Ashley

You can't (or shouldn't) criticise something you've not played. The review embargo dropped the day before release, by that point the sales were already processed. I'm not suggesting the next game will do poorly or anything, but there is a potential for reputational damage to take hold over time.

I could see this inevitably doing well simply because they've changed things up. However the blow back about the glitches seems bigger than previous games so there's a chance that narrative may break through. Maybe...

I think it's "you're open to explore the world in the manner of your choosing" rather than "the world is completely open" if that distinction makes sense. Because that's essentially what has changed in Pokémon with this iteration; it's gone from a designated path to one you can in theory do in any order (although obviously the leveling system guides you). I think you can still have an open world and have areas initially gated and also have areas that are loaded when required (either on the fly or "hidden" through transitions). In fact I seem to recall some analysis suggesting that's why Pokémon is so janky; most open world games load what is required and Pokémon loads everything at once into memory.

Wasn't suggesting it was. Arceus at least managed to justify its sparsity within it's narrative. I'll give them that.

Full disclosure, I've not played ScaVi (ViSca?) but seeing all the discourse it's got me wondering if the mainline series needs to take a bit more time with the next entry. They've become pretty much annual installments at this point and it reminded me of when Assassin's Creed admitted they needed to have a bit more of a gap and if I recall correctly set up two teams and alternated between them. I don't expect the games to ever look like the best games ever (I appreciate having nearly 1000 creatures to contend with will take up a lot of resource) but watching the DF video really does highlight poor textures and frame rate issues. Personally this feels more like rush than anything else. Yeah the series has never been amazing looking, but it seems more and more like they need to take a step back and try better. I know a common argument is "but the anime!" (Putting aside recent questions over it's future) but from what I've seen of the newest episodes they seem more like a "best of featuring Sw/Sh" rather than focusing on it so if they needed to I think a year or two of just Pokémon stories rather than retelling a game could work. Anyway, consider the floodgates open. What do you think?

Just read back what I wrote and God that was terrible grammar. You can tell I was distracted and writing on my phone. Anyway, yes it was a good set piece. And it was nice to go in worrying it may be difficult but I ended up doing it relatively easily.

Part way through the third world and just completed something I thought may be this (forgot the details, just knew it was world three) but it's not but thought I'd share anyway. As you can tell, I'm working my way through this very slowly

The London Eye is dangerously close to Westminster Bridge in London Loop. 0/10

Oh my

See I think the opposite; on the surface he's reasonably successful but he seems so uninspired - his job is monotonous, his daughter doesn't like him and he betrayed his best friend.

Really? I've found his character to be super annoying. Been rewatching some Fresh Off the Boat and it's such a shame Randall Park isn't given more to do in Blockbuster because he's good in that. But in terms of Netflix I've been watching Everything Calls for Salvation and finding it interesting so far as it digs into the weakness of mental health support. Might even give the book a go as Italian practice.

This is what I was referring to here

2020 did break us all in fairness.

And posted it's most important episode:

I'm sorry to hear this. Send her my best. Not sure if you're aware but it might be worth checking the Games Accessibility Database to find games that she may be able to play: https://accessiblegamesdatabase.com/

Well Elon Musk seems to be on the cusp of completely breaking his new toy with most of the staff having either quit or been fired by the petulant man child and reports that at the moment nobody can get into the building because the person in charge of badge access has left and the badges aren't working. So as another social media platform seems destined to fail why not talk about it? The good and the bad, the funny and the sad. I've been using it for over a decade now and it's the one I'm most active on but recently slowed that down and unfollowed a lot of accounts as I realised I just want to see what my friends are up to. It's so easy to delve into hatred on that site that I'm trying to back away from that (for example yesterday someone retweeted a video of a cyclist crossing a pelican crossing and a driver nearly hitting them and the replies contained a lot of blood lust). Plus it's gotten worse for pushing content I don't wish to see.

Just watched the GameXplain video review and it seems the main negatives come down to technical issues (including camera). Not exactly surprising and hopefully some will be fixed down the line, but just seems like another instance of Game Freak rushing things out too quickly.

I'll give it a try for sure, but yeah my habit tends to be long range. Typically use a spark on Luigi and get him to fire from long distance to do big damage.

I'm still barely started world 3 and think I've glitched it. Pushed a box off a ledge but can't now move it. Hoping going out of the area and back in will reset it but will try another time. I'm still enjoying it. The battle where you get Bowser was the first time I failed one and that is the only time I used that spark you mentioned (and realised it was not the right time for it). I've not actually used Rabbid Mario much as I'm not a close combat kind of person. Mostly been using the Peaches, Mario and Luigi. Maybe I should experiment more! Oh and it was only in the third world did I realise they were saying "dark mess". I just assumed it was darkness.

I saw a lot of Stray discussion at launch on Twitter, both from within the industry and without.

18th November marks ten years since the Wii U launched in America (30th November for Europe and 8th December for Japan) so I figured it would be a good opportunity to look back at what ended up being Nintendo's biggest home console miss, but also the bridge between the Wii and Switch. So let's discuss the good (the games), the bad (the sales and name) and the ugly (the GamePad). Did you get it at launch? Did you stick with it to its dying days? How do you think it changed Nintendo? Etc etc etc Also maybe I should update the description of this forum to remove Wii U

Well other than paying respect to the hundreds of people that worked on it 😋

makes sense

Not enough cats in my opinion. But an interesting array of styles and ideas. None I'll pick up but that's because I barely play games anymore.