Sire

Been enjoying the event thus far, although some of the territory control nodes took me by surprise with their gimmicks. (Still managed without the "proper guest servant," though.) I was originally trying to farm Embers and save them for the new FP summons, but some whimsical summoning netted me the the 3-star caster healer (who seems better than Iri), Mori, and 4* Summer Nobu. Almost all my Embers went down the drain, and I think I mainly just have some Saber ones left over. // I still have two Avengers who need to be leveled too... -- If we do get the 3x chance after burning everything after the 2x event, I'm gonna be a bit miffed. Granted, it's all RNG anyways, but I was expecting there to be some downtime to replenish my stores. When the Summer Rerun comes around, I'm thinking about trying for NP2 Summer BB because she has great utility and can farm general waves even though she doesn't have advantage. -- However, at the same time, I really should be saving for Skadi as a Quick Loop team would help me a lot, even though I can still use the classic Arash composition for 3-turn clears.

Reflecting on the direct, it is no surprise that Splatoon 3 or Fire Emblem did not make an appearance. As they were mostly focusing on titles released this year (and Splatoon 3 started development later than BOTW2), those two didn't make it as they are likely next year releases. -- Besides, people were more hungry for BOTW2 news, so capping the direct off with another teaser was good. A shame there wasn't gameplay, but they had Metroid Dread for that. -- I imagine Nintendo will do its own separate directs down the road, or wait for a different event to reveal more Splatoon 3 and/or Fire Emblem news. The Advance Wars 1&2 remake look great. The classic AW were always cartoony, so I don't mind the direction they went. The portraits look great, although I will miss the pixel artstyle for the units and battle scenes. -- The unit models look all right, but the backgrounds look a little off when the units are there. May just be me though. -- I guess Dual Strike didn't make it in since it was a DS game and not a GBA one, and it did make some use of the two screens. -- Days of Ruin (Dark Conflict in the EU) takes a darker tone, although I think it may be one of the more balanced AW games. Would be cool to see that again since I loved its "advanced map editor" when compared to the other AW games. WarioWare is also great, although admittedly I only really played a port of the original. I would love to get it for the Switch, but my Switch backlog is already rather intensive. I still have yet to finish Octopath Traveler, Monster Hunter Generations Ultimate, and have yet to get Xenoblade Chronicles Definitive Edition (among others). I am also interested in the Age of Calamity DLC as I rather enjoyed the demo and the original Hyrule Warriors. Of course, I have yet to get the game itself, so I guess I lucked out by waiting since I'll likely have access to all the DLC by then (instead of being burnt out on the main game). Mario Party Superstars looks like a return to the classic Mario Party that I loved. Seeing the original maps and mini-games are nostalgic, although they do seem to make the boards smaller than the MP64 size megaboards. I'm wary of the new Mario Parties as after 8, the entire series went downhill for me.

Initial thoughts during the Direct... -- Initial introduction to Smash Reveal, fair enough. -- Life is Strange, don't care for it. -- Looks like they are starting with the 3rd party stuff first. Perhaps to get the boring stuff out of the way? (Guardians, Worms) -- The JRPG looks interesting. Hmm. -- Mario Party Superstars, eh? As a former Mario Party fan/collector (1-7, DS), it looks interesting. -- Knew a mention of Metroid Prime 4 would be here, but Metroid Dread looks like something for Samus fans. -- Think I was too generous with my prediction time slots. Here I am expecting minute or two trailers with commentary, but its more like 30 seconds with optional 30 second commentary. ---- At this rate, I'm expecting Splatoon 3 to be the main flagship title at the end of the trailer. -- Monster Hunter Stories 2 or something, may be an interesting spinnoff but not for me. -- WarioWare! Hype! -- SMT5 looks cool. -- Danganronpa collection for Switch, eh? The expanded min-game may be the main draw for existing players. -- Fatal Frame port, interesting. (Maiden of the Black Water) -- ADVANCE WARS! ALL MY YES! -- Age of Calamity DLC. I still need to pick that game up at some point. ---- I have a feeling BOTW2 may be covered instead of Splatoon 3. Guess Splatoon 3 is still too new. ---- Also, no Fire Emblem. A shame, but Advance Wars makes up for it. -- Yeah, BOTW2 teaser at the end. Figured as much. Overall, fairly interesting. Now to stick around for Treehouse as I get my detailed thoughts together.

I haven't been following anything, so here's my random predictions for the Nintendo Direct. 1. Splatoon 3 news (I expect it to be the one of the main highlights, if not the main highlight, of E3.) 2. Smash Character Reveal (I'm thinking the may start with a reveal, with the ending being something else. // Random Thought: Doom Guy) 3. BOTW2 news (Likely going to overshadow Splatoon 3 if present, but another possible big hitter.) 4. Metroid Prime 4 news (Either something to actually show, or a message saying developing is still proceeding along for those wondering about it.) 5. Fire Emblem news (It's been some time since the last Fire Emblem, so there may be enough for a teaser trailer. // I'm just wondering if it'll be an Echoes remake or a new installment. A part of me also wonders if they may expand on the world of Three Houses somehow, although it doesn't really have a setup for a hard sequel like the Tellius games.) Detailed Random Thoughts

Finally finished LB4. Gameplay-wise, it was smooth sailing for me until the final set of fights, where I saw the horrific difficulty spike firsthand. -- As for the story, it had potential to be one of my favorites, but it had issues that I could not ignore. I thought the normal waves would've been harder for some reason, so I started out my support list with "tryhard Waver" (Waver with "His Rightful Place" CE), but then discovered that the bond points given were pretty great and went back to the Bond Point CE. -- I also fell into the trap of using the Story Supports because of the cool factor of their CE, then I realized I'm losing out on Bond Points, so it was back to using my regular supports as usual. Luckily I just did this for the first two "chapters/verses," so it wasn't that bad. MVPs for this Lostbelt were my Scathach and Valkyries. Scathach annihilated the boss mobs (Waver + Support Skadi), while the Valkyries handled many of the general wave quests. -- I heard Kama is supposed to be good, although I never really fielded her save for one or two fights. I guess I still look at class advantage/disadvantage a lot when looking for my "DPS Servant" instead of their utility and potential damage output due to the special modifiers and such. Gameplay Spoilers: Story Spoilers

Bonus Track: XCOM: UFO Defense - Geoscape (DOS Version)

I'm losing track of what songs I posted again. Oh well...

I have been sucked into the void that is FF XIV. It's pretty enjoyable, even while under the effects of its massive free trial.