Glen-i

Ys Origin is an action RPG developed by Nihon Falcom that originally released on the PC back in 2006, but only in Japan, the west got it 6 years later. But that's still sorta irrelevant, because I played the 2020 rerelease on the Switch. You play as either Yunica or Hugo (I went with Yunica) as they accompany various Knights of Ys to find two goddesses who have gone AWOL for some reason. Their search leads them to a ridculously massive tower chock full of demons. So it's up to Yunica and the rest of the Ys Knights (95% Yunica) to climb the tower and find the goddesses. The plot is simple and serves to just provide context for the gameplay, so not much else to say on that front. Thankfully, the game itself is quite fun. It's kinda like an isometric take on the Castlevania games (SOTN style ones). You have level ups, various things that expand your abilities and so on. It is a lot more linear, however. So linear, in fact, that the game doesn't have a map, and it doesn't feel frustrating. This is the only decent picture I could find online, and it's not even the Switch version! The bosses are definitely the star of the show here. Big, massive monstrosities (mostly) that are all about pattern recognition and feel very old school as a result. I had a lot of fun with them, even though the last few were real struggles. They certainly don't pull their punches. Anyway, I went into wrtiting this diary entry thinking that I could fill it up as I go, but there really isn't much to say about this. It doesn't break new ground, but it is solid. And that's fine by me.

I think that's precisely why they don't show the current price.

Most people would see the excessive amounts of dialogue as a negative, but me? I'm more intrigued by it. Helps that it seems rather lenient with how you have options to grind if you're struggling. (It's why I like Shining Force more then most Fire Emblems) And then there's the gorgeous visuals and the promising soundtrack. But I think the clincher for me is that it's part of Nintendo's game voucher system, which means I can use 2 of them on this and Kirby. So yeah, taking the plunge.

This might be of interest to you two. Current price is 54 Bells. No idea if this is promising or not, but I'll keep an eye out.

Fire Emblem sells, dude. There's a clear market for that kind of game.

Today is the last day to register for this month's legendary bird tournament. The actual battling begins tomorrow.

Yeah... Advance Wars is light years away from those two in terms of popularity, even without it's horrendous luck with world events. Hardly the same thing.

I'm not, I knew it'd be delayed as soon as Ukraine was invaded, especially given how AW1 starts. Speaking of, it's worth remembering that the original Advance Wars got a 3 month delay in Europe because the American release happened the day before 9/11. So let's wait a few months before panicking, eh?

Not for F-Zero GX. The key to winning that race is swerving.

That says that impression that people without the pass can still vote for the pass tracks as long as one person in the room has the pass. So, theme nights will still be doable, that's a relief.

Yeah, it's not great. The only thing I use it for is the Animal Crossing section, which is surprisingly useful.

Ah. But if she has 3 elementals ready, then she can use it three times in one chain attack! And with a bit of luck, she can summon more mid-chain, and then use more Talent Arts! It's such a shame that the AI is awful with her. She's one of, if not, the best damage dealer in the game, but she's tricky to use. By this point, everyone should have all of their arts, except for your latest character. So don't worry too much about it. Find what works. If you haven't already, it might be worth going back and checking out the shops in the various towns. You should be able to get some art manuals and unlock the level cap for them up to 7. That'll help. Here's some of my suggestions for great arts for each character. Reyn - Berserker is the only orange art he needs. It's seriously that good! I know the Physical Defense Down debuff it comes with seems counterintuitive to Reyn's role, but who cares when it makes him hit like a truck! They're tough to get, but if you have Debuff Resist Gems, you can sometimes cancel the debuff out by putting them on Reyn. I also recommend all of his red arts (Especially Sword Drive) except Dive Sobat, as well as Wild Down and Shield Bash. Sharla - All her healing skills should be there, as well as Head Shot, Thunder Bullet, and Metal Blast. The AI has an annoying habit of letting her rifle overheat all the time, which is not optimal. Dunban - Peerless is the best orange art for Dunban, no question. Gale Slash is an art that combos into a lot of other arts, which should also be equipped. But make sure you leave room for Soaring Tempest. Binding Blossom is also worth considering. Dunban is all about Agility, so keep his armour light and his weight stat low, and shove Agility Up gems on to him to try and get the extra 50 if you can. Riki - Heropon Riki is a bit of a Jack-of-all-trades. He can fit into any party pretty well. You Can Do It should always be equipped. It's the reason why Sharla becomes a bit unnecessary. It's really good. Other then that, Riki is all about stacking debuffs that cause damage over time. Bitey Bitey, Lurgy, Burninate, and Freezinate should all be there to really pile on the damage. Hero Time is the Orange Art I recommend. It boosts a random stat by a large amount, but also prevents low tension to everyone while in effect. This pairs well with Happy Happy to boost the Chain Attack guage quickly. Melia - Keep in mind that this kind of setup only really works well if you're controlling her. Summon Ice, Bolt, Flare, Earth and Copy should be there. All of them are great, especially Earth, which reduces the damage everyone around Melia takes. Ice, Flare, and Earth also cause damaging debuffs when discharged, which is how Melia becomes a veritable force of nature. Mind Blast is another very useful art, and the last two should be the amazing combo of Spear Break and Starlight Kick.

@BowserBasher does.

Ouch, @darksnowman. Don't want to think about going through the game without chaining colours! Speaking of, Talent Arts (Gray) act as a sort of wildcard in Chain Attacks, so you can use them to keep a chain going if you start to run low on a certain colour. With some forward thinking, you can even have a Break-Topple combo while keeping the bonus. Best of both worlds! This is mainly why Sharla lags behind in the mid-game, she can't use Cool Off in a Chain Attack, so she can't keep a chain going. Still, considering that you're still facing roadblocks from bosses despite getting extra skill trees, perhaps you're overlooking another mechanic? Here's a few things that I find most people overlook with this game. - You are leveling up arts, right? And while I'm at it, keep in mind that everyone except Shulk learns more then 8 arts as they level up. It might be worth looking at some different options. - Skills are great and all, but to really get the most out of it, you should be using Skill Links, which let you use Affinity Coins to give characters skills from other characters. That character you just got has various skills that are absolutely amazing on Dunban if you have unlocked Critical Drain for him, which heals him every time he lands a critical hit, which is quite often. That skill is pretty useful on Shulk too. Consider linking skills that improve your chances of critical as well as Critical Drain if you can.

Pure, side splitting laughter on that last match! My stomach hurts a bit now. Wario and Link is one dangerous mixture!

I visit his house once a week to sponge off his not-crap internet connection. I've got better things to do, like play Pokémon online.

He only just woke up.

Stock matches tonight at 8pm.

Rolling Western is purely about the Tower Defense aspect. The Last Ranger is a direct sequel that has more of the same but with some new mechanics to spice things up. Dead Heat Breakers, on the other hand, is a separate game (plot makes no reference to the eShop games) that comprises of two parts, the Tower Defense sections where you control Dillon, and the preparation section where you control the Mii, mostly. The Tower Defense sections are mostly what you'd expect. Rolling Dillon around to lay the smack down on enemies, while building gun towers to help cover the places you might not be able to get to. The preparation section is where you play various minigames to raise funds to make the Tower Defense sections easier for yourself. One of these minigames is the racing aspect you saw. Although, the racing mechanics do come into play during the Tower Defense sections. I think they're a lot of fun. Dead Heat Breakers is probably the one I'd recommend for newcomers, simply because it's the easiest one. The two eShop entries pull no punches. It also helps that Dead Heat Breakers clearly had a higher budget due to it being a retail game.

Oh wow! The angle of my comment there really sells the picture. The flavour of Kyoshi... Mild language and general rudeness. Sounds about right. A couple of pictures from me.

I guarantee James Turner designed Rillaboom at least. Or at least suggested the concept.

That infamous Cadbury's advert seems like the obvious inspiration for Rillaboom. At least in my eyes, it can't be anything else.

You trying to say that visually speaking, Sun and Moon didn't look better then X and Y? Because it's kinda obvious when you look at the two side by side. Of course, the downside to having such high fidelity models was that the 3DS couldn't handle it, and the frame rate chugged frequently in battles. So naturally, we could assume that once the jump to HD happened, that frame rate issue would clear up. And it did. Sword and Shield runs at a very consistent frame rate, and the Pokémon themselves still have really great looking models. The problem Sword and Shield ran into is that something went seriously wrong in that transfer progress. A lot of the models just flat out broke, so all that time that could've been saved by having older Pokémon be ready to go was spent salvaging just over 300 of them. Mega Evolutions were scrapped to save more time and the game ended up being quite truncated as far as the actual region itself was. Of course this would've been helped with a delay, but welp, TPC gotta keep that merch train chugging. The thing is, Sword and Shield still went on to become the second most successful entry in the series. Personally, I think that the Switch Effect is what saved that game, but I have no way to prove that. But it did kind of set a precedent of mainline games not needing to have a complete National Dex. You see this with the Diamond and Pearl remakes which don't even attempt to throw in a few Pokémon that were introduced after the original games, and Legends: Arceus with it's absolutely miniscule number of Pokémon you can catch. But I'll tell you one thing for sure, the battle system still is exemplary! It's got a low skill floor for young children and people who just want to go on a trip with their Pokémon, but a sky-high skill ceiling for those who want to dig into the very deep mechanics of team building and more competitive play. If it ain't broke, don't fix it. And if it ain't broke, certainly don't start stripping away parts in an attempt to simplify it, because then you get Let's Go and Legends: Arceus, which have poor interpretations of the battle system which don't reward forward planning and actively encourage people to avoid battles if possible. This is why I couldn't finish either, I just wasn't getting anything out of the battles, and they're my favourite part of the game. First of all, I never buy both versions, because anyone who buys two versions for one person is stupid. And the majority of people agree. Anyway, as for what I expect? Dynamax will be ditched, it's a fun idea in theory, but it just became too decisive in battles. It'll be replaced by whatever silly idea they come up with next. Whether it'll be awesome (Megas) or kinda meh (Z-Moves) remains to be seen. Now, we've already had confirmation that Scarlet and Violet are moving to be open-world, which worries the bejeezus out of me. I've played a handful of them now, and none of them felt like it benefitted from having such a humongous place to run around in. Legends: Arceus is already far too big (I swear the Mt. Coronet area alone is bigger then the entirety of Sinnoh!), so ideally, I'd like it to be much smaller, so that some actual good level design can be in there, but that's never happening. Open-world games are far too obsessed with being huge. Which brings me to you asking me what needs to be fixed from Sword and Shield. Well, originally, I would've said the visuals outside of battle, but I'll tell you one thing, if this region is as huge as most of you want it to be, that's not happening. Most of the effort is going to be spent making big empty fields to plonk Pokémon in and the visuals are going to take a hit as a result. It's not all doom and gloom though, there are a few things from Legends: Arceus that I hope show up here. The seamless transition into battle is very nice and I expect that to stick around. Sword and Shield did actually have some of these, but they were reserved for Gym Leaders. I want that on a wider scale. What I don't want is catching hundreds Pokémon by just chucking a ball at them in real time. It's far too effective, and ended up making battles completely pointless. Why bother training a team up when you can just sneak up to a level 80 Infernape and lob an Ultra Ball at it's back? Make me earn each Pokémon by proving that I can handle it in the first place. Speaking of, I hope they ditch Research Tasks, it's another neat idea in theory, but it gets so grindy. I'm scared this one will stick around and I don't want to have catch 20 Magikarp so I can read the Dex entry. Once is enough, and I don't want mechanics that encourage people to catch the same Pokémon over and over. It's boring. If the game has to implement a "Mass release" feature to not be unbearable, that game is doing it wrong. Actually, now that I think about it, there's not a lot from Legends: Arceus I want to see. Honestly, if they leave the battle system from Sword/Shield relatively untouched, then it might be enough for me to plod through the open world chaff so I can get some good competitive battling in there. That might salvage it in my eyes. Or add Battle Frontier back in. That would be great.

Legends Arceus has a really basic interpretation of the EV stuff. Just shove Grit items into everything and it boosts the stat of whatever you use it on. It's really dumbed down, as you can just max out every stat with no thought about what you should prioritise for each Pokémon's strengths.

Well, Grit Pebbles are stupid useful for getting EV's and Star Pieces are just vendor trash to get more money. @bob, I bought it digitally. And even so, I'll need it for transferring the new Pokémon to maintain my National Dex completion.