Julius

Overview trailer: Launching next Wednesday on 17th August; priced at £13.49.

Oh yeah 100%, that's what attracted them to her, there's little denying that I guess what I'm suggesting is the inverse? Not necessarily that people were attracted to her because of her origin, but they may have subconsciously taken that away (that they're [more] open to being attracted to people of other cultures, and Asians particularly, if they hadn't before, just due to the lack of exposure), if that makes sense? I could certainly see that being the case depending on the ages people were when they first played the game. Anecdotally, I had a friend in high school who randomly came out with "I'm into Koreans" after starting to watch anime and play League of Legends (which is a whole other kettle of fish) You're probably right about them looking at other characters like Lara Croft for what was popular at the time though, we got the final remainders of that in the early 2000's and then I feel the guys in the art departments started to calm down a little bit. Sort of. Maybe. I mean it's not all sunshines and rainbows regardless, I'm pretty sure VII is partially responsible for some of the, uh, more questionable parts of the internet and modern culture when it comes to things like Cait Sith The first link is just an article, though it does go on to point you in the direction of the feed. That second link though...yeah I'd save that one for after work, it has pictures of the questionably posed model in question Will be sure to keep that in mind definitely got my expectations set fairly low in that regard from clips/memes and such over the years, that much is sure. It'll probably be a tossup between X and Like A Dragon the next time I'm in the mood for a longer JRPG

In all seriousness, while there were many smart decisions made around Final Fantasy VII, the decision to have two girls (well, and Barrett) each representing the game's target markets geographically (Aeris/Aerith is distinctly Western, I'd go so far as to say European, in her design; and Tifa is distinctly Eastern) was absolute genius. Not only does it cater to both markets, I think considering that this was well before the mass globalisation of anime/Asian culture/etc. and that what we find attractive physically is typically an aggregate of what we're exposed to, I think there's a good chance it could have helped younger folks (and potentially older too) who played the game at the time in the West be more open to being friends with/dating people of a different race, and the same could probably be said for those playing the game in the East, too. I'd also be willing to bet that for many it was their first "real" exposure to an Asian girl or woman, just because that was the reality back then in a lot of the Western world. And I'm sure her, uh, features also didn't hurt in that regard either. I might be reaching there, but I imagine it's true for some (even if they've never consciously thought about it before). Hell, I'm mixed race (White/Asian) and being surrounded by white folks 99% of the time growing up meant that I didn't even really meet people of different races outside of my own family and their group of friends until I actually moved country. I don't think I could have been attracted to a different race if I tried because I simply didn't even know I could find them attractive due to lack of exposure in fact, if anything, the overbearing strength independence of Asian women (Filipinos, specifically) in my family put me off that idea entirely until just a few years ago And no, my parents didn't meet due to Final Fantasy VII and my dad cheering Tifa on as best girl. Though now that I think about it, they did meet and get married in 1997, the same year VII got release...coincidence? Anyways, I do agree with @Happenstance: while I thought Tifa was by far and away better in VII (and I still would say I'm Team Tifa after Remake), I do think VII Remake did a great job of fleshing out Aeris/Aerith in a way which the original game did not. VII's music is ridiculously good and, two years later, I still can't believe that Remake made a lot of tracks even better – I didn't even imagine it would be possible! I think there are very few soundtracks - gaming or otherwise - which come close, and even in the realm of Final Fantasy, I think the only thing I could debate (with the games I've played) is that VI might do a better job of giving party members their own theme and then recalling them throughout the game, which leads into the outrageously good reprisal of each theme during the credits? But even then, that's down to a different approach rather than VI's OST being outright better than VII's. Too many tracks to name that I love, but while I love how preposterous One Winged Angel is, I still think Those Chosen By The Planet (and how it's awesomely recalled in Birth of a God) are stronger themes for the character of Sephiroth, whereas One Winged Angel does an excellent job of capturing how ridiculous the position he ends up in really is. I'm so glad we got some of it in Remake! Oh wow that's super interesting, I first played it in 2017 too (though I don't think I finished the very last part until the very beginning of 2018..?). I think my key takeaway was that there were definitely some parts to the game which don't hold up tremendously these days from a design and technical perspective (general room-to-room navigation is a bit of a nightmare at times, gorgeous as some of those pre-rendered background are, and then there's obviously the well-documented translation errors, things like that), but more surprising to me was that I don't think the final act of the game - until you reach the very end - holds up under any real scrutiny? I found it very messy, to put it lightly, it went off the rails in a way which I don't think the game benefitted from (well, until it all got turned into memes and the sillier parts of the extended VII canon). I thought everything up to and including Temple of the Ancients was virtually flawless from a character and story perspective, though! There's a reason she turned up in the Italian senate, that's all that has to be said oh, and there was also that questionably posed Tifa statue! Damn, Tifa's having a busy 2022 I've only played VI, VII and IX so far, all for the first time in the last 5 years or so, and I find my answer tends to swap between all three pretty regularly – I think they're all great games with (well, other than the music) entirely different strengths. Overall, though, I'd probably say that I consider VI to be the strongest of the three from a critical perspective, so maybe that's my favourite? It's mechanically airtight, and something I think it has over the other two games (sorry VII and IX) is that there is a natural narrative throughline from beginning to end, whereas VII and IX both fly off the rails in their final act somewhere along the way for me in ways which have me going "uh, the how hell did we get here?" I need to play more Final Fantasy games, though, can't believe it's nearly been two years (!) since I played through IX! It'll probably be I, IV, or X next (sorry @Hero-of-Time, VIII is kind of just...waiting off to the side with V )

I doubt it just because I think there's only been one standalone Pokémon amiibo (outside of the Smash Bros. line), which was Detective Pikachu? But that would be funny I'm just imagining Sakurai going into a janitor's closet and all around are scrapped Smash characters as amiibo: these starters, Geno, Dante, Master Chief, Kratos... I think TPCi likely had these ready to go regardless, I'm not sure who is in charge of Pokémon toy production these days but I imagine that they've got multiple permutations of each Pokémon ready to go for things like this, but not necessarily designed for this specific purpose. Or at least I think that would make sense, but Anyways, just give me my Paldean Wooper statue already!

I think it's simply that we haven't been shown anything so far which makes the game unique and feel totally necessary – and I do mean unique here, not different. How many trailers have we had at this point, three or four? It still just looks like Splatoon to me, be it the first or second game (and, note: I'm someone that hasn't played either), for better or worse. Compare that to Mario+Rabbids - where again, I'm someone that hasn't played the first game - and I see footage from either and can quickly tell which game I'm looking at because of some mechanic or feature of the game which gives me an inkling of the game I'm looking at. Same goes for Xenoblade, same goes for Pokémon, hell the same goes for BOTW2's two trailers so far, and we've seen like three minutes and change of that game. I mean, let's be totally fair: just how different do you have to make a third person shooter which is primarily centred around online multiplayer so that I can tell from a glance which game I'm looking at? Other than the UI and new maps, I'm having a hard time imagining being able to tell that from a glance at gameplay. Now, this all isn't to say that there isn't a smorgasbord of mechanical tweaks and adjustments under the hood, or that hard work hasn't been put into the game, or that it won't sell amazingly well (of course @Hero-of-Time is right that this game is going to sell millions of copies, heck, I think it could be a critical failure and it still would!), but I think it's undeniable that Splatoon is unique in the pantheon of Nintendo IP in that they aren't looking to reinvent the game with each entry; they are innovating. Nothing about Splatoon 3 looks so off the walls to me that it wouldn't have been possible in the second - or even the first! - game, whereas I look at the other games you're talking about and again, can clearly tell which is which. It's refinement over reinvention. There's nothing wrong with that, but it's undeniable that the approach being taken is completely different with Splatoon, and I think it's given rise to the feeling some have about this game in this thread. And yes, there's an aspect of refinement to these other games too - of course there is, that's a key part of the industry moving forwards and a huge part of why I'd say Nintendo's first party is so strong! - but, much as I loathe it in some cases (ahem, Pokémon), they consistently bring new things to the table which either weren't possible or weren't thought of previously, and this helps newer entries to feel fresh and significantly distinct in a way which I can empathise with others for thinking Splatoon does not.

It's been nearly a decade and they're still giving off the same energy they were when Moyes took over, which is barmy to me. Remember when they spent a window targeting every world class midfielder under the sun, missed out on even challenging for players like Thiago because they were too busy twiddling their thumbs, and ended up with Fellaini? It's exactly that all over again! Also @Fierce_LiNk I totally agree. I feel like Ronaldo has gone through what Mourinho went through with United where he was coming in with an idea of changes needing to be made, not necessarily underestimating the undertaking to do so, but more realising as time went on that the abyss staring back was much, much, much deeper than they had first anticipated.

It's hard to look away from a trainwreck More seriously, as a United fan, I'm curious: where do you stand on Ronaldo's goings-on? I'm seeing a lot of fans use his situation as a black hole for all of the other issues at the club (such as the lack of signings this transfer window - apparently you're now getting Rabiot?), and from the outside looking in, I couldn't blame him for wanting to leave for UCL football if that's he wants. I've also seen some suggest he knew this would be the case at the end of last season, but I could easily imagine he was planning on staying if there was enough activity this summer to show that United wanted to get back to the top the same way he does, but there simply hasn't been. Then there's also the matter of him losing a child, I could understand him not being in the right headspace for that reason alone, and also potentially wanting to return to Portugal because of that (such as a potential return to Sporting) to be closer to family. It's crazy seeing some fans and the occasional pundit act like he's the issue, especially considering how many goals he scored last season, which was probably the best season anyone's had in a United shirt outside of goal since Ibra left

Watched the first episode of Light & Magic yesterday, and it's awesome. Feels so great to see people I've read about but couldn't put faces to in a series where they get to talk about their contributions in the early days of Star Wars and ILM, especially John Dykstra (because barely anyone knows about the Dykstraflex and it's one of the most important pieces of filming equipment in Star Wars!). Also just want to shout out Imagineering for those that haven't seen it already, as it has similar vibes to L&M (an incredibly polished docuseries which I feel everyone's scrolled by on Disney+ but not necessarily watched). Gaining incite into the Disney theme parks is truly fascinating, logically you can try to understand how much work goes into these enormous projects but you don't really get a grasp on it until you watch something like this. It's one of the best things I've watched on Disney+, hard recommend

United need to give ten Hag time regardless at this point, a minimum of one season in the same way that City stuck by Guardiola after his first season, when they "only" came third. Looking back on the comments from the likes of MOTD that season are absolutely hilarious, and I still don't understand for the life of me how they thought it would go any other way. I think the difference with City's approach, though, is they backed Pep to an absurd degree in the market, but that meant it only took one sort of off season and effectively four transfer windows to get the job done in making it his team. I think there's a lot more for United to do anyways due to their structure, but I also think they're going to take their sweet time in assembling the right team and getting deadwood out of the door. The bad part for United is that they don't have a history of doing this, they bring someone in, say "they've changed their approach", have a bit of a backdoor reshuffle and then don't stick by their managers when things go south or back them appropriately in the market. Considering the team he had, I would still say Mou gave United their best Premier League season, and then everyone was shocked when things went downhill when he wasn't backed in the market. How do you bring Mourinho in and not plan to back him in the market? And, similarly, now with ten Hag, how do you bring in a manager with their own deep footballing philosophy and not give them the time they need? Pep was a more than proven commodity before coming to the Prem, and it still took him a whole season and four transfer windows to adjust; ten Hag is far from a proven commodity, so I genuinely think sticking by him for two seasons would be the sensible move. And yes, even if they only make Europa League again this season, because now they find themselves up against a talented Spurs squad who look reformed under Conte and is surprisingly getting the backing he's always been worth of, and Arsenal, I hate to say it, are looking primed for a great season. I don't think it's too shocking, a massive stadium like Old Trafford is always intimidating for smaller teams, and Brighton had a long hiatus from the first division. I think the more interesting thing is that United haven't been snatching draws at home against Brighton since they came up (I wouldn't say I thought they'd be snatching draws, but I definitely thought there would have been a draw amongst the results), but actually had a 100% record against them at home since they returned to the top tier in 2017; according to this, United haven't actually drawn with Brighton since 1992, which was a League Cup game, meaning they've never drawn since English football started ()

Good result from us yesterday, not the most convincing of wins but we'll have to take it, obviously the team just doesn't feel complete at this point, but there hasn't been much time to integrate our new signings either. Curious if anyone has been keeping an eye on PSG's first couple of results this season? Because, even without Mbappé, they look seriously scary under Galtier – who knew that playing Messi centrally and actually making full use of their attacking fullbacks like Hakimi would have such an impact? Just two matches into the season and Messi and Neymar already have a combined total of 10 goals and assists. Also, Messi scored what I believe is his first bicycle kick goal (at 35!) to see their 5-0 victory last night, I think the closest he got before was a bicycle kick assist to Suarez back in the day? Well worth looking up if you haven't seen it, it's a wonderful goal. Even got the Clermont fans cheering! A lot has been made about the World Cup's potential impact on the second half of the season - especially over here, given how big a part fitness and fatigue has played in finding a winner several times over the last few years - but I haven't really seen anyone talking about the flip side to this: all being well, their summer break being cut short by a couple of weeks aside, every player playing in Europe and going to the World Cup that isn't going in injured should be in as close to peak condition as it comes when the tournament kicks off in November. Screw Qatar, but I wouldn't be surprised if this World Cup ends up being as compelling as last year's Euro's - if not more so - because of this.

I actually finished this on Monday night, but a pretty crazy week at work has meant I haven't really been able to round out my thoughts on this game's final third...until now. Let's get to it With the game behind me and many others here, I would be curious to hear how everyone else would rank the chapters? I found myself reconsidering each chapter I had played earlier in the game with each passing chapter, to the point that my list looks very different to how I imagined it would be while I playing through each chapter. For me, it would probably be: Imperial China Twilight of Edo Japan Chapter Eight Near Future Finale The Wild West Present Day The Distant Future Prehistory To close, I think Live A Live is wonderfully presented, from its gorgeous HD-2D aesthetic, to its bright colour palette, and its surprisingly effective soundtrack, but it is held back by archaic holdovers from the game it is a remake of. It suffers from spreading its quality thin across some of its chapters, where it becomes apparent that while each and every chapter has unique ideas to bring to the table - be it a mechanic or a setting - none of these ideas are fleshed out in any great and meaningful way, which I think is also apparent in the depth of its combat (or, rather, the lack thereof). With some chapters being as short or as light on combat as they are, the order you blindly tackle these chapters in will massively colour your experience with the game, and for me it resulted in slightly longer chapters feeling substantially longer than the short chapters I played through by comparison, as well as battle-heavy chapters feeling like a slog compared to chapters with minimal combat, which made the game's pacing pretty hard to bear at times (which is the first time I've said as much for a JRPG as short as this one). In short: great presentation, good ideas, but an execution lying somewhere between poor and inconsistent. I think the most damning thing about this game is that it is such a difficult game to recommend to anyone who isn't already willing to commit and see a JRPG through from start to finish and has some level interest in 90's JRPG's, so your mileage may vary.

The tweet from our Twitter admin confirming the deal was next level daylight murder and I love it (for context, Brighton came out and publicly denied reports, such as Fabrizio's, that Cucurella was going anywhere, to which Fabrizio doubled down). Also, I agree with you, it's been a very odd window in which I don't think we've really got anyone that we wanted as first choice. We missed out on De Ligt (though to be fair he seems a natural signing for Bayern) and Raphinha (to be fair to him if Barça is his dream club what can you do?); we've got Koulibaly in, but I'd say we still could do with another CB seeing as we lost both Rudi and Christensen; Sterling is a very odd signing for us in that while I'm sure he'll put in a shift, I just don't see what the thinking is there other than "well, we should sign someone to contribute to this almost nonexistent front line", but hopefully he proves me wrong; and somehow Azpi has ended up staying (I mean, I'm happy about it, but he was meant to be one of the first out of the door), and meanwhile we had more leftbacks than we know what to do with before, but now we've got Cucurella in the mix too (though, to be fair, he's been a FIFA Career Mode LB I've used since he was at Barça, so I guess I'm happy). Werner is potentially going to be on his way out through a loan too, so I have no idea. I think scattershot is honestly too light a word for it, I think we've been absolutely rudderless this summer after missing out on priority targets, and then have basically scrambled for whatever the leftovers have been. I know Marina has clashed with managers before, but seeing as we kept Tuchel, I think we should've fought to keep her if only for another season to avoid exactly what has happened; instead, we've had no transition, and despite knowing where the holes were going to be going into this summer since Abramovich's hand was forced to sell, we've ended up with one of the strangest summers I can remember for transfers

An art book is in the works, with plans to release in May 2023:

Releasing August 11th on PlayStation and the Nintendo Switch digitally, with plans for a physical edition on both platforms later in the year. Also coming to Steam in September. Priced at £33.99/€39.99/$39.99.

I knew the general gist of its connections to Final Fantasy Tactics (and branching from that the other Ivalice projects) in that it was basically a progenitor to that project, but smaller details I like to fact check (for instance, Matsuno not sticking around was something which sounded right in my head, but if there's one thing I do best it's doubt myself ). I read what I can on the history of games, it's always super interesting to get a general idea of how things have evolved, or in this case, what essentially one game branched off into, and who ended up where and working on what. Matsuno and Ito being sidelined is hard info to avoid just because a lot of Final Fantasy speculation threads, such as for XVI, often devolve into wanting Yoshi-P to get onboard or have one of the old guys step back into the spotlight. Anyways, fact checking more often than not leads to me discovering other cool details I wasn't aware of (such as Yoshida's involvement on Bravely Default and NieR, if I had to guess I would've said that was Minaba, who also worked on XII and does work on Granblue Fantasy), so those are neat details which are always fun to just lump in

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Yeah, I think you'd be right about that. I don't know if I think Nintendo need to pull that trigger yet - honestly, I think it'd be a shame for it to be doing as well as it is and having a great chance at overtaking the PS2 and DS a few years from now, just to have its legs brutally chopped off and end up in no-man's-land - but I also think Nintendo is really difficult to gauge as needing to make a step up in terms of raw specs, and it kind of feels like their generational leaps are more based on wanting to shake things up or try new things. To explain what I mean, other than games running better than they are now, I think they're the platform holder where it's hardest to imagine what next-gen actually looks like for them, as they rarely go the PlayStation path of aiming too high on terms of performance yield to have technical hiccups (they're there, sure, but their choices in art style, the Switch being a hybrid, etc., gives them a weird amount of leniency in this regard I think that PlayStation and Xbox don't with their own titles), and Xbox basically make games for PC these days and don't get as much out of their machine as PlayStation from a stylistic point of view (just my perspective, but Halo Infinite being smooth as hell but then looking kind of flat was...weird). Nintendo on the other hand seem to firmly push on their limitations, but they design for and around them more so than I think the others do, which is why I think it's hard to imagine. Ultimately, if STTLOZBOTW (sequel to The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild) does launch with the Switch successor, I think the components shortage almost becomes a non-issue in that it would likely sell out regardless, and would have a similar launch to what I think a Switch Pro might have: the people there on day one are going to be the diehards who want the best experience for the Breath of the Wild sequel (like me, because I don't want my time spent in a forest to look like a flip book). That might make the transition a bit smoother, but then I think it runs into this weird issue where Nintendo have a much bigger hurdle to overcome, which is actually marketing this thing well. I think it could get very confusing thanks to how generations have worked previously - maybe even more so with Nintendo - where backwards compatibility, at least for me, has felt like a footnote on the features list. I guess you could just say "releasing on Switch 2 and Switch in April 2023" in your advertising campaign, and then have a little graphic to say "best experienced on Switch 2!", but I don't know how you would go about communicating that new games on Switch also work on Switch 2 (and then you also get into the new Switch 2 boxes, etc., and how they'd communicate things...it could be very confusing for casual buyers). I guess there are ways to do it, but what gives me pause is that this is the same company that decided calling a console the 'Wii U' was a good idea maybe it'll be the PS4/PS5 method where you just see both versions on shelves, or they go the Xbox route of having it all under one (potentially confusing) umbrella. This is all of course assuming it'll be a cross-gen title, and that the Switch successor will be backwards compatible

Sooooooooo...Switch 2 in time for the Untitled sequel to the Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild next Spring (April to June) confirmed?!

I mean I'm excited, but that release date. Poor Tactics Ogre, being thrown out to the wolves of Ragnarök... This is one of the games I bought on my Vita but felt more like something I'd want to experience on a bigger screen, so hell yeah! Now we just wait for Final Fantasy Tactics, which will be next year I guess? It's not, but it definitely had some of the core team to be, as a lot of its style and direction is similar to the Ivalice stuff (Vagrant Story, XII, Final Fantasy Tactics) due to sharing some key same staff: directed by Yasumi Matsuno (director of Final Fantasy Tactics, Vagrant Story, original director of XII alongside Hiroyuki Ito) and with art by Ahihiko Yoshida, who did work on most of these projects (alongside some others who crop up on a number of these projects; Yoshida has also worked on Bravely Default and NieR Automata, where you can also definitely see his style pouring through). Matsuno still gets the occasional bit of work credited XIV, but his path nowadays reminds me a lot of Hiroyuki Ito's (director of Final Fantasy VI, IX, the other director of XII who stuck with it, and maybe more importantly remembered as the creator of ATB), as he's been shuffled into the background and has worked on much smaller projects for a while (hey, might be that they want to, but it's still crazy to think about having these legends on such comparably smaller projects). Also can we just laugh cry for a moment about the fact that Tactics Ogre is getting a modern console release before the classic Final Fantasy games and Chrono Trigger?

The second NeoGeo Pocket Colour Selection has been announced by SNK; Switch not officially confirmed yet, but it seems inevitable.

Something isn't quite right here... Much better

Oh yeah, I totally agree that that's the direction they're going to go. I do wonder - if it is still going to be locked behind story progression - if it's going to be locked behind just completing one story path, or having to complete all three? Be interesting to see how they handle it, because I guess you don't want a case of people getting a legendary Pokémon when their entire team is of a much higher level?

According to Variety, their sources have said it might partially be down to wanting to recoup costs through typical Hollywood accountancy fudging via tax write-offs. Anyways, it's a weird one. I don't know how, but post-merger they have managed to be consistent with the old regime in making increasingly frustrating decisions for DC live-action content. Pinning a reset on trying to do Flashpoint and throwing characters out of the pram is going to be very fun...to watch from the outside, while diehard DC fans lose their minds.