Aperson

Another Level 100 team amassed. That's it, I'm done with Gen 8 for now >.>

Pokemon Sword and Shield obligatory objective complete Crown Tundra wound up distracting me from trying to do the Galaxy 2 Green Stars, need to get back to that sometime...

Yay, everyone's favourite glorified advertisement is back! And unlike E3 it isn't cancelled! Obviously tongue in cheek really and I don't always agree with what they've been saying amid the industry being more monetised than ever before and also feeling like they give awards to games that the media has hyped up beforehand rather than the opinions of most people who are actually playing the games. I mean, if The Last of Us II wins Game of the Year I'm sure there will be plenty of heated debate on that! Personally I hope Final Fantasy VII Remake gets something in terms of recognition somewhere. Admittedly I haven't played many new games that came out this year, in fact it's only really been FF7R and Xenoblade Definitive Edition that are the only games that came out this year that I've played but FF7R really impressed me and felt like a real evolution in terms of gameplay for JRPGs, in a more involved way than what I saw with the Xenoblade games. The soundtrack is also fantastic and it is currently my game of th year. That may change when I get Miles Morales though...

Will try and remember that. Not sure if it's been mentioned in this thread before, but the composer Lorne Balfe apparently was also involved in the Assassin's Creed series, doing music for Assassin's Creed III. He has a Youtube channel where he uploads a lot of his work. https://www.youtube.com/c/LorneBalfe/videos EDIT: Couldn't find the specific videos through that link, but here's one of music tracks that was used in Season 1 that got remixed for Season 2:

Would definitely agree there. The complexity of the books does increase from the second book onwards so naturally things are getting more expansive in the show too. Although, people who have already read the books are freaking out over the bench scene... no spoilers obviously! Also, next time you try and make a scientific breakthrough I guess the answer is to just wait for a child from another world to come along and fix your problems... Sucks the HBO are getting it an entire week after the BBC but I suppose it can't be helped. I'll try and avoid talking too much about the series so that I don't spoil it for @MindFreak I will also say that I can't help but compare this and Xenoblade Chronicles to each other. Both feature a protagnist that gets some mystical item that allows them to perceive things not normal for humans and...

Still working on that Pokedex in Sword and Shield, focusing on the main Pokedex at the moment and got around to evolving my Riolu. Also managed to finally catch a Turtonator. Yes, I know you can change the date of the Switch to get it to skip days but I kind of have this old school mentality that if there's an in-game clock, it's more immersive to play the game at that time and so I was happy to wait a day until Turtontator was available in the Wild Area. Even if it was only a 2% random encounter... In other news, seeing as I've been playing a lot of Magic The Gathering Arena and Pokemon Trading Card Game Online... I thought I'd take it to the next level. Check this out...

Looking forward to this but will not pick this up until about a month after it's been released and even then I'll get it on PS4, not ready to shell out for a PS5 just yet!

Speaking of Season 3 apparently they have already started planning for Season 3 but as of yet there is no official confirmation of a third season by the BBC, who are probably waiting on viewer numbers for Season 2. I really hope there is a third season, been years since I read the Amber Spyglass but I definitely remember it being really interesting.

Just watched the first episode of the new series of His Dark Materials. Now getting into territory never adapted before so no film to compare it to and I must say I really enjoyed that episode. Notable how the amount of wisecracks Pan had this episode was definitely turned up a notch and he was part of all the funniest moments of the episode. The cinematography in the episode was really well done too, especially this shot: Looking forward to the rest of the series now. Sucks that there are only 7 episodes this season due to COVID, which may also unfortunately impact Amber Spyglass getting adapted into a third season of this series.

Did something on Pokemon Sword after trying this Galarian Star Tournament was fun, my one complaint being you can't be teammates with Ball Guy

Did a fair bit on Pokemon Sword this evening with trying to do the Dynamax Adventures. Acquired a few legendary Pokemon from it including Necrozma, Ho-Oh and Moltres. I have also found Kyurem and Tornadus in the lair but having trouble against them, probably because I'm doing it with Ai and having a bit of difficulty building a good team from the Ai against Tornadus from the Pokemon routes given to me on that particular route. Must say, I do think sticking all the legendary Pokemon in one location is kind of lazy though I do admit that with so many legendaries it's probably more practical. Still, I like how it was done in HeartGold and SoulSilver where every legendary had somewhere on the map dedicated to finding it. Same with Black and White 2, there were different locations for all the legendaries. Crown Tundra has felt like that sometimes for the Regis, the Galarian legendary birds and Calyrex but a good amount of the additional legendaries have been dumped in a single location again... Also this happened in a Max Raid Battle... Also been playing a fair bit of Pokemon Trading Card Game Online after I got the game working again and trying to catch up on the last few sets, mainly inspired by all the price hype from recent weeks. Got some pretty sweet pulls: I'll also throw this in as a bonus...

After playing the 3D Remake of Final Fantasy IV years ago I was impressed on how they turned the whole SNES game into a voice acted 3D experience and it gave me hope that a similar remake for FFVI could be coming down the line. Of course, the team behind that remake wanted to make their own games and eventually went on to make Bravely Default leaving the iOS version as the only actual remake FFVI ever got since then. So for me the GBA version is the definitive version of the game, soundtrack quality aside. As for remakes of games I want to see that haven't actually been remade yet... I kind of want a remake of Croc: Legend of the Gobbos. It's game I've played but for various different reasons (played a demo initially and then when I finally got the full game the disc freezes upon defeating the first boss). Kind of considering getting it on PS3 download for a version of the game I can actually finish but I wouldn't mind a remake of the game at all. Also Burnout 2: Point of Impact. This game feels SO good to play and I don't know what they did between the first game and this one but the sense of speed and using the boost feels SO much better in this game. Once you start darting around the traffic it's so fun. I would have also said Prince of Persia Sands of Time but that's actually getting a remake so... remake Pokemon Pinball! It's been years since the last one, completely bypassed both the DS and 3DS which would have perfect for the games with the two screens. The Pokedex gave Pinball and it's sequel a longevity that other pinball games simply don't have, you get a ton of replay value as you seek to try and complete the Pokedex. It was one of my favourite Pokemon spin-offs as a kid alongside the TCG GBC game and while PTCGO means we're not likely getting a standalone adventure game based on the TCG any time soon that leaves Pinball as the game I really want a comeback for.

Since it's Halloween now (or was) seems like a good time to indulge in some spooky game music

Oh yeah, it's the Genji Glove you get there, NOT the other item... Never mind then. At any rate, that type of combination was on my endgame Locke for the second playthrough, this is what I ended up with by the end (sorry about the screenshot quality, since I played the GBA version I could only screenshot a GBASP for the images)

You want to go back to Narshe while you have access to the airship, there's another character you can recruit if you go back through the network of caves. He's not an essential pickup admittedly but he's an interesting addition to have especially if you want to have all the party members. Also in an upcoming dungeon there is an item that allows you to attack four times in a row, if you combine it with the Genji Glove you can attack 8 times in a single turn, it's ridiculous!

So, just finished the Crown Tundra DLC, aside from doing the post game tournament and I have a bit of a treat for you all... I recorded my attempts to catch Calyrex: This one was a real doozy... I also redownloaded Pokemon Trading Card Game Online (PC) again and finally got it working properly. If you miss sets on these type of games it can be a problem... especially since there's been an entire rotation since I last played the game and I had to either tweak certain decks to keep them Standard legal or just make them Expanded decks... admittedly most of my decks are Expanded anyway but I optimised the Expanded versions for Expanded anyway. Here's some tweets from my first days back on the game... Some of the new Meta decks in this new rotation are pretty powerful. I played against the Eternatus deck and it amasses so much advantage through bench size and the fact that they could play this new card that let's you draw cards until you have 6 in your hand which was also a Dark type so happened to synergise with Eternatus' main attack which is more powerful the more Dark Pokemon you have. So I guess there was an attempt to try and balance it by restricting your deck building options but it's still a pretty powerful deck and it gets to it's really big numbers relatively easy so it basically OTKs everything and has 340HP so someone with an account of latter Sun/Moon era cards is always going to struggle. I have acquired some new cards from Rebel Clash and Darkness Ablaze through trading to help some of my decks and my favourite deck on the game, Rowlaboom, now runs Capture Energy to help search out the combo pieces. Kind of want to try and get the Rillaboom V and Rillaboom VMAX from Rebel Clash because that would be a strict upgrade on Cramorant in this deck. I also have a complete playset of Quick Balls now so edited all my decks to use this card to search things out.

Yeah, FFVI is WAY more forgiving when it comes to it's spell system. The important part though is that through this system this is how you're going to get the best spells in the game and anyone can learn them. This is going to become really important later on as the character with the best Magic stat in the game does not learn Magic naturally by levelling up. Even Terra and Celes are somewhat limited by what they can learn by levelling up, so I tend to value this system in the long run. You're going to be wanting your big damage spells come the end of the game after all. It of course depends if you want to optimise your characters based on their best stats, I didn't really do that on either of my playthroughs. But for non-damaging, non-healing spells like Haste and Float it doesn't hurt to give them to a more physically orientated character. But yeah, this is why I love this game from a gameplay perspective so much. An incredibly customisable party with plenty of options and each of them are further customisable thanks to this new system. The GBA version added exclusive ones too which you could add including a Jumbo Cactuar!

So, for the first time in a long time I'm stuck on a Pokemon game... Trying to solve this King of Bountiful Harvests mystery. It talks about a missing crown and it's obviously related to that new legendary. I found the location where the legendary is supposed to be but can't do anything there. There's a basket where some sort of offering has to be made so I guess you need to plant the Carrot Seeds or something but I can't find anywhere to plant them. Also the Mayor keeps asking me if I've checked the statue in town and I have checked that statue in Freezington multiple times yet every time I do so the NPCs act as if I haven't looked at the statue and I don't understand what I'm doing wrong here...

Yeah, at this point in the game you have more options as to who your party is even if for storyline reasons you are locked into specific party members. The choices aren't incidental, one of the most memorable scenes in the entire game is coming up within the next few hours... right after the next major "dungeon" as it were. Also, just started Crown Tundra on Pokemon Sword (Switch). I've got to say, if this is what Gen 9 is going to be like for Pokemon then I am really looking forward to Gen 9!

Anyway, FFVI is one of several games featured in my newest video because... well, It's EVERY game I've ever played. I realise how long this video is so here's a few yearly time stamps 0:00:00 - 2000 0:01:13 - 2001 0:02:36 - 2002 0:07:37 - 2003 0:11:09 - 2004 0:14:00 - 2005 0:19:05 - 2006 0:24:15 - 2007 0:32:07 - 2008 0:38:35 - 2009 0:45:09 - 2010 0:47:06 - 2011 0:50:59 - 2012 0:53:27 - 2013 0:56:44 - 2014 1:01:09 - 2015 1:04:38 - 2016 1:06:58 - 2017 1:12:13 - 2018 1:17:51 - 2019 1:20:16 - 2020

Is this a bad time to mention that I played the GBA version of the game which has a re-translated script? Regardless of the script they can't really change too much of the main story beats. And yeah, Kefka is one of the greatest villains in gaming history. The story itself is a bit of a slow burner but it gradually gets a bit more involved as more characters show up and join your party, which winds up developing the gameplay even more. One of the reasons I love this game so much is how much freedom you have to customise your party. In the early stages you are railroaded in which party you have but after a certain character shows up it gives you a bit more freedom to choose which order you do the next part of the game in and then as the plot develops, that too is reflected in the gameplay and the game's biggest mechanic is withheld from you until you reach that point. That said, the plot does escalate eventually and when it does... it's the best part of the game!

So it turns out rendering a 1 hour and 20 minutes video in Movie Maker is hard. I've had to render 4 parts individually and then move it all into one single video. In the meantime I've been playing a lot of Super Mario Galaxy 2 (Wii). In my hunt for the Green Stars I have got towards the end of World 4 with over 190 stars in total. Just need to do the second major Bowser level and it's on to World 5. The Grandmaster Galaxy is getting ever nearer... Also made a bit more progress on Super Mario 3D World (Wii U) after finally finishing the 7th level on World Flower. Though at this point finishing levels is not enough, I need to get all the Green Stars, all the stamps and I believe you need to hit the top of the flagpole in every level, which I think put me off trying to finish this game. Got to save those Cat Suits I guess...

OK so Vaan was made to be the main character because higher ups at Square didn't think anything but a shonen young protagonist would be marketable at the time. Which obviously causes problems which I think the game is self aware of when Balthier refers to himself as the "leading man" and yet you could argue that Basch and Ashe carry the plot more often than not. Then again, the plot ends up being one of the weaker elements of this game imo, though I can see it was going for a different style of story telling. Also this game's world was originally introduced in Final Fantasy Tactics. They then made Vagrant Story and Tactics Advance which also take place in Ivalice before this game came out. Personally exploring this world was one of the more enjoyable parts of the game for me and I kind of set it up so that my party members had Gambits on but I had to do it manually so that the game just didn't play itself. Except for when the monsters killed each other...

Highly, highly recommend the latter. But then I would say that... it's my favourite game of all time. Anyway, made a good start on Green Stars on Super Mario Galaxy 2. Got all of the Sky Station Galaxy ones and got two of the three Yoshi Star Galaxy Green Stars. Working on doing World 1.