Glen-i

Countdowns started! 17 minutes to go! EDIT: And it's gone. South Africa disappeared for a moment but now it's back and the countdown is back to 19 minutes.

I genuinely felt it was weird no-one suggested Advance Wars yet. It's like a bloody tradition at this point. Anyway, less than 3 hours to go now!

Another new world from me. This one is full of autoscroll shenanigans! You must have JavaScript enabled on your device to view Miiverse posts that have been embedded in a website. View post in Miiverse Just like always, there's a hidden 1-up in each level. Oh, and in case anyone asks about 7-4's name... Yes, that was intentional. Yes, it's immature. No, I'm not even remotely sorry for it.

They tend to include a few extra features, which normally end up being the best things that Gen offers. An extra storyline revolving around the cover Pokemon usually gets added. One of the most famous additions was 3rd Gen's Battle Frontier, a ridiculously massive place that had 7 different ways to battle against Computer AI. Standard rules, Tournament Knockouts, Dungeon Exploring, Rental Pokemon and even an infuriating yet hilarious mode where you test your luck by choosing a path and hoping you don't have a negative status effect planted on you. It was so well-liked that when people found out it wasn't in the 3DS remake, there was quite the uproar. And rightly so, it was the icing on the lazy cake of OR/AS. Of course, Black/White bucked this trend a little by instead, releasing a sequel with a completely different storyline taking place after B/W. And it's probably my favourite mainline game due to the sheer amount of content it offers. Makes X/Y look a bit sad in comparison.

Not if you don't like Pokemon! The game I'm looking forward to hearing about is Pokemon Super Mystery Dungeon. Problem is, I've gone on blackout on that, so I would just want to hear an exact European date.

Well yeah, but it was a pretty far-out plan to begin with. My take on the whole "Now I'm a boat" thing is that the boat is an inanimate object that the King posesses. Which is why I think it's eyes are closed during the ending. It was a unnerving small little detail that I love. Either way, he's still cool and has a fantastic laugh. And I like how he still refuses to actually walk in this game.

I assume you just mean Rocky? I don't think there was a Rocky 2 on Gamecube. I mean, in what universe would that particular game ever get re-released on VC? As far as I'm aware, that studio has been shut down for a while, not to mention the obvious copyright hurdles. That's such a bizarre request. It hurts my head just thinking about it!

EDIT: Ah! There is a Red Link one! Great! Now we can start a dungeon! This would actually be far more exciting than Banjo. Mostly because Playtonic is old Rare. Also, I might be a little biased towards Chameleons. ARRGH! Don't do this to me!

Well, that voice is hilarious! And I very much approve of spinny sail! Daphnes always was an odd character in Wind Waker. Your Kingdom gets flooded and you need to find the descendant of a legendary hero to fight against the King of Evil. But you need a disguise... Why, of course! That's sensible!

10pm, tomorrow. Literally right there in the thread title.

Playtonic showed off another supporting character. Say hello to Rextro Sixtyfourus. No, this is a high quality pic, he does actually look like that. I love that he has scanlines, such a lovely touch!

I know, I'm just messing with you. Just like how I look for any excuse to mention Grumpig. (Oh look, I did it again) The wait until January is killing me though! I'm on blackout, especially since it's out in America very soon. Screw Pokemon Z, this is the Pokemon game I want now. Ah, I forgot about the music. That can make or break a theme. I've heard next to none of the soundtrack, on purpose of course.

You must have JavaScript enabled on your device to view Miiverse posts that have been embedded in a website. View post in Miiverse It only took a month, but my World 6 is finally up! There's a bit of a theme with this one, combining 2 enemies to make things a tad more dangerous. Just like all my previous levels, there's a hidden 1-up Mushroom in each level. 6-3's 1-up is one I'm particularly proud of.

Awww... That's cute. To live in such hope. Such hilarious, misguided hope. Tell you what, pay Microsoft a ridiculous sum of money, then you'll get what you want.

Claims to not like Pokemon Mystery Dungeon, but has a Pokemon Mystery Dungeon theme... Hmmmm... The other PMD theme is better though.

Couldn't resist. No hard feelings, Wii. I know you're reading.

How did I know you'd have something to say? It always seems to happen whenever I play an RPG that was on a Playstation console. Don't ever stop, I like a bit of debate. You mean this? Fun fact: Half of the stuff here doesn't even happen in the game! Yes, I chose the English one, because it's the one I saw and the one N-Europe is most likely to see. Yeah, it's a great song. But it kind of hypes up the soundtrack to be a lot more than it actually is. The rest of the OST doesn't even stand a chance after that and it leaves a kind of forgettable taste in my mouth. The quality of the song hurts the actual games soundtrack more than it helps it. That sounds weird, but maybe you'll get what I'm trying to get at. Granted, it's a really great opening and I probably should have mentioned it.

Geez, how many people am I gonna have to shotgun on Thursday? Bullets are expensive, you know? I'll be shocked and amazed if Cube VC happens on WiiU. I was just about to say this myself.

You're gonna need a coach to Dover then... Is what I would like to say, but those are actually quite reasonable at the moment. Listen to me! Remember when anyone claiming Mother 3 getting an English localisation would get laughed off of the internet? Those were the days. Wait... no they weren't...

I'll be around with a shotgun later.

That was debunked as soon as Ninty announced there'll be no news on NX or mobile. Miitomo is mobile.

I'm gonna nominate you for the "Best lame excuse to play a game" award! Recently, I replayed Tales of the Abyss on the 3DS. For those not in the know, Tales of the Abyss is an action RPG in the long running "Tales of" Series that Namco own. This particular one is a port of the PS2 game, which never came out over here. The game revolves around some bloke called Luke, a noble who spends his days wasting his time stuck at home because he got kidnapped 7 years ago and his parents are too scared to let him out. The only time he ever has any excitement is when his Sword mentor, Van, comes to help him train. During one of these training sessions, a woman tries to assassinate Van and when Luke intervenes, the woman and Luke get teleported off to some valley far, far, away. The story is pretty good really, with a good cast that are voiced particularly well for the most part. And considering this was a game that came out in 2005 originally, that's quite impressive. The only main character I have issues with is the actual main character, Luke, who develops from a whiny, punchable little git into a mopey, punchable little git. He's right up there in my "worst RPG protagonist" list. He's gonna need that Free Run when Tear snaps and tries to knife him. Luckily, the other characters are genuinely interesting. But the true star of the show is Jade. A mid-30's colonel with a hilariously sarky sense of humour. Also, he has a very awesome belt! (Go on, click that link, it's timestamped!) It's helped further by having a good voice actor as well. And naturally, he's the most useful character in the game! IN-DIG-NAY-SHUN! Enough of that, on to the gameplay. It's your typical RPG fare, run around a gigantic world and fight stuff to level up, etc. But the thing that differentiates the "Tales" series are the battles. As you might have guessed from the video above, battles are done in real time, with you controlling one of the party members and engaging the enemy using a combination of attacks and special artes. I do really like this system, as it encourages good use of placement and co-ordination with team members, as with good timing, you can lock enemies in a stagger and really lay on a combo of pain. You can also give commands to your teammates to use one of their skills in times of trouble. It's genuinely fun and feels more like a fighting game than an RPG. But unfortunately, the gameplay outside of the battles is pretty basic and has a tendency to be interrupted by cutscenes, especially near the end of the game. Of course, if Jade's around, this isn't a problem. But otherwise, it might be annoying to the impatient players out there. Being a 3DS port of a PS2 game, the loading times are much better then the disc-based PS2 version, there's also a more stable frame rate, although it dips a little on the World Map sometimes. However, there is no multiplayer co-op feature like the PS2 game had, but good luck finding someone with this game anyway, so it's not a big deal breaker. Other than that and a few tiny gameplay tweaks, it's a straight port. Visuals are nice, they've aged better than most PS2 games due to adopting a kind of cel-shading style. The 3DS version naturally has stereoscopic 3D effects, but they're pretty average and don't really add much to the game. Music is nice too, nothing truly memorable, but nothing painful either. The 3DS has a few RPG's and this certainly isn't a bad one. But if you've ever tried a "Tales of" game and didn't enjoy it, this isn't going to change your mind. (You play one "Tales of" game and you've pretty much played them all.) If you haven't tried it and like action RPG's, you should give it a go, I'm sure you could find it for cheap these days. ...Or maybe not... And with that...

Oh! There it is, the date for the announcement of the next Smash character! Don't try and deny it, we all know it's gonna happen. EDIT: My hopes are on Shovel Knight! My money is not though. My dreams would be this situation! With added Dillon of course.

That vulgar language...

Was someone putting Melia as an AI party member? Because apart from her, all the characters do their job perfectly fine. It depends on what moves you give them. But yeah, if you're not liking the game, chances are that you won't like this.