Well_known_bear's recent activity
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Comment on What games have you been playing, and what's your opinion on them? in ~games
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Comment on Has anyone been watching 'False Memory'? How is it so far? in ~anime
Well_known_bear LinkI wasn't aware of this series, but the animation looks quite good! I'm convinced that on a technical level, the Chinese studios are already at a point where they are competitive with Japanese...I wasn't aware of this series, but the animation looks quite good!
I'm convinced that on a technical level, the Chinese studios are already at a point where they are competitive with Japanese studios. The Japanese studios still have an edge in that they are entrenched with an audience that grew up watching shows with ingrained Japanese sensibilities / culture, but I can see younger audiences today forming an equally strong attachment to Chinese and Korean content.
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Comment on What have you been watching / reading this week? (Anime/Manga) in ~anime
Well_known_bear LinkPicked up S2 of Nige Jouzu no Wakagimi. Very upbeat for a show about a boy lord whose entire family is slaughtered by a usurper's uprising. Lovely animation from Cloverworks. No gradations or post...Picked up S2 of Nige Jouzu no Wakagimi. Very upbeat for a show about a boy lord whose entire family is slaughtered by a usurper's uprising.
Lovely animation from Cloverworks. No gradations or post processing in sight. It often feels like watching impossibly clean cel animation.
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Comment on What are your favourite anime and/or manga? in ~anime
Well_known_bear Link ParentOther than Girls Last Tour, there is also Usuzumi no Hate for all your 'wandering around post-apocalypse megastructures' needs. Nothing is quite like BLAME! though.Other than Girls Last Tour, there is also Usuzumi no Hate for all your 'wandering around post-apocalypse megastructures' needs.
Nothing is quite like BLAME! though.
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Comment on What are your favourite anime and/or manga? in ~anime
Well_known_bear Link ParentSome recommendations: Shounen no Abyss (the author's earlier work Himegoto is also interesting but there are a lot of sex scenes) Aono-kun ni sawaritai kara shinitai Ressentiment Saishuuheiki...Some recommendations:
- Shounen no Abyss (the author's earlier work Himegoto is also interesting but there are a lot of sex scenes)
- Aono-kun ni sawaritai kara shinitai
- Ressentiment
- Saishuuheiki Kanojo
- Natsume Arata no kekkon
I thought the initial school arc of Aku no Hana was excellent but it really fell off a cliff after that.
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Comment on What games have you been playing, and what's your opinion on them? in ~games
Well_known_bear LinkDragon Quest III Remake Finished I-II Remake and moved on to this one. You can really tell that they made this one first because although it's in the same engine, it feels rougher in a lot of...Dragon Quest III Remake
Finished I-II Remake and moved on to this one. You can really tell that they made this one first because although it's in the same engine, it feels rougher in a lot of ways:
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Performance is noticeably worse. There's no shader compilation at startup and the UE traversal stutter happens all over the place.
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There's very little added story or characterisation. All of your party members are generated characters, so there's also no party chat. You're given the goal of following your missing father's footsteps and defeating the demon lord, but the demon lord and his followers don't actually appear in the early game at all, so there's no feeling of any narrative being developed as you progress. You're just visiting places and solving their local problems as you go.
Despite a slow start, it's pretty enjoyable once the world opens up and I'll stick with it.
Staffer Retro
Sequel to the mystery / puzzle game Staffer Case. I've completed 2 of the 5 cases so far.
It's a nice follow up.
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This entry is set in idyllic Sicily instead of the oppressive authoritarian London of the first game. The protagonist is no longer a cop but a kid caught up in unfortunate circumstances. Instead of every case being a gruesome whodunnit, they just start off as odd mysteries. It's a noticeably lighter tone in general, although I can see a build up to something bigger.
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Gameplay-wise, it's pretty similar to the first game. The menu is cleaned up a little in that you now get clear choices to deduce, speak and move, but the same problems are still here. Sometimes you'll know the answer but the game will only accept one specific combination of clues where another seems to get at the same point. Other times, the translation feels weirdly stiff or is outright different from the Japanese voiced line. A lot of the text is also tiny and calls for the use of the magnifying lens tool.
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Based on the steam page, I had thought that the story branched depending on how you solve the cases, but it's the same system as in the first game. The main story is linear, but each case has an easier but wrong solution and a 'dark side' solution with the correct (but inevitably darker) reasoning. This is a lot better signposted than in the first game and it's much more obvious where they branch.
This game also put me onto aglio e olio pasta which I can confirm is both easy to make and delicious.
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Comment on What have you been watching / reading this week? (Anime/Manga) in ~anime
Well_known_bear (edited )Link ParentI'm a fellow Kagurabachi enjoyer. This will likely be Weekly Jump's next poster series given most of their popular serials (barring One Piece and the frequently truant HxH) seem to have ended. The...I'm a fellow Kagurabachi enjoyer.
This will likely be Weekly Jump's next poster series given most of their popular serials (barring One Piece and the frequently truant HxH) seem to have ended.
The anime trailer looks fantastic and captures the flashy action (the core strength of the series in my view) really well.
I'd been meaning to post about Hunter X Hunter vol 39. I've never come so close to dropping this series - it's become a parody of itself with all the giant walls of text and people monologuing in cabins - but it really picks up in the second half by going back to what makes this series good - rules, systems and games. Hope this keeps up!
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Comment on Games at the press of a button: The Rip-O-Bot (1989) in ~games
Well_known_bear LinkGreat article. Miyamoto is the only game creator I can think of who approaches how prolific Tezuka was.Great article.
Miyamoto is the only game creator I can think of who approaches how prolific Tezuka was.
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Comment on What are your favourite anime and/or manga? in ~anime
Well_known_bear LinkProbably forgetting a few, but ones that come to mind: Anime Mawaru Penguindrum Shirobako / Girlish Number / Eizouken ni te wo dasu na! (the 'anime production trilogy') Yuru Camp / MONO: Weekend...Probably forgetting a few, but ones that come to mind:
Anime
- Mawaru Penguindrum
- Shirobako / Girlish Number / Eizouken ni te wo dasu na! (the 'anime production trilogy')
- Yuru Camp / MONO: Weekend animation
- Yojouhan Shinwa Taikei
- Teekyuu
- Yondemasu yo, Azazel-san
- Psycho-Pass
- Joshiraku
- Ano hi mita Hana no namae wo bokutachi wa mada shiranai
- Working!
- Gyakkyou Burai Kaiji
- Bokura no
- Code Geass
- Mushishi
- Hachimitsu to Clover
- Aria
- FLCL
- Read or Die (OAV)
- RahXephon
- Fruits Basket (the first adaptation)
- Jungle wa itsumo hare nochi guu
- Azumanga Daiou
- Love Hina (TV)
- Tenkuu no Escaflowne
- Slayers (S1-2)
Manga
- Sora ga haiiro dakara
- Yokohama Kaidashi Kikou
- Sayonara Zetsubou-sensei
- Kuutei Dragons
- Soredemo Machi wa mawatteiru
- Dungeon Meshi
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Comment on What have you been watching / reading this week? (Anime/Manga) in ~anime
Well_known_bear LinkI feel like the chaps at Kyoto Animation responsible for this cut this week had something on their minds.I feel like the chaps at Kyoto Animation responsible for this cut this week had something on their minds.
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Comment on From millionaires to Muslims, small subgroups of the population seem much larger to many Americans in ~society
Well_known_bear LinkThis is a minor point, but I take issue with the usage of 'millionaire' in the title when the actual question in the survey is "Have a household income over $1 million" (much rarer). Would have...This is a minor point, but I take issue with the usage of 'millionaire' in the title when the actual question in the survey is "Have a household income over $1 million" (much rarer).
Would have been interested to know the results specifically for net worth of $1m.
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Comment on What games have you been playing, and what's your opinion on them? in ~games
Well_known_bear LinkBeen dabbling in a couple of Super Famicom games. The great thing about the NES and SNES is that their libraries are so vast that every year, I come across stuff that I've just plain never heard...Been dabbling in a couple of Super Famicom games. The great thing about the NES and SNES is that their libraries are so vast that every year, I come across stuff that I've just plain never heard of before.
1996 JRPG from golden age Square. I came across a guy on a Japanese forum who really rated this and being someone who generally loves old Square JRPGs, I had to check it out.
Man, it's not for me. There's some good stuff here like a pretty original setting involving Indian mythology and the whole story taking place in the days leading up to the end of the world as part of a cycle of destruction and rebirth, but the moment to moment gameplay isn't really enjoyable from a modern day perspective.
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The encounter rate is high, fights play out slowly and there's no twist to the standard turn based combat to give it some sauce.
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There are some large maps, but there's rarely anything interesting to find. The castle at the very start of the game is emblematic of this - it's huge but empty other than a few places blocked off by NPCs. It's the same with the island you start out on - you can walk to other villages, but there's no real reason to. You can't afford any better gear there and there are no side quests.
For a game that came out 2 years after FF6, it's not nearly as engaging.
Marvellous: mou hitotsu no Takarajima
Despite this being:
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a first party Nintendo title;
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inspired by Zelda: A Link to the Past; and
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directed by Aonuma Eiji who went on to lead the Zelda team,
I'd never heard of this game until last week. LTTP is easily my favourite Zelda, so I had high expectations going in.
It's... okay. Fun to try for the novelty, but I can understand why it didn't get pushed to a worldwide release.
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The game focuses on a group of 3 (presumably American) kids camping on an island that turns out to have buried pirate treasure. Each of the kids can be controlled separately and has their own items that they can use. It's kind of like if you had 3 Links but they each only had 1/3rd of his tools.
You can move around as a party or leave the others behind and go solo, which is sometimes necessary to position the kids to solve puzzles. This mechanic is quite neat and reminded me of The Lost Vikings, although it is a bit unpolished in that sometimes the kids you aren't controlling will just decide to stop following you and you have to whistle to get their attention.
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From what I've seen so far, there's no combat in this game, but the puzzles can be fairly involved and some require pen and paper notetaking. Many involve investigating things more closely by going into an adventure game style first person view where you can click on things directly (although there's no mouse, so moving the cursor feels kind of bad), but there are also a fair number of action and environment-based puzzles once you start unlocking more of the items and skills.
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Visually, it looks very nice. The Zelda inspiration is definitely visible in the big colourful sprite work and some of the assets like the stakes may well have been lifted directly from it. The tone is also very lighthearted and makes me wonder if the devs took inspiration from stuff like The Goonies.
For anyone who wants to check it out in English, there's also a fan translation available.
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Comment on What games have you been playing, and what's your opinion on them? in ~games
Well_known_bear Link ParentGreat recommendations. I hadn't heard of any of these but feel like we probably have similar tastes in Japanese indie games. It's wonderful that devs in Japan have finally come to the party on...Great recommendations. I hadn't heard of any of these but feel like we probably have similar tastes in Japanese indie games.
It's wonderful that devs in Japan have finally come to the party on Steam in the last decade. Once upon a time, the only way to access games like this would have been to show up at doujin events and buy them on home burned CDs.
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Comment on Mobile Suit Gundam RG XARX-ZERO | Teaser PV in ~anime
Well_known_bear Link ParentThey have. There's been a mix of UC and UC-like traditional Gundam (some of which has been really good!) and more G Gundam-like experimental series. Some of the ones I've enjoyed: Gundam Build...They have. There's been a mix of UC and UC-like traditional Gundam (some of which has been really good!) and more G Gundam-like experimental series.
Some of the ones I've enjoyed:
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Gundam Build Fighters / Divers - About kids in the 'real world' who build Gundam models and use them to fight in VR competitively. Tons of references to the various different series.
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Gundam Thunderbolt - Gritty alternative history UC series with mech battles over jazz.
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Gundam: The Origin - Prequel to the original UC series about Char. Does a great job of filling in the stuff which you kind of have to infer when watching the original series.
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Iron-blood Orphans - Gritty drama about a band of Martian gangsters, done by Okada Mari and Nagai Tatsuyuki who made Ano Hana.
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Witch from Mercury - Utena in space with mobile suits.
I'm not sold on this specific trailer, but I don't want to give the impression that Gundam in the last couple of decades hasn't been worth watching. There's a ton of great stuff!
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Comment on Mobile Suit Gundam RG XARX-ZERO | Teaser PV in ~anime
Well_known_bear Link ParentYeah, that's it. Maybe it'll make more sense once it airs.Yeah, that's it. Maybe it'll make more sense once it airs.
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Comment on Ebenezer | Official trailer in ~movies
Well_known_bear LinkAre people secretly rooting for Scrooge? I would have thought that went against the point of the novel, but then there's Duck Tales, this movie, the Ebenezer Scrooge Metroidvania...Are people secretly rooting for Scrooge? I would have thought that went against the point of the novel, but then there's Duck Tales, this movie, the Ebenezer Scrooge Metroidvania...
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Comment on Mobile Suit Gundam RG XARX-ZERO | Teaser PV in ~anime
Well_known_bear Link ParentIt's a bit of a dilemma since it's the old timers who are dropping money on the model kits and other merch (i.e. where Bamco is actually making the money), so you can't piss them off too much by...It's a bit of a dilemma since it's the old timers who are dropping money on the model kits and other merch (i.e. where Bamco is actually making the money), so you can't piss them off too much by making it radically different from what they like to see.
At the same time, Bamco has to also build new audiences for the franchise. I can't imagine any kids these days caring about Gundam at all (in Japan or elsewhere), which is going to be an increasingly serious problem for them going forwards.
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Comment on Mobile Suit Gundam RG XARX-ZERO | Teaser PV in ~anime
Well_known_bear LinkNew Gundam TV series airs 2027. Set in the same universe as the Gundam Rogue Orbit game Directed by Kamiyama Kenji (GITS SAC, Eden of the East) Animation will be by Sola (GITS SAC 2045) The...New Gundam TV series airs 2027.
- Set in the same universe as the Gundam Rogue Orbit game
- Directed by Kamiyama Kenji (GITS SAC, Eden of the East)
- Animation will be by Sola (GITS SAC 2045)
The concept of Gundam vs aliens sounds like it might be good, but this trailer honestly feels a little bland. Also not doing themselves any favours with that name...
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Mobile Suit Gundam RG XARX-ZERO | Teaser PV
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Comment on What games have you been playing, and what's your opinion on them? in ~games
Well_known_bear LinkAll JRPGs all the time lately. Finished up Dragon Quest XI S. If Final Fantasy aspires to be fine dining, then this is mum's home cooking. One hundred hours of mum's home cooking. The world itself...All JRPGs all the time lately.
Finished up Dragon Quest XI S.
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If Final Fantasy aspires to be fine dining, then this is mum's home cooking. One hundred hours of mum's home cooking. The world itself is not even particularly expansive, but the assets and areas are recycled smartly enough that it never felt like a slog and I ended up finishing everything other than the super bosses at the end. I must have played that blacksmithing minigame for at least 5 hours by itself...
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The thing that really struck me as I played this game is that against all odds, Dragon Quest still retains all of the politically incorrect sensibilities of the Showa era in which the original games were released. There are still bunny girls, porn magazines and dirty old men. You can still gamble at slots and pay ladies to shove their breasts in your face. You can still give your female party members racy underwear and dress them up as schoolgirls, exotic dancers or cats. A little difficult to imagine Square Enix (which is, after all, now a global facing games giant) giving this kind of leeway to any other franchise - see in particular the counterexample below for its other flagship series.
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I wish this game would let you use the double / triple / quadruple techs all the time, Chrono Trigger style. There are so many combos and the devs obviously put a ton of work into creating custom animations for all of them (some of which are super goofy), but most players are never going to see like 80% of them because you can only use these skills when all of the relevant characters go into their super Saiyan 'zone' state, and that's complete RNG.
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Speaking of RNG, I want to give a special shout out to the worst RPG side quest in history which is featured in this game. Anyone who has played this game will likely know the one I mean:
This quest features a little orphan girl who entrusts you with what scarce money she has so that you can help her buy a statue - a gift for the kind man who runs her orphanage. Unfortunately, the last statue available has been purchased by a man who has disappeared into the casino (which understandably doesn't admit minors), so she wants you to go in and buy the statue from him.However, once you get in there and find the man, it turns out that he's a degenerate who refuses to part with the statue unless you show him a jackpot in roulette, which is when the ball lands on the specific number and that number also lands in the jackpot space.
There is some debate online about the exact odds of hitting the jackpot and whether you can improve them, but no one has come up with any method that demonstrably does so, and some unlucky players have reportedly spent dozens of hours grinding roulette without success. I personally spent about 2 hours save scumming it myself during which I tried every method I could find in Google - no dice.
What's worse, there is no other way to complete this quest. You cannot have your thief steal the statue. You cannot seduce him for it. You cannot knife him in the face and take it. You can't even give the money back to the little girl. You are committed to praying to the RNG gods indefinitely or forever being the hero who misappropriated money from an orphan.
I ended up downloading a mod which lets you win the jackpot in one spin and can heartily recommend this solution to any other PC players.
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33
What more is there to say about this game that hasn't already been said? Great visuals, great music, great gameplay and just enough game.
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I was a little apprehensive that this game would melt my modest PC given it's UE5, but it runs fine at around 70-80fps once dropped to 1080p with DLSS. I grew up gaming on CRTs so have absolutely no issue with 'low' resolution, but I am feeling the limitations of 8GB VRAM more and more these days with these AAA releases as the pop-in and level of detail shifts are pretty noticeable.
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The reporting around this game really made the parrying sound a lot more important than it is. If that isn't your bag, it is still completely playable as a regular JRPG where you ignore the parry button and just make best efforts to learn the enemy attack patterns and dodge. I played the whole game this way on the regular difficulty and am convinced that you could probably even just facetank the damage and not dodge at all if you're setting up your equipment and skills properly.
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As undeniably JRPG influenced as most of the game is, I had to laugh when I saw the camp system and how the character socialisation worked. It's the most Dragon Age / Baldur's Gate 3 western game design imaginable.
Final Fantasy XVI
If you're playing this in Japanese, you'll quickly realise that something feels off:
- All of the tutorial screenshots are from the English version.
- A whole bunch of the in-game text is also in English, like the pop-ups during combat and the '[Boss name] slain' banners.
- None of the lip synching matches the Japanese voices. It's clearly made for the English script.
Between this and the Game of Thrones sex and violence presentation, it's difficult to avoid the impression that the devs were trying their damnedest to make something first and foremost for western audiences rather than Final Fantasy, and while I don't want to say that this game is bad as a result, it's kind of hard to recommend:
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The level design isn't far off from FFXIII's trashmob corridors followed by a boss, and even where it seems to have some options for exploring, you aren't rewarded with anything more than expendable potions or crafting materials for stuff you can often just buy with money.
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The combat feels like Nier Replicant (i.e. not the fun one). You're just repeating the same combo over and over, but it's even worse since your only weapon is the sword, there's no real choice of magic, equipment (+7% to the effectiveness of one move or +9% to a different move!) or items to speak of and your movement speed is so slow that I would often barely manage to stroll outside AOE attacks telegraphed an eon in advance. There is a teleport move, but it's not in every loadout and our protagonist only learnt how to teleport to enemies, so it's useless when you want to move away.
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The subquests are largely fetch quests for randos reminiscent of Xenoblade 1. In some cases, there's at least an attempt at adding exposition to the depressing world inhabited by the characters, but none of them are actually fun to play.
But wait, there's stuff I like too!
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The game looks great. It's some odd internal engine instead of UE, but it looks every bit as good. It's also reasonably performant, although it absolutely chugs on the world map due to the weird decision to load wherever you're going during the world map transition animation.
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The idea of certain people being Dominants who can transform into gigantic kaijyuu Eikons (funnily only referred to as shoukanjyuu or 'summon beasts' in the Japanese script despite this being the one game where they're not summons) and turn the tide of battles is really cool in an Attack on Titan kind of way, although the story doesn't always follow through on it. For example, right at the beginning of the game, you have a nation that just abandons their Dominant entirely when leaving the battlefield, which is kind of akin to just leaving your nuclear deterrent behind. A real head scratcher.
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Middle aged bad ass Cid is great and an obvious homage to the game breaking 'Thunder God' Cidolfus from FFT. I appreciate them giving a Cid a relevant story role again.
I may stick with this just out of morbid curiosity. It's a striking comparison with how confident FF7R is in sticking with its JRPG roots (switch to action combat not withstanding), weirdness and all.
Dragon Quest I Remake
The grand daddy of JRPGs which stole the fire from the Olympus of Wizardry and Ultima and gave it to Final Fantasy, Megami Tensei and all the others to follow.
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Famously, this is the one which doesn't have a party - it's just you, the hero, against all of the monsters in the world. You might expect that this implies a pretty chill experience where you just grind fights, level up and roll through dungeons, but that's not where this remake is at. It takes every opportunity to send gank squads of 4-6 enemies your way, and often they'll hit like a truck, take two actions per turn and/or mercilessly spam the instant death spell Zaki (in a single party member game!?) The result is that you're constantly switching equipment to do crowd control and thinking about all of your options, because again, there's no designated healer or DPS or whatever - it's just you and your one action per turn. It's surprisingly engaging in a way that DQ XI isn't with its death squad of 8 party members, especially for the bosses that serve as a wall if you aren't hard countering their mechanics with your own strategy.
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The original NES game is rough to play today, but this remake mostly solves the issues with a boatload of quality of life changes. No more buying keys, torches, etc. No more cryptic clues about what you need to do next. The only pain is from the usual garbage DQ inventory system, which is somehow even worse than DQ XI here since there's no 'equip' menu. Instead, you have an equip command which does nothing if your character's bag is full - it just asks if you want to empty the character inventory that you painstakingly picked out (you don't), even though all you want to do is replace one old piece of equipment item with one new piece of equipment. I ended up just using the workaround of opening the party inventory and manually replacing the relevant equipment in the character inventory, following which the game automatically asks if you want to equip the thing you just moved in. It's incredibly byzantine to have to do this each time and it baffles me how this wasn't raised by playtesters as the number one thing to remake.
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In addition to the nice HD-2D graphics, the characters and story also get a bit of a modern overhaul. The original has very little story to speak of at all let alone characterisation, but characters in the remake move about, emote and actually have a bit of personality and relationship to the protagonist. I don't fault the original for not having this stuff, but it is something that people later came to expect as a given in JRPGs, so it's nice that it's in here.
Dragon Quest II Remake
Basically all of the above (it comes in the same package as a twofer), but significantly easier since you have an actual party in this game. I'm enjoying it and will likely also play DQ III Remake to round out the Roto trilogy.
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Fields of Mistria
Stardew Valley-like (Harvest Moon-like?) farming sim. Jumped in following the 1.0 launch last week and have found myself coming back more than I expected.
I guess we're firmly in the 80s anime aesthetic revival at this point. Can't complain!
The gameplay hews pretty close to its inspirations. All the usual tools are here and function the same way, as are the usual farming, fishing, crafting, mining and socialisation systems. However, there are also a whole raft of QOL additions like being able to craft from any chest, being able to use shops when the shopkeeper is away and no deadlines for any of the quests, so it feels noticeably more chill than Stardew Valley.
Money has been easy to come by so far, and most of the upgrades and progression come from crafting and completing quests anyway, so it doesn't feel like there's much incentive to be a hard nosed efficiency-maxing capitalist.
The characters are fine and each has a ton of dialogue and quests, but I'm not seeing much in the way of character development or depth, and the dark edge to the writing that Stardew Valley sometimes had is very much absent. I've heard people say it's closer in tone to Animal Crossing, which pretty much hits the mark.
Will likely play this one on and off between narrative games.