Julius

Game has gone gold: Launch trailer dropped yesterday: The way things are going, I could easily see the review scores being posted bringing an end to this thread Absolutely. Especially when you consider it's also one of few first-party games with a date, you'd think it'd be getting pushed so much harder than it has been, for example previews and hands-on time with a game like this is the clear call to make...and yet we haven't had either? And no demo? I'd be lying if I said deep down I didn't hope that this was because of a pivot around GaaS now that Jim Ryan is leaving, because the double blow of sending this thing out to die and Naughty Dog not going ahead with Factions would then make so much more sense. It would be a shame though, a waste of talent to sink this much time into a project and not back it as much as you can. Time will tell, I guess feels like it's set up to be Destruction AllStars 2.0 – and didn't that also release in Feb? Weird.

I'm just patiently waiting, ya know, reeeeeeeeeally patiently... ...nah, who am I kidding, let's gooooooooo I will say, I do think the barrage of new releases we're about to walk into is keeping my hype somewhat in check, as I'm forcing myself to hold off on a lot of next month's releases besides Rebirth. I selfishly hope they aren't silly enough to drop it on the game's anniversary towards the end of next month, but I also hope that that's exactly what they do Really curious to see just how big this DLC has got as well as how it's priced, as releasing DLC after nearly two years of near radio silence and a year after it was announced is insane, to the point I'll be shocked if it's not at least some 20-30 hours? Especially for the type of game it is... But yeah, patiently waiting. I'll take whatever we get, even if it's only two hours of Ranni talking to us about the weather

Welp, just went to start this tonight seeing as I was going to go through the PS4 version, and my cloud save from completing the PS4 version of the game has failed me, with my most recent auto- and manual saves being 25 hours into my time with the game...6 hours behind where I finished, so a good Act and a fair chunk has gone missing. No NG+ options available because, well, apparently I never finished the game Oh well, bit of a shame but think I'll just wait until Friday to upgrade to Remastered, play through it for the first time again (maybe at a higher difficulty this time?), play No Return, and then see where I'm at and if I'm up for going for the Platinum and/or a Grounded playthrough after On the upside, it means I have some time to sort out my PS5's storage and to play a shorter game in the meantime

Not quite the AC7 I was hoping to hear about next, if I'm being honest still, a nice reminder that I need to get around to this at some point, as I've seen a lot of recommendations to jump into Ace Combat from fans of Armored Core VI! Interesting that there's no word on AC5's remaster/port/whatever it was being bundled in with this like it was with the early copies of AC7 and one of the deluxe edition variants, guess that ship has truly sailed, what an odd one

Wrapped up my first game of the year last night... Chrono Trigger | 1995 I talked about Chrono Trigger extensively the last time I played it back at the start of 2020, and long story short, well, reading it back I agree with everything I wrote back then, so I guess if you want a long, thought out write-up from me on the game, it's already out there Instead, I want to spend this time highlighting the little things I picked up on that I didn't really speak to last time. This time around I played the game on TV for the first time via my docked Steam Deck, which was a transformative experience for the most part. Hearing those themes blast out of my TV and not needing to look down at a small DS or 3DS screen felt much more appropriate for a game of this scale and grandeur. There were a few minor hiccups throughout, with things like audio issues and getting stuck on the geometry of the pixel art happening one too many times to go unspoken about, but it in no way became an obstacle to my enjoyment. There are small tweaks to minor issues like those, though, which I'd like to see for an eventual - I hope - release on current platforms...perhaps in time for the 30th anniversary of the game next year? To dive right in, one of the crowning achievements of Chrono Trigger is its brevity - playing through to the normal ending with all sidequests completed took me a bit shy of 19 hours - in a genre known for getting carried away and stacking hour after hour to your playtime, and what really struck me on this playthrough is just how brief every type of interaction in the game is. Combat is fast and reactive, even on this playthrough using Wait rather than Active (just to see if it changed how I got on with it) it was going along at a much faster clip than many of its modern contemporaries; dungeons and the like are incredibly short and easy to navigate, just a few screens save for some late game areas, and you're often in and out in the course of 15-20 minutes, with a major story beat has typically playing out in that time; and it's very rare that you spend longer than 30 seconds at a time on the World Map screen between locales, which has you consistently moving from one beat to the next. Conversations and quick talks with random NPCs aren't long and meaningless button-mashing sessions, with such interactions kept lean and often to limited to three or less text boxes, but they often add so much value to the game, whether it be something to ponder over, chuckle about, or pointing you in the right direction - which is exactly what I want to talk about next. A whole lot of this game's brilliance is down to how much faith and trust it places in the player, but also how it balances with not being afraid of telling you the fastest route from A to B. One of the best examples of this is that there are numerous times throughout the game where an NPC will clue you in on an enemy or boss weakness or nuance ahead of going into their respective dungeon, with one of the best examples of this being an NPC in the Middle Ages hinting that the wooden hammer-wielding Ogan in the Denadoro Mountains are cowards without their weapons, a very direct and obvious suggestion to use a Fire-based attack. Fights against the hammer-wielding variants of Ogan could take a while without this knowledge, as their hammer offers extra resistance to attacks, and this information is gained simply by following the typical general advice in a JRPG - especially of the time - to talk to anyone and everyone you come across, and an additional hint in case you come across these enemies without talking to that NPC is that there are also Ogan you'll encounter without the hammer, clearly nudging you in the direction of needing to wanting to do something about their big and brutish splintered mallets. This in turn reinforces the need to talk to anyone and everyone - similar to Dragon Quest's excellent job of getting you to ransack every place you come across in the search for items, because valuable ones are out there to be found - which in turns leads to interesting side tangents, humourous moments, little details about the world, and you're usual NPC-talking affair, but the key difference being the efficiency with which it is conveyed. This level of trust but also direct communication throughout the game about what and when you need to do something shaves valuable time off the game, I think, saving players from dragged out sessions; I genuinely think this game would be 5-10 hours longer if they took a similar approach to other games of that period, which either wanted you to rely on a guide or to simply try things out in an aimless manner. This also carries through to boss fights, where there can often be a lot of moving parts, but weaknesses and what the game wants you to do often feels very clear even against the tougher bosses - and if you do find yourself trying things out, the game very quickly corrects your course in a fast and heavy-handed way, such as by having that part of a boss immediately counter or by hinting at the order you should take parts of the boss out in by clearly telegraphing that this hand heals, or that leaving both hands of the boss around can result in disaster. The developers clearly and simply didn't care if you found the game easy, because you'd earned the knowledge required to push ahead, and its in this way that they respect your time and that, in turn, Chrono Trigger gains your respect. There is a sense of humility on show by some of Japan's best and brightest creators of the 20th century which I think few other games and creatives dare to even consider matching. The side quests - the main ones of which are left to the end of the game, with each party member getting a sizeable focus - are absolutely brilliant, too. Why should you deviate from the main path so close to the end of the game to complete these quests? Why, for important character moments and progression, and some of the best gear in the game, of course! It's yet another way in which your time is being respected, and its in all of these little ways that there are these constant value-adds throughout the game: you're rewarded, in some form or another, by doing as much as you can, without it ever becoming a slog. And then, well, there's just the usual stuff to praise which I talked about last time. Awesome ensemble of characters. Arguably the greatest soundtrack ever composed for a game (and if not, it is firmly in the conversation, and spawned the career of a legendary composer still active in the industry today, nearly 30 years later). A combat system with appropriate depth should you want to dive in, but it's totally optional, as no particular trio of characters or set of gear feels like it's ever going to hold you back. A tear-jerking, chills-inducing story with an amazing message just as important today as it was back when the game launched, and will be decades from now when I'm on my 20th playthrough, and beyond when I'm long gone. There is simply a peace and tranquility offered to the handling of heavier topics in this game, such as the idea of death and the passing of time, which this game bestows that no other game, or film, or book I've ever come across has been able to communicate, in the kindest but most honest, communicative and understanding matter-of-fact way; almost as if a parent speaking to a child. I'm so glad I revisited Chrono Trigger to remind myself that, yes, everything that I remembered about it and more holds true: this game is a timeless, and always timely-to-experience, masterpiece - far and long ahead of its time - in every sense of the word.

There's a Golden Saucer snow globe (or "glitter globe) exclusive to the S-E Store, to be purchased with points only: I've never wanted a snow globe before now, but this looks awesome

Shouldn't the question really be why you're up at 04:30 in the morning to see me telling you this?

A reminder (as if you needed it) that the games get added to NSO today!

This is pretty huge for the channel involved and super interesting for Atlus to provide such access I feel, but Archipel have just announced that they'll be putting out a documentary on the game: For those who haven't heard of them, Archipel is an awesome channel focusing on Japanese artists and storytellers across all mediums. Particular highlights for me from a gaming POV are their interview with Yoshi-P on XIV, Yoshitaka Amano, talking to Akira Yasuda about Chun-Li and there are a slew of others well worth checking out too (Soejima and Hashino for Persona 5, Yoko Taro, Mikami, Nagoshi!). Super excited to see how this turns out

Launch trailer: Can't say I'm interested right now, and what a month to choose to launch!

Yes, and I remember doing the exact same Maybe games are bad for kids after all...

This release has a dedicated PS Blog entry where they sit down and talk to some of the folks from Aspyr: Some of the stuff they're adding is kind of nuts? This release has a Photo Mode. That's wild! I've just seen in the Blog entry that there are over 200 trophies to earn across the three games which seem, eh, pretty excessive... Really curious to see how this one shakes out, got a lot of great early memories spent in the early parts of these games

We've got the final round of previews: And an interview: Crazy to me how quietly the run-in to this game seems to be going, and because of this I expect the conversation at launch to be relatively short but positive as other games come into focus on the horizon, but I guess that's simply the price you pay when you release when they've chosen

Features trailer: Still remember being blown away by the accessibility stuff in 2020, kind of nuts (in the best way) that they continue to push that so hard. But, man, I completely forgot about the commentary mode...DAMN IT. Think I need to start flipping coins to decide what I'm doing here, I really don't want to end up playing this through 3 or 4 times, but hopefully the exhaustion I feel after the first go through gets me to slow down Also, I know Remastered has its own director so it makes sense they'd talk over it, but it's interesting to me that Neil didn't provide the VO for this one, considering how front and centre he felt for Part II back in 2020 and for HBO's TLOU, too. Don't want to read into it too much but I hope that means he's really, really busy working on whatever's next. Anyways, unsurprisingly it's being well received in its reviews, seems like No Return isn't anything groundbreaking but is a solid roguelike in its own right. Still waiting on the DF breakdown of the improved performance here after re-watching the free PS5 performance patch from a few years ago (which, idk, to me renders the existence of this whole thing downright questionable), so the closest we've got for now: EDIT: never mind, they just wanted to be casually late, apparently! DF's breakdown:

Sure, I totally agree, and I said something similar when we talked about it underperforming last year. If we're going purely by sales volume? Great result. 3 million of any non-Nintendo-developed, relatively niche genre, console exclusive game sold is objectively good if we're only going to be talking units sold. If we're going by actual business expectations, factoring in revenue, profits, and the full nine yards? I'm seriously unsure why Ubisoft thought a higher budget game with a longer dev cycle which saw it's predecessor reap the benefits of featuring Mario right at the start of a new console's life and which very much also reaped the benefits of said heavy discounts would do anything but underperform. Keep your damn expectations in check, Yves. It's ridiculous. I think you probably get at least 1.5x, if not 2x, those sales, with a smaller proportion sold at a discount, if you just wait the extra couple of years to launch with the Switch 2 – I get that there's more to how to optimise a release when you consider overhead and such to keep things toeing the line and to not elongate dev time thus stretching out costs, but they sent this thing out to die, and then had the gall to pin it on the developers. But, I mean, Ubisoft being a mess – what else is new?

Wasn't really sure where to put this, but considering his videos have been dropped in here a few times, thought I'd share Happy Console Gamer's video on turning 50 and his thoughts on still gaming at that age: I think it's awesome. I really do think insight and the sharing of experiences is so valuable for the growth and continuation of any medium (I mean, it also just is in general), so while it's sad that he highlights that he knows a lot of people who dropped gaming before reaching a certain age (for a number of reasons), I think it's great that he's still going strong experiencing his passion. I still remember when I started checking out HCG probably a little while before I started posting here on N-E and his excitement for games like Shenmue (well, his and Michael Huber's ) really just gripped me. Ultimately that passing on of experiences is invaluable because I feel it really helps form a suitable lens for people my age and younger to go check out older games for the first time, which in its own way, I'd argue, is just as important for video game preservation as the release, documentation and availability of those older games. This is not even to mention the potential cognitive benefits I can imagine a healthy relationship with gaming could bring. Anyways, this all just reminds me I'll be keeping the idea of Final Fantasy XIV private servers in my back pocket until I make it to the retirement home

So, this time last year Ubisoft all but branded the game a sales flop (at the time, Yves also blamed a number of flops on the developers): VGC now understand that the title has sold nearly 3 million copies: Ubisoft declining to comment is to be expected, but I also think it's a very embarrassing look. Hopefully those involved get to take a swing at something for Switch 2, be it another game in this series or something wholly original, but I'm not holding my breath.

Destined for Rebirth trailer (banger of a trailer for just 1 minute): That lil One Winged Angel tease at the start before transitioning into the battle theme Funnily enough, the video description mentions it's Most Anticipated win at the TGAs last month I'm sure Keighley's really feeling himself out there right now, wherever he is Also, new Yuffie key art: And one for Cait Sith, too: EDIT: my goodness, that Junon shot looks INSANE!

Thanks for the thread merge @Ashley, really appreciate it Remastered will be weighing in at 76 GB, with (unfortunately, but not unsurprisingly) no pre-load option for those going the upgrade route: Additionally, as has frequently been the case with these PS5 remaster SKUs/Director's Cuts, you will be able to import your PS4 trophy progress to Remastered, including your Platinum. I have no pick-ups planned for the month after deciding to leave Infinite Wealth until spring/summer, and decided against picking up Tekken 8 to get in on the ground floor (one of these days I'll commit to a fighting game...probably), so right now I'm toying with the idea of hopping back in to clean up the Platinum for PS4 and then upgrading to try out No Return, as some of my friends are planning on picking this up and are either playing it for the first time or replaying it for the umpteenth time. If I do, this would be my first replay since launch. It's one of those games for me which is in the select group of being a better experience than it is a game, like how I feel about Breath of the Wild or Tears of the Kingdom, but naturally for very different reasons (because Link commits war crimes ). It was actually on my list of games I wanted to replay this year anyways, so now would seem as good a time as any to get back into it, but I also remember how heavily my first playthrough weighed on me (I got through it in a weekend and then took a break from games for three or four weeks?) – is that how I want my early time with games this year to be defined? So I'm not decided yet, but I do want to revisit it to clarify my thoughts, compare it to The Godfather Part II (a great excuse to revisit a great film) after seeing the similarities between the first game and the first Godfather film, and though I want to get fewer Platinums this year, this one wouldn't be nearly as involved as others considering it'd be a NG+ clean-up, but then after how much it changed and fleshed out my experience of the first game, I also like the idea of checking this out on Grounded (though probably not on Permadeath, because that sounds unnecessarily stressful). We'll see how I feel, I guess

A tweet from the game's Japanese account shows that Fast Travel in the game is indeed fast: Somehow it had completely slipped to the back of my mind that this would be an open world affair, just an overwhelming amount of games coming up these next few weeks. Crazy to think this game is just 6½ weeks away. Curious as to if and when we'll see a demo drop, maybe at the end of Jan/start of Feb?

Grounded II: The Making of The Last of Us Part II is on the way ~ Loved the first one, so I'm very curious to hear about the making of Part II! Also @Ashley (sorry, I never know who to ask ), would it be possible to fold this thread into the dedicated TLOU Part II one at all please? The titling/early marketing stuff made it sound more like a remake, but it's basically a Director's Cut akin to ones we've seen for Death Stranding and Ghost of Tsushima, so probably deserves to be slipped into the end of the original game's thread if that's possible

Muhahahahahaha No pressure of course, but would love to see what's left in your backlog at this point, especially if it's less than 10! I have not despite Galaxy being my favourite Mario of the ones I've played (haha, let's not start listing those ), it's just kind of been sitting on my shelf these past couple of years. Well no more! I'll get to it in 2024! I publicly pledged so!