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I got hit with a 8% hit rate twice in a row. But can I hit a single 83% chance? No.

It'll break after 10 uses.

so you can taste the tears?

Had some weird off centre control stick issues at first there, so was having to fight against that for a bit. Went into calibrate and it seemed all good, so hopefully just a blip or something. Anyway onto the fun stuff. I am very proud of that one I'm also very proud of that one too.

Sonic Origins Plus announced. Adds playable Amy and 12 Game Gear games as well as new challenges. Getting a physical release. Do I want a physical copy? I'm not really sure.

I really should write about the handful of games I finished off last year, but I can't be bothered. Xenoblade 3 was my GOTY then, followed by Bayonetta 3. I'll start this post by listing off Metroid Fusion, Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga, WarioWare inc: Mega Microgames, and The Legend of Zelda: Minish Cap courtesy of the NSO Expansion Pack. All great games that I've no doubt talked about before. Today, I want to talk about... Pepsiman 2 Uh, I mean, Fire Emblem Engage is a strategy RPG and the latest Fire Emblem game. It released back in January and is developed by Intelligent Systems. The game follows Alear (Who I renamed PepsiBoy, because, I mean, come on, if you're gonna give your main character that hair, I'm not gonna take him seriously), a Divine Dragon who has just woken up from a 1,000 year nap, only to find the continent of Elyos is under attack by the forces of the Fell Dragon, Sombron, that half-dragon, half-cobra dude in the pic above (No joke, that's one of the coolest dragon concepts this series has come up with). Alear is tasked with taking his very small army on a quest to gather the Emblem Rings, pieces of bling that allow Divine and Fell Dragons to summon Emblems, recreations of heroes from previous Fire Emblem games, such as Marth and Lyn. The story is well, a bit rubbish, it basically boils down to "Evil Dragon bad, go stab". If you were going in expecting political intrigue like in Three Houses, you won't find it here, do yourself a favour and play Triangle Strategy instead. If you're here for some solid gameplay though, then look no further. The Emblems allow for some great mix and matching with the various roles characters will have along the way. They may seem overpowered at first, but as you progress, you'll soon realise that you really need these bits of jewelery, as the odds are supremely stacked against you later on. So much so, that my scrub self lowered the difficutly to Normal half way through (Appreciate the option being there) I mean, really!? Anyway, that video above shows the Break mechanic. When you initiate an attack with a weapon that has an advantage over the enemy weapon, you "break" them. This means that they can't counterattack against the next unit that attacks them, which can be devastating, so you need to be really careful with who you send to the front lines, especially if you have permadeath mode on. In between battles, you have the option to explore the Somniel, you can talk to the units you've recruited, give them gifts, go fishing, etc. It's a stripped down version of what Three Houses did, but not mandatory like it was in that game. The social aspect is suitably stripped down as well, which is what turned me off from Three Houses. I want to play Fire Emblem, not Persona. Game looks gorgeous, if you haven't noticed already. It's bright and colourful, a great game to christen the Switch OLED I got for Christmas. The music is noticably a step up too. The Solm battle music is a particular favourite of mine. All in all, a very enjoyable FE game. Probably my second favourite after Shadows of Valentia. There's still the extra campaign that the DLC promises, so I'll be revisiting this at some point.

Fixed that for you.

Great to have you back. Player's Choice tonight at 8pm.

For the first time in many moons, and connection shenanigans forbid, I should be able to join this evening's proceedings. I'm no Allen Iverson so the lack of practice should rank me as a novice, so.... erm... go easy.

Great stuff @Cube, really enjoyed your write-ups. I thought I was aware of most Sonic games, having owned some of those Tiger LCD ones, but the sheer volume and array of titles you’ve managed to find is astounding! 👏🏻

For the 90s kids

Star Trek Game (1974) Original Release: 1974 Developer: Unknown Publisher: Hasbro Platform: Board Game Luckily for me, this one had already been created on Tabletop Simulator, complete with working spinners. Unfortunately, there is very little “game” here. You spin the spinner and move. Sometimes a space will make you do something, but most times now. Each player is on their own section of the board and the first to get around wins. The game has two spinners: warp and impulse. For the path leading to/from the circle you need to use the warp one, for the circle you need to use the impulse one. Functionally, they’re no different (they both go form 1 to 8), but if you spin the wrong one, you miss a turn. The design and artwork is nice, but that’s all the game has going for it. Star Trek Game (1975) Original Release: 1974 Developer: Bob Brechin Publisher: Palitoy Bradgate Platform: Board Game Another roll and move Star Trek board game – this time from Palitoy Bradgate. In this, your quest is to capture two crystals from the surface of two planets and then blow up the Klingon ships. While this game has standees of Kirk and Spock, you play as nameless crew – Kirk and Spock simply protect you from harm. The game starts off similar to Ludo where you have to roll a specific number to stat moving, then transport down to a planet: an ice planet with a strange monster called a Bluug, or a fiery planet with a giant spider: if either catch you, you’ll have to go back to the start of the planet. Klingons are also chasing you, although they only take you back slightly. Other spaces will move you forwards, backwards or even send you back to the Enterprise to miss a turn and have to start again. Constantly restarting really feels like a drag. You can forfeit your turn to move Klingons instead if you want to slow down your opponents. The board itself is really nice, with lovely design and a fun layout, but the gameplay is very poor. Star Trek Phaser Battle Original Release: 1976 Developer: Mego Publisher: Mego Platform: Electronic Handheld Not played: Too expensive to get second hand. A basic game from Mego. This one keeps track of your score, and is very large and bulky. Stars will scroll past (the effect looks like the doctor Who opening) and sometimes enemies will appear. You need to line up your targeting and blast them. Star Trek: Phaser Strike Original Release: 1979 Developer: Milton Bradley Publisher: Milton Bradley Platform: Microvision The Microvision was the first handheld console that came with interchangeable cartridges – the whole front of the unit peeled off and could be replaced with a new game. With it being so early, the display was limited, boasting a whole 16×16 pixels. Although there is something satisfying about these big chunky pixels. In Star Trek: Phaser Strike, you destroy incoming ships by shooting from one of three different directions. Your shots are slow, so you have to time your shot based on where your enemy will be. It’s a very simple game, but for it’s format, it’s fun for a quick blast. Star Trek Game (1979) Original Release: 1979 Developer: Michael Gray Publisher: Milton Bradley Platform: Board Game This board game definitely has some interesting ideas. It’s another one I had to recreate in Tabletop Simulator, although it doesn’t have the nice Enterprise shaped player pieces or the artwork on the cards (I found the text for the cards, but not the artwork). The board itself is lovely, looking like a display console showing a galaxy map. There’s some lovely artwork of the Enterprise, too, but that gets covered up by tiles. The tiles feature warp paths in two colours. While in a sector, you can only swap between the two routes at your starbase or following the route to another sector. It creates a lot of thought when planning your route, especially later in the game as you need to land on explored systems exactly. The only downside is how movement is determined: rolling two dice and moving that amount. Movement is the major part of the game, too. You get dealt four mission cards and need to complete three of them. The cards will have flavour text like “defeat Klingons” or “deliver serum” along with other instructions, but these don’t actually mean anything in terms of the game. You just need to discover these on the map and head to them. As you move, you will reach unexplored stars. You can reach these without using your full movement. You draw a card to discover what is there. Three cards will send you back to your home base (something another player can do if they land directly on your space), but the rest are different kinds of stars, outposts or advanced civilisations. Once a system has explored, however, you can only land on it with an exact role – which makes it harder to complete a mission if you weren’t the one to discover it. If you roll a double, you can move an opponent instead of you, however this just hurts both of you and isn’t very useful, even as a player has finished three of their missions and is heading back to their base. Despite so much depending on the roll to move mechanic, this is a pretty decent board game. It would be interesting to build upon this with some different movement mechanics. Star Trek Make-A-Game Book Original Release: 1979 Developer: Bruce Nash, Greg Nash Publisher: Wanderer Books Platform: Board Game A board game that you make yourself from a book. This is more about the construction, as you’re following a pre-set design instead of developing your own board game. Someone has already done the hard work developing this for Tabletop Simulator. The game itself is a very basic roll and move. Spaces will earn you deflector shield components, others will make you lose them. Once you have all six, you can reach the bridge and need to get an exact roll – overshoot and you have to go all the way around the board again. It’s a pretty poor game. One curious thing is that the board itself is missing part of it. There is supposed to be a corridor to the bridge that is completely missing – so you just have to imagine a couple of spaces there. Star Trek Starfleet Game Original Release: 1979 Developer: McDonald’s Publisher: McDonald’s Platform: Board Game A tiny little roll and move game. This was part of the first ever themed McDonald’s Happy Meal, promoting the launch of Star Trek: The Motion Picture. The game is obviously quite basic, but it’s short and sweet. There are multiple paths to choose from, so it’s slightly more involved than some games. Star Trek 3.5 Original Release: 1982 Developer: Lance Micklus, David H Summons Publisher: Adventure International Platform: Atari 8-Bit This is another version of the 1971 Star Trek game. This adds a lot more visualisation, a larger galaxy and more types of areas to encounter. The Enterprise and Klingons now look like ships, and the game displays a list of actions each time so you don’t have to jot them down separately. The galaxy is now much bigger, with quadrants in three dimensions. Navigation has been altered a lot. You can choose between impulse (moving within a sector) and warp (moving to different sectors). Within a sector, the speed determines how many squares you move. For warping, you enter the coordinates of the system you want to go to and the speed (which determines how many stardates pass). You also get a really nice animation. You also see torpedo paths animated out, making it clearer what is happening in battles. Another significant change is how damage works, as you can repair systems without navigating to a starbase, which is useful when sensors are completely down and you’re flying blind. Overall, this is a really nice version of Star Trek. Star Trek: The Motion Picture Original Release: 1982 Developer: GCE Publisher: GCE Platform: Vectrex Made for the very unique vector-based console called the Vectrex. This console is made up of white lines on a black background. In order to add colour and a HUD, you have to put plastic sheets on top of the screen. In Star Trek: The Motion Picture, you turn in a 360 degree angle, blasting enemy ships. Torpedoes will get fired towards you and you can either dodge by turning away so the torpedo is no longer on screen or by holding down the shield button to block them. Your shields have limited capabilities, so you’ll need to connect to a space station to recharge. The game is simple but a lot of fun. It’s not the most “Star Trek” game, something the developers also thought as it was sold in some regions under the names “Space Ship” or “Harmageddon”

This guy tried to buy every Wii U and 3DS game from their eshop's before they close, I figured some of you might find it interesting.: https://youtu.be/ujHUMG0Uovs I found it interesting to see some of the issues he came up against while trying to purchase everything, such as not being able to have more then $200 worth of credit in his account at any one time, certain games not unlocking the right to buy DLC until a certain percentage of the main game has been played and other issues. Aso how much memory it took up etc. He's a mad man, but I also happy someone managed to buy everything on both platforms

After being in 3rd and 4th for the majority of that game I finally got some luck and won big on one of the battle mini games. Also @Dcubed helped by sabotaging @Glen-i again. Managed to end up second because of it.

That was both the most disgusting act @Dcubed and the most amazing. That actually got me joint 1st with @Glen-i for the second GP of the night

Got the Lego Mighty Bowser today from my wife and kids! Really happy about that, looking forward to assembling it. Might even let my oldest son help me out, he loves Lego and can spend hours assembling stuff. Using the iPad builder app, he can even do it alone now (he's 5).

Well, now the collection's worth purchasing. After they release their DLC pricing flowchart, of course.

Thanks for the games. There were some close races this week, a few technical issues, and more than a few projectiles thrown. Though we didn't have enough time for a fourth GP, the three GP's we did get to race, were pretty good. Here's a link to this week's stream... - - - - - N-Europe Get Together! (23/03/2023)

I felt a little disappointed when it disappeared up its own arse when it decided to become But I think it pulled it back. I'm a little disappointed with how they handled... I tried watching In From The Cold, but I just couldn't get into it. It starts off as an ex-Russian spy trying to have a new life, then gets pulled back in. Seems standard, then it's revealed and I couldn't take it seriously after that. Finished re-watching iZombie. Still recommend it to you all! Rose McIver is such a versatile actress.

Wave 4 arrives 5th of April.

Game Boy poster set is available: Yep, they look lovely

Just finished this week's episode of Mando S3... Anyways, solid episode, even if it's probably the weakest of the season so far for me. I don't need every episode to be the same length, but going from nearly an hour episode last week to just a half hour episode this week really emphasised this episode's pacing feeling a bit hectic by comparison – I don't think there's been an episode on the 30 - 35 minutes range of live-action Star Wars that I've really loved so far (could be forgetting one I guess), and I really do think that's down to how those episodes end up feeling a bit clunky in terms of pacing because of potential cutting room floor casualties. Oh well, again, still solid – looking forward to next week's episode!

Tbf, yes the Mando/Ahsoka footage leaked from last year but most of it seemed to be taken down pretty quick, a couple vids of half the screen were on reddit in terrible quality but otherwise it's actually quite hard to find a good copy nowadays. Playing devil's advocate if you show thousands of people on the whole convention floor there's a lot greater chance the footage will get spread around. But I totally get what you're saying, it's pretty bad. Now that I'm 100% on board with you. I don't think it's been 100% confirmed no panels at all will be streamed, so wait and see, but yeah. The panels that don't necessarily share any big news, just put them up ffs. Even if they wait until after the show or something. We'll see, but yeah. They might argue they want to reward convention goers but if you asked anyone there whether they minded the panels being streamed I think most would say they would love them to be. The lotto makes sense I think. Tbh I'd rather that than queue 4 or 5 hours beforehand. I actually think the panel stuff is organised well given the difficult situation of literally everyone wanting to get into the big ones, it's just Lucasfilm's handling of people outside the rooms (and at home) that stings. This was my favourite purchase from Anaheim, a massive print of this beauty, signed by the artist. It was like £100 but worth it. Even with Pearce Brosnan as Thrawn lol It's funny you say that because that's exactly what happened, this morning reports saying Lindelof and his co-writer have left the 2024 project back in mid Feb. Siiiiiiigh. Apparently the production timeline is set to be the same, and LF got someone else in already, but yeah. I thought his interview comments you mention sounded really strange. Now we know why. I still think we'll see some film news at Celebration but it's so frustrating to say the least. I reckon... Ahsoka trailer, Skeleton Crew trailer, maybe a new series announcement, film news and an Indy trailer. Yeah should be good. Seems to have been in production a while, might be another Andor on our hands. Also, apparently the directors behind Everything Everywhere All At Once are set to direct at least one ep of Skeleton Crew, so that's exciting. Edit: just been confirmed from the horse's mouth Be interesting if with two, presumably big, eps of Mando still to release, they'll want to pull focus away from that with a publicly released Ahsoka trailer. I could see them waiting until after the last ep of Mando before putting it online, but we'll see. Yeah exactly. Fingers crossed, but it seems like great casting. I just hope the on-screen portrayals of the characters are right. Both her and Ezra are big personalities, I hope they don't try and tone those down and make it stiff and stoic. Yeah they have, Ashley was invited on set for the Ahsoka show. S1 was very cameo/legacy character-heavy (Kanan, Cut Lawquane, Trace and Rafa, Rex, Fennic Shand, Cad Bane, Hera, Chopper, Bib Fortuna etc) and it kind of wound me up, S2 has much less of that and it's more focused on the Batch themselves. It hasn't branched out into the wider galaxy quite as much as you might like/be expecting, but I think that's to come in the future. I don't actually think this is the last season, but still hoping they confirm it soon. Resistance only lasted two years but they announced S2 would be its last before it aired, so hopefully that's a good sign here. Yes definitely catch up. It would have just finished by the time Celebration starts, so will be quite a talking point I imagine. Three of the opening four eps are a little meh, but it gets brilliant after that.

This is the part which really confuses me, and irked me just as much last year for those that attended as I'm sure it will this year if it repeats. The rooms have limited capacity and as far as conventions go, Celebration isn't exactly a cheap event to attend just in terms of ticket price (much less the transport, accomodation, etc.); off the top of my head, I can only imagine things like SDCC and NYCC maybe being pricier? To some extent I can understand not wanting to stream things to YouTube/etc. directly, especially if it's rough work which is more of a "this is the direction we're heading in and it's an early look for you guys attending, but we're not comfortable releasing this to the general public just yet" and comes out more as a preview than anything, but trailers are another thing entirely for me, and I can only think of one so far that was Celebration exclusive and made sense to not share (the Rogue One 15 second or whatever tease at SWC 2015). I can't wait for SWC but I just know it's going to be gutting when I inevitably can't get into the Lucasfilm or Ahsoka panel and miss a trailer or something that everyone will be talking about...and will almost certainly leak anyways! That's the bit that really puzzles me: you have to know that someone in the crowd is going to leak this stuff, so is this really the way you want people to get their first look? Where I really draw a hard line as a fan though is not being able to watch the panel itself and get some insight into whatever's going on with the creative process. To this day I still occasionally return to some SWC panels of old just because of the vibe and what's discussed, and it's really rare that we do get that insight into the creative process, even if they have finally taken the steps to have docuseries follow their major Disney+ releases. It's just such a shame I think: there should be things exclusive to the event itself (for me prior to COVID the idea of just being surrounded by that many Star Wars fans would have been reward enough!), but it practically adds two additional layers in the form of a paywall (to attend) and a lotto (to actually get into a high value panel), which just unnecessarily splits up the fanbase Anyways, mini rant over. I can't wait to attend and just be surrounded by Star Wars-loving folks but I wish we'd go back to the pre-COVID type of Celebration. Ah that'll be exciting! Yeah I'm sure I'll probably spend more on the show floor (trying to talk myself down from picking up a lightsaber, if I can find one...) but will definitely one to pick up some commemorative items I'll be honest, I'm nervous about getting film news, maybe just because it's been so long since we've had some? Plus we had all those collaborations just get very publicly canned, it felt like they were clearing the board as if to say "don't expect much at this Celebration" in terms of film news. On top of that actually, I remember there was a snippet from an interview somewhere last week where Lindelof kind of (really) heavily implied that he might be walking away from his Star Wars project, saying something to the effect of "I love Star Wars, but if a project can't be great, it shouldn't exist". So yeah, I'm honestly not sure what to expect in terms of film news? The fact that they're calling it the Lucasfilm Showcase again makes me think we're getting another Indy trailer or maybe even an extended preview for attendees, and maybe something else? Is it time for The Land Before Time to makes its triumphant return? It's funny how the necessary success of Disney+ has flipped the narrative and I'm much more confident about getting some news of some of the series in the works, like Skeleton Crew and The Acolyte. Oh man, I am *very* hopeful for The Acolyte Yeah, I think Ahsoka is going to go all out, because we're going to be fast approaching it's release I feel and it should be pretty deep in post- (probably releasing some time in Q3 if things go smoothly?). Ezra I do think gets brought out on stage here, and so in turn I think it's probably a trailer (publicly released I'm not so sure based on how they've done things with Mando, so looking forward to the leaks!) and a preview showing a little of his involvement to get people talking and (re)watching Rebels ahead of Ahsoka releasing. Sabine I agree they've nailed, there was a vibe to Natasha Liu Bordizzo last year where she kind of just seems like a badass anyways so I'm confident that's good casting. Yeah, Ahsoka is still a weird one for me, I thought Rosario Dawson did a fine job, but it does still rub me the wrong way a little that Ashley wasn't considered, and maybe even more so that Rosario didn't reach out to her to discuss the character/etc. Hopefully they've met up since! Well, sounds like I need to catch up! haven't watched any of S2 yet but the animated series (and, after last week's episode of Mando, possibly just anything Filoni is involved with) generally spin off a little in S3 or S4 to show new perspectives (which for me is when the shows really start to get good), and I do think The Bad Batch always seemed much more focused on following, well, The Batch, rather than showing other perspectives (obviously haven't watched S2 yet so idk, maybe they've dived into that a little already?). I might need to start catching up tonight so I'm caught up ahead of the finale next week

There should be a standby queue so worst case scenario you'll just have to get there super early and wait in line. Not expecting any of them to be live-streamed though, not even to convention-goers which is such a massive shame. They should probably be announcing the store products any day now. I'd suggest you'll definitely find better uses for your money on the show floor itself tbh, but the main store is still good for some SWC branded stuff and a few other bits. In terms of what we actually see, I'm getting hyped for that opening Showcase. I definitely think it's time for film news. Even if it's still 2+ years out, a teaser logo, a timeframe, a director and a lead would be great. Ahsoka panel, gotta imagine they'll bring out live action Ezra on stage. Sabine I get the impression they've nailed, but Ezra is such a big character I'm a little scared. Now I know what all the Ahsoka fans felt like before Rosario Dawson was announced ha. Last week's ep of Bad Batch centred on something that hinted at an endgame for the series/characters. It has me a little terrified S2 might be the last. Probably not, but still... I guess we'll find out soon.

They've really gone with some great designs this year, love the little speeder bike for the 40th anniversary of ROTJ too, neat little touch! Yeah, like I've said before, my expectations aren't particularly high when it comes to the lottery (such a shame that it comes down to a lotto system in the first place, even if it's functional for the logistics of an event of this size). I'll keep an eye out for alternative ways to get in, or line up, but I'd like to get into one of them through the lottery. Never tell me the odds, but yeah, they ain't going to be great! And that's alright, if I can find *some* way into just one of my top three priority lotto panels I'll see it as a success, but I'm probably collectively more excited for the Live Stage, some of the BTS panels, checking out the Store and just being surrounded by Star Wars fans for a change (and checking out a bunch of restaurants otherwise ). I just hope that things turn out better than they did last year in terms of getting trailers outside of the Stages (and I just mean being shown elsewhere for people attending, not even necessarily released online), but either way, I'm super excited Yeah, worst case I'm hoping things die down later afternoon and I can sneak in to pick up a few things. No idea what I'm looking out for at the Store and I'll try to not go *too* crazy, but as someone not too interested in the pins, hopefully if I can't get in with the reservation lotto I get a good chance to look around anyways. Can imagine the Funko stuff being in crazy demand though so definitely hoping the Force is with me on that front Some excellent tips – appreciate them! I'll add them to my notes (totally not freaking out about how unprepared I am or anything!)

The badge art is lovely this year. Last year was a bit meh, especially the 4 Day Adult one, I've no idea what they were thinking when they picked that design! Not got mine yet, not even shipped yet. I would go in with lower expectations with the lottery, I know a ton of people who had no success in Anaheim and the rooms had far more seats than the Excel, so we'll see. You're right though Kenobi should hopefully be a bit better odds since it was quietly added. The Celebration store was a funny one last year, everyone kept saying it was a nightmare to get into but they must have meant early in the day cause I just wandered in around 4 or 5pm a couple days in after about 2 minutes of queueing. Sure the daily pins I wanted were sold out by then but 95% of the store was still in stock. Portable power bank for your phone would be very useful if your phone battery is getting on. Some kind of poster tube/protectors too if they give any out at panels, though they sold those right next to where you pick them up. Comfortable shoes. If you want any autographs they have a bunch of prints and you pick which one you want signed, or bring your own. If they do the daily panel reservations, as many phones as you have like we talked about. Make sure to stop off at the droid room too. Snacks and drinks for the queuing. They revealed the Celebration live stage guest times, or at least a chunk of them, so have a look and maybe see who you'd like to listen to. They didn't do that last year and I randomly walked up to the stage seconds before Doug Chiang was brought out. Result!

@S.C.G Just my thoughts on it. It can be fun, but in my opinion, if you're just running around and not trying to attack then that isn't fun. If you're using the stage but getting in attacks too, then I think that's OK. But just running away and not trying to fight is where I think people start saying that's camping. So by all means use all the stage, that's what its there for, but remember its a fight too. Anyway I had to save this from last night as it was one of, if not the best thing I may have ever done to win a match.

I have to agree with @Ike. I can laugh off a lot of things in Smash. But having to deal with camping tactics is frustrating. It's why I never play with randoms. You see it all the time there, and I just want to trade blows. There are obviously times when legging it is the smart idea. (Someone got a Golden Hammer? Ain't no-one gonna suggest you take that person head on), but those situations only last a few seconds, making it a fun, yet, temporary dynamic switch. Sorry if this sounds like I'm piling on here. But just wanted to get my thoughts across.

I mean you going to the edge of the stage and jumping away when you are approached. Either someone has to run around after you out it becomes a 3v3, or that second player gets attacked. And yes, Hyrule Temple its not fun (for me) to watch Glenn chase you round like it’s Mario Kart night. Ultimately you lost anyway (iirc, I stopped watching). It’s just not during stamina week either. I wasn’t sure if it was a lack of confidence which is fair enough. But if that’s fun for you then who am I to tell you stop?

At least it’s something practical? Though you need to buy the collector edition to get the knife & fork for a complete set.

Stamina matches tonight at 8pm.

RPG Maker Fes - £3.99 Culdecept Revolt - £7.99 Etrian Odyssey Untold - £3.59 Etrian Odyssey 2 Untold - £3.49 Etrian Odyssey IV - £3.59 Persona Q - £3.59 Soul Hackers - £3.59 Devil Survivor 2 Record Breaker - £3.49 Stella Glow - £3.49 Runbow Pocket - £2.19

Nintendo eShop new releases (week 11) The eleventh week of releases. A selection of new titles are now available on the Nintendo Switch eShop. Check the article for the full roundup. - - - - - Also, cheers to @Josh64 for keeping the main page updated with news this week. It doesn't seem like there's been a lot of news over the past few days, but all the main articles are there, highlighting the latest NSO Game Trial, all of the recent NSO NES, SNES and Game Boy Updates for March 2023, and the Release Date for Dokapon Kingdom: Connect.

Heads up @Julius I'm sure you've applied for the Celebration lottery for the four big panels by now, but it seems they've quietly added a fifth. The 'look back at Kenobi' one, just in case you want to apply for that. Might help with under the counter panel ticket trading if you get into Kenobi but would prefer another one? PS: Bad Batch 2x13, another quality (beautiful looking) ep I adore this show.

Thanks for the games. Well, that's Mario Party 2 finished... ...Mario Party 3 when? Nintendo - "Some time this year... probably... when we feel like it..." OK... Here's a link to this week's stream... Mario Party 2 on the Nintendo Switch Online Expansion Pack - N-Europe Multiplayer (16/03/2023)

Mario Kartma thankfully hit @Dcubed like a ton of bricks after that.

Technically, I didn't remember it, so I'm still right.

Kirby's Dream Land 2 and Burger time Deluxe have been added to the Game Boy catalogue:

Side Pocket and Devious have been added to the Super SNES and NES catalogues, respectively!

So... who else has given the demo a go now? I gave it a quick playthrough on the Steam Deck... Outside of some Proton related graphical glitches it runs very well. And my main PC runs the game like a champ. The game itself though? Ehh... It's very much TLOU RE4 edition, and everything that goes with it. It controls like utter dogshit! Because it's a modern AAA game, it just has to use the right stick for moving the camera and the result is a mess. The camera doesn't follow the player whatsoever and will put absolutely no effort into framing the action for you, happily letting you run into the camera Crash Bandicoot style unless you constantly babysit it with the right stick. This worked ok-ish for RE2 Remake, because that game had a moderate pace and took place in small, cramped environments. With the much more action-heavy focus of RE4? And the wide, open environments like the Village shootout section? This combination is a disaster! I'm constantly finding myself running straight into the faces of enemies that I can't see! They've also greatly reduced the effectiveness of Leon's roundhouse kick. Its hitbox is tiny now and it's nowhere near as effective at crowd control as before... In general, your options for crowd control are hugely limited compared to the original game. The shotgun's area of effect is woefully limited and nowhere near as punchy as in the original game, while enemies are huge damage sponges who can happily take a pistol shot to the face and barely even stagger, often not even giving you the option to follow up with a kick! To make matters worse, they've greatly increased the number of enemies on screen and they've taken away almost all of the i-frames after you're grabbed, meaning that enemies will constantly Wombo Combo you... Oh! Speaking of which, that's clearly very intentional as the game has a very heavy emphasis on combo follow-up attacks where one enemy will grab you and the other will charge to attack you (some of them even being scripted one-hit-deaths!). I see this becoming very quickly infuriating when you're constantly being attacked by enemies that you can't even see! All the enemies having magic magnet hands with massive Plesioth sized hit boxes for grabs doesn't help either. Generally speaking, your guns feel pretty weak and nowhere near as satisfying to use as the original game (also, dismemberment is almost entierly gone now - including the iconic Leon Chainsaw Death from the original where he gets his head cut off... that's gone). Leon's movement also feels clumsy and not as responsive as the original game either. I can't even kick doors open anymore! I'm not impressed with how this game plays at all. There's also a rather nasty potential design flaw in place with the new knife durability system... It's entierly possible to softlock yourself completely. Should you run out of gun ammo and destroy your knife? You're totally screwed. If you end up in that situation and you're in an area where you have to kill enemies to procede? That's it, your save file is ruined, because you can't even kill enemies to get your ammo back. Now I did test this out in the demo and the game does have a pity system in place where it forces item drops to become gun ammo, but it's still absolutely possible to put yourself into an unwinnable state; and that's really not acceptable. Speaking of which, the idea of a knife durabity system runs entierly counter to many of the game's new mechanics anyway! You actually lose knife durabilty for carrying out stealth kills and for killing enemies with them with normal slashes, which makes no sense! You are actively punished for playing well! WTF!? This is a bad idea from a game design standpoint and it will lead to players actively avoiding using the knife (especially since knives now take up space in your attache case to boot!), while also allowing for nasty softlock situations. Finally, the level design is somewhat suspect in the demo... The initial house has been turned into a dungeon basement of sorts and navigation feels unintuitive and confusing. I found myself getting lost for an embarrasing amount of time as I couldn't find the stairs to go up and get out, I had no clue where I was going in a way that I never felt in the original game (or RE2 Remake for that matter); and it's not a good kind of lost either, the way out was just very poorly signposted as I kept running right past it. And I don't know if this is just for the demo, but pretty much the entire start of the game was cut up until the initial Village shootout section, outside of the first house; there's basically no room for exploration whatsoever. The original RE4 is definitely not this linear. As for the game's overall tone and narrative? It's strange in that it seems to want to keep some of the B-Movie esc cheese from the original, but also present itself as a super serious HBO drama. The game seems to want to have its cake and eat it, and I feel that it's not going to satisfy either camp that wants a Prestige TV drama nor those that want something true to the original. And this is just a pet peeve of mine, but I find it deeply unsatisfying that you don't even get to fight the first Ganados you encounter; he's entierly dispatched in a cutscene, and you miss the iconic realisation that he's a regular human and not a zombie... (This also has gameplay ramifications as you're not even given that chance to familarise yourself with the gun controls here before you get into a proper encounter!). Likewise, you don't even get to jump out of the first window either. Already the game's narrative changes rub me the wrong way, and I can already see myself lamenting the loss of the QTE sections that the original game was so famous for... Overall? I'm not happy with the demo... I think I'm either gonna give the game a miss, or I may wait until it's on deep discount.

Continues to look incredible: That lighting though! Oh, and The Mercenaries is coming, and a Special Demo is on its way soon too

i suspect unlike most of you, I haven't played this game in a long time. The Cube version is the only one I've ever played. That combined with my shit memory, and I'm all up for this remake. It looks great, and half the game will feel like new because of the tweaks of because I've forgotten stuff. Hmm. Just found out Ashley's face model is Dutch.

Tru dat

PC is an option.

The tone is still too serious for my liking, despite some one-liners still being in... but I have to admit that I'm impressed with what we've seen so far. The village shootout's level design is basically a 1-1 match for the original, and the Castle section is still in (though I suspect that it'll be heavily truncated), as is the Del Lago fight. I'm not happy about the addition of a crafting system (because of course it has a fucking crafting system, it's a modern game, it has to have the obligitory Minecraft ripoff), but I am happy to see that they haven't messed with the Tetris Attache case too much. The new parry system looks good though, and the idea of Leon parrying a chainsaw with a piddly little butter knife tickles me in all the right places That being said though? The guns look weak as shit compared to the original. I don't care if it's more realistic, I can tell just by the video footage that the gunplay is going to feel much worse than the original, never even mind the Wii Edition. I like the addition of more context-sensitive actions though, like the burnable cow and the wooden overpass being chopped down. That's the kind of stuff I want to see! I am still not convinced that most of the original game's content is going to survive the chopping block though. I cannot imagine a scenario where Capcom actually manage to recreate even half of the original game's content in this HD-era. The original game's scope is just far too big. Still. If there was anything that they were absolutely sure to not mess with, it was going to always be the initial village shootout section. Also. Everyone except for Lois & Hunnigan look weird. Edit: ALL CUTSCENE QTES ARE GONE! (wait... what the hell does this mean for the Krauser Knife Fight!? Surely that isn't getting cut right? RIGHT!?)

Happy birthday!

Looks nice, but I don't enjoy RE4 for the horror, so I'm super out. Why can't I just have a HD port with the Wii controls!?

Yes it is (AKA, the best one). Was first released on the Gamecube back in 2005.