darksnowman

They could always do it like the novelisation and expand it by giving a look (playable, not FMV) at the characters' backstories and what they're up to before being dropped into the Spencer Mansion.

A little lull before the June Direct. Mixed in with the trailers, I saw an advert for Luigi's Mansion 2 at the cinema so that could be what they move on to promoting next. Looked far better on the big screen than TotK! Did you ever get Plumbers Don't Wear Ties reviewed? This week sees the release of a seminal RPG, upgraded, QoL enhanced, and streamlined for the modern audience: Wizardry: Proving Grounds of the Mad Overlord. The Switch/ eShop has been tremendous for bringing these kinds of games our way. Just a pity about the pricing—£35 (at least there's 10% off to begin with). It's done by Digital Eclipse. I was able to nab Turtles Cowabunga Collection on the cheap so hoping Wizardry will be ripe for price reduction too.

Were you tensely waiting for him to calculate the weight shift required to take Ruby's phone so he could call Tennant to come and sonic screwdrive the mine, provided it'd been modified in the interim to work on Donna's hoover? I thought it was fun for Villengard to crop up purely because I was reading some of the short stories last week to try and get back in the Doctor Who frame of mind and Villengard was mentioned in one. Also trying to figure out where I was with the series for a potential catchup and it's not as clear cut as I thought. Last one I remember watching was the DIY Dalek Christmas New Year's Special, but going by the episode names/ descriptions of the following series, there's at least two I reckon I've seen (Tesla and Mary Shelley). Either I caught them through the sheer random chance of tuning in in the right month, day, and timeslot, or it's easy to believe I did from the adverts and being well-versed in the general formula the programme follows. One thing's for sure: despite skipping it for years, there doesn't appear to be a great deal of series and episodes I missed. They really lost their way with it.

https://www.theguardian.com/games/article/2024/may/10/the-15-ish-greatest-uk-video-game-magazines-of-all-time The Guardian put together a list of the top fifteenish UK game mags. There's a blurb for each through the link. I'd put GamesMaster higher but maybe that's the nostalgia goggles. Retro Gamer should either be higher or not make the 15 because sneaking it in at 14 is too low. Saturn Mag sounds like it must have provided decent coverage.

Emcee Vinze in the Balduqian Strongman Contest is trying to give the DQ:M announcers a run for their money.

With nothing riding on it, it was a bit of a snoozefest at Anfield. The crowd chanted through their repertoire and after the red card that was Wolfs day done. Two times I stepped away and that was when the Pool scored. You're gone, Klopp! Onwards to a new era.

Glad to see they are still capable of making a good Planet of the Apes film.

And may the curse of Kane continue at the Euros, boys.

Haven't heard of it so it looks like I'm not hobnobbing in these highfalutin circles. Looks like it could be all right. Making a mental note to be on the lookout for "Glen-i's game with a Pokémon move name" in the January sales.

Is there anything you would like them to do with another RE1 remake or are you just not having it at all?

Some texture to it this week. Life's a beach, eh. Seems they were watching Outlander before they stepped onto Kastarion 3.

For The Kart The Bell Tolled, this week. Kept thinking I was doing all right holding a top ten position... but this isn't Mario Kart 99.

Rereleased thereafter. Haha, I'm reminded of the end of Buffy episodes.

Thanks for the races.

Wouldn't even have needed polished up before you sent it on. 'Twas very much a kid in a sweet shop approach you took to blowing through your Christmas bonus—few would have been able to stick it through all the hours of gaming you'd enlisted yourself for.

I left the door open for World 2 but to each their own.

£37.29 @ Amazon + a paper plane.

It's never a bad time for FF VI but you gotta go where your gaming heart takes you. Have you polished off all those Switch games you treated yourself to six months ago?

Mario Land 3 is a pretty weird Mario game. Hope that link doesn't spoil the end credits music for Helmsley before he gets to bask in it in-game.

VAR itself is not a problem. Technology is used in other sports. The thing is how inept they've been at integrating it in footy. That and some sort of a clash of egos between the people doing it and the protocol they've bound themselves with. You'd think after five years of on the job learning they'd have figured it out a lot better by now. Like that Luis Diaz decision couldn't be rectified because the game had kicked off again? Give me a break. Apparently 96% of VAR decisions have been correct (up from 82% pre-VAR) but so many teams have been screwed over by that 4%. Still, I would be surprised if 7 clubs don't vote to keep it. Especially when you remember it was no better before. Did they even get letters of apology back then? Automated offsides is a step in the right direction. Hope it doesn't take another five years to improve the rest.

Yeah, chests are already a foregone conclusion the way it automatically gives you a chest count in each area and puts them on the map for you. Same for graffiti. Love how upfront it is about this stuff. I've now pretty much got all the petals in each area so far (plus chests and graffiti) and even found a little secret area in the slums when I went back through it with Third Eye on. Oh, nice. I'll come back to this after I hear all the music in the game first. I have the Pact Edition which came with a code to download some tracks. Every year's been the year of JRPGs for me since the GBA/Gamecube era. Thought you were mining your memories of a long-ago playthrough to provide tips; wasn't aware you were playing in tandem otherwise I'd have... nah, I doubt I'd have wrapped it up any sooner. Reckon I'm about 20 hours in (at the Entertainment District) so I'm sure it'll be another while yet before I get finished. Recently did a segment in the prison that was a bit annoying with one-hit kills. Yes, another game with this: I welcomed Lucien into the hideout since he wants what we want. Nice to read you had an overall decent time with it. Where it excels for me is it's just fun to play. The way it doesn't seem to hide missables is a massive plus point too. So I'm more inclined to do as much as possible (not that I'm going for achievements) when it's all laid out for you, and with it being plain old fun, I'm happy enough to just look around or do a side quest rather than beeline the story. It's just a good time. Ys VIII is more of the same in a different setting, minus the Gifts. I don't mind feeling around for where these games will allow me to reach so invisible walls didn't bother me in the slightest. Depending on how strongly you're put off by the fencing you've described in IX, you could feel pretty hemmed in at times in VIII. Yup, Hawk checks out with your personality. All the characters are fun to use but I'm not really liking the look of any of them, which doesn't make me particularly lean towards White Cat and Hawk as I would normally favour the early joiners too. I've dropped Hawk and I'll drop the White Cat too, even though from a story perspective she's sort of set up as your sidekick. I'd prefer to choose from the likes of Dogi, Carla, Parks, Saradhi. It was similar in Ys VIII where I would rather have rolled out with some of the castaways than the party members I was saddled with—but again, they were fun to play as so I saw past it.

Wonder if they considered titling it Switch Edition or 2024 Edition.

Launch with: Mario (fleshing out the Bowser's Fury blueprint without the slumbering boss in the middle). Few months later: Mario Kart (not open-world. Bring back missions. Run periodic events or something at a similar rate to Tetris 99 to go easy on the FOMO. No micro-transactions). Later in the first year: Mario Maker 3. Don't front-load it. Spread the rest out over the next nine years. Quality, not quantity.

I like that song too. The Super Ball (with music) is in Mario Maker 2. I'm surprised this is a blind spot for you, though it's cool to have some fresh perspective on it! There's a hard mode if you play it again after completing it—but it won't be much harder with all these years of platforming under your belt. Mario Land and Tetris were the Gameboy combo to start off with. I played ML at home, in the back of the car and on the go repeatedly back on Gameboy and tons more on 3DS.

Looking forward to seeing what these will be. I'm drawing a blank beyond Mario Tennis and the Michael Chang one.