Video Games Fanclub

[Geodude 🌻]

Apr 20, 2020 10:17:32 GMT -5 Killix said:

Ran out of space on our PS4. FF15 is the first to go. That 70GB of space can be better used. XD

Are you getting the FFVII remakes? Or because it’s Squeenix, the right thing to do is to wait and see? I don’t have a choice, since it’s a PS4 exclusive until next year, but that’s actually probably a blessing in disguise. By that time, they’ll iron out any major issues hopefully. I just hope they don’t ruin the next Bravely game on Switch.

[Killix]

Apr 21, 2020 10:45:45 GMT -5 Geodude 🌻 said:

Are you getting the FFVII remakes?

Nope. Not interested in them.

EDIT: I should mention that

SPOILER: Click to show

I've heard that Nomura changed/ruined the story with time travel/alternate timelines nonsense, so there's that, too. XD
Phish told me that he played the demo and the gameplay is just like FFXV's.

... and it's being released episodically, meaning you get to pay more $$$ than ever before for a single playthrough of FF7!

Yeahh, Hard pass for me.

[Geodude 🌻]

Speaking of remakes, is it too early to talk about what I want the next FE game to be? Yes I know the DLC showed up this year and I’m finding maddening difficulty quite maddening on the Crimson Flower route (finally getting to this route and I’m warming up to Edelgard and Hubert).

Shadows of Valentia was a nice remake. I wonder if FE4-5 (Genealogy of the Holy War and Thracia 776) will be the next candidate for a remake. FE1 was remade for the DS so I am unsure it’ll be remade again for switch.

[Geodude 🌻]

Finally finished the Edelgard path in FE3H. She really didn’t develop much as a character. This path felt like an afterthought. :/ Oh wells, now my next task is to beat Pokémon Sword because shhh...I haven’t beaten it yet...

[Geodude 🌻]

I've only played the original Paper Mario and Sticker Star. However, the often forgotten series is back:
arstechnica.com/gaming/2020/05/nintendos-first-rumored-mario-game-for-2020-has-come-true-paper-mario-in-july/

[Blueysicle]

Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door is one of my favorite games of all time. So I really, really, REALLY hope this new Paper Mario ends up being a return to form. As I understand it, the Paper Mario series has kind of lost its way for the past few games. (Like I saw one person put it, the developers of the more recent games tried to reinvent the wheel and decided it should be a square instead) I'm cautiously optimistic, but a bit more the former than the latter, so I think I'll wait until the game comes out and people have played it before deciding whether to buy it myself.

One other thing to note is that this announcement lends some credence to rumor that's been floating around for a little while now:

SPOILER: Click to show

Apparently Mario's 35th anniversary this year will be seeing a lot of remakes, remasters, and re-releases of older titles, including 64, Sunshine, and both Galaxies. Super Mario 64 was the first video game I was ever truly captivated by, so if the rumors are true, I'd be pumped to be able to play that again. (And maybe even actually beat it - I wasn't very good at video games as a kid. ) A new Paper Mario was part of this lineup, so that's where this rumor may have some truth to it.

Another separate, but possibly related rumor, that included Paper Mario was the announcement of a new 2D Metroid. Which makes that Metroid gag at the end of the trailer pretty suspicious. If it's true, I'm also intrigued by that. I played Super Metroid as my very first Metroid game just last year on my SNES Classic, and I enjoyed it quite a lot.

[Ian Wolf-Park]

Apr 26, 2020 22:45:49 GMT -5 Geodude 🌻 said:

Speaking of remakes, is it too early to talk about what I want the next FE game to be? Yes I know the DLC showed up this year and I’m finding maddening difficulty quite maddening on the Crimson Flower route (finally getting to this route and I’m warming up to Edelgard and Hubert).

Shadows of Valentia was a nice remake. I wonder if FE4-5 (Genealogy of the Holy War and Thracia 776) will be the next candidate for a remake. FE1 was remade for the DS so I am unsure it’ll be remade again for switch.

If there were a Genealogy and/or Thracia remakes, it's likely that we'll see voice acting. In fact, you can probably expect a good chunk of the Three Houses cast reprising their roles (among others) from FE Heroes in Genealogy and Thracia.

[Geodude 🌻]

Maybe this time I will actually beat the first Xenoblade Chronicles in its remastered form on Switch. Then I’ll actually find out how XC2 was loosely linked. I’m on Chapter 13 when the party is fully reunited.

The performance and story of XC: Definitive Edition is much better so far than XC2 imo. The game actually doesn’t lose framerate in battles with many enemies. Still, the usual flaws persist. Battles can get long and repetitive and the side quests are pretty mundane (but are more interesting than straight up grinding.

Still can’t quite get past the name Fiora, though, because when I hear it, I can’t help but think of the Neopian Faerie Queen lol.

Xenoblade is the only series in the Xeno set of games I’ve played. I’ve heard the rights for the older games are complicated because Monolith wasn’t a Nintendo property back then. I would like to see some remakes for Switch.

[Geodude 🌻]

These PS5 exclusives so far aren't very interesting to me. I'm not really into the Spiderman games and Square Enix has to earn my trust again after FFXV and KH3. (I almost treat the Bravely/Octopath team as a separate company doing only Nintendo things.) I currently have a Switch + Xbox One X. Nothing I've seen so far makes me want to upgrade anything.

[Geodude 🌻]

FFXV was horrific so I went on a search for another game. At the time, I had bought a used copy of Ys VIII: Lacrimosa of Dana for Switch. Then I got distracted for a while. I finally came around to playing it and I finished it in 40 hours. It lacks slightly on the graphics but the gameplay and the story more than make up for that. The ending was pretty wacky though, but given the plot was already pretty unique, I sort of expected it. Now I’m pretty excited that Ys IX is also seeing a switch port in 2021.

[Breakingchains]

Out of curiosity, why was FFVX so loathed? I liked it a lot riiiiight up until the story and structure went right off the rails into insanity (a detour into horrible product placement notwithstanding), but apparently a lot of people couldn't stand it from the start, so maybe it just hit a very particular set of features and story beats long enough to get me invested.

(In fact I've just started playing it again, but I do enjoy referring to it as Barbie's Magic Roadtrip Adventure though)

[Killix]

I dunno why some hated even the beginning... but that's fair, too. I guess the open world sidequest adventure just wasn't up their alley? Or maybe they didn't connect with the cast of bros. It is pretty annoying that the backstories of the main cast aren't even present in the actual game (they were made into a short anime and released outside the game) so anyone who didn't see that extra media isn't going to have all of the context.

Or maybe the battle system killed it for them. The main battle system is pretty shallow and most battles go one of these ways:
- Garbage-tier mooks, your team one-shots all of them. Battle over in 1 second.
- Damage sponge enemy(ies). You mash and mash and don't even take any damage 'cause it's so weak, but it just won't die so mash some more.
- OP squad murders you as soon as the battle starts. No prob though, just chug some revive items. Losing all of your HP in this game is but a slap on the wrist.
- Don't wanna waste my time battling, I'mma just keep runnin'. Bye!


For anyone else who hasn't played FFXV and is wondering why it was so loathed in general:
FFXV was a total train wreck of a game, from its very troubled development to its final demise when the remaining project leader peace'd out and Squeenix just went "K bye. Now we're cancelling all of the in-progress DLC that was supposed to fix some of this mess."

Completely botched. Much potential was squandered.
I say it had potential because the beginning of the game is genuinely pretty good! (from my POV, anyway. XD) You've got your band of bros and you're running around in the (very pretty) open world, exploring, beating up monsters, taking side quests at your own pace...

buuut once you get on that boat, the rest of the game is just a linear slog of characterization inconsistencies, wishy-washy lore, convoluted ineffective storytelling (with plot points that go nowhere, and characters and arcs that vanish half-way through or are otherwise ultimately left unexplained. Also, a good portion of the game's story/lore was separated into other media. Real accessible there Squeenix... though the game and movie contradict each other anyway, 'cause they just kept changing the story around up until the last moment.) and the final half of the game is just a rushed mess of barely interesting gameplay (I like to call it the "Final Fantasy Hallway Walking Simulator").

To anyone interested, I suggest looking up the crazyness that was the development of FFXV for yourself because it's just impressive how badly it all went. XD
Even though it's one of the worst games I've ever played, I say it was worth the experience because I now have better appreciation for all of the good games out there. XD

[Breakingchains]

Makes sense. You make a good point on the battle system, and the bros were in fact 90% of the reason I got so sucked in for so long (ever look at a cast, immediately say "wow I am being systematically emotionally played" and then just go with it anyways...? No? Just me? ok) so if that fell flat for someone no wonder they'd see nothing of value here. Can't necessarily call it one of the worst games ever, it's more of a "haul it out once every blue moon" title for me, but I do see your point. (I also had no idea there even was other media, so I just learned a thing. I just assumed the story was deliberately left vague, esp. backstory.)

Incidentally, though, that comment got me wondering what is the worst game I've ever played... I can't nail down any specific one but if I did sit down and try to name a definitive title, it'd either be one fanboys would fistfight me over or some indie thing that got three downloads. xD;

[Killix]

Yeah, the bros all have backstories explaining how they're connected to each other and you can see a bit of nuance in them. I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have liked Prompto at all if I hadn't seen his backstory. XD

(It's baffling that Squeenix thought it would be a good idea to separate that important story/character context from the game, but I guess that's just one misstep in the minefield of... uh... missing... steps. XD)


It is hard to define the number one worst game I've ever played, but FFXV is definitely in that category of worst games. Along with Shadow the Hedgehog and Harvest Moon: It's a Wonderful Life.
(I guess if I pretend that the game actually ends juust before you 'splode Altissia, I can trick myself into believing that it's not too bad. XD)

[Geodude 🌻]

I tend to prefer games that spend a lot of effort on world-building. I just felt like the first half of FFXV was doing that quite well. It was a neat balance of world-building and giving you some freedom to explore this world, and the pacing of the story was decent. Once you got onto the boat, I was suddenly confined to this linear plot where it felt like a mad rush through the rest of the story and the world-building was left unfinished.

Now IMHO, there's no such thing as too much world-building, hence why I play obscure JRPGs like the Trails of Cold Steel series where world-building is center stage. (And more popular ones like Xenoblade Chronicles.) However, I would agree if you said that ToCS has pacing issues because it spends so much time laying out every aspect of the world. However, FFXV leaves too much potential on the table and I felt the latter half could have allowed me to explore and figure out some more things rather than rushing through it all. I don't hate FFXV with a passion, I just feel like it could have been a much better game.