Hawkwing

I suggested the idea a few years ago, but a game about rebuilding a taguel warren. It would be a combination of underground base building, Fire Emblem, and King of Dragon Pass as you fend off attackers, handle diplomacy, and rebuild a culture from the ground up. It's a unique combination I haven't seen before, and I believe it would actually work extremely well mechanically. It would also be a good opportunity to give more lore to the taguel, as they didn't get enough in Awakening. Fire Emblem at the Olympic games More seriously, I would like to see a Heroes of Might and Magic styled game using Fire Emblem mechanics. I am very curious to see how Fire Emblem's gameplay would hold up when units are more expendable, you're allowed to lose fights, and battles aren't on predetermined maps in a linear order. It would also be interesting for weapons and classes to be unlocked by building up cities and resources and to have different factions with unique elements to them.

Completed the mainline quest for the Rito yesterday. While the dungeon itself was smaller than a typical Zelda dungeon, getting there was an (fun) ordeal, so I didn't mind. I hope that the odd flying trampoline boats appear throughout the game. They're a fun and helpful way to traverse the sky islands, which aren't always convenient to navigate, and I'd be disappointed if they're relegated to a single region. Anyway, I'm greatly enjoying my time with the game. They kept the strong sense of exploration and discovery from Breath of the Wild alive and expanded upon it with a ton of fun new mechanics. While the overall map is the same shape, the area's themselves are far from 1 to 1, and they clearly put a lot of effort into making these places familiar while being entirely new. As for my thoughts on the new abilities: Ultrahand: Easily the games biggest selling point. I had fun creating even the simple contraptions allowed early on, and I expect that you'll be able to create even wilder inventions later down the line. I fully expect to see compilations of the wildest things people have come up with soon, as well as compilations of looney toons moments of inventions failing in the funniest ways. Recall: An overall awesome ability. Reversing time so that enemies projectiles return to their thrower never gets old, and I greatly enjoyed the few puzzles I've encountered so far that utilize the ability. I really, really hope they get wild with the puzzles Recall allows. Ascend: More of a quality of life ability to save on climbing time, though some of the puzzles I've encountered utilize it well. This will probably be the ability I miss the most if I get back to playing Breath of the Wild. Fuse: I need to experiment more with this mechanic and I don't know whether or not I like it at the moment. I appreciate that it gives a purpose to items I usually just saw as sidequest or upgrade fodder, and I love that it consistently rewards out-of-the box combinations. At the same time, I fear that the game may have some option bloat, as time spent looking for a specific material to throw or attach to an arrow could add up, and there may be fuses that are funny but functionally useless outside of some niche situations. I also don't think the weapon limit meshes well with this mechanic, as I'm not allowed to get as crazy as I want since I have to keep that limit in mind. There are some smaller things I enjoyed. I'm glad they increased the enemy variety as that was my biggest critique of the previous game, and the news towers shooting you into the air does make exploration and travel quick than having to climb/warp onto a tower and fly off. I haven't seen enough of the story to comment on it yet, though I do appreciate that it is more involved and active this time around and I do find the mystery intriguing Really, my biggest criticism of the game is that they kept aspects of Breath of the Wild I wasn't fond of. Korok seeds and the compendium were fun the first time around but quickly became busywork, and both are back in full force. I also could have gone without the "you start with pitiful health and armor and some attacks can kill you in one hit" schtick that I didn't find fun the first time, and it's just as frustrating here. My biggest disappointment is that they gave more tools for combat but left the system itself unchanged, which I believe was a big mistake. Combat in far from bad, but it is flawed. Your defensive options aren't as quick or tight as they should be for group fights, which make up the majority of encounters. The targeting system and dodging works well against singular opponents and bosses, but against multiple enemies, your shield doesn't cover every angle, you have to put some weapons away to even access the shield which while quick isn't immediate, you have to hold down a button to dodge which also snaps the camera behind you which isn't always helpful, and it's all too easy to get sniped from behinds. This isn't terrible, but the sheer amount of damage you take and how some attacks kill you instantly really highlight flaws of this combat systems, and I was really hoping they would improve upon that. (Doesn't help that I played Sifu before getting this game. That game is very difficult and punishes players who don't know what they're doing, but it's defensive mechanics are quick, tight, and responsive) Overall, I enjoy the new abilities and exploration is still a ton of fun, I just could have gone without some repeats of Breath of the Wilds more annoying elements. Depends on what you liked or didn't like about Breath of the Wild. I talked with a friend who didn't care much about Breath of the Wild but is having a ton of fun with Tears of the Kingdom. The new mechanics are what sold it for him, particularly fuse and ultrahand. I know that won't be the case with everyone, though.

That was an exciting trailer that this game seriously needed! I had to rewatch it a few times to really absorb everything new they showed off, and I have no doubt there are several details I still missed. They seemed to have addressed most of the issues I had with Breath of the Wild. I'm expecting several of the large structures they showed off to contain/be dungeons, they cranked up the enemy variety, and the fusion mechanic is a double whammy of giving weapon durability more out-of-the-box workarounds as well as giving the various resources you can nab some much needed utility. Link may also be able to interact with NPC's in more interesting way this time around, as there were some villagers fighting in the background, Link built a carriage to transport some of them, and he has a partner in some scenes (potential multiplayer? I don't know exactly how it'd work but I'm down). I'm very glad to see that they seriously shook up the world. I was concerned that they would reuse the same map with some floating islands being the only real additions, but no. The ground level has a ton of new structures, and the sky has a ton of creative new mechanics and set pieces. I wouldn't be surprised if the $70 price tag comes from having to use an expensive cartridge just to store the whole thing, as this is easily the largest game Nintendo has ever made. I hope that Ganondorf has more of a presence this time around. While his actions clearly had an effect on Hyrule in the previous game, Ganon himself was really just there. I hope the story as a whole sees some improvements. Breath of the Wild's plot was fine, but it was very minimalistic and I could summarize so many cutscenes as "stop Ganon". I did enjoy Links interactions with several of the characters in that game, but the Divine Beast quests were pretty formulaic. I hope that Tears of the Kingdom seriously shakes things up this time around. As excited as I am, I'm not going to lie that I wish we got a trailer like this earlier. The previous trailers gave off the impression that it was "Breath of the Wild with more stuff to do". It took until Aonuma gave a gameplay demonstration of the new mechanics for Tears of the Kingdom to really show if how unique it would be. As cool as that video was, I could have easily seen those mechanics being introduced in a far interesting and exciting manner. I just say this because I've seen some people call this the best trailer they've ever scene, and I can't say I agree. I personally would have been more hyped for this game if these details weren't revealed a literal month before the game comes out. That aside, this trailer was still awesome, I'm looking forward to Tears of the Kingdom, and will likely pick it up as soon as I can.

Thank you. I'll keep this in mind the next time I see the game on sale. Looking forward to the Total Warhammer 3 writeup, however long that will be.

I'm a big fan of Mandaloregaming, and his Total Warhammer reviews are some of his largest videos, as he covers not only the general gameplay and presentation, but each faction individually. Needless to say, it was very interesting to read though your summaries and see were your opinions lined up nearly word-for-word, and were they differed so sharply I almost wondered if you two were playing entirely different games. I suppose that's the joy of a game with so many asymmetric components. Speaking of Mandaloregaming, I've enjoyed almost every game he's recommended (and even the ones I didn't, I'm still glad I played) and I've had my eye on Total Warhammer 2 and 3 for a while now (The Lizardman faction having playable dinosaurs were enough to sell me on the games. The Skaven also sound incredibly fun, and the Tomb Kings are pretty much Necrons and I fucking love the Mechanicus game so of course I'm interested in them). How "RTS-Noob" friendly would you say they are? I've played and enjoyed a handful of RTS games in the past, but it's not my go-to genre and I make no claims to be good at them. Is Total Warhammer fine for a newcomer to jump into or does it expect that you already know what you're doing?

Just got home from the theater after watching the movie with my siblings. Overall it was a lot of fun and I greatly enjoyed it. However, I will say right now that it is very much a Mario product and very much a family film. I think it's very important to set your expectations accordingly before going in. The animation is great and this is easily the best looking film Illumination has made. Not just from purely visual standpoint, but from how well they integrate various aspects of the Mario universe into the film. The movie is littered with easter eggs and references, but it goes beyond "I recognize that!" to being intertwined very naturally with the action scenes and world as a whole. Every era of Mario is referenced, and you can tell the artists and animators were very passionate about the games and getting the look just right, and I would say they succeeded. It is easily the best aspect about the movie. The plot and comedy are fine, if nothing to write home about. It's extremely by the book, but thankfully it knows it's by the book and doesn't waste your time. The movie is incredibly fast paced, so any scene that may comes off as cliché doesn't last long enough to be annoying. Also, there are no fart jokes (and only one burp joke that's quick and actually kinda funny) which immediately puts the film above several other family movies. My only legitimate plot critique was that I wish Mario and Luigi had more screentime together, as they bounce off each other extremely well and establish a very believable bond in a short amount of time. It's refreshing that Peach wasn't kidnapped this time and it makes sense that Mario would go out of his way to rescue his sibling, but I can see a version of this story that has the two brothers working together the whole movie. The voice cast was good. Maybe not my first pick for these roles, but no one gave a bad performance and I quickly bought everyone as their respective characters. The Charles Martinet cameo was clever and much appreciated. The original soundtrack is AMAZING... which makes me wish there was more of it. I don't hate the pop songs they selected, but I do think the film would have been better off without them. I can kinda see why the handful of critic reviews I've seen were all over the place. If you know nothing about the Mario franchise and/or story is king no matter what, then the movie offers very little. If, on the other hand, you wanted to see a celebrations of all eras of Mario and weren't expecting a noteworthy story in the first place, then I think there is a lot to enjoy. I recommend this movie, especially watching it on the big screen, but I would also say to do so when it's convenient for you. It's a fun film, but not something you should go out of your way to see. I am very curious to see what the future holds now that Nintendo has dipped their toe into the moviemaking business. The purchased Dynamo Pictures last year, which leads me to believe that they'll want to make more movies in-house. I've seen a number of people say they want a movie about Luigi's Mansion, Metroid, or Star Fox, and I can see each of those working. We could possibly be in for a string of movie adaptations of videogames that manage to be high quality while remain faithful to the source material in the near future, which should be very interesting.

A fairly interesting set of challenges. The amount of mileage people get out of Super Smash Bros never ceases to amaze me.

Wonder who nearby was a vampire, since he seems to be absorbing their soul.

ROOK'S CAMPAIGN DAY 3: We Never Had This Hilarious Conversation Replies: Update:

In regards to gameplay, Camilla is a strong and reliable unit with a straightforward and useful personal skill. She can handle a lot of what Conquest throws at you without being an automatic "I win" button. I'm not a fan of the developer favoritism the royals got, so I tend to use the retainers more than them (with the exception of Elise and Sakura, as I'm not saying no to an extra healer), but when push comes to shove, I have no qualms deploying them during the harder levels. My main critique is Camilla's lack of a personal weapon, which applies to all the female royals across both games. The dudes legendary weapons are fun to use and are a big part of their gameplay identity, and it's a shame they're limited to already strong units. I'd be down with being able to forge the female royals legendary weapons as part of the games story, so you could have the choice between, say, giving Camilla a powerful axe or devastating tome. I'm not a fan of Camilla's characterization, though I would be lying if I said I wasn't interested in seeing how she would be handled in the alternative universe where Fates was competently written. While I found almost all of her dialogue to be creepy, I got the impression that it was the result of a messed up backstory that twisted her perception of the world. Had this been further developed, I may still have found her character disturbing, but that could have been more intentional, with potential layers to her character that could be interesting to dissect. As is, while there are glimpses of depth, a lot Camilla's actions and dialogue come off as the writers being horny. Complaining about Camilla's outfit is a dead horse at this point. It's still one of the worse designs in the entire series and I don't get the impression they even tried to make it look like "armor". The cutscenes focusing on her chest and behind just give a shallow impression of her character. I have to enjoy Fates in spite of these aspects. I agree that it is annoying how much attention Camilla gets in side material and how many alts she has in Heroes. There are plenty of other characters that I would say are more deserving of the spotlight. Perhaps the most frustrating aspect with how much attention Camilla gets is how little they do with her character. They've had multiple opportunities to make her more well rounded and give her more depth, and they keep squandering it in favor of giving Camilla yet another outfit.

Favorite: I'd say Shadow Dragon. I love the aesthetic they went with, and all the information is readable at a glance. It's not perfect, as I wish they had the purple outline for enemy ranges that future games went with and having to manually keep track of the stats Dragonstone affects isn't fun, but as a whole it's the UI I have the least issues with. Runner-up is Fates. I appreciate how it manages to organize so much information onto a single screen, but I was wish there was another option that sacrificed some visual flair for providing text as to what each weapon and skill did. I wouldn't say I ever got annoyed by having to constantly touch the bottom screen, but the option would have been nice. Otherwise, It did a surprisingly good job of keeping things coherent considering how many variables you have to keep track of in the Fates games. Least Favorite: Three Houses. The style is fine, but I'm not a fan of how many menus you have to swap between if you want the full picture. It's not unbearable, but the time spent hopping between menus in and out of battles does add up and contributes to the games overall slow pace.

Killer

Irenaeus of Lyon's Against Heresies St. Augustine of Hippo Confessions Athanasius Dionysius of Corinth Justin Martyr Aristide Ignatius Clement of Rome Hippolytus Clement of Alexandria Tertullian Origen

Book

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https://www.smbplumbing.com/

I'm still surprised that when making Gaiden the developers realized the issues that permadeath would cause for a smaller cast, and came up with the revival fountains as a solution. Their uses weren't unlimited, but you were allowed to make a few mistakes and had an option to recover the lost unit. Call it a band-aid solution all you want, but it showed there was some awareness for how to utilize a smaller army without sacrificing permadeath, and I'm surprised this approach was never used again until the remake, which made them redundant thanks to the turnwheel. I don't mind casual mode, though I feel it is more reliant on the player than the developer on how they use it. Some players will use it to get used to the games mechanics without being permanently punished for not realizing certain tactics don't work in Fire Emblem or a that mechanic does X when they expected it to do Y. Other players will use it as a crutch for bad strategies and fail to learn from their mistakes. The developers can make sure that the game is beatable doing an ironman run, but how players actually play the game is up to the individual. I've thought about it for a while, and I've come to the conclusion that a big reason Fire Emblem struggles with permadeath mechanically is because the games aren't designed around the player straight up losing. Games like Jagged Alliance and XCOM have permadeath, and they aren't afraid to continue after the player lost all their best soldiers, will straight up give them a game over after enough losses (heck XCOM 2 takes place in after you fail the first game because the developers stated that 66% of players lost their first game). Good roguelikes thrive with permadeath since dying is part of the experience, and you typically get back into the action for another go rather quickly. The only way to truly fail at Fire Emblem is to softlock yourself, as otherwise if you lose, you go back to the title screen and are expected to give the map another go. I'm not saying Fire Emblem should become a roguelike (though I would love to see the idea attempted at least once. Fire Emblem has the mechanics to work well in the genre), but there needs to be more ways for the player to "lose" with ways to continue on that aren't "just restart the map" or "live with the lost unit". The player should be able to get a TPK and still have ways to continue on, or fail a main objective without causing the map to suddenly end. Maybe even be willing to straight up give a game over and have to start over if you play badly enough. At the same time, I do think that there also needs to be more incentive to continue going after loosing a unit. A lot of the story changes that previous games had if someone dies aren't huge moments in the overall plot, but they still manage to stick will players. I'm not asking for entirely separate routes depending on player performance, but small moments that acknowledge deaths without changing the overall plot could be the way to go. As flawed as Shadow Dragon's gaiden chapters were, the base concept of giving struggling players more opportunities to recover is a good one that needs several overhauls. Instead of locking off content, change the ways you get characters and equipment. For instance, if the player is doing well, a character may need to be recruited through the classic "talk to the enemy with a specific unit" trick, while if the player is struggling the unit joins earlier without hassle. There are several ways to implement this concept, and possibly even give story reasons behind it. I really enjoy permadeath because I actually have to pay attention to the enemy and respect their capabilities, and it kicks me out of bad habits because there may not be a "next time" to use that vulnerary or silver lance. It allows for more interesting storytelling, and helps the gameplay be more smooth as I'm not restarting all the time. I would love to see a Fire Emblem game that embraces permadeath and allows the player to actually lose sometimes.

Conquest has its moments, but to be honest the dialogue or story beats that weren't hilarious atrocious were often boringly bland. Characters often say what you expect them too, and that's really only funny if there is a ridiculous scene to go along with it, which isn't always the case. The gameplay doesn't help, as levels are intense and demand your full attention, and can sometimes take over an hour to complete. That's not the best environment for the Mystery Science Theater 3000 approach with a group of friends, since you'll only be able to mock the game in small chunks. Aside from the Fates games, though, I can't say I found any of the Fire Emblem games plots to be awful. Flawed and/or boring, definitely, but they're far from the worst stories I've seen for a video game. I can't say I'm impressed with the little I've seen of Engages writing, but I'll reserve judgement until I actually play the game. While Birthright has some gems, I thought the game had a major case "you've seen this done before, and you've seen it done better". Even tropes and and story beats I wasn't immediately familiar with I still felt like I was seeing a weaker version of a far better plot that already existed. That doesn't exactly make the best riffing material. I will say that I found the plot to be so predictable that I actually started a personal game where I would guess what would happen next just to make things more interesting. I didn't always get a bullseye, but I was never far off the mark. Seriously, the single thing that caught me off guard was Zola's survival, and even then I predicated exactly how his story would turn out.

Just got done watching the direct. First thoughts were that was... alright, if personally underwhelming. I'm glad to see gameplay of Pikmin 4. It looks gorgeous and I'm happy it wasn't just pretty flyovers like so many game trailers are guilty of. I really need to try out the games at some point, as the franchise looks up my alley. The Metriod Prime Remaster was leaked so often I expected it would show up eventually. Shame it's not the trilogy as a whole, but I'll probably still pick it up, as I've never tried a Prime game before. Even if I'll be annoyed that it will probably be priced at $60 because Nintendo knows they can get away with it and Gamecube games aren't cheap. I know there's the trilogy on the Wii, but mine is really starting to show its age. I only know of Baten Kaitos because of the music from Smash Bros. It uses a card system, and I've had amazing experiences with those recently (Griftlands is one of my favorite games of all time, Fights in Tight Spaces is an underrated gem, and Midnight Suns is an awesome strategy game and is pretty much a superhero version of Three Houses and is better in every single way, fight me) so I'll probably look into it. I still need a hook for Tears of the Kingdom, Nintendo. So far it's just "Breath of the Wild with more stuff to do". Which would be fine if this game weren't releasing 6 years later. Seriously, Monster Mazes's videos on the patents have me more excited about the game than any of the trailers, and those were revealed a year ago! I am fully expecting a direct that focuses solely on Tears of the Kingdom soon, but at this point I find the marketing to be more frustrating than intriguing. Aside from that, it was pretty much expected news on DLC and Nintendo Switch online. The rest were pretty much indie games and other smaller titles. I'd like to pick up Ghost Trick since I've heard good things about it, and I'm reminded I need to play a Professor Layton game sometime, but aside from that I don't remember much. Oh, and Bayonetta Origins has a "the AI does the fighting for you" mechanic while you play as a supportive mage, which just makes me say that Sacrifice did the concept way more interestingly back in 2000, is an underrated gem, and is 10 bucks on GOG. And that more games need to have the ability to summon volcanoes and tornadoes. Again, I didn't walk away from this Direct necessarily disappointed, but Nintendo needed more heavy hitters. There are a handful of games I'm interested in and will likely pick up, but I get the feeling Nintendo won't be the most interesting player in 2023. Still, there's a lot that can happen in a year.

I've heard of it. I'll definitely check it out later. You're welcome

I have over a 100 hours in the game, and I still have some side missions left to complete. I'm personally not aiming to 100% the game, since I just don't have the patience for some of the missions. I own the original series on GOG, and one day I want to complete at least the original game. I've tried it before, and I just need to be in the mood to deal with a game with some archaistic elements (biggest one being manually tracking time units). I adore XCOM: Enemy Within and consider XCOM2 to straight up be the best tactics game I've ever played. The numbers are readable and every shot dealt or taken is meaningful. The skills offer new tactical options instead of a higher number, and even then skills that do increase damage offer new strategies. The games are well paced about consistently giving you new toys, as well as new threats to deal with. Especially XCOM 2; Legitimately every single enemy in that game counters a strategy or habit of the player and forces you to adapt your tactics. Even the lowly grunt fulfills this purpose, as they don't bother with anything fancy and just shoot you, and sometimes that can be enough. I also love the base building aspects and how well they compliment the tactical layers. You want to research new weapons and armor to do well in battles, and you want to do well in combat to have more things to research. The various buildings unlock more options on how to approach either layer. They feed into each other, and I always look forward to entering the other side of the game. I even enjoy the non-gameplay related aspects of both games. I could talk for a while about how much I love the art style of the aliens in EW and how they have their own twist (like Thin men being inspired by the "men in black" cliche, except they're on the aliens side, or how cyberdisks look super sleek and futuristic, until they unfold and reveal a more monstruous design) or how ADVENT troopers from XCOM 2 look uniform yet distinct, while also being massly produced. I even appreciate how the stories are handled. The developers knew which events were important enough for cutscenes, and backed off elsewhere, because they knew that the players experiences and stories of the first time they met a new alien or lost their entire squad, or blew up a side of a building with a grenade so the sniper could make the life or death shot, or the time the soldier customized to look like their best friend turned out to be a powerful psychic and so on would be more memorable than anything they could come up with. So yeah, I love the XCOM games. Easily one of my favorite video game franchises.