Lurker > NBIceman

"Half-assed" is giving too much credit. Quarter-assed, maybe.

Nanis23 posted...

Chao are overrated and are only good for people who are nostalgic
It's just a shitty minigame that I wish didn't exist as it's a waste of time

is this the most nanis take ever

Another new Tales already? Guess it's not impossible.

Nex Machina (PC)

Very generously gifted to me by our very own KCF, so thank you again for that! Not much to say about this one - it's a wild, fast-paced bullet hell twin-stick shooter, and it's awesome. Short and sweet. I'm not often an arcade-y, high-score-chasing kind of gamer but this is one that I'm gonna keep installed to do runs of every once in a while when I have just a bit of time to game. This one had been on my radar for a while and it didn't disappoint.

TROUBLESHOOTER: Abandoned Children (PC)

Speaking of games that have been on my radar for a while... I have a ton to say about this game but I'll try to keep it relatively short.

This is an XCOM-style SRPG made by a small team of Korean developers, and it's an all-timer of a hidden gem. SRPGs outside of Fire Emblem normally don't land with me, but reviews were super positive and really spoke to me, and that dev team is still putting a ton of work into it two years following the release, so I figured it very much deserved a shot.

And it paid off. There's an insane amount of content here for a game that regularly goes on sale for $15. 70 hours to get through the six chapters that make up the main story plus a few scattered side missions from time to time, and there's a whole additional chapter that's been released as free DLC that I haven't even touched yet, along with tons of other optional missions for players that just can't get enough. And to go along with that insane amount of content is an insane amount of depth. Character customization is ridiculously expansive but never complicated, and you can spend as much or as little time tweaking your units as you want. There's a loot system, equipment crafting, monster taming, character bonding, and probably one or two other mechanics that I'm even forgetting. Maps are tightly designed and can even be huge sometimes with ~100 enemies to take down, but there was only one occasion I can think of where a mission felt like it actually dragged.

The story is pretty great too, only held back by a pretty rough translation that's mostly headed by the community. That's honestly the game's only flaw in my mind - it's never so terrible that you can't tell what's going on, but a good bit of dialogue will come off as very awkward to native English speakers and I'm sure there's quite a bit of nuance lost. Which is a bummer, because there's a ton going on - lots of characters with different alliances to keep track of and so forth. There's of gang warfare, religious cultism, shadowy government programs, deft political maneuvering, and more, all held together by a super likable main cast with a couple of real standout characters. AND this is only the first game in what, as I understand it, is planned to be a pretty sprawling series.

Hell, even the soundtrack is great! I really can't say enough good things about this game; I think it could really threaten to be the favorite game of all time for a certain type of gamer. Definitely wish it was more well-known, because it deserves to be spoken of in the same breath as the titans of the genre. If you're a fan of SRPGs at all, please do at least check out the Steam store page to see if it grabs you.

Piano Man is right up there as one of the best songs ever written. But there are indeed a lot of great ones.

Durant just overplayed his hand putting it out there that he only wanted to play for Phoenix or Miami, and only if they didn't send back any of their good players in the deal, because he just created a no-win situation for everyone. Those two teams don't feel the need to put huge packages on the table because they know they have the leverage of being his preferred destinations. Other teams, of which several have the ability to offer more attractive packages if they were so inclined, are reluctant to do it because Durant clearly has no issue with pulling the ripcord the second things get a little tough. And the Nets don't have to do anything because he's still under contract for four years.

It's a staring contest that's not gonna give anytime soon. I'll be surprised if he's not still a Net by the time the season starts.

Okay, I'm really really really sorry I completely fell off of this topic the way I did. Real life started getting insane in March and it's only now starting to kind of slow down - getting back to this felt kind of daunting but I enjoyed catching up! Don't want to just throw in a bunch of walls of text so I'll just do a few quick-hitter thoughts - a lot of my opinions echo yours anyway so it'd just be a lot of rehashing.

-First and foremost, I'm obviously just really glad you enjoyed Berseria as much as you did. You and I are agreed that Abyss is the gold standard Tales game that will likely never be topped, and Berseria's my definite #2 (#3 is either Arise or Xillia 2 depending on what day I'm asked). I hated Zestiria with such a fiery passion (that's only gotten worse over time) that Berseria was gonna have to really blow me away or I'd be at risk of falling off the series entirely, and fortunately it did.

-I have some thoughts on the game's ending but the only real strong ones involve Zestiria spoilers, so I'll keep them to myself for now.

-Also very happy that you enjoyed the majesty that is Magilou - I'm glad some of my ramblings gave her a little bit of extra memorability in your mind! I'm not gonna say much about the characters here since that would lead to more walls of text (although if you want that, I guess, now you can go back and read my writeups for them in the ranking topic I did! Just don't read the last couple spoiler tags in Laphicet's post.)

-There's a little detail about Eizen that I'd really love to go ahead and bring up since it's only actually covered in supplemental material, but I guess one aspect of it could also still be considered a spoiler so I'll wait on it.

Anyway, I do hope you like Zesty. I don't know how much I'll comment considering most of what I could say would just be spewing vitriol, but I'll definitely keep following along and jumping in if I do feel like I have something worthwhile to contribute. Cheers!

I will never understand how people find nose rings attractive.

Jupiter and Mars are the two acceptable ones.

Emeraldegg posted...

Gobert to minny for some players and picks

Four first rounders, to be exact, plus Kessler from this year.

Glad the Spurs finally picked a lane and committed to a direction for the next few years. This'll be the most excited I've been to watch the team since Duncan retired.

Received and redeemed both, many thanks! Did my first arcade run of Nex Machina earlier today and had an awesome time with it, definitely gonna be playing around with that one for a good while.

Feel like I'm being greedy but I wouldn't say no to Wizard of Legend.

Snake5555555555 posted...

Meh winner, insanely fun contest! Thanks for hosting Suprak!

Yep! Wish all Save Mys did weekends off, honestly.

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I would love Nex Machina unless I missed someone grabbing it before me.

Rocket 1

Daredevil

Pretty solid top 3.

Daredevil

Bulbasaur

Daredevil

Blue Lions > (Ashen Wolves) > Golden Deer

Really have no desire to ever do a Black Eagles run.

Rocket

Bulbasaur
Espeon

Daredevil

Espeon
Decidueye

Tales of Arise
I haven't actually played a Tales game in a while, but I really liked Symphonia and Abyss so I wonder if I should be paying more attention to this series. Was Arise good? I don't know if I have the patience for another long RPG right now.

Giant fan of Tales here - I loved Arise but it was hit-or-miss for a good portion of fans. If you liked those two, I'd say there's a good chance you'll like others in the series for sure, but I'd probably point you to Berseria before I'd recommend Arise if you're on the fence about committing to a bulky JRPG. Berseria is almost universally regarded as one of the better entries in the franchise.

Cyndaquil
Pancham

Daredevil

If your take on any situation ever is "I would've done the same thing as Vince McMahon," you might be a danger to society.

Oh hell yes.

Rocket

Ys VI: The Ark of Napishtim (PC)

Played Oath in Felghana last year and thought it was... eh, fine. Prevailing opinion seems to be that Ark is a little worse, but I feel like they're about on the same level. Combat, plot, characters - they all feel pretty samey to me. I may even have a slight preference for Ark; there's fewer bosses I'd call bad and annoying, the OST is a little more to my taste, and I feel like Oath overstayed its welcome just a tad whereas this one really didn't.

This era of Ys just ain't quite for me, but I've enjoyed my time with it for what it is. One day I'll get to the most recent ones in the series, though.

Daredevil

Hbthebattle posted...

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/8/8/6/AAXETKAADWFW.jpg

this also turned up

... I gotta admit, I actually don't hate this.

Heracross
Snorlax

Death to Mimikyu.

Daredevil

I know this leaker has some credibility and a track record, so I'm inclined to believe this is a thing. Worth noting, though, that that screenshot (and the other pics that are around) just came from some other rando, though, who also claimed they were very early - so those might be better taken with more of a grain of salt.

I'm gonna reserve judgment on the "Emblems" thing until we know more. It sounds awful but it might be something like the Awakening gimmick that you can completely ignore if you want to. My number one hope is for no Avatar, but I'm not incredibly optimistic there.

Yelena

Daredevil

Bane_Of_Despair posted...

Is the consensus here really that MoM was good? Wow, that surprises me. The pacing feels awful in it especially the beginning half, some of the special effects are comically bad for something with this big of a budget (the fuckin third eye jesus), America is barely a character and basically just a plot device, and the Marvel humor falls especially flat in it when I generally am pretty alright with Marvel humor. There's more but man was I bummed watching it.

I liked it, didn't love it. Lower half MCU movie for me for sure.

Yelena