Thursday Next

Time to dust off my Comet Azur...

Y tho? Like, what problem is an airless b-ball solving?

The Ninty president did say on the 9th Feb that "action would be taken", which is where I get 2 from. Dunno the whys and wherefores but it might have been the case that this was (a) not a slam dunk infringement; and (b) wasn't considered a material issue to spend the time, Yen, and effort on dealing with. No point going for a 70% chance of success case, and suing for damages when nobody has heard of the game, and there's no money to claim even if you win. Now that they have a lot of cash coming in and are occupying a lot of headlines, many of which associate Pokemon with guns, Ninty may feel it has gone too far and is worth their time to tackle.

Would have watched this if Prime had remained ad-free, but Amazon gonna Amazon.

See, I could be wrong, but I don't think Palworld is "only going to get bigger"... I think that it will go the same way as Battlebit. A huge amount of UA at the start fueled by some streamers and general mainstream hype around the whole "lol, pokemon + guns" bit, but I think it's going to see a rapid drop off, especially given two factors: 1. It's a tiny dev team. They aren't going to be able to create a content pipeline to keep the game feeling fresh and so will lose players quickly; 2. They are going to have to waste a lot of resources fighting Nintendo precisely because the leant into the comparisons with Pokemon which means they are even less likely to be able to keep the content updated, and they won't be able to spend on further UA bringing new players into the game.

So I totally think they've ripped off a lot of Pokemon stuff, and as an IP lawyer, I think that is NotCool™, but I also think that is a fight for Ninty/The Pokemon Company to have (or not) at their discretion. If they think it's problematic, they are quite capable of putting on their big-boy-pants and taking on the devs themselves. Nothing weirder than people defending corps against other corps.

MWIII Solid Call of Duty fare. The open combat missions, where you are able to navigate an open area, find weapons and equipment on-site and tackle objectives in your chosen order is a nice innovation feels like a sort of PvE Warzone, the rest is the usual tightly executed shooty-bang gameplay you would expect. Full disclosure, for those who don't know/forgot I still work for ABK, so take that into account before making any purchase decisions. AC:Mirage next.

There are no status or elemental affects in FFXVI at all. It annoyed the heck out of me too. It just feels really dumbed-down. If you check out the reddit/YT vids you can see people chain together impressive looking combos, but the game in no way encourages this behaviour. FFVIIR at least kept elemental affinities, weapons had pros and cons in terms of magic/physical attack, other effects like materia growth etc, in FFXVI there is one number associated with your weapon, the bigger the attack number the better weapon, at least there's a transmog system so you can pick your prefered unga-bunga look...

AC6 Got the platinum on this one today. Absolute banger of a game. Loved the development of the story over the multiple play-throughs. Some minor annoyances, like not tracking on the level replay what collectibles you are missing, and some utterly opaque requirements to "S-Rank" levels, but those are minor quality of life things rather than huge fundamental issues with the game. Hope we see more AC games soon as this was my first and I loved it! Up next... MWIII.

Don't want to build your hopes up but...

I love that you can just throw shit at enemies, like empty weapons, feels very John Wick. Pew pew click, throw gun, pick up new gun, pew pew pew... such a satisfying loop.

Hey Cowboy, nice to see you again. Mine would be... AC6, cos I'm a From fanboy. FFXVI. Horizon: Call of the Mountain. Dead Space. Pikmin 4.

Armoured Core 6 Beat my first playthrough of AC6 at the weekend. Started tidying up the missing logs, chests, etc. and then I'll crack on with NG+/++.

Don't you already have a Steam Deck? Is the new one that big of a leap?

FF16 Enjoyed this one. Will probably shoot for the plat since I am an FF nerd. My only complaint really is that the combat went a bit too actiony, the complete lack of statuses and elements took a lot away for me.

You mean Meyoothos?

I too, am looking to fire my rubicon. Need to finish FF16 first, and I still have Jedi Survivor waiting to be played...

Yeah, it just feels like they use the same voice actor (or give the same direction) for all these games. It's all soft spoken, slightly dreamy/wistful delivery of lines that amount to "When I was a kid I told that person I hated them when we had a fight. I regret that now." and then some solid, reliable bloke will pop on the line being all "Hey, hope everything is ok, it's important to explore all your emotions while fixing the pump that is powered by berries for reasons." Basically, I kinda miss GLADOS.

I'm enjoying clockwinder, but it is a bit twee and saccharine. Reminds me somewhat of Maquette(sp?) in its style and storytelling.

I used to think this about the story telling in Quantic Dream games, but then you see the number of people who seem to think that Star Wars is not a story about antifa, that Space Marines are the "good guys", or that Fight Club is a blueprint of how to be cool and I think, "maybe it's not possible to set the bar too low".

Forspoken Mixed feelings about this game. I like the characters, the writing is decent, the world building is great, the combat (eventually) is really satisfying. The pacing however is all over the place. There are four elements (for want of a better word) you start with the ability to sling rocks, and unlock more elements (fire, water, and weird) as you go. I'd say that the pacing goes roughly: 1st hour, no powers, walking around NYC, pointless exposition; 2nd to 4th hour, one power. Explore the magic world, defeat first proper boss; 4th to 5th hour, two powers. Learn about enemy elemental weaknesses etc defeat 2nd boss; 5th to 5th and a half hour, defeat third boss, unlock third power; 5th and a half to sixth hour, defeat 4th boss unlock final power. At this point you immediately hit the final act against the big-bad. You never really get to muck around with the 4th power, explore the world, get juiced up. Then credits roll and it's post-game mop-up time. You spend at least half the game hobbled, with access to up to half your skill set, which is a real shame, because when you have access to all the traversal tools and different combat abilities, the game really shines. I might come back to it at some point, but to be honest with so many other games to play...

I see. I still hate it. lol.

It's PS5 compatible? Or they just borrowed a PS5 controller? Looks comfy. "Spatial Computer" lol. "We aren't late to VR/AR, we're the first to make a SpAtiAl CoMPuTeR."

How?