Last night I got drunk and challenged Bachelor to a FT69.
At 56 wins I started crying, and by the end of the set I had experienced all the stages of grief.
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anyone who likes transistor but not ff13 is lying to themselves
anyone who likes transistor but has not played ff13 is depriving themselves
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what if i like ff13 but was bored by transistor
Eventually, they sound pretty daunting
Boy I really am a sucker for a good burglary simulator, your Thiefs and Dishonoreds etc. All I want to do is sneak around places and rummage through desk drawers for loot. Dishonored 2 continues to scratch this itch even as it feels pretty by-the-numbers.
ff13 is a transistor
lightning resistor
conducting to the mother star
that’s what you are
renegade sound system XIII
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i enjoyed transistor but whenever i think about it i remember that god awful voiceover
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the only VA I couldn’t stand was the villain’s voice. It was just incredibly bad acting.
Transistor has a much more interesting combat system than FFXIII and actually lets you flex it less than 30 hours in
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Still playing a ton of Teamfight Tactics, up to Platinum III in ranked, although I’m a bit stuck there, right now the games tend to longer than they have in previous patches, which means people are more able to build ideal teams, which means a lot of 6th place finishes if you don’t get the run of the green for champs or items. I liked it a lot more when the games were a bit faster and you had to think on your feet to make it through the mid-game alive.
Best thing about Transistor is that the song The Spine is incredible. Everything else didn’t really do much for me
And it’s still a better game than Bastion
Tetris Effect was fun for a few hours
I’m playing phantasy star 2. I’ve much further than I’ve ever gotten, maybe 1/3 - 1/2 of the way through, and man…
this game really sucks, doesn’t it
like I want to like it but the dungeon design… like it’s not even so much bad as it is like conspicuously cruel, and not in a fun “let’s challenge the player” kind of way but more like let’s make these layouts as obnoxious and needlessly cryptic as possible, and they keep finding new ways to top themselves on that front.
the first phantasy star was like this to some degree too I guess, it just feels worse here, maybe because of the slow movement or the verrrrry lazy camera tracking (which I guess they did to simulate a limited field of view, and it does heighten the atmosphere at first, but boy it really wears thin after the 10 hour mark).
idk I’ll always love the music, the aesthetic, and the plot is really cool too! I just like… I’m really glad I can just look at maps and fast forward on the emulator to grind, but even with that progression is starting to feel tedious.
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I recently figured out another source of the Phantasy Star aesthetic: the 70s manga miniseries Tera e (To Terra/Toward the Terra). It has psychics, metallic environments and even a computer called Grand Mother. It got an English translation recently, I recommend getting a copy to get a pure shot of Phantasy Star style without the RPG grind
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this looks delightful, thank you 
I still feel like there is something to this game in terms of its design that a lot of modern games lack. it’s just kind of spread too thin. the pacing of the game is surprisingly meticulous given how dense and repetitive its form is. like, level progression dovetails with dungeon length/difficulty in a way that feels very structured, and there is a certain kind of intimacy in having to explore the dungeons with such care. there’s something cool there and it compliments the game’s atmosphere. after awhile this pattern kind of becomes grotesque but when it’s good it’s real good.
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It’s probably good if you were able to construct a context where you had nothing else to do and no other games to play for three months and no knowledge of other things – in its own hermetic little bubble it is complete, satisfying, nourishing.
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Yeah I think the only way I was ever able to complete Phantasy Star II was using online maps and holding the fast forward button for 70% of the time (which on the PS4 collection eventually glitched the 3D room menu into a purplish wireframe retro 80s aesthetic)
The dungeons just feel like way too much, and the battle speed is way too slow and the random encounter rate is way too high. I found it weird that there’s only like, three bosses in the whole game. I feel like for JRPGs the whole point of fighting the regular mooks in dungeons was as preparation for the real event, being the boss monster at the end. Without that it just feels like pointless grindiness for the sake of it.
The ending is really something though, but you can just go on youtube for that these days.
Also, that manga looks fantastic, may have to track down a copy
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instead of playing anything on my newfangled phone i’m replaying mother 1. it’s awful. i love it
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even though the easy ring makes everything too easy, there are certain moments where fights can still block you. you can’t fight cars as the mc by himself if you don’t have an expensive item for his asthma. there’s a robot guarding a monkey maze in the desert, and it’s impossible to beat him without a tank. there’s a guy nearby with a tank and a plane and if you fly in his plane enough times to get 10 ticket stubs he’ll let you take his tank. the plane rides just show you around the world map. that’s it. each ticket stub takes up an item slot, and you get 3 per flight, which means you need to have 12 slots free, which is asking a lot for this game. it’s so dumb. you need to do this. you need to ride this man’s plane and empty your pockets for his stupid ticket stubs. i love it
anyways my favorite npc is the forgotten man. he’s an npc you must talk to in order to proceed. you have to listen to his monologue and answer correctly or he starts all over again. in the famicom version it seems he also warps you back to the beginning of the area he’s in.
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I think about that guy a lot
how after he’s gone through that depressing monologue, you have to tell him that you absolutely definitely will NOT remember him, or you can’t proceed in the game
Ironic
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