folks appreciate those things as lead-in material, what really sells people on gaming products are the video packages. Because there’s nothing quite like a sharply edited trailer to get you hyped for a new game or piece of hardware.

The Switch itself received two hype videos. The first providing an overview on the console as a whole, while the second focused specifically on the Joy-Con controllers.

image source - Nintendo

Video one started out as a nice little recap of how the TV Mode, Handheld Mode, and Table-Top Mode functions work and really hammered down the benefits of taking your game anywhere. As the package rolled on however, Nintendo started to answer some FAQ’s regarding certain elements of the Switch’s hardware like for example: What’s the battery life of the Switch tablet? Will the tablet have a touch-based interface? How many Switches can be linked together?

Answer 1 - As the previous rumours suggested, roughly three to six hours. Nintendo says this is fully depending on the game in play. So something like say Breath of the Wild can run up to three hours, while smaller scale stuff like low-res indies or Virtual Console classics are likely in six-hour territory.

image source - Nintendo

Hot take – It’s kind of hard to say this revelation is disappointing but it still is. It’s running games at 720p and 60fps, so this is pretty reasonable. On the other hand, three hours isn’t much play time for a handheld device. So if you plan on traveling with this thing, bring a book, too.

Answer 2 – Yes. It’s a 6.2’ inch multi-touch pad, similar to the tech used for the Wii U and the Dual Screen handheld lines.

image source - Nintendo

Hot Take – It’s a good design choice, as that interface worked beautifully for those systems and opened up a lot of game design possibilities. I fully expect this new screen to work the same magic for Switch.

Answer 3 – Up to eight Switch tablets can be linked together for local multiplayer.

image source - Nintendo

Hot Take - So ... that’d be 8-16 players depending on the game? That’s going to come in handy for competitive tournaments ... or a big old house party!

Editor’s Note: It was also pointed out online multiplayer can be accessed in all three Switch Modes ... kind of weird that that got mentioned. Most people would think it was given but good news all the same.

Switch video #2 provided a demo of the Joy-Con’s motion sensing technology, because Wii aren’t going to see Ninty let go of that old chestnut any time soon.

image source - Nintendo

Although, perhaps a Wiimote/nunchuck comparison isn’t totally fair. Oh, Joy-Con R&L serve the same purpose but according to Koizumi’s demonstration, these nifty little inventions are more sophisticated and precise than their predecessors. Apparently they allow actions like say swinging Link’s Master Sword or one of Little Mac’s trademark Star Punches to be performed with pin-point accuracy.

Part of what makes this proposed accuracy possible is an IR camera built into the right Joy-Con that can measure the shape, motion, and distance of any object in front of it.

That’s not to say Joy-Con R is the only of its kind to innovate because both the right and left controllers have built-in “HD Rumble”, the Rumble Pack’s next-gen cousin. What this new tech does is add a greater sense of weight and sound to the rumble, making it so the player can really feel the impact of the aforementioned punches and sword clangs.

Editor’s Note: His examples were Rock, Paper, Scissors ... Glass of Water. Mine are better.

Also, the left one has a Share button and the right one has an NFC scanner for Amiibo figures. Oh, and wrist straps are included in box to ensure no wayward Joy-Cons breakthrough the televisions that bind them.

Editor’s Note: Don’t you dare laugh at that last part. The threat is real.

image source - Nintendo

Thoughts on video #2:

So, on top of being two-thirds of the Switch Grip (TV Mode controller), two-thirds of the Switch Handheld, as well as P1 and P2 controllers (Tablet Mode), the Joy-Cons are also Wiimote/nunchuck 2.0 HD? Quite the little technical marvels, wouldn’t you say?

Now, I haven’t been one to consistently sing the praises of motion controls, not that I don’t think stuff like Wii Sports, Wii Fit or Just Dance can be fun ... in fact, I’ve had plenty of fun with those games.

image source - Nintendo

That said, the precision of Wii Motion (even with Plus) wasn’t always up to snuff and Nintendo would often insert those slightly finicky mechanics into more traditional (or classic style) games and let’s just say (to put it gently) the results varied.

image source - Nintendo

Still, motion control technology has a lot of potential and overall I’m glad Nintendo experimented with it. If what Koizumi said is true, we would be looking at the most immersive gameplay set-up around ... that doesn’t involve a VR headset. I don’t know if I fully buy that but I’d be willing to give his bold “new world of entertainment” a fair shake ... just as long as it doesn’t force me out of my comfort zone.

image source - Nintendo

Editor’s Note: At the very least it could prove to provide plenty of fun. I mean, who doesn’t like to move around and get a little silly with friends, right?

My one suggestion would be to build games specifically around those mechanics, as opposed to cramming said mechanics into everything. Considering this setup doesn’t work in Handheld Mode, I don’t think that’s much cause for concern.

The Share button ... OK; Nintendo’s more than a couple years late to the social networking party, which is sad cause it could have lead the charge back in 2012 ... but it didn’t. Although, there’s something to be said about better being late than never and this function will be very useful for fans to share their experiences ... just a shame the video portion will be a few months late.

image source - Nintendo

Editor’s Note: A logical step two would be to sign a partnership deal with Twitch TV. Step three would be to stop putting an ad revenue cap on Youtube uploads. If you want creative folks to make and share videos based on your IPs, you got to build that bridge.

image source - Nintendo

The Amiibo scanner is a no brainer and building it into the Joy-Cons only makes sense since it allows figures to be usable in all three Switch forms.

Oh, and (again) the wrist straps are great because they prevent property damage.

Ooooo! Now we can get to the best part of this little blog, The Game Trailer Lightning Round!

image source - Nintendo

The screen (whether it be TV or tablet) is almost a non-factor in 1-2-Switch, a weird (oh so very weird) mini-game collection/Joy-Con motion sensor showcase.

Whether it’s engaging in a quick draw showdown, a copy cat dance-off, cow milking ... or fictitious sandwich eating, 1-2-Switch is all about gaining the upper hand on your opponent through awareness of audio cues and slight changes in HD Rumble.

Pro-Tip: Keeping a watchful eye on your opponent and their physical tells is also a keen strategy.

I honestly didn’t know what to make of 1-2-Switch. Between the goofy gestures and one-on-one contact, this one has the potential to be a game night regular. But the clips in the trailer were a bit too strange to get a good read on whether or not I’d personally enjoy it overall. (I say overall because I was sold on that Quick Draw game from the moment it shot up)

Release Date – March 3, 2017

Editor’s Note: This would make for a perfect pack-in title.

image source - Nintendo

Next up is Arms: a figurative (and literal) one-two punch of physicality and traditional gameplay.

Likely inspired by the Nintendo Ultra Hand, Arms is a 3D fighting game that’s a little bit Wii Sports Boxing and a little bit Team Fortress 2.

Players can pick from a variety of colourful heroes, each with their own unique abilities and power-ups ... with the added twist that their arms are spring-loaded extendo-gloves.

Basically the goal of the game is too grab, throw and punch your opponent from half-way across the arena until you can deliver a super move and knock ‘em out; as you bob, weave, jump and dodge. And it’s all done through a combination of wrist-flicks, timed button presses and actual punching.

I had no idea whether or not the game would work as intended but it was so incredibly silly that it tickled punched me in all the right places.

Release Date – Spring 2017

image source - Nintendo

Swimming in from Inkopolis was Splatoon 2! (A proper sequel ... good swerve)

Good to know the kids and squids are back to squirt up some more trouble in an all-new set of turf wars filled with new characters, weapons, maps and even a few new mechanics like a dodge roll and rocket blast.

The original was one of the few games on Wii U to bring millions of players together through online play, so it’s little to wonder why The Big N decided to let the squids (and kids) Switch it up for a whole new round of Splat Fests.

Yup, happy to see Nintendo continue its efforts to support fresh IP ... and even happier to know Splat Fest (along with a variety of free DLC) is making a comeback, too.

Release Date – Summer 2017

image source - Nintendo

Then suddenly, after years of build-up, we finally caught a good glimpse of [insert drum roll] Super Mario Odyssey!

Oh man, oh man! I think it’s safe to say many of us have waited years for a new 3D open-world game to take the red-clad plumber far beyond the samey terrains of The Mushroom Kingdom and when it finally came, I (for one) wasn’t disappointed.

Mario jumping and swooshing around the busy city streets of New York Donk City like Spider-Man; exploring the deepest darkest forests of parts unknown; cooking up trouble in a crystallized food world; and riding the frickin’ sphinx from Super Mario Land(?), were awesome sights to behold!

Wait a second ... he can break dance? OK, I’m giving it six, no, seven stars!

image sources - Nintendo and Capcom Fighters

... Also the new hat throw and hat jump mechanics are pretty neat.

This trailer blew me away then knocked my socks off! It’s a beautiful looking game that boasts the Switch’s HD vigour in full effect and a great mix of cool new stuff and the classic stuff that made us all fans in the first place.

So yeah, good first impression. Can’t wait to see more during E3.

Release Date – Holiday Season 2017

Following that wonderful display was an onslaught of upcoming RPGs:

image sources - Monolith Software, Koei Tecmo, Square Enix, Nintendo, Atlus and Bethesda

Xenoblade 2 – A proper sequel to the cult classic brought stateside by popular demand.

Dragon Quest Heroes 1&2 – After further confirmation of Dragon Quest X and XI Switch ports, it was revealed Square Enix’s classic series’ recent crossovers with Koei Tecmo’s popular hack-and-slash Dynasty Warriors franchise would also “make the Switch”.

Fire Emblem Warriors – Speaking of Dynasty Warriors, following its recent success crossing over with Nintendo’s Legend of Zelda series, the two dev teams are hoping to make lightning strike twice but this time with Fire Emblem characters. No footage was shown aside from a shield, a hand, and a sword.

Shin Megami Tensei 25th Anniversary HD Project – A new entry in Atlus’ (oc)cult classic franchise “makes the Switch” with many of its fan favourite monsters in line. It’s probably the fifth game in its mainline ... probably.

Project Octopath Traveler – 2D pixels and 3D backdrops collide in this little beauty from Square Enix.

Skyrim – At long last, Bethesda has joined forces with Nintendo and together they will bring at least one of the best western made RPGs to the Switch, and that game is the legendary Skyrim! Not only that, but the game looks great (maybe not the best it’s ever looked but still great) and having it on a handheld is sure to make many Elder Scrolls fans shout H-Ur-Rah!

RPGs have always had a prosperous home on Nintendo consoles (excluding the N64) and it’s nice to see such a great and varied selection settle on Switch. It’s just unfortunate (for this blog at least) that aside from the ports, we really don’t know that much about any of them other than they’ll all be out this year.

youtube

video source - Nintendo on Youtube

Later on in the evening, fans watching at home were treated to the typical end of show sizzle reel, featuring a rundown of every game shown up to that point, as well as a few many that were left out ... many being 22 in this case.

And here they are ... *Ahem*:

I am Setsuna

Dragon Ball Xenoverse 2

Rayman Legends

Snipperclips

Mario Kart

Steep

Sonic 2017

Has Been Heroes

Skylanders: Imaginators

Minecraft

Minecraft: Story Mode

LEGO City Undercover

Redout

Farming Simulator

Disgaea 5

Just Dance 2017

Puyo Puyo Tetris

Super Bomberman

Nobunaga’s Ambition

Ultra Street Fighter II: The Final Challengers

Rime

NBA 2K18

Editor’s Note: *GASP! PANT! PANT! GASP!* I think that’s all of them.

More on this list later but first ... the grand finale.

After much teasing and commercial plugging, Nintendo’s biggest wigs closed out the show with a final bow and fade to black, very classy.

PSYCHE!

... Yeah, that stuff happened but to serve as a lead in for one last trailer for The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild!

image source - Nintendo

Wow, what a trailer! It had everything: drama, tragedy and of course some sweet gameplay action, all without giving too much away. It was the perfect piece of mass media marketing.

And that March 3, 2017 launch date reveal? Truly a “legendary” stinger to close such an historic night.

Some loose notes from the show:

image source - Nintendo

An EA rep appeared on stage to announce a new kind of FIFA game is coming to Switch this fall. Probably the best possible sports game get for the system given FIFA’s world-wide reach.

image source - Nintendo

Suda 51 made the scene with the announcement of a brand-new game starring No More Heroes loser-in-chief leading man Travis Touchdown. Apparently, it takes inspiration from pro-wrestling and that’s all he could share ... so maybe it’s No More Heroes 3 or maybe it isn’t. Also, it’s only in the early development stages, so it’s not coming out anytime soon unfortunately.

Editor’s Note: No More Heroes 1 & 2 were hallmark titles on the original Wii, making Nintendo (and publisher Ubisoft) a lot of money, while also transforming Suda from a weird niche auteur into an indie dev superstar. Welcome home, Suda-San.

And at the start of the show, Nintendo president Tatsumi Kimishima addressed the crowd and viewers at home with five fascinating factoids.

First & Second: A fair share of Nintendo’s online services will revolve around a mobile app and when I say fair share, I should really say most, since the app supported features include match making, lobbies and voice chat. Sadly, the app won’t be ready in time for Switch’s launch but basic online play and the eShop will be up and running from Day One.

image source - Nintendo

Speaking of Switch’s online play, Nintendo will take the Xbox Gold and PlayStation Plus route with some sort of pay-to-use structure ... the details of which weren’t ironed out during the show.

Hot takes – I’m of two minds on this whole app business. Match making and voice chats through an app is an interesting concept and with DeNA (a mobile company) behind it, it could be taken in several creative directions. That and it kind of makes sense since Switch is two-thirds a mobile console.

On the other hand, users’ best keep a watchful eye on their phone bill ... or stay put in a wi-fi zone.

image source - 20th Century Fox (made with Frinkiac)

Editor’s Note: Fingers crossed this isn’t a data muncher.

image source - 20th Century Fox (made with Frinkiac)

*Sigh* I guess it had to happen eventually and I understand the logic of charging for online play (servers and whatnot). Still ... maaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaan. Free online play was a nice competitive edge Nintendo had over the competition (and not having to pay an extra $60-80 a year was a nice treat for customers) and now it’s gone. Let’s just hope the price is reasonable and it has some perks aside from basic services.

Editor’s Note: Also, credit where it’s due, Nintendo will grant users free access for the first few months, as DeNA works out the kinks. Props to The Big N for doing something it (in all honesty) didn’t have to do.

Third: Starting with Switch, Region Locking is donzo on Nintendo!

image source - Nintendo

Editor’s Note: He put it more eloquently but I wanted to rhyme and it’s my blog, so there!

Hot take – This is good news for developers who make niche games that don’t typically get localized for foreign markets. It’s good news for international fans who can ship and play said games without having to also ship region specific hardware (or resort to piracy). And it’s also good PR for Nintendo, so it’s good news for everyone. Nice play, Big N.

image source - Nintendo

Fourth & Fifth: Mark the date, Nintendo fans. Planet Earth will “Make the Switch” on March 3, 2017! Two weeks prior to the date that had been tossed around by the press ... and it will be priced at $299.99 in North America.

Hot takes – March 3 is a pretty good launch date. Just before spring break season and it’s also when some lucky folks have a bit of extra cash on hand. So a nice portion of Nintendo’s base is bound have some time and money spend on Switch.

That North American price point seemed so bold to me. In fact, I couldn’t believe it when I heard it and had to rewind the video feed twice. But Kimishima said clear as day the words, “$299.99” and “North America”, as in a universal price point across the continent? It seemed so.

To put that into perspective for my fellow Canucks, Switches sold in Canada would be roughly $75 (USD) cheaper when the (usually terrible for us) exchange rate is taken into account. “Truly a gutsy and most appreciated move”, I thought. “Nintendo must really want to win the Canadian market share.”

Editor’s Note: I was so young, so naive. Like a little koopaling.

If I were to give a brief overview of the show, I’d say it wasn’t without a select few weaker moments but the showmanship was good and between the potential in the hardware’s gimmick and some sweet looking games, I closed out of the window feeling mighty enthusiastic about the Switch.

...

Editor’s Note: I realize this is a tad late (on account of multiple re-writes ... each longer and more thesis-y than the last) and for that I’m sorry. To make amends, here are some reactions to Switch stuff that popped up in the aftermath.

In the mere minutes that followed the Switch presentation, Nintendo and a handful of third-party partners continued to dish on the multifaceted dream machine and it wasn’t all good news.

For starters, it turns out Kimishima forgot to put a USD label next to that price tag. ... I should have known it was too good to be true.

So what’s the true Canadian price? $400 CAD...

And with that, my optimism took a good bonk to the head.

image source - Nintendo

Editor’s Note: Total time spent in denial – 75 Minutes

Dang dude, it’s almost as if Nintendo doesn’t want to compete here in The Great White North.

I get Nintendo of Japan doesn’t want to lose money on the exchange rate and I’m sure Nintendo of America would rather not see its customers travel north of the border for bargain Switches, but really? $400 for a Switch is craz ... ludacr ... less than ideal.

An Xbox One or standard PS4 in Canada can run between $380 & $350 depending on where you shop and the particular bundle. Sony and Microsoft have chosen to take a slight hit on the exchange but in turn, they’ve also kept their consoles within an enticing price range. This is important because a lame loony means consumers have fewer of those loonies to spend on luxuries.

image source - PlayStation Blog

image source - EB Games

Also notice how I said “bundles”. Yeah, PlayStations and Xbox One S’ come with games and not just any games but major blockbusters like Uncharted 4 and Gears of War 4; or Battlefield 1 and Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare. Yes, customers pay more in CAD than their friends down south would pay in USD but they can still feel like they’ve gotten their money’s worth. Switch has no such pack-in. Not even 1-2-Switch, which might as well be classified as a tech demo.

Editor’s Note: Nintendo said a pack-in game won’t be included in order to keep the price at $300 USD.

Then there’s the memory issue. Ordinary PS4′s and standard Xbone S’ have 500GB of storage built in. What does Switch got? A 32GB Micro SD card. ... Breath of the Wild on its own is a 13GB download.

Editor’s Note: Additional Micro SDs of up to 256GBs can be swapped in but could be another pricey purchase, especially if you choose one with Nintendo branding.

Not to mention the other two options also have superior hardware and some slightly spiffier graphics.

And it’s not just the console that’s steeply priced. Get a load of this:

image source - EB Games

Yikes. $90 bucks for the least gimmicked controller? $100 bucks for an extra pair of Joy-Cons? Yes, there’s fancy tech installed into the JC’s and yes, name-brand controllers are pricey across the board but at least the other players on said board have affordable third-party alternatives in stock.

Editor’s Note: To Nintendo’s credit, it did commission HORI to make a cheaper ($39.99 CAD) wired controller ... but it can’t be used for travel play, which is Switch’s main selling point.

Well, at least game prices synch up with the competition ... even if $65 for 1-2-Switch, $70 for Bomberman and $55 for The Binding of Isaac is a bit much.

Oh and speaking of games, a few more Switch titles have been announced since the presentation.

image sources - SEGA, Nicalis, Arc System Works and Bandai Namco

Sonic Mania (YES!), BlazBlue (YES!), The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth (YES!), the next Tales game (neat), and New Frontier Days: Founding Pioneers (woo?) were all announced just minutes after the keynote.

Another game related revelation of the (late) evening was that the new Mario Kart game is in fact a port of Mario Kart 8, as previously rumoured.

image source - Nintendo

Mario Kart 8: Deluxe features 10 new characters (including Dry Bones, King Boo and the Inklings from Splatoon), a second item slot (as well as some new to MK8 items such as the Super Leaf) and (by popular demand) a return to the classic Battle Mode. Just a shame the Inkoplois park is the only new track.

MK8D will be a good pick-up for those who didn’t pick-up a Wii U (which is A LOT of people) and perhaps OG MK8 players will pick it up, too because of the new content.

In the month since ...

image source - Yacht Club Games, Nicalis, Tomorrow Corporation and Warner Bros.

Yacht Club Games confirmed the Treasure Trove edition of Shovel Knight will dig into the Switch. Indie publishers Nicalis and Tomorrow Corporation have confirmed choice selections from their libraries. Warner Bros. will continue to build its relationship with Nintendo through a Switch version of LEGO Worlds.

Ah yeah, and Nintendo hosted a Fire Emblem themed Direct on January 18 in which a proper (but yet to be named) Fire Emblem title was announced for a 2018 release on Switch.

image source - Nintendo

We also got to see Chrom slash a bunch of dudes in a slightly extended Fire Emblem Warriors trailer.

image sources - Nintendo and Koei Tecmo

Wait ... I almost forgot. When Game Spot’s Chris Pererira caught up with Nintendo of America President Reggie Fils-Amie at the January 13 hands-on event at Nintendo World in NYC, Pererira attempted to inquire about two particularly popular (and currently MIA) franchises. I don’t think I need to you tell what those franchises were ... (they were Metroid and Mother) *Cough*. Anyway, Reggie cut him off guard and asked the question himself, at which he promptly answered in a rather interesting manner.

image source - Nintendo

"Oh, so earlier today I got asked about Mother 3; maybe you can ask me about Metroid. Look, again, I am proud as an executive with Nintendo to say that we look at all of the boards and all of the comments and we really have a good understanding of what our consumers want. And believe me, we take that to heart as we work to create content.

"So I have nothing to announce--here. But we are aware that there are some key IP that consumers just can't wait for the next true installment in that franchise's legacy. Suffice it to say, we're aware of it, and talk to me in a year and let's look back and see what's happened." - Reggie Fils-Amie to Game Spot (January 13, 2017)

As Pererira noted in his article, these comments do not guarantee either a new and proper entry in the Metroid franchise or the long-awaited (and official) English language release of Mother 3. However, they do offer up a nice little bit of hope that maybe, just maybe, those deeply wanted announcements are incoming ... maybe at E3? ... Maybe?

image source - @Nintendeal on Twitter

Aside from all that, Nintendeal made this nifty little (albeit incomplete) 2017 release schedule, with the added promise that between Nintendo and its third-party partners, 100 games are currently in development for Switch.

That’s all well and good but ... is it really enough?

image source - 20th Century Fox (made with Frinkiac)

Editor’s Note: *Sigh* I’m starting to come off as an entitled snot, aren’t I?

Look, 100 games is a great release target for a console’s first year, I’m not debating that. And I certainly wouldn’t imply it’s a weak collection from what we’ve seen thus far.

Between the point-and-click adventures, world-builders, platformers, racers, puzzlers, party games, fighting games and the wealth of RPGs, Switch will have plenty of good stuff to offer all ages and tastes.

However, most of what’s listed is ports of games released several months or years ago on PS4 and Xbox One. Now that I think of it, there’s also an alarming lack of star power outside of Nintendo’s development bubble.

image sources - Blizzard, Ubisoft, EA, Rockstar Games, Bethesda, Square Enix, Capcom, NetherRealm Studios, BioWare and Nintendo

Sure, Switch has most of the world’s leading development and publishing houses pledging support but where are those studios’ heaviest hitters? Have Overwatch and For Honor enlisted? Will Injustice 2 and MvC Infinite bring the fight to Switch? Red Dead 2 and GTA are MIA? Did Final Fantasy XV & Kingdom Hearts 3 not belong in that RPG package? I could go on with a longer list of missing major third-party titles that have or will make fat stacks on and for other platforms, but I’ll leave it at that. ... Oh, and I don’t recall seeing a Switch logo in the recent Avengers teaser.

Editor’s Note: And aren’t there sports other than Basketball and Soccer?

Perhaps these games will be revealed down the line during E3 or even in one of the few Directs Nintendo is bound to host between now and then. Or maybe they won’t arrive at all.

image source - EA

Respawn’s Mohammad Alavi recently scoffed at the idea of Titanfall 2 landing on Switch, stating the console’s hardware was “under-powered”. There are also rumours Switch’s crack at the FIFA franchise will be based on past PS3 and Xbox 360 versions.

Editor’s Note: Yikes.

Basically, despite its Maxwell chip suggesting it could handle producing games visually on par with basic PS4 and Xbone titles, there might be some U-esque hardware flaw that prevents ports of let’s call them “busier” games from being viable options.

Editor’s Note: Potentially devastating, if true.

Although, another likely explanation could be these studios are playing the waiting game to see if Nintendo moves enough Switches to make the effort of porting that stuff worthwhile. As much flack as some of Nintendo’s hardcore fans tend to give them for Wii U’s “failure”, these companies got burned, too; losing good money on their few investments.

image source - Bioware, Ubisoft and Warner Bros.

Long story short, Switch’s initial line-up is fairly solid with some good (and great) stuff from third-parties and Nintendo itself. However, the third-party portion has some major absences for one reason or ... multiple others.

I wouldn’t normally wish to speculate off the cuff but (granting Switch is successful), I think these publishers will port over as many of their hallmark games as they can (IE as many of them that are compatible with Switch’s hardware). I suppose any gaps could be filled with original content they would’ve made for the 3DS. (This is likely the fate of Level-5’s Yo-kai Watch series, for example)

image source - Level-5

PS: One more thing that’s setting off some red flags is the fact only a handful of games has a release date set in stone. I hope we don’t see any dry spells like with the Wii U’s early days ... and middle days ... and later days.

Boy, this sure is getting long in the tooth (again) but before I end this, I want to make sure I cover the growth of Nintendo’s online services.

In the moments following Switch’s grand showing, Nintendo released this adorable little gem on Youtube:

youtube

video source - Nintendo on Youtube

To summarize, Big Bow protects Little Bow from the more intimidating aspects of online play, as well as shielding him from inappropriate content, all while tapping contently through a simple mobile app. This app also gave the senior koopa the power to control junior’s playtime and to set a play schedule, all while learning everything there is to know about his son’s favourite games.

I’m all for anything that gives parent’s the power to monitor what their kids are playing and add any restrictions they deem suitable for their child. I also think Nintendo should be commended for encouraging parents to learn more about their child’s interests and to play with them. I like that a lot.

Having it all controlled through an app is a great idea, too. After all, mom & dad can’t be home 24/7, so having an ace up their sleeve for some extra piece of mind is a lovely courtesy.

Editor’s Note: I hope mom & dad have good coverage.

image source - 20th Century Fox (made with Frinkiac)

Another key online selling point Nintendo immediately put forward was its counterpoint to PS Plus Rewards and Games With Gold.

Subscribers to Nintendo’s online service will get one free NES or SNES classic each month. OK, that doesn’t quite measure up to the competition considering they hand out multiple free and current (or currentish) games each month, but a free game is a free game.

Wait, let me just read this fine print before moving on...

image source - Nintendo

It expires after a month? You mean to tell me Nintendo can’t afford to give away decades-old roms no bigger than a couple songs on iTunes? Not to mention the library of NES and SNES games is so massive; The Big N couldn’t possibly come close to giving them all away anyway. Come on, man.

Needless to say, that news irked me a bit when I first read it. However, I’d be lying if I said I didn’t appreciate the member discounts continuing on into the Switch’s life-span or thought online play for SNES games wasn’t so darn cool.

You know what else is cool? A region free online store!

image source - Koei Tecmo

On January 19 it was uncovered that much like Switch discs, digital copies have also been unshackled! But ... there’s a bit of catch. That catch being region specific sections of the eShop, as well as region specific games, can only be accessed with user IDs tagged to those regions. Luckily, up to eight user profiles can be attached to a Switch console and those profiles can be tied to any region of the user’s choosing. So, say if a primarily English speaking player wants to buy and play a Japanese game but doesn’t want to go through the expensive process of importing a physical copy, all they have to do is create and log into a Japanese profile on their Switch. Easy peasy, Wario queasy.

Getting back to the NYC show, Youtube personality ProJared caught up with Reggie for a rather Switched up interview.

image source - ProJared on Youtube

At one point in the discussion, Jared inquired about the possibility of Virtual Console purchases becoming cross-platform tie-ins. Reggie offered this promising reply:

“We’ve heard this comment. We’ve heard it many times. Obviously the first step for us was getting a unified Nintendo account that goes back and ties back not only existing systems but will tie back to the Nintendo Switch and mobile gaming. The details of exactly how the Virtual Console will work, we’re holding back a little bit, so we can share the full concept at a later date but we heard the comment and we’re working on it.” - Reggie Fils-Amie to ProJared (January 13, 2017)

Not much to say here other than it’s about time. You buy a game once, you shouldn’t have to buy it again or pay a fee just to transfer it over to another system. Good to see Nintendo has finally come to understand this.

I also can’t forget February 1, when Japanese financial paper Nikkei uncovered Nintendo’s plan to charge between 2,000 and 3,000 yen per year for the online service. (This translates to $17 and $26 USD ... or roughly $22 and $34 CAD).

image source - Nintendo

Needless to say, that’s great! If Nintendo has to charge for online play, at least it’s reasonably priced ... more so than PlayStation Network and Xbox Live which charge (at least) twice as much.

Suddenly the whole “month-long free VC game rental” thing doesn’t seem so bad anymore.

Editor’s Note: Switch Online sure has some nice positives ... *Sigh* I’m going to miss Miiverse. I know, it’s getting scrapped because Nintendo can’t provide enough moderation to make it a family friendly environment but still :( .

image source - Pure Nintendo (via Miiverse.net)

Editor’s Note [part deux]: Nah, I don’t want to end the discussion like that. Hmm ... oh, those bothersome Friend Codes are gone! I don’t care to remember all those extra numbers.

image source - 20th Century Fox (made with Frinkiac)

Update - Scratch that, they’re back. Groooooooooooan!

Hold it! ... Is there anything else about Switch I should note before reaching the conclusion? Well, I saw the Switch ad that played during the Super Bowl.

image source - Nintendo

It was alright. More or less the same sort of ad used to reveal Switch last October; folks out enjoying their games anywhere and everywhere to the tune of a snappy song about beating to the tune of your own drum, expect this time the entire family got into it, as opposed to just the hip millennials. The message of the ad is simple: Switch can be enjoyed anywhere and everywhere by anyone and everyone.

Editor’s Note: Wait a second ... “First Thing” – TV Mode; “Second Thing” – Tabletop Mode; “Last Thing” – Handheld Mode. Oh my, that’s some clever use of song lyrics.

I guess I could also make a brief mention of the Treehouse livestream. While it didn’t reveal any additional games, it did shine a nice spotlight on the games that made their debut the night before ... also Zelda.

image source - Nintendo

All of the Treehouse segments have been archived to Youtube but I’d like to list off my favourites:

Arms – I didn’t expect this game to look so cool in motion but it did. The button presses, wrist-flicks and RL punches flowed into each other perfectly. Not to mention the game itself seems like a nice light-hearted bit of fun.

Super Bomberman R – I don’t know what’s more shocking, the fact Konami brought Bomberman back, or that his return didn’t blow up in a pachinko machine.

Snipperclips – An adorable paper craft puzzler that took me by surprise.

Ultra Street Fighter II: The Final Challengers – A new spin(kick) on a timeless classic.

Super Mario Odyssey – Nothing new here but I loved Miyamoto’s history lesson concerning Super Mario’s 64 and Sunshine and the influence their design had over this grand new adventure.

1,2-Switch – The Treehouse gang had some fun messing around with a few mini-games and it was fun to watch. That said, I’m still not sure if I’m entirely sold on it just yet. Still, I’d love to try out a few samples.

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild – I really enjoyed the quick look at the improvements made to the horseback riding mechanics and the new stable system. The real-time weather was quite something as well.

Moment of truth time is finally here; the moment to render that verdict I P-Winged my way out of last time. And now that there’s virtually no escape, boy, I have to make a call.

OK...I have to give Nintendo credit, the Switch’s introduction into the public eye has been a rousing success these past few months...for the most part.

The hardware and marquee games both left a major impression, and (unlike Wii U) Switch’s ad campaign has been firmly on point. Based on the tens of millions of Youtube views alone, there’s a level of excitement for this thing that hasn’t been felt for a Nintendo product in a good-long time. I’m talking Wii and NES level excitement. Its appeal has reached far beyond gamers and hardcore Nintendo fans; the Switch is now part of the wider pop culture consciousness. The mainstream market is very much interested in “making the Switch”.

image source - Nintendo

Editor’s Note: Pre-orders have sold out world-wide and some shops have even had to cancel pre-orders because their pre-order stock couldn’t meet the pre-order demand and that is after Nintendo increased production to get more Switches on shelves...this is going to be a hot item. (*sigh* Oh Nintendo, Why do you under stock things?)

Will this mainstream appeal last? That’s a whole other story.

Sure, it’s currently selling out like crazy and folks are desperately clamouring to get one but a lot of fads started out that way and died down eventually and there are a few ways Switch could meet that same fate.

Like say, if the third-parties ultimately choose to abandon porting their big blockbusters to Switch, much like they did with the Wii U. Or if Nintendo were to disband its current united front and build another handheld to succeed the 3DS, giving big publishers that want to work with Nintendo (and even Nintendo’s own teams) another option, which was another thing that hurt Wii U.

There’s also the matter of Nintendo’s hardware and accessory pricing.

Editor’s Note: “Oh look at this big baby crying about those Canadian price points, again.” First: it’s my blog and I’ll cry if I want to. Second: yes, the prices are too darn high! Third: those US prices aren’t exactly bargains either. The US controller prices are gouges, too and Americans can buy those same PS4 and Xbox One bundles I mentioned earlier for the USD price of a Switch! Is the portability gimmick enough to cover the lack of a pack-in game, lack of decent hardware storage or lack of guaranteed full-fledged third-party support?!

*Cough* The Big N might also shoot its own Big old Foot and under stock Switch to the point customers just give up and choose to spend their money on other things. ... I’m looking directly at you, NES Classic Edition!

Or maybe, Switch is destined to fade away into fad zone obscurity. Like the SEGA CD/32X; the PlayStation Vita; and (to name it again) Nintendo’s own Wii U. It’d be unfortunate and it could happen for any number of reasons but to put it simply, sometimes things just don’t work out.

image credit - SEGA, Sony and Nintendo

I certainly see Koizumi’s angle of a bold “new world of entertainment” and its potential is bright but the more I think about, the clearer I can see a few possibilities for failure.

In the end, the only advice I could give to anyone who is curious about “Switching over” but isn’t entirely sure about it, would be to wait it out a bit...although in all honesty, they probably don’t have a choice but to wait at this point anyway.

How long of a wait am I talking here? I’d say Christmas (because there will likely be at least one good bundle and a much wider array of games to choose from) or next year (because a slight price drop is probably going to happen in year two). Not to mention waiting it out for 8-12 months would give you plenty of time to get a read on Switch’s future and determine whether or not it’s a good long-term investment.

Editor’s Note: If you’re desire to “Switch sides” relies on “Breathing in the Wild”, the latest incarnation of Zelda is also saveable on Wii U...yeah, it’s essentially U’s last rites.

Whelp, that does it. I hope you enjoyed this exceedingly long look at the Nintendo Switch’s pre-release hype and I thank you so very much for sticking with me.

Also, if I still have your attention, and if you do dig my work, feel to share, like, comment, re-blog, or whatever. ... A follow would be great as well, since it’s a lovely indicator that people are reading. *Cough* Ah...bye for now!

Don’t touch that dial...

Research sources – Nintendo, Game Informer, GameXplain, IGN, Game Spot, Game Rant, Siliconera, IGN(again), Game Spot (again), ProJared, the BBC , Digital Trends, Game Rant (again), The Verge, Forbes and VG247

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terribleco · 5 years ago

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WAIT A MINUTE...

… EA ANNOUNCED A NEW SKATE GAME IS IN DEVELOPMENT?

During the EA Play 2020 Livestream last week, Skate franchise Creative Director Chris “Cuz” Parry and Game Director Deran Chung popped up to reveal that, yes, a new game in the Skate franchise is in the works. As mentioned previously on this blog, I have said that Skate3 is, in my professional opinion, the best skateboarding game of all time, and only something like Skate 4 could top it. And here we are.

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Yes, another blog post about video games. I'm a game developer, I'm allowed to talk shop here, OK? Some people prefer Tony Hawk games, with their massive combos and grinding power lines (and to be honest I am stoked to play that remaster in September), whilst others prefer the hardcore realism of Session and SkaterXL. I find Session still has a very long way to go, and some of the design decisions in the game are at odds with what I look for in a skateboarding game.

I am yet to play the newer updates for SkaterXL, but it looks like it has edged past Session in getting some decent transition skating in there. Both, however, feel overly complicated to me, striving for that real simulation approach. If I'm being honest, the last thing I want to do when playing a skateboarding game is remind myself how difficult skating in real life is. I know how satisfying it is to try a trick for half an hour and finally land it. I don't need that in a game, I just want to blast some realistic airs. Skateboarding, and gaming, are massive though, and there is room for THPS, Session, SkaterXL and Skate to all exist.

I continue to play Skate3 a lot - the controls make the most sense to me and there is just enough difficulty in trying to land something complicated. You can battle with tricks in Skate, but the game isn't such a slave to simulating skateboarding that it's frustrating. It straddles the line between simulation and arcade perfectly. The closest thing I could liken it to would be something like Forza Horizon - a racing game based in reality, which amplifies the fun aspects of driving to make it accessible and never forgets it’s a video game. But, I would say those games are fun, because (at the expense of showing off) I worked on them.

If Skate 4 (or whatever it ends up being called) aims to continue this tradition, and retain the feel and tone of the first 3, I am totally in. People seem to think the whole #skate4 thing is a meme, but it really isn't. This is a calculated, smart move by EA. With competing skateboarding games coming out, skateboarding on the verge of entry into the Olympics, core brands still more popular than ever amongst young people: There is no better time to make a skateboarding game. The team behind the originals have “brought the band back together” too, which instils confidence that this will carry a lot of the core principles we love about Skate, and not be in the hands of a completely different team with no understanding of what made Skate good (e.g. the THPS5 situation).

Some people I know are skeptical - Why would EA choose now of all times to bring Skate back? Is it only because of the popularity of Session, or SkaterXL, or the return of THPS? Video games are, first and foremost, a business, and it is totally EA’s decision to develop whatever game they think is going to make them money. If Skateboarding games in 2020 are deemed profitable for them, and they want to add another game to the now expansive list of new titles featuring skateboarding, I say that’s completely fine. We had a drought of 10 years without a decent skateboarding game. I’m not saying you have to like whatever game is produced, but the arrival of a new Skate is likely to not impede on the success of it’s rivals. As has already been proven, these games have healthy, growing communities.

As mentioned earlier, there is room for all of these games to exist, and quite frankly, I have missed having the options on the table. Not since the PS1 have we had such a varied selection of video games representing skateboarding: Anyone remember Grind Session? Thrasher Skate and Destroy? MTV Skateboarding? Street Skater? After the PS1, everyone chased the THPS template, until Skate came along and offered a true alternative. And whilst not every single game of the PS1 era lived up to expectation, the competition between all of these games created some cult classics and spawned some great game design ideas. There are people who swear down that Thrasher Skate and Destroy is a better game than THPS, and there’s even a small group who absolutely love Grind Session (for the record, Grind Session is fucking amazing).

What excites me about new “triple A” skateboarding games, is the prospect of the next Skate being a "live game", like some of EA’s other titles like (fantastic Battle Royale shooter) Apex Legends. Live Games are a modern invention in game design, introduced in the latest generation of consoles, where games continue to draw players in after launch - adding new content, new levels, new gameplay. Skate3 had the beginnings of this, with additional levels you could buy and new boards, but live games go further than this. Forza Horizon 4 is a live game, and we have added a variety of new cars, race events and features to the game every month for almost 2 years. Even as someone who works on the game, knows what’s coming, and should realistically be sick of seeing it, I still hop in every Thursday to see what new content has dropped.

Imagine a new Skate game where they add a new drop of boards, new areas to skate, new challenges based on the latest video part on Thrasher, and new features? Imagine UI which highlights the best new user created parks, and updating with new parks and board designs which are trending? All of the improvements in game accessibility and an increased presence on social interaction over the last 10 years, re-enforcing the feeling of this game being a giant, virtual skate scene. Skate3 was ahead of the curve on this in many ways, so expanding this for Skate4 could be something very special. In an era where making games “streamable” and promoting user generated content is more important than ever before, a game like Skate, a game all about expression and tackling the environment in your own way, could be awesome with the budget of an premiere EA game.

A Skate game in 2020 (or whenever it comes out) is a very interesting prospect, and after an extremely long wait, I am very excited to see what EA produces.

#skateboard guff

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entergamingxp · 5 years ago

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DualShockers’ Favorite Games of 2019 — Chris’ Top 10

December 28, 2019 10:00 AM EST

This Top 10 list of 2019 games from curmudgeon contributor Chris Compendio is full of oddities, with both indie titles and blockbuster hits.

As 2019 comes to a close, DualShockers and our staff are reflecting on this year’s batch of games and what were their personal highlights within the last year. Unlike the official Game of the Year 2019 awards for DualShockers, there are little-to-no-rules on our individual Top 10 posts. For instance, any game — not just 2019 releases — can be considered.

There is a particular attitude that comes with end-of-the-year discourse. Much like how there is an “Oscar movie,” we have “GOTY games,” triple-A titles so hotly anticipated that many in the gaming community are sure that it will already be their favorite. Look no further than any social media feed, where people are already arguing about what will be Game of the Year 2020. But when I look at my favorite games of 2019, I am surprised by how many of them are sleeper hits, quality titles that snuck up on me.

I still believe that there is value to having group and outlet-wide Game of the Year lists, and it is fascinating to see where everyone ends up. Still, I’d much prefer to sift through personal end-of-the-year lists, as they are a better indicator of the personal gaming journeys that individuals went through during the year. There you’ll find obscure little nuggets, or perhaps contrarian and eye-opening angles to games that you may have missed out on or didn’t give a chance.

With my personal top 10 list for 2019, I find that the uniting factor between most of these games is that they are weird. They are incongruous, non-traditional, unusual, and so on. And most of them are games I hadn’t even heard of a year ago, making the value they provided all the more surprising.

First off, some Honorable Mentions that didn’t quite make the cut, including Untitled Goose Game, Gears 5, Tetris 99, Baba Is You, The Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening, CROSSNIQ+, Pokemon Sword & Pokemon Shield, Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order, and Mini Motorways, all of which could have formed their own top 10 list. Then there’s the stuff that I didn’t finish or get to, but will absolutely do so starting in January, including Luigi’s Mansion 3, Kind Words, Arcade Spirits, Knife Sisters, Wolfenstein: Youngblood, Outer Wilds, The Walking Dead: The Final Season, Life is Strange 2, Disco Elysium, and Neo Cab.

Man, I wish we had room for more than ten entries.

10. Ring Fit Adventure

I have fond memories of playing Wii Fit back in the day; while it obviously wasn’t a proper substitute for more intense workouts, it was a nice way for Nintendo to encourage health and regular exercise into one’s daily routine. That’s why I was so surprised by how freaking hard Ring Fit Adventure went. For the first time playing an “exergame,” I was left sore and sweaty, so much so that I had to lower the intensity at times.

What Ring Fit Adventure succeeds in doing is actually turning exercise into a video game. It took Nintendo maybe like, over a decade to get there, but it’s great to see nonetheless. All Ring Fit Adventure comes down to is a turn-based RPG where the moves and attacks and defense are achieved through exercise. The Ring-Con is durable and versatile, and as the game encourages, I find myself turning it on by itself and doing some mindless exercise while doing other activities or watching television. It is obviously far from the most impressive video game of the year, but Ring Fit Adventure is the one that I came back to the most often in 2019.

And fun fact: the model in that lifestyle photo that serves as this list’s featured images is my friend from college. You’re damn right that I had to use it for this.

Check out DualShockers‘ review for Ring Fit Adventure.

9. Kingdom Hearts III

The Kingdom Hearts series is like a specter that will never stop following me. I don’t even have to go over how much these games mean to me and how wild the pre-release period has been since Kingdom Hearts III was announced what must have been a century ago at this point. And I’m not even going to bother to talk about how stuffed and contrived the lore is—at this point, Kingdom Hearts practically speaks for itself. Even if you aren’t into the franchise, hearing all of the fervor around it should at least give you a feeling of what it’s about.

And once Kingdom Hearts III finally released a lot of people, ranging from newcomers to devoted fans, were quick to scrutinize and tear it apart, and a lot of the criticisms were fairly justified. Perhaps I was in my own world, but none of that stopped me from enjoying the hell out of III. It may have just been the novelty of playing a brand-new, high-definition Kingdom Hearts game, or all of the obvious fan service and emotional scenes of closure, but whatever it was, the feeling of playing Kingdom Hearts III could not be recreated by anything else I played in 2019.

Check out DualShockers‘ review for Kingdom Hearts III.

8. What The Golf?

Most of the games on this list were surprises to me, but What The Golf? was a strange game that contained a number of different surprises within it. The facade of this being any sort of ordinary golf video game quickly wears off, as you find yourself hitting more than just golf balls into the hole: maybe it’s a golf club, the golfer themselves, or even another damn hole that you have to get into the hole. And that’s just the beginning—you’ll be going through city streets, parodies of other video games, and space, with some gravity-defying shots.

What The Golf? is an excellent example of how to create comedy that is unique to the medium of video games. It isn’t writing or cutscenes, but rather the actions that the player does themselves that creates hilarity. Each level plays with your expectations in a different way, and there is enough variety to prevent the game from just turning into the same punchline replayed multiple times. Other than that, the game has excellent sound design, and there’s a neat feature that lets you showcase a short, curated level selection to friends. What The Golf? is perfect for short bursts of play, and at some point in the near future, I’ll probably find myself going through each hole yet again.

Check out DualShockers‘ PAX East preview for What The Golf?

7. Ape Out

With such a bold art style and a distinct percussion-based soundtrack, Ape Out is impossible to ignore. The core gameplay is quite easy to wrap your head around, but I appreciate all of the strategic considerations that go into playing the game. As a massive ape trying to make your great escape, your main tools are a basic attack and a grab; enemies die easily, but so do you, with only three hits. The decision I always faced was between brute-forcing myself through gunmen or taking a slow and deliberate pace using an enemy as a human shield. Better yet, breeze through the randomly-generated maze and avoid conflict altogether.

The trial-and-error nature of Ape Out might naturally draw comparisons to Hotline Miami or Celeste, and as magnificent as those games are, putting this game only in those terms would do it a disservice. There was something so intriguing about the total lack of context given regarding this ape, but as you continue your rampage and leave a trail of death and destruction behind, aided by some brash and flashy visuals, what has led to these events is irrelevant—the scene and tone and the feelings that they invoke are already enough.

Check out DualShockers‘ review for Ape Out.

6. Wilmot’s Warehouse

This is a last-minute entry in my 2019 list, but Wilmot’s Warehouse instantly won me over by getting all of the gears in my head to click into place. It is a game all about organization, but the hook of this game is that players can organize everything in any way they want to. As such, the game essentially becomes a Rorschach test for whoever tries to play it—what does the way you organize your warehouse tell about how you live your life? Perhaps by color, by category, or some other wild methodology of your own invention?

Wilmot’s Warehouse is almost like a single-player Overcooked, but with a lot more versatility and room to work with. It has a charming minimalist art style, with some lovely motivational posters to come with it. It is challenging, less so because of everything the game throws at you and more so because your own methods and styles will begin to crack and fall apart. It also makes you wonder about the infrastructures we have in real-life, and why giant corporations at Amazon can’t seem to come up with proper organizational strategies that don’t exploit and abuse their warehouse workers. I guess it’s just a fantasy at this point!

5. Death Stranding

Honestly, I’m surprised that I bought Death Stranding in the first place. I was anything but a Hideo Kojima stan, and much of the previews and the pre-release discussions over the game were quick to turn me off for a variety of reasons. Once Kojima and company began to actually show gameplay, however, something resonated with me. Yes, you can derogatorily call this game a “walking simulator,” but I am all about games where traversal itself is a puzzle. There’s that whole cliched pitch of “You see that mountain? You can go there!” but what if that phrase was just the premise of an entire video game?

There’s more to it, of course, but the story is absolute crap with a total lack of subtlety, nuance, and sensitivity. Even as I rolled my eyes at pretty much every single cutscene in the game, I spent endless nights on Death Stranding, optimizing the amount of weight I was carrying and carefully planning out routes, not to mention becoming obsessive over building projects. And once the chiral network aspect of the game comes into play, it becomes more of a unique massively-multiplayer co-operative game of sorts, with other players’ buildings and structures coming as assistance in the most harrowing of scenarios. Awful story but addicting gameplay was enough to put Death Stranding smack dab in the middle of my favorite games from 2019.

Check out DualShockers’ review for Death Stranding.

4. Apex Legends

If we’re going to talk about surprises, then I am required by law to write about Apex Legends, because just the existence of that game alone was a surprise. Announced right before its release, Apex Legends appears to be the end-all-be-all battle royale only by looking at its feature set, but it absolutely earns the title once you pick up the game and play it—I don’t think anyone can possibly deny that games from Respawn Entertainment feel good. It’s fast, responsive, but most importantly, it’s just fun.

I’m not an expert on multiplayer balance, but I’ve personally found every character in Apex Legends to be viable. The game’s design is full of so many smart decisions, from the concept of the Jumpmaster, to how inventory is handled, the diverse hero abilities, the respawning, and especially, especially the Ping system. This game has so many quality-of-life features that I never even knew I needed, and they make any session, whether it’s with a close group of friends or with complete strangers without microphones, feel like a breeze. After playing Apex, why even bother with any other battle royale shooter in 2019?

Check out DualShockers‘ review for Apex Legends.

3. Control

Man, this game is cool. I can’t think of any other video game in 2019 where I would actually read through all of the pick-ups and collectibles and logs, but Control had me going through every piece of lore the game threw at me like a drug. This game, more than almost any other game, inspired curiosity in me. It is esoteric without being pretentious, it is bizarre without being off-putting, and there is rarely any sort of disconnect between the narrative and the actual gameplay.

It may take a bit of time to get into the combat flow of Control, but the trials and tribulations leading up to that are worth it. Eventually, you’ll have a number of psychic powers and weapon forms to utilize as tools of destruction, and as you get used to the enemies and their behavior, each encounter will feel like a fast-paced game of chess. The latest from Remedy Entertainment was enough evidence that I needed to get into their previous stuff, so I spent some time with Alan Wake and Quantum Break as well. No one quite does such an excellent blend of surrealism, world-building, and combat like that studio.

Check out DualShockers’ review for Control.

2. Katana Zero

I’ve been becoming more and more tolerant of difficult fast-paced trial-and-error games (see: Hotline Miami, Super Meat Boy), but Katana Zero may perhaps be the first one of these games that I barreled through with few breaks in between. The premise of this side-scrolling action game with its drug-induced time-manipulation and the fast and twitchy gameplay demanded my attention and time, and boy did I give this game just that. There were too many deaths to count on the way to the end, but all was worth it.

Katana Zero is infused with a neon art style and rousing electronic music, which further enhanced the compelling gameplay. It all comes down to planning, looking at the scenario at hand and taking into account reaction times and all of the environmental pieces around you to brutally dispatch your enemies while also avoiding their own attacks. And your katana-wielding character is thinking about all of this too, as your failed attempts are actually (at least, the way I interpreted it) the scenarios in his head that just didn’t work out. It is perhaps the smartest game I’ve played in 2019 in merging story and gameplay together, and out of all of the titles on this list, this is the one that I want a narrative sequel to the most.

Check out DualShockers‘ review for Katana Zero.

1. Sayonara Wild Hearts

After writing a review of over 1,500 words for Sayonara Wild Hearts, I’m not even sure what else I can say about it. But in the context of my personal life, I should say that it came at exactly the right time in my life. Underneath all of the colors and the fanciful style is a story about overcoming depression and getting outside of your comfort zone to lead a truly happy life. All of the other games on the list I probably could have played at any point in my life and enjoyed it all the same, but Sayonara Wild Hearts feels like the definitive 2019 game for how my year went.

Even months after the game came out, I still came back to Sayonara, one reason being to finally achieve some of those Gold Ranks, but mostly just to try to live the euphoria of the emotional experiences that this game provided me; somehow, the entire “Begin Again” sequence is still enough to get me near tears, producing the same powerful reaction each time ever since I first played a demo of this at PAX East. I still listen to the soundtrack on a regular basis, letting myself get lost in the soundscapes—eventually, I would actually seek out the lyrics to these songs, and I would find the written words to be just as touching.

I was used to my safety and peace I mistook all this tedium with being at ease But then you came around, said “it’s time to let go” And you took me to a place I don’t know

Check out DualShockers‘ review for Sayonara Wild Hearts, from yours truly.

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Check out the rest of the DualShockers staff Top 10 lists and our official Game of the Year Awards:

December 23: DualShockers Game of the Year Awards 2019 December 25: Lou Contaldi, Editor-in-Chief // Logan Moore, Managing Editor December 26: Tomas Franzese, News Editor // Ryan Meitzler, Features Editor December 27: Mike Long, Community Manager // Scott White, Staff Writer December 28: Chris Compendio, Contributor // Mario Rivera, Video Manager // Kris Cornelisse, Staff Writer December 29: Scott Meaney, Community Director // Allisa James, Senior Staff Writer // Ben Bayliss, Senior Staff Writer December 30: Cameron Hawkins, Staff Writer // David Gill, Senior Staff Writer // Portia Lightfoot, Contributor December 31: Iyane Agossah, Senior Staff Writer // Michael Ruiz, Senior Staff Writer // Rachael Fiddis, Contributor January 1: Ricky Frech, Senior Staff Writer // Tanner Pierce, Staff Writer

December 28, 2019 10:00 AM EST

from EnterGamingXP https://entergamingxp.com/2019/12/dualshockers-favorite-games-of-2019-chris-top-10/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=dualshockers-favorite-games-of-2019-chris-top-10

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recentanimenews · 5 years ago

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I Defended Humanity from Hungry Titans (And So Should You)

Full disclosure: I love video games, but I have all the digital skills of a wet bag of ramen noodles, so when I was asked to review Attack on Titan TACTICS, I panicked a little. My experience with real-time strategy games consists of activating “God Mode” in Blizzard's Starcraft and Warcraft series and stomping the enemies' bases with a single invulnerable peon. My mastery of tower defense consists of playing 15 minutes of Plants vs. Zombies and installing a Steam copy of Dungeon Defenders that crashes every time I try to boot the darn thing up.

My experience with social games with a gacha component is non-existent. What if my staggering ineptitude resulted in the entire Scout Regiment being devoured? How would I live with the guilt of sending poor Marlo Freudenberg and a bevy of other fresh-faced recruits off to die in the gullets of a horde of terrifying, naked, sexless, cannibal giants? I can't handle this sort of pressure!

Lucky for me, Attack on Titan TACTICS is designed for both the hardcore (not me) and the casual gamer (definitely me) alike. After a bewildering intro mission that tossed me into the shoes of Eren Jaeger going toe-to-toe with the Female Titan in the Stohess District, I was soon plowing through the tutorials, learning the basics of how to train and deploy Scouts, and—like Captain Ahab—having a whale of a time. Attack on Titan TACTICS is an exquisitely crafted game with many simple systems that are easy to learn but difficult to master, and it provides just the sort of card collecting elements and RPG level up mechanics that fans can sink their teeth into.

At its core, Attack on Titan TACTICS is akin to a collectible card game in which players use gacha mechanics to unlock and craft characters from the Attack on Titan manga and TV anime, each of whom has a distinct set of skills and combat applications. In the preview build that I played, I was allowed unlimited gacha rolls in order to add a single character to my roster. My first roll netted the indomitable...Marlo Freudenberg? Who the heck is Marlo Freudenberg? Sorry, Marlo, but your 4-Star ass isn't cutting it when the fate of humanity is as stake.

I re-rolled twice (three rolls, total) and netted Annie Leonhart, a 5-Star Scout and also my favorite character from Season One of Attack on Titan. Feeling serendipitous and aglow with the irony of putting Annie in charge of my squad, I dove into the game and was instantly neck-deep in Titans.

The Story Mode campaign in Attack on Titan TACTICS consists of five Chapters, with each Chapter further divided into individual stages, in which the goal is to fend off a relentless Titan assault with squad of selected characters. Each character fills a particular role: Attack types, such as Eren Jaeger and Mikasa Ackermann, attempt to control the battlefield and deal direct damage to the Titans with their blades. Assault types, such as Armin Artlelt and Sasha Braus, are deployed for a single massive hit in order to incapacitate the enemy or to rescue comrades that are about to be eaten.

There are also siege weapons such as cannons that deal direct damage or create area-denial effects to slow the Titans' endless march. Deploying a unit costs a fixed amount of AP (“action points”), which are represented by a meter that slowly recharges as the stage progresses. Each unit has a stamina bar which ticks down as they attack or take damage from foes, and units temporarily depart the battlefield when their stamina is depleted. Each stage is timed, and completing the objectives quickly yields better rewards.

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Choosing a well-rounded squad and picking when and how to deploy your units becomes increasingly challenging as the game progresses. In my play-through, I breezed through most of the early Chapters, relying on a brute force technique that required an overpowered and over-leveled Annie Leonhart to do most of the heavy lifting. But this lazy approach caught up with me, and I received a grim reminder that there's a reason the 'S' in 'RTS' stands for “strategy”.

Upon reaching the end of Chapter 3, I hit a gigantic roadblock in the form of the Large Abnormal Titan boss, and my sloppy deployment tactics resulted in my base getting knocked into next Tuesday, prompting me to abandon the mission and spend several days regrouping and testing new schemes. Attack on Titan TACTICS forced me to adapt and to change my play-style. It made me a better player through a school of hard knocks approach, and the victory was all the sweeter when my new strategies paid off.

Outside of combat, there's another layer of strategy via resource management. In order to level up your heroes and enhance their combat abilities, you must gather and allocate materials. Completing daily missions and scouting expeditions rewards you with different in-game currencies (deployment power, mercenary points, crystals, gold, etc.) which all have different functions: deployment power is used to field teams of Scouts to fight off Titans in order to progress the story or collect resources; mercenary points and crystals are used for gacha rolls to acquire new units; gold is used alongside other materials to make your Scouts more powerful, unlocking new abilities and passive bonuses as they level up.

It's a very crunchy system, and nothing goes to waste. You can always exchange unwanted doodads for gold, and if you pull duplicate characters from gacha rolls (I'm looking at you, Hans), the duplicates are automatically converted into “souls” that can be used to make your existing characters stronger, bumping up their Star ratings and level caps through a process called “limit breaking”.

If real-time strategy and RPG elements aren't your cup of tea, there are other aspects to enjoy in Attack on Titan TACTICS. Using a visual novel-style format with pictures, text, and voice acting, the Story mode currently recaps the events of the first season of the Attack on Titan TV anime (Episode 1 – 25), and there are future plans to encompass later plot developments in-game. Additionally, unlocking key characters also unlocks game-original Episodes (essentially cut scenes) that explore character's backgrounds, elaborate on their motivations, or simply introduce a humorous twist. The scene with Conny and Sasha plotting to rob the officers' meat rations made me legit laugh out loud.

I'd never played a smart phone game before, let alone a gacha-style one, but Attack on Titan TACTICS made me a believer. The game features a basic free-to-play (with in app purchases) model, so it's perfectly suited for casual players or hardcore fans alike. I spent more than an hour each day over a period of two weeks playing with the provided preview build—training up my heroes, unlocking new characters, progressing the story, managing resources, and sending my troops on timed scouting missions so that I could make progress in-game even while I was doing other things in real life.

I didn't expect to be bowled over, but Attack on Titan TACTICS knocked my socks off, and I heartily recommend it to anyone who loves the Attack on Titan franchise and longs to experience a well-designed social game full of thrilling action, intriguing characters, challenging scenarios, and advancing giants that still manage to be completely horrifying even when sporting chibi-style character designs.

Want to save humanity from the greatest threat it has ever faced? Check out Attack on Titan TACTICS via the App Store and Google PlayTM today, or register at the official home page at aot-tactics.com.

REVIEW ROUNDUP

+ Fun, fast-paced gameplay that is easy to learn but difficult to master.

+ Dozens of characters to collect with extensive RPG-style systems to build up your ideal team into a powerhouse force.

+ A rich and engaging strategic gameplay layer that combines resource management and crafting mechanics.

- Low drop rate on some of the coolest heroes. Advancing your Squad becomes more difficult post-level 20.

Are you ready to build a Squad and take the fight to the Titans in an effort to turn the tide for humanity? Who's in your ideal group load-out? How many potatoes can Sasha fit in her mouth at one time? Let us know what you think of the game in the comments!

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Paul Chapman is the host of The Greatest Movie EVER! Podcast and GME! Anime Fun Time.

Do you love writing? Do you love anime? If you have an idea for a features story, pitch it to Crunchyroll Features!

By: [email protected]

#Anime #News #Latest in Anime News by Crunchyroll!

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