Mister Jack

Xenoblade Chronicles X This game is a mess. Where do I begin? While I appreciate the open world, the super high jump, and the removal of that bullshit where higher level enemies are nearly impossible to hit, everything else feels like a step back. The decision to remove some of the most basic QoL features from the last game is utterly baffling to me. Why do I have to physically track down my party members now if I want to change them? There's like twenty of those fuckers I have to remember! Why am I forced to take three of the same party members on every story mission? It makes leveling up anyone else almost pointless, especially when the fourth spot is also reserved for specific characters during story missions. Why is healing a quicktime event? WHY IS HEALING A FUCKING QUICKTIME EVENT?! What's worse is that it appears without warning, so it's very easy to miss your chance to heal and fuck yourself over. The story has some neat themes in it. Too bad they don't get explored until the last hour. There's only twelve story missions in the game. The plot is an afterthought, and it's just as well because the characters mostly suck. With only a few exceptions, everyone is either completely generic or annoying. The plot introduces a few cool characters with potential, but then they disappear completely and are never mentioned again. There's also a running gag about eating one of your teammates that gets repeated constantly. It's only mildly amusing the first time and it's pure torture the other fifty times. Also, it's far too easy to get one-shotted by enemies thirty levels or more above you out in the field. The first game had elite enemies roaming around too, but in this one they're everywhere! No matter how careful you are, you are guaranteed to be killed by these things several times just because they're too numerous to avoid. Hell, some of them can even fly. If you aggro them, and you will, it's almost impossible to run away. They chase you for way too long, even over water and THROUGH MOUNTAINS. I seriously had an enemy throw a boulder at me through a fucking mountain. The only reliable way to run away is with a mech, and even then the only way to guarantee your escape is if it can fly. I get that the game was trying to convey that you're not the dominant species on the planet, but they went way overboard. So did I hate it? You bet your ass I did...at first. The thing is, once you get your giant mech the game becomes a lot more fun, even with its flaws. You are finally able to hold your own against the giant wildlife in the world. You can even do a mission to give it the ability to fly. It's just too bad it takes TWENTY FIVE HOURS to get it. You only get one mech for free too. After that you have to buy the rest yourself and you'll be paying out the ass, which means grinding for money. There's a really cool mech game buried here, but it often felt like the rest of the game was actively fighting to keep me away from it. Would I recommend it? Ehhh, your mileage may vary. Obviously I liked the first game more, but if you want something completely different you might like it more than I did. If you don't care about stories in JRPGs and you just want Monster Hunter with giant robots, I could even see you really enjoying it. Just be prepared for a merciless grind. I'm not sorry I played it, but I never intend to play it again. That was the last Wii U game on my backlog, so now I can finally get a Switch guilt free.

Even if what you say is true, the decision shouldn't be made for them.

Oh, some of you think he's making things up? Well does THIS look made up to you!?

The upcoming book about Trump's first year in the White House written by journalist Michael Wolff is making enormous waves in the American press, but if you Brits haven't heard much about it, here's an excerpt for you to read. It illustrates in horrifying detail just how unqualified Trump is to be the president when he can't even control his own administration and has to be constantly led around like he's in an adult day care.

Blood and Wine might be some of the best DLC I've ever played.

This guy did heat experiments on the Switch to see how hot it actually gets.

That could very well also be the bending issue's fault, since the console is twisted into a shape that wasn't meant for the dock.

I've actually read recently that the whole console warping thing is physically impossible for it to be the dock's fault because the amount of heat the Switch generates isn't nearly enough to bend the metal shield inside of the console. Instead, it's been suggested that the bend is the result of a manufacturing defect in the Switch itself. Has anyone here had their Switch bend on them? I plan on getting one in the near future and I've been doing a lot of research on this issue.

I started Xenoblade Chronicles X, the one game I still own a Wii U for. I'm only a few hours in, but aside from the battle UI, everything about it feels completely different, both in good ways and bad. One thing that annoys the shit out of me is that I am pretty much forced to use the clunky gamepad to play because as far as I can tell, the second screen is the only way to see the map. The navigation is much better than the first game, but did they have to only put the map on that damn second screen? Was a separate menu so much to ask?

I liked the Porgs. I know they're merchandise bait but I'm a sucker for cute critters, and it helps that they were just a background gag and they didn't take over the plot like the Ewoks. They also weren't incessantly noisy all the time.

Oh man I would love a Shadowrun movie.

I finally, FINALLY finished Xenoblade Chronicles 3D. I started this game all the way back when it first came out on the Wii, but good god it is so long. There are also huge difficulty spikes at certain parts that required me to go back and level grind for a while, which is something I hadn't done in an RPG in ages. This is an extremely complicated RPG, perhaps too complicated. There were some features like the affinity skill links that I didn't even realize were a thing until I was already past level 60. The game just throws so much stuff at you that it's easy to overlook some of the mechanics entirely if you're not careful. Even after I started using everything the way I was supposed to, the game still wasn't easy. It also places a pretty huge importance on your level. Being a mere 3 or 4 levels below an enemy ensures that many of your attacks won't even hit them at all, whereas being a mere 2 levels above a boss can turn it into a complete cakewalk. I didn't want to grind a whole lot, so I ended up being within 2 levels of most of the endgame bosses. The game as a whole was overwhelming, but it was pretty damn good when it finally clicked. Of course, I ended up going back and finishing it so I can move on to Xenoblade Chronicles X, which I own but never started. After I beat that, I can finally sell my Wii U and get a Switch.

I might be thinking of the iPhone version. I just remember playing a version without all the slowdown.

Got a deleted excerpt from the script for Last Jedi right here.

The PS1 version definitely suffered from slowdown issues back in the day. The PSP didn't have this problem.

RPGs with real time combat where positioning is important need some kind of indicator to show which side of the enemy is the back. Final Fantasy XIV is actually pretty good about this. As you can see, there's an arrow on the front of the ring to show which way it's facing. It's not essential for this coeurl, but there are plenty of enemies without faces or that are oddly shaped where it would be very difficult to tell which way they're looking without that arrow. I'm trying to get through the rest of Xenoblade right now, and I'm running into the issue that I often can't tell which way certain enemies are facing because they don't have a ring like this, and that's a game where positioning is absolutely vital. For example, look at this thing. The only difference between the back and the front is that the back doesn't have a blue light. Now that may seem easy to notice, but not only is it hard to tell at a distance, but when there's a big melee going on and this thing is spinning all over the place, it gets really easy to lose track of which direction it's facing in the heat of battle. Fortunately it's not an especially powerful enemy so it hasn't cost me any team wipes yet, but it's still a pretty big annoyance that I wish I didn't have to deal with.

@Atomsk88

Only idiots give a shit about Merry Christmas vs. Happy Holidays.

This was actually a gift. It's already pretty nice as is, but it becomes amazing after you hack it and add a bunch more roms...

Rather unexpectedly, Mal gifted me Trails in the Sky. Thank you very much for that surprise show of generosity.

It was on sale at Square Enix's website. I played the free trial until I hit the level cap and then stopped. 30 bucks for the full game and both of the expansions was too good to pass up.

How direct is the plot connection between the three games? I'm still stuck on the original on 3DS because it has a billion sidequests, but I still want to play the newer ones. I still have a Wii U just for Chronicles X.

From the Yakuza team. Is it weird that I kinda want this despite never playing a Yakuza game?

I'm glad to hear Hollow Knight gets better because I played the beginning and it bored me enough to make me quit. Maybe I should go back to it.