Irrational Passions: Recent Episodes
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I will always remember the Christmas when our parents got my older brother and me our Nintendo 64 with GoldenEye, or the countless hours my friend Erik and I spent sniping bots on Skyrail in Nightfire. It’s been a minute since we got a Bond game, especially a good one, and from the moment IO Interactive revealed 007 First Light, I took notice. It seemed like a no-brainer that the studio that gave us the best assassin simulator would be the perfect fit for a spy game. Now having snuck, fought, and blasted my way through this newest adventure, I can say unequivocally that that faith was well placed, and has delivered perhaps the most fun I have had with a game so far this year.
007 First Light is a departure from what’s come before as it tells the untold story of Bond, before he became “Bond, James Bond”, the gentleman super spy with a license to kill. Opening when James is simply an incredibly lucky member of the British Royal Navy, rescuing some hostages, over the course of the 15-ish hour adventure, will see the man earn his signature 00 moniker. This is a young Bond, where his retorts are quick, his fashion sense flashy, and his wit is sharp. More bravado than suave, more bombastic than subtle. All of those little mannerisms fans of the books and movies associate with the legendary figure are here, just in their infancy, and are rough around the edges, and pulled off spectacularly by the Irish actor Patrick Gibson, who plays him in First Light.
The familiar Bond elements don’t stop at the character himself. Every sort of staple of the franchise is here, and I mean that in the best possible way. Nifty gadgets? Check. Beautiful ladies? Check. Driving awesome cars that shoot missiles and an evil villain’s Arctic lair? Check and check. And of course, beloved characters like Q, Moneypenny, and M have all received modern updates with their respective actors also bringing a wonderful new yet familiar take on the memorable characters that I came to love.
The story itself strangely feels a bit more grounded than what you find in the books or films. There’s no super satellite poised to rain destruction down if demands aren’t met, or an army of ninjas for James to fight against, or a blimp equipped with a laser gun. Instead, First Light is more a tale of what happens when you put too much trust in an AI (wow, how topical!). While there are some robots you fight, this isn’t an “AI going rogue” situation.
One of my biggest head scratchers with First Light was with Lenny Kravitz’s Bawma. More specifically, how little of the character is actually in the story. Prior to launch, the team seemed to hype up Lenny Kravitz’s character, having him get his own reveal trailer, Lenny doing interviews, and even appearing at the Game Awards. He played a very small and, in the scheme of things, rather insignificant part, where I only interacted with the character for 10-15 minutes, tops?
Aside from feeling a bit like a bait-and-switch, it’s too bad that Bond and crew don’t get more time with Bawma or his pirate haven of Aleph, nestled away in an abandoned ship graveyard among the sands of Mauritania. There is so much mystery and allure surrounding this character that the story does nothing but tease at, such as his missing sister, whom he has been searching for for years, and MI6 has been tracking. You find this out in a short 30-second sequence, and it isn’t touched again. IO Interactive has already teased a new mission coming that will require our favorite spy to assist Bawma again, but for how much IOI pushed Bawma leading up to the release, it threw me for a loop just how little he showed up or impacted Bond’s mission.
Playing First Light is a clever mix of pulse-pounding action set pieces, exploring your surroundings, making a plan, and devising a backup plan when everything goes to hell. In typical IOI fashion, the levels themselves provide you with options and avenues to try and tackle each mission and goal how you want. It’s in this way that the team has leaned heaviest on their experience gained from their years of work on the Hitman series, but outside of simply being given options, I never felt like First Light was just Hitman with a Bond skin plastered on top.
While sneaking around and trying to blend in may have felt familiar, our 00-in-training shot better (seriously, I felt like I was picking off people from across the map with a simple pistol) and is a beast when I had to slug it out up close. It’s made clear pretty quickly that Bond is a younger and nimbler individual than Agent 47. I was sliding over crates, kicking guns out of enemies’ hands before tackling another, only to chuck my empty pistol at the face of another oncoming guard. The seamless integration with Q’s gadgets also led to some wonderful moments, like dropping chandeliers on enemies with my watch laser, making a nearby guard sick with a dart so I could sneak by, or just blowing folks up with my pen missile.
Fighting is just one option you can take, however, sneaking is just as viable a choice – outside of the boss encounters. Being a spy and all, James is great at sneaking around, darting between cover, and silently knocking out enemies. I found this method to be almost an intricate puzzle, requiring me to utilize the environment and learn patterns to find the more hidden routes to the various objectives. Hacking gizmos with my watch or lighting a garbage pail on fire to cause a distraction, allowing me to grab a key I needed from an unsuspecting nearby partygoer, all made the gorgeous and varied levels feel even more exciting.
Perhaps the best part of sneaking around comes from First Light’s brilliant use of Bond’s charm as a resource, letting me bluff my way past possible trouble. The truly outlandish things Bond would say when using the Bluff ability led to some genuine laugh-out-loud moments, such as claiming I was just looking for the gift shop when I stumbled across a guard in a heavily protected area. Sneaking past enemies without drawing any attention feels just as, if not more, satisfying than going in with guns and fists raised.
As much fun as I had being James Bond, some of my favorite moments were the quieter, more personal ones that gave us a look underneath the calm demeanor of the young agent. A particular moment was when James was preparing for a party and was frustrated and at a loss because he didn’t know how to tie a bowtie, so he called Q, who serves as a sort of surrogate father figure for James in First Light. This is the person who, by this point, had seen friends die, survived numerous assassination attempts, and even been dangled above hungry alligators – among many other things. It was an intimate moment and really showed that here was a man who wasn’t yet the legend he would be, and was in some ways still just a boy. It made James feel human. I loved how he was worried that he would do it wrong or that it would fall off during the party. Moments like this gave First Light heart and complexity to a game that otherwise would have just been a neat action game.
While the story itself can be completed in a couple of weekends, there is a whole Q Labs worth of content to do besides that. Few game studios support their single-player games to the same level and quality as IO Interactive. Similar to Hitman’s World of Assassination, which basically makes the games infinitely replayable with new targets to take out, First Light has TacSim. This mode pits you against various challenges with punishing restrictions, such as having stronger enemies lurking about or restricting you to only having the guns you bring with you to use.
I have managed to sink a few hours into TacSim so far, and I appreciate how well the challenges and tasks force me to approach levels differently or make me be more deliberate in what I do. Things like “don’t get detected” or “don’t use guns” are fun and all, but I’ve been enjoying challenges like “vault and disarm X enemies”, “Shoot X guards in the leg to disarm them”, or “eliminate X guards by crushing them” the most. Forcing me to plan my routes, as there are limited numbers of enemies on each map, so each action really counts.
That being said, I do feel that the initial offerings are a bit scarce. It’s also hard not to compare it to World of Assassination (despite being completely unfair to First Light), even though that has had years to grow and expand. IOI has already promised their full support behind TacSim, and I’m eager to see what gets added. My hope is they will include classic locations or missions from the films for this latest Bond to tackle. Let me fight 006 on the cradle, and please, for all that is good in this world, let us fight Oddjob!
There was one moment during one of the earlier levels where I was chasing after a rogue agent in a vintage Aston Martin and I heard my wife chuckling next to me. Looking over she just tells me she was just looking at the big smile I had on my face during, and all I could respond with was “This game is just so cool!” That sums up my time with 007 First Light pretty perfectly. This is just such an enjoyable game to play, and I can’t remember the last time a game gave me such a pure sense of fun. It recaptured those cherished memories I have of GoldenEye and Nightfire, and now, 007 First Light has given me all-new memories to smile about in the years to come. Like an awkward Bond, learning how to tie his first bowtie.
We were supplied a PlayStation 5 review code for this review.
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Man, Capcom, you need to slow down with all of these bangers you are putting out! 2026 has already proven to be a wild year for beloved developers, with the first half of the year already giving us knockouts like Resident Evil Requiem, Monster Hunter Stories 3, and Pragmata. And after Summer Game Fest this year, what may be Capcom’s biggest treat of the year, is still on the horizon with Onimusha: Way of the Sword, and the official reveal (but heavily rumored) Resident Evil: Veronica looms tall alongside Mega Man in 2027. During the Play Days event, I had the chance to go hands-on with Onimusha: Way of the Sword and attend a Q&A panel on Veronica, which only further cemented my belief that we find ourselves in Capcom’s new golden age.
Opening Geoff’s show with the debut trailer of Veronica was a magical experience to see live. The slow realization dawning over the crowd, marked by a growing crescendo of excitement, was a sight to behold, so when I, along with a small group of other journalists, got to sit down and get a chance to ask questions of Yoshiaki Hirabayashi, the game’s producer, it was a pretty special moment. Granted, so much is still being kept under wraps that most questions were met with something along the lines of “the team is hard at work to deliver an experience that will delight fans” or “we aren’t ready to talk about that just yet, but please look forward to more details in the future.” What Hirabayashi was more open to sharing was the overall approach that the team is developing it around- that team being the same one that worked on both the Resident Evil 2 and 4 remakes.
Hirabayashi explained that the core experience that he and the others are working towards with Veronica is a title that reveals the horrors that can lurk inside the human heart and mind, not only the grotesque creatures the series is known for. The end goal is to deliver a game that not only elevates the story and experience, but highlighting those core concepts and what made the original Code: Veronica what it was. So, with enhanced vigor from the massive amount of excitement from the reveal (a level of support that surprised even the team, apparently) Hirabayashi departed back through the black curtain he had arrived through, and the next segment began.
During this same presentation, Capcom also showed off a brand-new demo of Onimusha, separate from the public demo. This hands-off display of samurai badassery took Musashi on a quest to help a geisha, which involves sending him into a Genman-infested area in need of cleansing. This 15-minute or so glimpse featured some new foes, including a fish-lady that tries to seduce you into the water, a terrifying boss-like Genma, the sword-wielding Dohatsu-ten, and, surprisingly, a bit of humor too.
That last bit was perhaps my favorite part of the whole demo. After getting the request, Musashi has to get in a boat to make it to the area he is to clear out, but there is just one problem – he doesn’t know how to work the boat. This man, who can cut down demons like they were nothing, deflect back arrows, and stare back at danger, has no idea how to work a boat, and lets the girl know. This brief bit I found really humanized Musashi and hinted at a depth to the character that I hope is explored in the full game.
It wasn’t until I got a chance to get my hands on Onimusha again that it became my game of the show for Play Days. I got an hour to check out yet another demo, this one offering a look at a large, village-like area, free for me to poke around, fight through, and, at the end, do battle against a menacing boss covered in arms and hands. The last time I went hands-on with Onimusha was back at PAX West, which was the same demo that’s now available publicly to try out. It was a far more guided experience. And perhaps it’s just my age catching up on me, I don’t remember seeing or hearing that Way of the Sword would feature more wide-open and explorable spaces, prior to this demo. It was a really neat surprise!
The main questline of the demo involved me finding some missing stone totems of a local village’s protectors that had been stolen and hidden in the surrounding area. So off I went to find some talking heads.
Sprinkled throughout the ransacked village, I came across villagers being attacked that I could save, what appeared to be crafting supplies, shrines to heal at, and mobs of enemies to practice my timing and attack combos on. One neat system that Capcom has added to Onimusha to help players get their timings down and make them aware of some of the actions you can take in response to attacks is having symbols appear over an enemy’s head as they are about to strike. Helping you learn when you should press a button to counter or parry an attack. This can be turned off for those who want to learn the hard way, or after they feel confident enough. It doesn’t appear to telegraph when the timing to perform the normally instant-kill Issen attack, so you will still have to work it out on your own.
So I killed some baddies, found stone dudes crammed in jars, and after returning them to their rightful place, the finale of my time with Onimusha began. It was time for me to take on the boss – a Genma whose body was covered in hands with long, multi-jointed arms sticking out from his back. Imagine the Pale Man from Pan’s Labyrinth (you know, the one with the eyeballs on his hands), crossed with a spider, that also wields a big sword . It was a really fun boss fight, dodging out of the way of projectiles, parrying massive sword swings, and deflecting him as he would rush at me, causing him to face plant in the dirt, letting me score some bonus hits. I enjoyed it so much that I actually fought him over two more times, giving myself harder challenges each time, from turning off the action prompts to fighting without healing. I REALLY have a good time with Onimusha’s combat, and I’m already bouncing in my seat with anticipation of getting to play the full game in September.
If there is one oddity or issue I have about Way of the Sword at this point, it’s why do the characters have a weird British-like accent in the English dub? The voice actors don’t seem to be doing a bad job, though I haven’t heard them enough to make a call either way yet, but I just find it to be a really weird choice considering the Onimusha’s setting. It doesn’t fit Musashi or any of the characters I have seen thus far, and it’s not like we have Jeno Reno connecting the game to modern-day times (at least that we know of). I know I’m not the only one who feels this way, either, as it was a pretty common topic of discussion when talking to others who played the demo. Thankfully, though, just played using the Japanese voices and didn’t have to dwell too hard on this during my precious hour of playtime.
Capcom is sitting pretty well right now, and there is a very strong likelihood that a third of my top 10 games for this year and next will be Capcom stuff. I wish we had had a chance to get a bit more information from the producer about Resident Evil: Veronica. It is what it is. Onimusha made up for it, and I didn’t even mention the massive-looking Monster Hunter Wilds expansion, Ascendance, also releasing next year.
With my time up, I left the Capcom area, and haven’t stopped thinking about the game ever since. I have such fond memories of renting the original games on my PS2 back in the day, being amazed by the graphics and controlling Samanosuke and Jubei, we slew Genma together. And don’t even get me started on the underrated Onimusha Blade Warriors fighting game (it got bonus points for having Zero from Mega Man Zero in it) that I sank many, many hours into as well. Onimusha: Way of the Sword is shaping up to be an explosive return for the series, and I, for one, can’t wait for it to launch on September 25, 2026, but hey, Capcom, just between you and me, do you think we could get X and Zero back, too, one day soon? Thanks!
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When it comes to a cool piece of tech, one of my favorite things to do is find creative (and usually nerdy) ways to use it that may be a bit outside of the norm. A mission I gladly undertook when Xtra sent over its Muse handheld camera for review, a tiny 4K camera aimed at vloggers While it may be designed to house a wide assortment of features that make it a standout for that group, this little camera can be so much more and may be worth it even for those of you who are more in the business of general content creation, like myself.
Running you around the $450 mark (often on sale for far less) and coming in at just about 180 grams (just under half a pound), the Xtra Muse is roughly the size of a hot dog. Crammed inside this small package, you will find a camera setup that can record in 4K@60fps, take solid-looking still photos, track a target, has a built-in stabilizing gimbal, and has other nifty tricks up its sleeve. Having grown up in the time of large camcorders that recorded on VHS tapes, I still sometimes find it blows my mind how small and advanced technology has gotten in the past few decades.
With its ability to go from your pocket to filming with a satisfying flip of the Muse’s touchscreen in just about 5 seconds (yes, I timed it), it’s easy to see the appeal from a typical vlogger’s perspective. Have a deep and insightful thought? Boom, got your camera out. See a double rainbow in the sky? WAM, your camera is rolling! The Muse is damn handy, and the fact that it fits easily in your handbag, backpack, or even potentially your pocket is pretty damn neat. Just be warned that the Muse doesn’t have any onboard storage, so you will need an SD card to actually record. Even if you don’t consider yourself a vlogger, this is still a damn solid camera even for casual use. Thanks to the gimbal’s stabilization and range of movement (panning between -230 degrees to 53 degrees, tilt: -115 degrees to 65, and rolling: -45 degrees to 45 degrees_, the Muse has become the camera I reach for when I need to take product shots for my various tech and board game reviews, such as my recent SN Operator review. The Muse also supports panorama, countdown, and time-lapse photography.
Recently, I attended Summer Game Fest and made a point to bring my new Muse with me to really test it out, and I was surprised by how much more I enjoyed using it to shoot with than my phone. Normally, when shooting, I have to resort to an odd balancing act, using my pinky finger as a stabilizer, and I rarely shoot video vertically. Call me old school, I guess. With the Muse, the fact that you just hold it upright, even when shooting landscape, is comfortable as can be, especially with how light it is. The subject tracker not only lets the Muse follow a face but also tracks non-faces in a shot. I’ve had some surprising success tracking board game pieces and even art from Magic cards, giving me some cool ideas for videos in the future. The Muse has other video modes, such as slow mo (up to 120 fps) and low-light settings, which provide even more versatility. I put that versatility to good use while roaming the Summer Game Fest show floor and exploring Los Angeles with friends after hours.
Whether I was taking still photographs or recording video, the stuff that comes out of the Muse looks damn good. Images come out incredibly crisp with vivid colors and great contrast, and watching something that’s silky smooth in 4K always leaves a good impression. For folks who like more control to dial things in, a pro setting can be activated that lets you manually adjust settings like ISO ranges and shutter speeds for your videos and photos, with even more options when shooting in low-light video mode or slow motion.
Speaking of those modes and settings, the Muse’s menus are surprisingly responsive. A few quick clicks of the nub pad will recenter the lens, and three clicks will reverse it for when you need that perfect selfie shot. Nearly everything else is done either by swiping or tapping on the central 2” touch screen. For most things, as someone with larger hands and fingers, using this didn’t prove too troublesome, finding it pretty comfortable to swap modes and the like. I did run into some issues, though, when trying to make finer tweaks and adjustments, such as manually adjusting the ISO and shutter speeds, seeing as those menus were a bit smaller. That said, Xtra does have an app that lets you connect your Muse to your phone, letting you make those finer adjustments on your phone instead. This app also lets you remotely control the gimbal, download your videos or pictures, and even livestream from the camera, so long as you are connected to wifi.
The Muse also features a pretty commendable battery life, too, with its 1300 mAh battery. In most cases, I could comfortably get a bit over two hours of use before I started worrying that I’d have to charge soon, and even then, it only takes about 35 minutes to charge back to full.
Thanks to the eyebrow-raising similarities in design (and honestly, basically everything else) between Xtra’s Muse and the DJI Osmo Pocket 3, there are a ton of accessories out there if you really want to go deep into the vlog-o-sphere. I have not found a single incompatible accessory from mounts, to cases, to lens filters, and lights for the Pocket 3 that don’t work on the Muse. And thanks to a firmware update earlier this year, you can connect DJI Mics and Mic Minis via Bluetooth, should you so choose. Linking my Mic 3s was painless and took mere moments. I simply put the mics in pairing mode, and they appeared and were detected by the Muse, and that was that. And you will probably want to get some sort of mic, as the mic on the Muse will do a fine enough job in a pinch; it didn’t knock my socks off.
But, by far my favorite feature of the Muse is also the one I feel I have seen and heard the least about in the various videos and guides I have watched on the device. This thing can be a webcam. As in, you plug in a USB cord and tap the “Webcam” button on the screen, not just a camera that you need to jerry-rig a workaround to make show up as a random, unnamed source, sort of webcam. Plugging in the Muse will, by default, run as a 1080p webcam that tracks your face, but you can use its 4k capabilities by configuring it in your preferred capture software, such as OBS Studio. Granted, doing so will unfortunately deactivate the face-tracking feature, oddly enough. So not only are you getting a great video and photo camera, but you are also getting4 K 4k webcas partout of the dtoo.
While I find myself firmly in the “fan” camp for the Muse, that’s not to say this is a flawless piece of gear or that there aren’t some features I would love to see in future iterations of the device. Perhaps the biggest complaint I have with the Muse is that it seems to have a really hard time getting good close-up shots of small objects. I tried to take some pictures of my Warhammer 40k miniatures, using the limited 2x zoom as best I could, but getting those suckers in focus nearly made me chuck the camera across my basement. I get that this is more of an extreme case, and a single lens in such a small package will have its limitations, but it’s still disappointing. Even if future Muse cameras can’t let me take shots of my plastic minis, having a better, easier time getting close-up shots would be welcome.
Secondly, I wouldn’t mind an extra button or control to make it easier to adjust your shot. Particularly with the zoom and gimbal movement being tied to the same nub. Having a small wheel on the side, which could be for zooming, would be a big help, with a bonus addition letting you click it in and manually adjust the focus too. The Xtra phone app is pretty slick if you want to remotely control your camera, though it could still use some work. There are menus and icons that haven’t been translated, and I would occasionally run into a Chinese pop-up. All that being said, I still find the pros vastly outweigh the cons with the Muse.
At its full price of $450, the Muse is a bit harder to swallow and one I would only recommend if you are really thinking about investing your time in the vlogging route, and it is a harder sell to the casual audience. When it’s on sale for that $330-ish range I have often seen it at, it’s an easy recommendation for folks that want a flexible on-the-go camera option or are looking for a good webcam.
I’m not a vlogger, but holding the Muse in my hand, I’ll admit I’ve thought about giving it a try. Xtra has made a device that is really designed and tailored for that purpose, no doubt, but I have found far more reasons and joy in using it. I look forward to seeing how the Muse line continues to evolve in future iterations and hopefully addresses some of the annoyances I have with this current device.
For myself, this hotdog camera is now a constant companion, always in my backpack wherever I go, and I don’t foresee it leaving anytime soon. And even if you don’t think of yourself as someone who can wax insightfully into a camera about your day, and you’re just someone who wants a handy camera or a new webcam, the Muse may just be right for you.
The Xtra Muse is available over on Amazon and on the Xtra website.
Xtra provided us a unit to review and try out, but all thoughts are our own.
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When Dragon Ball Xenoverse 2 launched 10 years ago, few of us DB fans could have guessed that it would be a game that would still be getting content a decade later. But all good things must come to an end, and Bandai Namco is finally delivering Xenoverse 3 to the Z-fighters around the globe. Recently at Summer Game Fest’s Play Days, I got a chance to sit in on a behind-closed-doors gameplay demo of the new game and get a glimpse at what’s new, what’s returning, and some intriguing changes that left my Saiyan eyebrow raised.
Initially announced as Project Dragon Ball Age 1000, Xenoverse 3 is set in what is described as an “unknown future” set 1000 years after the series. Similar to the previous Xenoverse games, you play as a custom-created character, picked from a handful of Dragon Ball’s beloved races, including Saiyan, Majin, Namekian, Frieza’s people (seriously, can we get an official name for them), and Human. The last of which was used in the demo.
Your character is a member of the Great Saiyaman Squad – a group of superhero-esque characters based around Gohan, Videl, and Goten’s Great Saiyaman personas. West City looks to serve as the central hub city this time around, with your apartment acting as your home base.
Right from the get-go, I was impressed by the new approach Xeno3 takes to depicting Toriyama’s legendary style. I have always found the more plastic-y shiny look of Xenoverse 2 to be a bit of a turn-off, so when the original AGE 1000 showed off a look more in line with the anime, I was on board. Seeing it all in action, even in this early state, with some harsh shadows and technical glitches happening, I am already on board with the new aesthetic!
Looking to adopt a mission-based structure again, the mission that we were shown featured an icy landscape with mobs of what appeared to be generic Frieza-solider minions, culminating in a fight against Broly from the Dragon Ball Super movie. The battlefield wasn’t just an arena, but you had to fight your way through waves of these mobs, flying around a sort of canyon to progress. Even this quick glance has me excited by the prospect that missions may be a bit more intricate this time around, and the boss fights will be more involved and require more strategy. During the boss fight against Broly, you would have to take cover behind large ice pillars to avoid his rage-infused attacks. Failing to do so meant getting blasted by a devastating attack.
Much of what we were shown was what one could expect from any Dragon Ball game – the signature beam blasts, dynamic dashes around the level, and hard-hitting punches. We even got glimpses of the Super Saiyan and Super Saiyan 3 transformations for the created character! Bandai Namco remained tight-lipped about how characters like Vegeta and Trunks appear in this future, but we did get a glimpse at how these sorts of legendary characters will factor into the game’s mechanics.
Before you go on a mission, it appears you will be able to select the “soul” of DBZ favorites with Future Trunks (DBZ) and Vegeta (Saiyan Saga) appearing in the demo. The naming of the characters makes it look that much like Sparking! Zero and other recent DB games have done it, characters will be broken down by arc versions, with each having a different special move set. During combat, the souls you have equipped can either be used as Soul Attacks (basically calling in that character as an assist to use a signature move, such as Vegeta and his Galick Gun, for instance) or Soul Switching. Switching will briefly swap out your created character for the soul, giving you access to the full toolkit of that character. In the demo, the person at the controls became Trunks, hurling his Burning Attack at minions and letting loose brand new combo attack strings.
While the Soul system initially brought another modern Dragon Ball game to mind, what surprised me most was how much Xenoverse 3 may be pulling from Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot. Beyond the action combat, it appears this new game will lean more heavily into RPG mechanics than previous Xenoverse entries. Characters would level up, damage numbers would appear with each attack, and you could further augment stats in various ways, such as equipping accessories. This latest Xenoverse entry seems to be bringing in more RPG elements, including character levels and damage numbers popping up when you connect with an attack. Both mechanics are absent from the first two Xenoverse games.
Out of everything that has been shown so far, this seemingly more RPG-leaning approach has me the most intrigued and excited. I am curious to see how prevalent the RPG aspects are in Xenoverse 3, and while I don’t expect massive skill trees for your character, I certainly wouldn’t be against being able to tailor and customize my playable character a bit more, to a specific style.
Dragon Ball games will always tap straight into my nostalgia, having grown up in the Toonami era when arcs repeated for years at a time. I loved Xenoverse 2 when it came out and have been blown away by the support it has received, continuing even today! The Xenoverse 3 demo we saw did nothing to diminish my excitement for it. 2027 is already shaping up to be jam-packed with killer games, with Dragon Ball Xenoverse 3 sitting near the top.
Dragon Ball Xenoverse 3 releases next year on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series S/X, and PC.
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NOTE: The developer has been issuing patches since launch that could have addressed issued mentioned in this review at time of publishing.
In the world of games that make you squint, turn your head to the side and ask “wait is this Resident Evil?”, Vultures – Scavengers of Death is the most curious one to come around it awhile. Trading third-person (and I guess now first person) action for turn-based tactics. After playing through most of the campaign, I’m convinced this genre facelift isn’t just a gimmick. There’s something about the tension of strategy games that melds pretty well with survival horror sensibilities. That said, I don’t think Vultures is the best product of this fusion. As many times as I was charmed by its cleverness, I was also frustrated by its obtuse AI and frustrating bugs.
I enjoyed how tiptoeing around maps would snap seamlessly into combat should mutants catch wind of, or straight up ambush, you. It can’t recreate the trepidation that slow walking through a dark hospital with gurneys full of zombies produces, but it does tickle a pragmatic and technical set of gears in the brain. When the COMBAT STARTED dialog fills the screen, I’m instantly thinking about spacing, action and movement point efficiency, and gear options. Can I successfully launch a good offense and have enough movement to avoid counter attacks this turn? How many turns until I run out of floor and box myself into a corner? It’s these moments that I am most like the me that is pushing through dark halls as Leon Kennedy. I’m not afraid of the boogeyman around the corner, I’m afraid I might now have enough bullets for him.
Hypothetically anyway. In practice, I spent most of Vulture’s 10 hour campaign pretty well-stocked. I wasn’t overwhelmed with ammo and gear drops so much as I didn’t have to spend these resources most of the time, because combat with general enemies was a puzzle that was easy to solve early on. Your characters, the gruff and tough Leopaldo and sleek and sexy Amber, have various actions they can spend a limited pool of action points on like shooting a gun, using a healing item, or crucially, pushing enemies around.
Both characters are almost identical as far as actions they can take in and out of combat, with the exception of Amber’s grappling hook, which can pull enemies towards her (or yank shields out of their hands), pull her across gaps and over hazards. Combat in Amber’s levels have an added depth because of this tool and the level is designed to give you plenty of opportunities to use it, and generally makes playing as Leopoldo feel bad in comparison, who may have some sort of unique function about him but I never really noticed it.
Melee and ranged attacks can be directed towards specific parts of enemy bodies, with each area providing some benefit over others. Torsos are the easiest to hit, attacking the head does more damage but costs more AP, etc. Shooting and stabbing legs can immobilize enemies, which when done right before pushing and enemy away from you to avoid attacks, becomes a bread and butter combo for keeping yourself safe on the cheap. If you can do it with a knife, which has a good chance of causing enemies to bleed every turn, and you have a great recipe for neutering most fights. This has the add-on effect of boss fights going out in a whimper rather than a bang, as I often had a stock pile of grenades and bombs and the like ready to dump on them on site.
The difficulty curve does eventually start to catch up to this dynamic, introducing stage hazards around mid game and stepping up the amount and complexity of the enemies towards the end. That said, I felt like I was coasting through most of this game. Even on the occasions that I did die, it often introduced a factor I realized too late and, once implemented, trivialized the next try at it.
When I had to resort to weapons that weren’t the default pistol and knife, I was happy to find that almost all of them perform completely differently and have very unique strengths and weaknesses. If I needed something with more umph, the shotgun fired in a shallow cone that could also push enemies around on impact. If the numbers game was getting the best of me, spray from the assault rifles wide range could pepper many enemies multiple times, but relatively randomly. Even in melee, trading the keen edge of the knife for the stun club gave me some ability to stun enemies, and even paralyze them with electricity should I have the battery power to. Stopping zombies from moving or acting is the most powerful thing you can do in Vultures and you have an abundance of ways to do it from the jump.
No tools were strong enough to protect me from the myriad bugs I encountered in combat scenarios though, some of them occasionally forcing me to restart a mission from my last save altogether, like a moment of brilliance I had luring a blade-handed hunter mutant into dashing itself into a trap door sending it careening into the darkness below and never making it to me, only to realize that the joke was on me because the game never progressed past the state of it falling and me moving on to capitalize on my prowess. One mission in a mansion courtyard had an encounter I had to restart three separate times because burrowing enemies kept trying to unearth themselves from immovable objects, and I couldn’t move on from the room without dealing with them first. When people think of indie developers, they think of low resolutions and small scopes but sometimes forget that indie also sometimes means not enough resources for QA.
The “tiptoeing around maps” part that comes between the combat walks the line between semi-compelling environmental mystery and obsessive item hunt well enough. The PSX-through-a-CRT art style helps set the expectation that every underground cave, sinister science lab, or dilapidated urban center is definitely inspired by the games you think they are. Environments are muddy and dark, but evocative and sometimes even didactic. But most of the time, each level is just a new look wrapped around similar sorts of exploration dynamics.
Speaking to the item hunt of it all, managing inventory was often my constant point of tension, as I kept hoovering everything I came across into my limited pockets, having to make frequent runs back to storage crates to unload. I liked this approach to scarcity. On the off chance a combat scenario was giving me issues, they stemmed less from that I didn’t have the resources and more that I didn’t bring the right ones with me. The necessity for proper preparation was where Vultures nailed survival horror the most consistently.
Hypothetically, combat shouldn’t have to be the only option. Stealth is a factor here, as throttling your walk speed to basically a crawl and avoiding enemies vision ranges means you can maybe pass through rooms completely unnoticed. While in combat, you can spend an action point to open a door and leave a room and end the battle prematurely, but this isn’t a great option if you ever want to return to that room again, as the monsters in it will have, without fail, crowded the entrance and will get free shots on you when you return. This sort of meant that whenever you started combat, you have to be certain your prepared to kill everything involved. Not very survival horror, in contrast.
But as an answer to a question no one was really asking, Vultures – Scavengers of Death really does present the first solid argument for moving the classic horror subgenre into new forms and functions. Especially in the same year as Capcom drops one of its more remarkable entries in its flagship mother series, Resident Evil, Vultures is like a great “if you liked that, try this” entry despite its imperfections. It did feel like a pretty solved equation early on though, with the “correct” dominant strategy being completely antithetical to exploring the really fun and diverse weapon options most of the time. It’s very buggy, and lacks too many real eye opening moments or surprises as you progress through it, but I think it succeeds in being a worthwhile curiosity to fans of either strategy games or horror in general, and has some potential to be even better if post launch support can rescue it from itself.
Code was provided for review.
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Ever since getting my first taste of Capcom’s new IP, Pragmata, at last year’s Summer Games Fest, it has been one of my most anticipated games of 2026. From boosting around levels, hacking malicious robots, and getting adorable pictures from my little adopted robo-daughter, I can easily say that the anticipation was well placed. Pragmata has hacked its way into my heart and quickly has become one of my favorite games of the year.
You play as Hugh, an engineer sent to the moon to repair what is basically a really big 3D printer that has broken down, but gets caught up in rogue AI hijinks and has to find a way to make it back to Earth alive. Shortly after things go sideways, Hugh is helped by Diana, who is in fact a Pragmata – a special robot that closely resembles a young girl, and together they navigate the damaged moon base, contend with the station’s AI, IDUS, all the while piecing together what transpired to cause IDUS to go against the human workers on the moon. While neat, I never really found the science fiction elements to be the biggest draw of Capcom’s latest, feeling a bit generic. How many times have we seen the rogue AI bit be done? In its defense, however, as someone with a 3D printer, I find myself wondering about the hobby’s future when I look at the industry’s potential future.
In order to discover the causes and issues plaguing the moon base, you will be exploring the various sections of the malfunctioning station, with each tailored around a specific function reflected in the domes’ visuals. The Mass Production Array, with its sprawling metropolis, feels and looks like New York, while the Lunum Mines sets you on the surface of the moon and all of its rocky facade. Visually, even on the Switch 2, where I played, everything looks great, though the designs and layouts of these areas were a mixed bag.
Being a game that features a great deal of items and collectibles to find, something that really took me by surprise, the levels and their layouts are pretty big, with hidey-holes and goodies tucked behind corners all over the place. In areas like that city, I found myself having far less hassle navigating around, with clearer, more distinct landmarks than the Terra Dome, with its winding roots and trees that all seemed to blend together after a while. The map wasn’t much help, giving a rather unhelpful top-down view only, making me wish for a minimap of sorts, akin to the one used in Metroid Prime, for instance, since verticality is used rather frequently in its levels. That said, I did find myself appreciating the game, giving me a clear tracker of what items can be found in what zones of each level and how many were left to find – perfect for completionists. The plentiful fast travel points that let you zoom between your safe zone, the Cabin, and different areas made revisits to collect things a breeze.
Even the most expertly crafted maps are only fun if exploring is fun to do, and controlling Hugh and Diana around the station feels snappy, with solid shooting back in action. Typically, when I see space games with the main character in a bulky space suit, I just assume that the game’s tension will come largely from the fact that the protagonists can’t outrun the danger. Not the case here. With boosters on his upgradable space suit, Hugh can hover between platforms and dash around the maps like Mega Man X. Certain upgrades you can acquire will even slow time whenever you perform a perfect dodge by boosting out of harm’s way just in time, letting you score some added potshots on the angry bots going after you.
Speaking of shooting bots, you gain access to a mix of the familiar, like shotguns and a pistol, and more utility-focused offerings like the riot blaster, which will knock down enemies, the stasis net that freezes them in place, and the decoy generator that (surprise surprise) puts up a fake image of Hugh to draw the attention off hostiles.
Pragmata’s approach to weapons being more of a consumable item, with each one (except a standard sidearm that does have infinite ammo but does feature a far too slow cooldown bar to refill ammo) only having a handful of shots before being ditched, requiring you to find more in the field, was an interesting choice, but not one I was particularly enamored by. It reminded me somewhat of the more recent Zelda games and their weapon break system, which I am firmly in the “anti-weapon break” camp, so it wouldn’t be my first choice, but I do appreciate the sidearm with the infinite ammo to always fall back to. But the duo has another trick up their sleeves – Diana herself!
Even the strongest weapons in Hugh’s arsenal seem to ping off the armor of the robots that will get in your way, requiring you to take advantage of Diana’s powerful hacking ability to expose the delicate components of your foes. To do so, you will need to complete a simple puzzle-esque minigame in real time, routing a cursor to a specific box on the grid, which will open up the bot’s chassis. The fact that this has to all be done as you dodge and shoot your way around the area gives its combat an injection of chaos into the mix, with the bosses and their giant hacking grids paired with devastating attack patterns to learn, leading to many white-knuckle moments.
What really sold Diana’s hacking mechanic for me was how you can evolve it and augment it as the game progresses, allowing special hacking nodes to populate it that can let you expose all similar robots nearby at once, or change them to fight for you instead of against you for a short time. This adds to the minigame’s complexity, true, but they all remain optional, so that in especially tense moments you can opt to head straight for the goal instead. There is even an ability you can unlock for Diana relatively early on that allows her to auto-hack the target, which does a good job of also hitting those hacking nodes, too. It’s saved my butt more than once during encounters.
I’m reminded of Devil May Cry and Onimusha – two other Capcom series that have grown into heavy-hitting series of theirs, which began their lives as concepts for new Resident Evil games. As I was shooting through the bloodthirsty robots in Pragmata, a thought that kept popping up in my mind was how it wouldn’t surprise me if the title began its life as a concept for a more futuristic, sci-fi-geared Resident Evil. Perhaps it is because we are only a few months past Resident Evil Requiem’s release, but from the over-the-shoulder shooting, third-person perspective, and the highly thematic environments populated by lurking enemies and puzzles, I can see that loose possible link back to a common ancestor.
Pragmata is a game that I will be thinking about for a long time, yet I think. While the science fiction elements didn’t blow my mind, the connection between the characters of Hugh and Diana, however, did. As a father myself of an almost three-year-old little dude, the wonder in Diana’s expressions and dialogue whenever she saw something new instantly hit home, reminding me of the same looks and excitement I see daily on my son’s face. Having Diana ask Hugh about every new Earth object memory you find or playing hide and seek with her are moments that fill my days almost more than any other task I do, and that same sense of wonder is duplicated here, and I can’t help but just smile every time it happens. Though it will be some time yet before my boy is as articulate with his words as Diana is. There are many games where I find myself caring about their characters, but it is far rarer for me to feel for characters and relate to them on such an intimate level as I do with Hugh and that little girl on his shoulder. And yes, there were moments in this that made me cry.
Capcom has been firing all rockets the past few years, and 2026 is shaping up to be an absolute banger for the long-running studio between Pragmata, Resident Evil Requiem early this year, Onimusha: Way of the Sword coming down the road yet, and even hints of a Monster Hunter Wilds expansion rounding out the year. It may have spots of rust here and there marring its otherwise refined surface, but this still is one of the games that I would bet will land somewhere on my top 10 games of the year come December, and Hugh and Diana, with her drawings and games of hide and seek, will be one of my favorite, and most personal, duos in all of gaming. And now, I’m off to go run around and play with my boy, and enjoy these days while they last.
A Nintendo Switch 2 code was provided to us by the game’s PR firm.
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While I grew up with the Resident Evil series in the background, it wasn’t until (strangely) the pandemic, when I was out of work, that I really dove into the tales of Leon Kennedy, the members of S.T.A.R.S., and all the nefarious goings-on of Umbrella. Perhaps it was a strange sort of catharsis, playing through a series about a potential world-ending virus during (what at the time) was a societal reset caused also by a virus. Paired with nearly a year of free time, it all made for quite the memorable first foray into Raccoon City and Resident Evil. Now, Resident Evil Requiem drops me back into those same streets for a brand new adventure with fresh and familiar faces that manages to capture the spirit of both the early classic games and its modern evolutions, in a single bloody damn good package.
Finding itself five years after the events involving Ethan and RE: Village and 11 years out from Village’s “Shadow of Rose” DLC, Requiem features dual protagonists, Grace Ashcroft, daughter of Resident Evil Outbreak’s reporter Alyssa Ashcroft, and series rockstar and dad joke master, Leon Kennedy, as they work to pull back the curtain on yet another secret of Umbrella and Oswell Spencer. As much as I loved the Resident Evil Biohazard and Village, and will always appreciate how they revitalized the series like a T-virus shot in the arm, the mold organism and locations never quite hit that same feeling as the Spencer mansion, Raccoon City, and their iconic imagery. Requiem, with its puzzly Care Center and the return to the devastated Raccoon City, left me with a smile on my face from start to finish. When I wasn’t jumping and squirming from the horrific creatures getting in my way, that is.
As I snuck and shot my way through the infested corridors of Requiem, I couldn’t help but feel like I was playing two games at the same time, or more accurately, two different generations of Resident Evil games. One, the survival- and puzzle-focused gameplay as Grace and the other an action shooter horror game as Leon. I tip my blood-soaked hat to Capcom for being able to make both feel equally fantastic and nail both styles, with bonus points for giving us fans the ability to play in either the more modern first-person view or over the shoulder in third. My time spent as Grace was filled with tense hands, held breaths, and squeezed shut eyes, hoping in vain that it would have some magical impact that would prevent that nearby zombie from noticing me in the corner. My time as Leon was the polar opposite, as I hurled myself into confrontation, stunning the shambling remains and bioweapons with a hail of bullets before delivering one of Leon’s signature roundhouse kicks or other brutal finishers. Rarely, even on the boss fights, did I ever feel like I was in much danger, thanks to the small arsenal I could pack on him, with enough ammo, or resources to craft more, to tackle any bio-horror in my way.
On the topic of the bosses, one of the qualities I appreciated most during my playthrough was how the team made these more challenging encounters feel more naturally occurring, as opposed to previous games, where you would enter a room and then have a big boss standing in your way. Creatures like Chunk or the chef roaming the halls of the Care Center could be avoided or dealt with, alongside the more set-piece classical boss encounters that were gruesome good times.
While it’s no surprise anymore, I am consistently amazed by just how gorgeous games made with Capcom’s in-house RE Engine are, and it continues that high pedigree in Requiem. From the dark and rusty catwalks of the water treatment plant to the blown-out windows and ruins of familiar Raccoon City buildings, and even the greying stumble on Leon or the gaunt, decaying skin on the zombies that elevate the tension and oppressive horror that oozes out of Requiem’s pores. Capcom really has built themselves a damn good engine, and Requiem is just a reminder of that.
As much as I enjoyed the gameplay, the story, and the visuals of Resident Evil Requiem, that doesn’t mean there aren’t any aspects I wish were different, however. The greatest of these would have to be in how the story was presented, specifically, the bouncing back-and-forth between Grace and Leon. Like I mentioned earlier, the focus and gameplay of both would feel at home in two separate games, so the fact that Requiem bounces you from one to the other at specific points would give me whiplash at times. Much like the return of Raccoon City itself, I wish this ninth entry also brought back the ability to play through the game from a singular viewpoint, as you could in the original Resident Evil and Resident Evil 2.
This is a game that I will happily play multiple times, fleshing out a bit of both characters’ stories (and just the story in general, thanks to some pretty big mysteries still remaining when the credits roll) to make both Leon and Grace’s viewpoints stand stronger on their own. I would even settle for just giving me the option in subsequent playthroughs to only play character A or B’s parts, and skip the rest, but no such luck. Hopefully, though, maybe that will at least get added in a future patch, fingers crossed. We already know that we are getting story DLC so who knows what else?
Players already knew that Capcom was setting itself up for a hard-hitting 2026, and Resident Evil Requiem unleashed a strong opening salvo. Not only did it bring back the heartthrob Leon Kennedy with a more grizzled and, judging by the internet’s reaction, far hotter iteration, but it has also delivered yet another magical zombie adventure full of reveals with implications for the series as a whole. Making fans question long-held beliefs and wonder what is coming next, and I can’t wait.
Ever since the pandemic, when I really dove headfirst into the series at long last, it has quickly shot up as one of the series whose lore and games I just eat up. From watching speedruns, challenge playthroughs, and timeline deep dives, I am now thoroughly on the zombie hype-train whenever a new game releases, and Resident Evil Requiem sated every itchy, tasty feeling I had, and to think we still have a year full of Capcom bangers ahead. Looks like I’m not getting off this train anytime soon.
We received a PlayStation review code to produce this review.
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In recent years there’s been a re-appreciation of Resident Evil-style horror games, largely lead by Capcom themselves, remaking the classic RE2 and RE4, and innovating on their own formula with RE7 and RE8. At the same time, the independent scene has done its own bit of reminiscing, mostly by playing around with, or deconstructing the key pillars of what makes those games tick. Games like Save Room drill down on one particular system, the Tetris-esque inventory management, and make a whole game out of it. Then there’s Vultures: Scavengers of Death, a game that takes the resource scarcity, puzzle solving, and zombie crushing and turns it into a turn-based RPG.
If you’re deep in the Steam store trenches, you might be thinking “there is a turn-based RE-style RPG already and its House of Necrosis.” First off, great pull. Secondly, there’s room for more than one. Especially since Necrosis is specifically a roguelike, run-based RPG experience focused on optimization and score chasing, and Vultures is a more traditional single player narrative experience.
I didn’t see much of that narrative in the limited demo I spent some time with, but what I did see promised a dark tale about cultists and the kind of twisted rituals that can bring the dead back to life. The setting for the first level – a destroyed, 90’s police station littered with bodies both dead and undead – set some great early vibes, the environment telling is own silent story of the kind of horrible shit that went down there hours before you, a rough and tumble member of the paramilitary force called VULTURE, stepped onto the scene. Your mission: to extract whatever usable intel and materials you can to help find the cure to the bio-hazard incident that has befallen Salento Valley.
How long these tense vibes stay will depend on what you come to games like this for. There’s no real jump scares in Vultures, and zombies don’t really have the presence to be scary when you can take as long as you need to assess your situation during any given fight. Though I definitely get creeped out from time to time, I tend to not be very scared of the more action centric versions of games like this, there’s no amount of “immersion” that would make me feel like some faceless freak is coming to kill me personally. That said, I do love the tension of trying to escape danger, and the fast tactical thinking necessary to make it through a tough group of monsters with whatever ammo and resources I can muster. In that way, Resident Evil 4 is just as “scary” as Elden Ring, to me, and I’ll say that Vultures demands that kind of thinking from players moment to moment, as well. The first time I ran out of ammo, my pistol was looking back at me like that first zombie in the storm from the original Resident Evil.
Moving from room to room in stealth mode is the best way to get the drop on enemies, and finding the right moment to strike (and angle to strike from) can mean the difference between walking away or limping away. Once you open combat with a big critical hit either with your pistol from a distance or up close with your knife, things seamlessly roll into turn-based mode, where moving and doing things like attacking, switching weapons, or using items cost points to do.
Where the blood soaked office hallways and disheveled offices set a great tone in exploration, it doesn’t translate into interesting spaces to have turn-based tactical combat in. There are minimal obstacles to put between you and shambling drones who want to eat your face, most rooms being largely just wide open spaces where your best bet is to kite enemies who have no other offensive options besides walk towards you and attempt to take a bite. I missed the environmental or positional factors that could be used as an advantage or at least add a bit more tactical variation that you often find in other games in the genre.
Combat has its wrinkles, though.Enemies in the demo really didn’t very at all as far as what they can do to you, which is shamble in your direction and attack. Their biggest endangering factor was that they often came in groups, which could easily overwhelm you if you weren’t careful. Luckily, your VULTURE agent has some options. You can shove enemies around when they get too close, which is handy in that previous situation. When shooting, you can target different parts of the body for a chance to add different kinds of debilitations to the target. I would frequently aim for the legs, which could immobilize enemies, making them easy targets, while also giving you plenty of time to reposition without them breathing down your neck. Knife cuts could cause them to bleed, one of a handful of possible status ailments in the game.
With the limited enemy types and weapons, I’m not sure this demo is an accurate display of this game’s potential depth, especially since the very last fight, against a complete whopper of a boss, really speaks to a better game in the distance. Against this creature, I had to plan around its patterns, saving my more damaging attack options for when it revealed itself from the shadows, while also navigating the more fodder minions that kept me moving in between phases. It was a lot of fun, and great pick-me-back-up after the charm of the exploration parts of the earlier bit wore off.
My time with Vultures: Scavengers of Death was a bit of a roller coaster ride. I was really charmed by the RE but a tactics game formula out of the gate, but the plodding exploration and limited combat encounters stopped wowing me and began to get a little tedious. I can see how this could be a slow burning, tense experience with more on the line through an entire campaign, but for an hour where nothing I do here matters, I wanted something more gripping. Then I got it from the last boss, and now I can’t wait to sink my beak into more of this when it launches in full.
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My 20th(!) high school reunion took place a few weeks ago. I might be projecting a little here, but I never really vibed with games set in school because I always felt like they were for and by people who had a remarkably bad time then. I did not. It wasn’t a great time. I grew up pretty different from my peers in a number of ways. It wasn’t a bad time either. I was relatively popular (I was in student government and a halfway decent athlete) but nothing at the main character level. Im at peace with how it went, and feel no need to relitigate any of that.
I, of course, really wanted to play Demonschool anyway. From the people who brought you a game where you protect a house full of babies with progressively more ridiculous guns, and a game where you play volleyball with guns, Demonschool, at the very least, was going to have that same sense of humor, but this time wrapped around a serious-ish story and some mechanics that really speak to me.
And I was right about the first bit at least: Demonschool is legitimately funny. Be it in small one off bits where an NPC says something completely off putting and unexpected, longer recurring gags that continue to pay off hours later, or fractious back and forths between the Cheesecake Factory menu of colorful characters, the jokes come fast and furious and most of them are great. The things that don’t land pass and get replaced by a new one so quickly that you don’t really have much time to sit with the smell of a stinker. The scope of the doom that is surrounding the school and the island it’s on is mostly light hearted, with any real twists of fate and fortune being played for some reliable laughs.
Outside of the jokes, the writing is more inconsistent. Maybe not just the words themselves, but in combination with glacial mission pacing, I often felt like I was spending way too much time watching the Black Magic Club arrive at a new conclusion to investigate their on-going mystery just to get sidetracked pointlessly. Several days out of each of the ten weeks the team has to save any one felt like I could have just skipped without missing anything vital. You also spend a lot of time revisiting the same smattering of locations that change a little – with different denizens coming and going based on the time of day or day in the week, or with odd activities that can have surprise results like throwing coins into a fountain – but not enough to make them feel less tedious. They look great, dense with little details that appear and disappear depending on the time of day and streets, alleys, and town squares that always feel lived in if not always populated. But that charm wears off a few weeks in, and about half way through I stopped smelling the roses (or picking through trash to find lost opals) entirely.
That said, it’s Saturday Morning cartoon-meets-Persona flow is approachable and perfect for playing in small doses. There’s literally a monster/mystery-of-the-week that acts as great punctuation for sessions that don’t feel too long in the tooth so long as you keep within those boundaries. Each day has phases where a main task and also a small smattering of side things can be accomplished, but without the time pressure of of those Atlas highschool RPGs, so you don’t have to choose between spending time to get to know one of your companions better or trying to catch demon fish at the cursed bay. This really helped dull the sharp pains of some of the “busy work” nature of Persona that bounced me off of those games. That said, the tension that the off-dungeon days are completely absent, too.
Just about every segment of every day in Demonschool comes with an opportunity to kick hellspawn ass in engaging and rewarding, almost puzzly tactical combat. “Motion = Action” is something you learn early in the tutorial, and it means that there are no attacks to select from a menu like tactics games from yore. Instead, every move you make is also an attack, and each character in your party of four shares a pool of action points to do. Every punch and kick costs more and more AP, so balancing actions across the party is encouraged to get the most out of a turn.
Actions are planned in the planning stage, which helps you foresee the future consequences of your intentions, like if they move enemies around or if the impact might send monsters flying into each other. Here you can optimize your strategy out of relative danger, lining characters up to combo with one another without having to worry about immediate counter damage. Once you’ve locked your choices in, your fighters act simultaneously to carry them out in the action phase. Enemies, whose behaviors are hinted out but not specified and therefore are sort of random, carry out their phase of moving and attacking, and then the cycle begins again. I didn’t love not knowing exactly what the enemy might do next but you learn to work around. A real frustration I never really got used to was that new waves of enemies spawn in periodically and you have no idea who or where they’ll appear. This is specifically annoying when dealing with the sort of crawly grabby ones that move down the field like pawns on a chess board, except instead of getting promoted when they reach the end, they break out of containment and end the game automatically. If you spent the previous turn running your squad down to the enemy side, necessary to win the mission, and one of these bad boys plops down on your end, your whole strategy explodes.
Clearing any given mission isn’t necessarily difficult, but with a grading system based on how fast you can kill a certain amount of enemies and extract, there is an optional challenge waiting for those who seek it. I really appreciated that I could lock in and aim for maximum efficiency – and combat rewards – one battle, and just skate by the next if figuring out the exacting way to meet the mission goals was more than I could stomach. Figuring out which group of four out of the ultimately 15 playable characters, and even how to specifically arrange them to get the most out of every turn, can be a tall task that I wasn’t always ready for, and Demonschool was pretty chill about letting me skip those tests when needed.
None of your characters gain experience or stats, so making them strong enough for the escalating threats comes in the form of employing good strategy with the right pairings of characters, as well as learning and equipping abilities that can alter them in large and small ways. For example, Knute is a healer, and actually can’t normally damage enemies, but you can equip abilities that allow him to target enemies with his healing attack in order to debuff them instead. There is so much juice to squeeze out of this clever horizontal progression mechanic and its an impressively effective way to grow a team’s strength without having to grind to make numbers go up. I do think it takes far too long for this system to feel like a regular part of my party building ritual, mostly because you need to assign your members in pairs to learn them individually (after finding them in the first place through side missions), and the cooldown before your clubmates can do it again is far too long.
The enemies you scrap with during any given fight are a bit repetitive but are mixed in such a way that always provides an interesting challenge. Regular goons that just walk and punch are a dime a dozen, but eventually share space with demons that want to explode on you or tether you to them with evil magic chains to steal your turns. Beating them all effectively always made me feel smart and resourceful. I cant say the same about the boss fights, which are designed with special, sometimes hidden mechanics that undermine the normal ways of conducting a fight in exchange for a specific sort of call and response mechanic that is less exciting.
As I wrapped up my time with Demonschool, the combat is what I was left missing the most. Its story is largely aimless, and Ill remember it for being funny at the time, but I’m not confident I will be quoting its gags with the homies in 6 months. But its clever use of space and movement as combat actions, mixed with its grindless progress systems that effectively make getting stronger an exercise in getting smarter as well, should be the witty tactical prophecy this high school sim leaves for the ones who will pick up arms to hunt demons in its honor.
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It’s funny how something can feel so familiar and yet so different all at the same time, an experience I felt on a fairly regular basis during my nearly 100 hours with Octopath Traveler 0. I have been an avid fan of both the series and the HD-2D aesthetic it pioneered, and while the underlying DNA of Octopath is still present in this adaptation of the mobile title, Champions of the Continent, the end result is a mixed bag that left me grasping for how I felt about it.
Octopath Traveler 0 separates itself from its predecessors right out of the gate by letting you create your own custom character that will serve as the vessel through which you will experience Zero’s narrative. Right away, you are introduced to the peaceful village of Wishvale, where your character and their family live, and things quickly take a turn as the village is burned to the ground, people are murdered, and your character is taken in by a nearby scholar. Fast forward some non-specific period of time, and your character and friend Stia set off to not only rebuild Wishvale but also seek out those who destroyed their home and see justice done.
What follows are three multi-chapter stories, seeing your character and the survivors of Wishvale track down and deal with those who destroyed their lives, all culminating in a fourth conflict resulting in even more surprises and losses, with the fate of the continent being decided before the finale and rolling credits. This more focused narrative that had my character front and center with a strong motivation was a welcome chang,e and I was riding high, but little did I realize at the time that despite this already taking me about 50 hours, this was only the first credits, and I had in fact only finished somewhere between a third and a half of the game.
It was around this point that I started to hit a bit of a wall with Octopath Traveler 0. The story and my character’s role in it shifted from one where he had a personal stake and purpose in it into more of a support role where my group and I were helping out the various characters we met in the previous arc or due to a more generic “chosen one” responsibility.
The structure was also nearly identical, with three routes being open to me to freely pick from, each composed of a multi-chapter story which, when all completed, resulted in another massive story being unlocked. While there were still moments of surprise and some interesting foes, none of them gripped me nearly as much as those in those first 50 hours. It all reminded me a bit of different seasons or arcs of an anime, and feels very much like a remnant of Zero being a retelling of the mobile game, Champions of the Continent, and these having been released over the course of a long period of time that players would come back to and check out.
Thankfully, while the plots themselves were a mixed bag, I largely enjoyed and fell in love with the characters these plots revolved around, with Bargello and his mafia family of particular note. It is just a shame that so many of these characters don’t actually join you until very late in the game, with much of my expanded party instead being composed of characters I couldn’t tell you the names of that I recruited by encountering them during my travels.
In place of only eight fleshed-out characters to compose your party, Zero lets you field eight characters at a time from a vastly larger roster of choices at the expense of the job system from Travelers 1 and 2. With these larger party sizes and far more expansive roster, Zero suffers the same troubles as other RPGs that opt for this approach — it is really hard to keep everyone geared up. Even completely forgoing attempting to keep those not in my active party kitted out, it was a monumental task trying to keep everyone up on the best weapons, armor, or accessories. Thankfully, levels and skills seemed to matter more than gear, and occasional upgrades got me through well enough.
Having access to a bunch of characters is neat and all, but it requires a good battle system to make it worth it, and thankfully, Zero continues Octopath’s pedigree for great combat. Your party acts more as four sets of paired characters rather than eight completely independent characters, with one set in the back row and the other taking more of an active role in front. During a pair’s turn, they are freely able to swap places, which adds an interesting new layer to the tried-and-proven Octopath combat.
Combat itself, despite the change, feels just as engaging and pulls me in like the others. I’ve always loved the trial-and-error puzzle that is Octopath’s battles, where you need to discover an enemy’s weaknesses in order to break their defenses to unload the BIG damage on them. Due to having a larger group on the field and more skills to pick from, enemies have far larger shield pools you need to break through, which required me to really plan when I would actually land the final break, making sure I did it at the start of a round to take full advantage of the opportunity.
For all my issues with the main story, I was surprised by just how much side content Zero has, and more than once did I find myself spiraling out into random side quests and checking off lists that I would look up, and hours had passed. Path actions in the earlier games proved to be my Octopath kryptonite, where I had an insatiable need to make sure that I had interacted and completed actions with everyone in a town that I could before moving on. This habit returned and proved to be as alluring as ever.
I also became a particular fan of hunting down new special Elite Enemies that lurked in many of Zero’s regions and dungeons. These foes always served as great tests of strategy and skill, and vanquishing them would yield a special item known as a Radiant Cornerstone, which allows you to upgrade your buildings in the village-building system that is brand new to Octopath Traveler 0.
Before the release, this was the part I was most intrigued by, but after experiencing it, I felt it was a bit too restrictive and limiting. Rebuilding Wishvale lets you place homes, businesses, and special buildings like a giant monster arena, but the system limits what you can build behind town levels, requiring you to complete quests to increase. I wish that parts were perhaps only tied to rare items but could be placed however you want to your heart’s content as long as you had the materials. Once I had fully leveled my town, I enjoyed it more, since those limits had been removed.
Had I not been aware prior that Zero was a reinterpretation/remaster of a mobile game, the thought wouldn’t have crossed my mind, but with that knowledge, the more I played, the more I felt that some parts of Zero were remnants from this adaptation process and mobile roots.
I could see how the different arcs would make more sense with a mobile release schedule, with a new main quest coming months, if not longer, after the last. Low XP, money, and JP values in the early game gave me hints of playing a mobile title trying to suck time from me, and the large pool of possible party members wafts of gacha systems. These shadows of the mobile game don’t muddy the fact, though, that the team has done a fine job taking a mobile experience and making it into a full console RPG, despite some blemishes.
Octopath Traveler 0 is a strange game for me. It offers some of my favorite moments from the series, such as the more focused and cohesive narrative in the first arc, where I felt like my character mattered, to the most disappointing, with a majority of the playable cast landing flat, where I remember them more for what weapons or skills they possess than even their names. And then there are things in the middle, like the combat adjustments, where I still love the basic combat loop of discovering and exploiting weaknesses and then letting loose a ton of pain on my enemies, but I still vastly prefer the job system from OT 1 & 2 over the 8-man party. Zero is still a solid RPG and one that I had a good time with, even if I was hoping for a great one. I find myself wondering what I would feel had the game ended at those first credits instead of going on for another 50 hours, but regardless, it’s a fascinating case study on how a mobile title can be adapted into a full-on console experience, for better or for worse.
Octopath Traveler 0 was reviewed on the PS5 using a code provided by the game’s PR group.
The post Octopath Traveler 0 Review – A 100-hour mixed bag appeared first on Irrational Passions.
Every still frame of Million Depth sort of convinced me that this game was a side-scrolling action game in the vein of Castlevania, but how you kill the monsters of the depths in this game bears no resemblance to it. Every floor you fall to is a stage that could hold one of the various shops to trade at, an opportunity to scope out the remains of human society, and more. Many have the potential for monsters (you’ll know before you go thanks to the rogue-like “choose your own adventure” style of dungeon progression). When you find some, your get trapped in a sort of fish tank of combat, where enemies lash out at you between walls that shrink as time passes and they are slain. You dodge their attacks, which only move towards you while you actively move yourself, and strike back, either by charging bad guys with a dash attack, or by ramming a hovering weapon into them.
You can, and must, customize this weapon every run, giving it shape and function depending on the pieces you use. A jagged tree branch of a structure made of bronze blocks can do some damage, with every point adding some attack value to the entire piece. Maybe you add spikes to the ends of the gnarls to up the pokey potential, or you can use recipes for specialty parts, jamming two spikes on top of each other to make a longer, deadly one, or stacking two rows of blocks together to create a self-swinging sword blade. I was really surprised by how much I got into making implements of death, Gummy Ship-style.
How you make these weapons determine how they’re best used. Whatever side the scariest point is what baddies will be most in danger, and because you can’t rotate these weapons around, the weakest side is likely where you’re most vulnerable. You do eventually get multiple objects that you can switch between and build for a balance of offense and defense – a floating shield to block incoming damage and a long spear-like thing to stab back, for instance. Or you can lean into madness, and turn them both into weapons of war. On one run, I had a pair of simple blocks with spikes on opposite sides so that they could bounce enemies between them like a sadistic pinball machine. Just as surprising as the lure of creating these weapons, and the combat mechanics themselves, was just how many times I put together some weird set of pieces that turned into a goofy yet not completely out of line strategy. I did wish the screen didn’t always feel so busy between all of the monsters, you and your weapons and UI tool tips galore. The latter being a problem that persists into all of the menus as well, as menus aren’t just crowded but sort of a mess to navigate.
I wish the story contained the same little “wows” but I came away from Million Depth’s tale the same way I walked into it, largely not impressed. I’m willing to hedge my early lack of investment on my general malaise towards twee anime girls who’s adorable earnestness must shine through the dark cloud of the impossible burden placed on their shoulders. I certainly don’t watch enough to be qualified to say that it’s true that every anime-inspired thing does this when it centers young women, but it certainly feels that way to me. There’s also that sinking feeling playing through to your first clear – traveling all the way to the millionth kilometer and into the Earth’s core – that you’ve seen this story and its coming twists before.
It does, thankfully, pivot from that one particular nod, allowing for some expansion on a different twist that you can see falling down from a million kilometers away. But none of your journey to figure out what happened to all of the humans on Earth was particularly compelling from moment to moment. Stumbling across ancient ruins of school houses, survivors hiding under the stature of their God for protection, and even bizarre natural wonders like endless deserts or gardens where deep roots act as trees stands out the first time, but loses its luster on repeat visits. Its also all undermined by verbose and mediocre writing all around, full of internal monologues and back and forth between characters that overstay their welcome.
It has an interesting format for how the rest of the game is organized beyond the first clear, though. Each subsequent play through exists to make progress towards a “true ending,” each floor you land on with some exploration elements often come with some sort of choice to make that can alter your path forward, and altering enough paths in enough ways will take you deeper into the narrative mystery being woven. There’s a literal flow chart to consult between runs to see if you interacted with the right things the right way to open new story corridors. A curious and tempting set of boxes to check, but the substance of all of this travel left a lot to be desired. Even though the tone of each of these new runs can vary dramatically, I found the more droll spaces between the real cool and compelling stuff to be too far to wade through. I haven’t found this true ending yet, and I’m not sure I will.
Million Depth is a game about subversion. It really wants you to think it’s going to do one thing, and will revel in the disarray caused when it does something unexpected. These zig zags didn’t make me gasp, but I did give curious “oh really” on a pair of occasions. Combat has a sneaky amount of depth in its unconventional and maybe overcooked design, and after an early-ish twist, the structure of getting to the beginning to the end of each dive down to the center of the earth changes completely. What it becomes though is a plodding exercise in check-listing that wears thin quickly, further dragged into the darkness by a story and characters cloaked in a mystery that is heavy on drama and light on intrigue.
The post Million Depth Review – A Clever Race to the Bottom appeared first on Irrational Passions.
Tales of Xillia was the first “Tales of” game that I ever imported. It’s hard to believe that it has been 14 years since then, and diving back into Reize Maxia and revisiting the beloved cast with Tales of Xillia Remastered makes me marvel at how much can change, and how little, at the same time. I still remember the days when it would take months, perhaps even years, for the English-speaking audience to get games, if we got them at all. Bandai Namco’s “Tales of” series is one of those that, if we got them at all, would arrive a good while after the Japanese release. Xillia is the second title to get the remaster treatment as a part of the Tales of Remastered Project, and it has been great to see how well it holds up against more modern entries. And even though the remaster itself is solid, I found it a bit uninspired.
Tales of Xillia features dual protagonists Jude Mathis and Milla Maxwell, with you given the choice at the start as to whose eyes you will be viewing events through, though the main events of the game are largely the same. Nefarious forces have built devices capable of killing spirits -the source of power and magic in the world- and it is up to the party to uncover how far their plot extends, save the spirits, and even discover truths of their world that have long been hidden. It’s a story that is about as “Tales of” as you can get, and it pulled it off back when it first came out, and still does.
Xillia is the second title that is part of the Remastered Project after last year’s Tales of Graces F and shares all the associated improvements and tweaks that it did. The Grade Shop, the special menu that allows for different modifications and gameplay tweaks like bonus experience or dealing extra damage, is once again available from the get-go in Xillia Remastered, no longer locked behind needing to have beaten the game already. New markers also now appear on your screen and mini-map, pointing you in the direction of where to go next, and now all the interactable items and chests have their locations displayed on your mini-map at all times to help you track down all those pesky Black Feathers and Aifread’s treasures. Thankfully, you are able to turn off all these icons if you want to keep that sense of discovery.
With two games now having the Grade Shop unlocked from the outset, with plenty of points to spend before your first playthrough, I’m still on the fence as to how exactly I feel about it. It isn’t the fact that it is available since it’s completely optional, but I have always found the shop to be a great incentive to beat and replay the game, and some of that drive and excitement I feel is lost when I can access it right when I boot up the game the first time. I don’t think that I want this to become the norm, though, for brand-new Tales games. Or if it does, something else needs to take up the void left by the shop as the reward for beating the game.
From a visual standpoint, even nearly 15 years later, Xillia and its anime aesthetic hold up incredibly well. At least on the PS5, where I played it, Remastered is a buttery-smooth 60fps experience, in and out of combat, which is great because Xillia has some of my favorite systems in the series. Its sphere-grid-esque Lillium Orb leveling system provides enough flexibility to allow you to have some say in how you build out characters, but the combat is where Xillia really shines.
In combat, with a quick button press, you are able to pair the character you’re controlling with another member of your active party, which will impart a bunch of effects to help you out. Each character has a special support ability, such as Milla freezing enemies in place with a shield or the dashing merc Alvin breaking an enemy’s guard, leaving them stunned for a short time. Paired characters will also be able to combo specific Artes together (Artes being the Tales’ series special attacks each character has), into more powerful versions that utilize both participants’ strengths! The fact that you are able to quickly and freely swap around this connection at will adds just another layer of depth and excitement to fights that I fell in love with back in 2011 and am still head-over-heels for now in 2025. This all says nothing about the unique talents each character has on their own, too, such as Jude teleporting behind an enemy when you backstep at just the right moment. Xillia remains one of my favorite combat systems in a Tales game, easy.
For as much as I have enjoyed my time revisiting Jude and company and the world of Rieze Maxia again in Xillia Remastered, it has also left me a bit underwhelmed. It’s a very solid, albeit rather barebones, remaster that has actually removed some content from the original PS3 release, including some crossovers, thanks to rights and licensing shenanigans. Perhaps the biggest blemish is the fact that Xillia’s sequel, the appropriately named “Tales of Xillia 2,” wasn’t included here. It’s already been announced that Xillia 2 is coming, which is great, but I wish that this remaster had been delayed, and instead Bandai Namco opted for just a Xillia Remastered Collection. An approach that wouldn’t be new for the series, with both Symphonia and Xillia itself seeing collection releases back in the PlayStation 3 era. It would have helped set the Xillia remaster apart from Graces F Remastered, considering both share nearly all of the same “updates” and new features. It also would have meant that the next “Remastered” project wasn’t just another PS3 release.
When the “Tales of” Remastered Project was announced, I was thrilled by the prospect that hard-to-play games, or even gasp ones like Tales of Rebirth that never saw an official localization, would soon be available to the masses. While things haven’t quite progressed to that point yet, with the releases being exclusively the PlayStation 3 entries so far, it still makes me smile to know that I no longer have to bust out my old system, hoping it and its special Cell processor still function just to play these games. Tales of Xillia Remastered is a great time, and easily the best way to experience the tales of Jude and Milla, even if the package isn’t the most inspired.
Tales of Xillia Remastered is available on Nintendo Switch, PS5, Xbox Series X/S, and PC.
Irrational Passions was provided a PS5 review code to cover.
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My first theater of war with the Battlefield series was 2004’s Battlefield Vietnam, and since then, I have dabbled in the series, enjoying the chaotic, massive skirmishes that only DICE’s series can offer. Having experimented with different gameplay changes—including free-to-play, futuristic, and others—finding varied amounts of success, Battlefield 6 is upon us and feels like a return to the series’ roots. Despite the performance hiccups I ran into, this latest outing reminded me of those late nights squadding up with friends, even if my reaction time isn’t quite what it used to be.
Coming as no surprise, Battlefield 6 is a visual spectacle full of giant explosions, realistic war-ravaged arenas, tons of guns, and, making its dramatic return, destructible buildings. With smoke and rubble strewn all around, one look and it’s easy to tell that this game is a package that will test even the beefiest of PCs if you hope to shoot those rockets in 4K and hit high frame rates. Even then, peak performance isn’t a guarantee—at least not yet. Despite my machine being rather solid, with a 4080 Super, AMD Ryzen 9 7950X3D, and 128GB of RAM, I frequently contended with CPU spikes that made my gameplay stutter, even though my CPU wasn’t even close to being maxed out. The stuttering was far more prevalent in single-player for some odd reason and would require me to bump down my settings to low if I wanted anything close to a smooth gameplay experience.
Considering that Battlefield 6 will likely be supported for a good number of years yet, like any of these sorts of titles, patches will continue to roll out, and things will stabilize. That said, it didn’t really help me out now, and the stuttering and occasional crashes resulted in my computer restarting itself. One particularly nasty episode of this resulted in my campaign progress being wiped out. Thankfully, this only happened after I had beaten it and was replaying it to try and earn a reward, because had it occurred during my initial playthrough, I would not have picked it back up to finish.
Playing through Battlefield’s campaign will take you roughly eight or so hours, but unfortunately, what I got was hours spent shooting through identical-looking enemies, with underwhelming and frankly generic military shooter fodder. Over the course of its nine missions, you fill the boots of Dagger 1-3, a special operations unit from NATO, as you struggle to take out and put the kibosh on the private military group Pax Armata, which is currently being a thorn in the world’s side.
Told via flashbacks, you see various events around Battlefield’s world where Dagger had been deployed and are tasked with “travel to X spot, survive or blow something up, travel to Y spot, and repeat,” all while shooting the same-looking Pax troops, with set-piece moments sprinkled throughout. Scenes where I was driving a truck in pursuit of a hijacked subway train are neat ways Battlefield can showcase its gorgeous visuals.
I don’t think a campaign inside a game like Battlefield is a bad idea; in fact, I think it could be an incredibly powerful tool to help teach new players the nuances of the title. Why couldn’t there have been a level where you have to learn how to pilot jets or helicopters in a safe environment, free of ridicule or grief, as you learn? Give me a stage where I have to keep a tank alive as an engineer using my repair tool, or as the squad’s medic that has to make a daring dash across a battlefield with my defibrillators to revive someone. At the VERY least, considering you are requiring me to stay connected online to play this SQUAD-BASED shooter, they could have at least let me play through the campaign cooperatively with friends. Instead of being a useful learning tool that could double as an exciting campaign, what I got was a handful of characters I don’t care about, with a story that feels uninspired and serves no point outside of unlocking a couple of cosmetics for completionists. And as harsh as it may sound, at least it can be uninstalled, saving you space on the hard drive.
That all being said, let’s be real for a second—a vast majority of folks, myself included, don’t get Battlefield games for their story but for their multiplayer. Many of the series’ entries are exclusively multiplayer even. Luckily, from the matches I have played so far of Battlefield 6’s eight different game types across the nine maps available at launch, I have been having a great time. Running through the smoking oil fields of the Operation Firestorm map to try and hold a capture point or fending off waves of enemies in the streets of Manhattan frequently left me on the edge of my seat.
During the review period, most of the games I played had a majority of their spots filled with bots, with varying amounts of other humans mixed in. The bots never came even remotely close to the skill of other human players, but I have to say, I sort of like the bots, too. I will openly admit that I am at the age where my reflexes aren’t really getting any better, so I appreciated being able to feel like I could contribute more to a game by taking out the bots alongside the occasional real player. I wouldn’t be against options to perhaps increase the smarts of the bots so they aren’t quite so stupid, but I appreciate them nonetheless, and the forgiveness they provided me as I learned new loadouts and guns.
Battlefield 6 retains the class system that was revived with Battlefield 2042, but now classes aren’t restricted to specific weapons and instead can equip anything. This open-weapon concept is interesting, but I found it detracts somewhat from what makes each class unique. Thankfully, a subset of modes referred to as “Closed Weapons” provides a more classic approach, locking classes to their specialty arms: Assault with assault rifles, Engineers with SMGs, Recon with their sniper rifles, and Support with all of their machine guns. I appreciate being able to have the option to keep the classes more specialized as its own mode option, offering players a more classic Battlefield feel while also moving the series forward. I’m always down for more options and player choice in my games.
There is one massive feature that was unfortunately unavailable during the pre-release review period, and that is the big Portal mode. This special mode, which will function like a super Forge mode, will allow creators to build custom maps and more, so I wasn’t able to mess around and see what all it will offer. To be fair, even if it had been available, the true depth and power of Portal won’t be seen for some time yet, once it launches. Griffball wasn’t made in a day, after all, either.
With the exception of the campaign, Battlefield 6 has all the makings of a splendid shooter that I can’t wait to play with my group of friends and relive our bygone days of youth, when we would stay up until dawn playing together—even if nowadays we’ll only stay up until maybe 11 p.m. That said, my time with Battlefield 6 has so far been spent in a bubble, and even with all the bones of a great online shooter, it doesn’t feel right to assign a score yet before getting an idea of how vital things like server stability and performance are, saying nothing of having no time to explore Portal yet. So consider this a review in progress. I have faith that DICE will patch away the performance issues I had and that the community will deliver on Portal’s potential. If they do, I don’t see why Battlefield 6 won’t go down as one of the best of the series. Regardless, right now I can’t wait to squad up with my friends, shoot back a couple of beers as we take out some enemy squads, and scream like children as we get overwhelmed by players vastly better than us in this beautiful chaos.
With Secret Lair releases, we have seen classic Magic cards done up with artwork by famous artists, made to resemble retro arcade cabinets, and even SpongeBob SquarePants memes. While some have landed better than others for me, the upcoming Spider-Man Superdrop revealed today has perhaps my favorite with the Daily Bugle Breaking News drop.
Revealed as a part of the big Spider-Man Superdrop alongside Secret Lair x Marvel’s Spider-Man: Heroic Deeds, Mana Symbiote, Venom Unleashed (Colors), Venom Unleashed (Inks), and Villainous Plots, Daily Bugle Breaking News presents its five cards in a style that resembles front-page headlines of J. Jonah Jameson’s newspaper. Included in this drop specifically are some great cards, too, including “Fact or Fiction,” “Frantic Search,” “Scheming Symmetry”, “Blasphemous Act”, and “Impact Tremors” to sweeten the deal.
What I really enjoy about this treatment is the small attention to detail that each card has, which makes it look like a real newspaper. Short subheadings accompany each card’s name, like you would see on an actual front-page spread, such as Blasphemous Act’s “Daily Bugle Under Attack” or Fact or Fiction’s “Spidey Good for the City?”. Each of the offerings also comes complete with different bend and crease effects printed to make them appear as something that could be seen blowing down the streets of New York City or flung by the explosion caused by a pumpkin grenade. And of course, the top of each card features the traditional Daily Bugle header.
In the comics, one of the ways that Peter manages to make money at the Bugle is by taking great pictures of himself—er… of Spider-Man—and selling them to JJ. Some of the included cards manage to convey this idea better than others (sorry, but skilled as he is, I don’t see him webbing up his camera to take the picture featured on Impact Tremors), and I wish Wizards had the artist lean a bit more into this idea. What they came up with is good, but I would have loved to see shots that look as though Pete staged them a bit more (or even cooler, recreating the iconic thumbs-up pose from Capcom’s Marvel vs. fighting games). It would have been the cherry on top. Or shmear on top of the bagel.
Despite my appreciation for their visuals, the Bugle cards, similar to any of the highly stylized treatment cards, are a bit too hard to quickly pick the important card bits out on—things like mana cost, effects, or color identity. I will happily enjoy these cards on a surface level, but tend to avoid adding them to any of my decks for this reason, including the Bugle cards.
All six of the sets included in this Marvel’s Spider-Man Super Drop will be available to try and thwip onto starting on September 22, 2025, over at MagicSecretLair.com, releasing right between the Marvel’s Spider-Man set pre-release starting on September 19 and the full release on September 26.
For those who want full details on the pricing and cards offered in each set, check below!
Secret Lair x Marvel’s Spider-Man: Daily Bugle Breaking News
Contents:
- 1x Fact or Fiction
- 1x Frantic Search
- 1x Scheming Symmetry
- 1x Blasphemous Act
- 1x Impact Tremors
Price:
- Non-foil: $29.99 USD
- Rainbow foil: $39.99 USD
Secret Lair x Marvel’s Spider-Man: Heroic Deeds
Contents:
- 1x Ephemerate
- 1x Three Visits
- 1x Lightning Greaves
- 1x Sol Ring
- 1x Command Tower
Price:
- Non-foil: $29.99 USD
- Rainbow foil: $39.99 USD
Secret Lair x Marvel’s Spider-Man: Mana Symbiote
Contents:
- 2x Plains
- 2x Island
- 2x Swamp
- 2x Mountain
- 2x Forest
Price:
- Raised foil: $59.99 USD
Secret Lair x Marvel’s Spider-Man: Venom Unleashed (Colors)
Contents:
- 1x Damnation
- 1x Dark Ritual
- 1x Peer into the Abyss
- 1x Surgical Extraction
- 1x Tendrils of Agony
Price:
- Non-foil: $29.99 USD
- Rainbow foil: $39.99 USD
Secret Lair x Marvel’s Spider-Man: Venom Unleashed (Inks)
Contents:
- 1x Damnation
- 1x Dark Ritual
- 1x Peer into the Abyss
- 1x Surgical Extraction
- 1x Tendrils of Agony
Price:
- Non-foil: $29.99 USD
- Rainbow foil: $39.99 USD
Secret Lair x Marvel’s Spider-Man: Villainous Plots
Contents:
- 1x Deadly Dispute
- 1x Go for the Throat
- 1x Lightning Greaves
- 1x Sol Ring
- 1x Command Tower
Price:
- Non-foil: $29.99 USD
- Rainbow foil: $39.99 USD
Despite the upcoming Spider-Man set still being weeks out from release, Wizards of the Coast has begun to reveal and pull back the curtain on cards featured in their Universes Beyond Avatar: The Last Airbender set, releasing in November. In today’s livestream, we received a trailer that not only provided details on the product line itself (notably, the absence of Commander decks is an interesting choice), but also gave us a glimpse at a handful of cards. This final set of the year features characters, locations, and mechanisms pulled straight out of the series. When the set was first announced, I was most interested in seeing how the team would adapt the series-defining “bending” styles, and now, we know.
Here is a breakdown of how the four different bending styles have been translated into Magic: The Gathering!
Earth BendingShowcasing the “Earthbend” mechanic, we have “Toph, the First Metalbender” and Sorcery- Lesson, “Earthbending Lesson”. Among all four types of bending, “Earthbend” is perhaps my favorite from the set as it turns a target land you control into a creature with haste with different amounts of +1/+1 counters on it. These beastly lands still can be tapped as lands, and even if the land “dies,” it comes back into play only tapped. Considering the lands get counters and don’t simply have a specific power and toughness, it means Earthbend effects can benefit from the likes of Doubling Seasons, Tidus from the recent Final Fantasy set, or other cards that add and move counters around.
Air BendingTemplate_GroupedStylesShown off with the “Appa, Steadfast Guardian” card, Airbending allows you to bounce a card(s) you control into exile and then cast them out again for two colorless mana at a later time. The first time I read the description for Airbending, I got flashbacks to the recent “Warp” mechanic from Edge of Eternities that released last month. Airbending feels like a better version of Warp. In Appa’s case, he basically lets you Warp out to safety any of your permanents, avoiding something like, say, a Farewell or other board wipe, only to bring them back for a low cost. I am curious to see how this will play with Warp, though, letting you warp something in for cheap to then Airbend them out before they leave play via their warp effect. Depending on what the cards feature this mechanic, I can see Airbending quickly becoming a staple in decks with heavy ETB triggers. That said, I don’t know how I feel about Wizards making exile into another zone to play cards from, alongside the fact that players will have to be careful to keep track of what sort of exile each card is in, and how/if they can return.
Water Bending“Katara, Water Tribe’s Hope” and “Aang’s Iceberg” highlights “Waterbend” in this initial reveal, with Katara serving as considerable boost in power to your side of the field, changing the base power and toughness of all the creatures you control to X, where X is the amount of mana you pay and Aang’s Iceberg letting you Waterbend to scry your deck. The main aspects of Waterbend are that you can cause an additional effect to happen by paying mana with the added element of being able to tap creatures and artifacts that you control, for this specific effect’s cost. Compared to Earth and Airbending, Waterbending feels a bit lackluster to me, as it dwsaxzis just an alternate payment option as opposed to a specific effect to get excited about.
Fire BendingLastly, we have Fire Lords Zuko and Sozin to showcase firebending, which is all about a limited mana ramp. When a creature with firebending attacks, you will gain a certain amount of red mana to use that lasts until the end of combat. It’s a bit of a bummer that the mana that is gained doesn’t stick around until the end of your turn. It is very on-brand for Firebending to be a great addition to burn decks that rely on quick and damaging instant burn damage. For decks that utilize things like burn spells or fire breathing, firebending will fit perfectly, giving you free mana to dump into your reserves.
We still have a good bit of time between now and when the Avatar set releases, including a whole Spider-Man set first, but this first taste gives players a chance to start brainstorming and theory-crafting decks. From this cursory look, I find myself certainly more excited about some bending styles than others. Avatar is a beloved animated series for many people, and with new movies and series on the horizon, this set couldn’t be releasing at a better time. It will be interesting to see how this set utilizes these various bending mechanics, a fact that we will be discovering over the next few months as more and more cards get revealed. In the meantime, what combos can you think of that take advantage of the new options?
Here are all of the cards that were revealed during today’s livestream!
Avatar: The Last Airbender Universes Beyond launches on November 21, 2025.
There is no shortage of Souls-like titles on the market these days to get your fix of tough boss fights and skill-reliant gameplay, so new offerings need some special sauce to help set them apart. This time, Wuchang: Fallen Feathers is the new souls game on the block and manages to provide more than just a Chinese aesthetic twist to the formula.
Wuchang dropped me in the role of the amnesiac pirate lady, Wuchang, who is suffering from a strange, curse-like disease referred to as Feathering that is plaguing the land of Shu, where the game takes place. To get to the bottom of the strange affliction, recovering memories and tracking down Wuchang’s missing sister sent me through hordes of gruesome demons, rebels, stylish and infuriating bosses, and the odd townsfolk and NPCs. I largely found the story and cast of characters, including Wuchang, to be rather forgettable, but admittedly, the story hasn’t ever been something I pay much attention to in these sorts of titles. While I couldn’t tell you the names of the bosses or NPCs outside of monikers like “lightning dude with gun” or “old spear guy with sick beard” that I gave them, I chalk that more up to how I choose to interact with the genre and not really a blemish on Wuchang itself.
Gameplay is the big attraction for me when it comes to Soulslikes, and Wuchang manages to incorporate just enough cool ideas and smart gameplay decisions to create a system that falls somewhere between Dark Souls and Nioh in complexity, delivering a system that ranks among my favorites in the genre. Wuchang drops the more traditional MP resource in favor of “Skyborn Might”. Instead of a bar that drains, these are charges that power your magical spells, your weapons’ special skills, and can be stored to provide additional buffs. These charges are earned either by perfectly timing dodges away from an enemy’s attacks or by executing successful attacks. Navigating the extensive webwork of Wuchang’s skill tree will also open other avenues to earn Skyborn Might with the five weapon types you can spec into.
Wuchang rewards and incentivizes you to master and learn attack chains and combos, managing your Might while turning combat into more of a dance of death than just trying to mash the bumper buttons. As you progress farther into Wuchang’s story, more options to customize your build will become available. You will gain the ability to add elements to your weapons, learn skills, referred to as Disciplines (which can be swapped around on a per-weapon basis), and equippable Benediction items that grant passive buffs. For those that enjoy the min-maxing aspect of games and coming up with new builds, Wuchang will be a treasure trove, made all the more sweet by the fact that at any shrine (Wuchang’s bonfires) you can freely reallocate points on your skill tree. Zero penalty. It’s a shame, however, that there is no way to save different loadout sets, and if I could pick one thing this game needs soon after launch, it’s a method to do this.
The mechanic I found to be the most intriguing is “Madness.” As you kill non-monster enemies or die, the bar increases, representing the Feathering curse taking more and more of a hold over our heroine. Depending on how high Wuchang’s Madness is, various effects will begin to trigger, with more being able to be unlocked via the skill tree. These bonuses can be incredibly powerful, such as increasing the health gained from the dual sword’s Blademaster skill or speeding up how fast an attack comes, but this power comes at a price. The higher that Madness rises, the more Red Mercury—Wuchang’s currency and experience points—you drop when you die and need to retrieve. At the same time, both the damage taken and dished out increase. Maxed-out Madness has the added risk of causing an evil phantom to spawn where you die, which removes your Madness when you take it out. These fights were fun. I thoroughly enjoyed watching this phantom kill a bunch of enemies on its own before I swooped in, dealing the final blow and earning the spoils. As an extra bit of temptation, you can purchase items by taking Madness onto yourself, a system I never really took advantage of, but an interesting inclusion nonetheless.
The visuals of Wuchang, with its Chinese architecture and inspiration, also help the game set itself apart from the more common medieval European and high-fantasy peers on the market. Textures can occasionally be a little rough, and if you look too closely at some models in the environment, you will see flaws, but these blemishes were easy to overlook thanks to the beautiful vistas and varied environments I fought through. Icy peaks, deep forests, and destroyed temples are just a small sample of what you can expect from Wuchang’s massive and imposing map.
Wuchang’s sense of exploration reminds me of the original Dark Souls, with a handful of main areas that splinter off into smaller interconnected ones. They are broken up in such a way that to beat the game you won’t necessarily visit everywhere with friends I knew who also reviewed the game found places I never saw and fought bosses I never encountered. Thankfully, backtracking is made easier due to shrines allowing you to fast travel between one another, but I would kill for some sort of map. I realize that this statement could be considered taboo and sacrilegious amongst the most diehard fans of the genre, but that doesn’t stop me from wishing it were there. Some alternate paths aren’t very clearly conveyed and just lead to frustration and confusion when trying to progress. Unfortunately, I found Wuchang to suffer from this issue of vagueness in more than just finding my way around.
While I may appreciate all the tools Wuchang lets me play around with—from Madness to Skyborn Might, the various elements, and more—Wuchang really drops the ball when it comes to explaining things well. While the occasional tip pop-up will appear in multiple locations, I had to resort to sifting through the System Help menu’s mess to try and find what I was looking for. Even then, aspects like a spell’s “Alacrity” or a one-handed sword’s “Binding Time” stacks remain unclear. If Wuchang could implement a feature that allows you to press a button and open a window providing a brief explanation of the highlighted keywords featured in a description, this issue would be fixed. Having a better understanding of what everything does and how Wuchang’s various systems interact with one another may help alleviate my other main issue: the multiple sharp difficulty spikes around the bosses.
One of the defining aspects of the Soulslike genre, and one that appeals to many of its fans, is its challenging boss encounters. The first 8–10 hours of the game pitted me against challenging yet still rewarding bosses that tested and pushed me, where seeing my strategies work gave me a warm, rewarding feeling. Once I got deeper into the game, I felt like the bosses weren’t playing by the same rules. I was getting knocked out combo strings, my attacks being brushed off as though they were nothing, and sometimes I would get hit before I regained control after entering their arena to fight them. Fights changed from being moments to test my prowess and strategy into looking for the best random environment asset I could get the boss stuck behind to cheese out a win. On the rare occasion that I was able to summon one of the NPCs to assist me, they would run headlong into attacks over and over again with little regard for their own self-preservation.
It was also around the time of the first big challenge spike that I came to realize two things about myself: maybe I’m getting too old for these sorts of games, and that I appreciate other Souls games incorporating multiplayer. I know that I still enjoy the RPG-heavy systems of these sorts of games and that victorious high you get when you finally tackle that boss that has been giving you issues, but running around chasing an energetic toddler and keeping them alive has reduced my available free time to find ways to keep myself alive against these bosses. In a game like Dark Souls, Elden Ring, or Nioh, when I’m struggling, I can just call up a friend for help, or at the very least, struggle in solidarity with them, but with Wuchang, I have no such luck. This all just resulted in me feeling old and worn out, though that could also just be the sleep deprivation talking.
From a purely mechanical standpoint, Wuchang is one of my favorite non-FromSoftware takes on the genre I have played. Its abundance of builds potential and the encouragement to experiment, thanks to the free respecs at shrines, should become the standard going forward. The emphasis on combo-strings during combat and replacing a typical MP bar with charges was also a breath of fresh air that helps set Wuchang apart for me, but extreme difficulty spikes, the shoddy AI with your NPC “help,” and the lack of clarity and information leave me with a sour taste in my mouth. I really want to like this more then I ended up doing, and maybe I’m just getting old and don’t have the adequate time to “git gud” anymore, but I hope that through patches, at least some of my issues will be addressed in the weeks and months after launch, but I’m not reviewing what “could” be.
Wuchang: Fallen Feathers leaves me wondering if the grind to try and learn how to tackle infuriating bosses is really for me anymore. I appreciate the approach it takes to set itself apart in this saturated market of soulslike games, but unfortunately, its stumbles are too great to really let it soar.
Wuchang: Fallen Feathers was reviewed on the PlayStation 5 using a code that we were provided.
With gorgeous artwork and a tale rooted in Eastern mysticism, Bandai Namco aims to break into the roguelite genre with their upcoming Towa and the Guardians of the Sacred Tree, developed by Brownies Inc. During Game Days at Summer Games Fest, I had the privilege of checking out a behind-closed-doors hands-on demo of this upcoming game. While I may be feeling a bit of rogue fatigue lately, with a new rogue-adjacent title either being released or announced on what feels like a weekly basis, Towa offers some unique mechanics that have made me take notice, despite it feeling familiar at the same time.
If you have played a roguelite title in the past few years, particularly so if you’ve played Hades or Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Splintered Fates, Towa will feel familiar. Before each run, you will pick two characters, one main character that you will control, referred to as the Tsurugi (sword), and a second, the Kagura (staff), that you can call in for assist attacks. A run consists of fighting through various types of rooms, powering yourself up with new skills, abilities, and equipment, all to make sure that you are ready to beat the big boss at the end of that route.
In the demo we tried out, only a handful of the roster were available to choose from. I opted for the sneaky-looking ninja guy as my Tsurugi character and the blonde wizard lady as my backup Kagura choice, and off we went. Each character will have different skills, depending on their role as either the Tsurugi or Kagura, making for some strategy in deciding your party composition before you set off. The main character you control will have access to two swords, which in essence are just two main attacks they can choose from, while your secondary will have access to two different assist skills that go on a cooldown after use.
One neat thing that Towa does revolves around requiring players to switch their main character’s swords out, doing so not only toggles between what your attack is, but also will perform a special quick attack when you swap. This mechanic gave me serious Muramasa: The Demon Blade flashbacks, and its inclusion is another unique twist to Towa’s gameplay compared to its peers. For my ninja guy, one of his attacks was an area-of-effect explosion that could set enemies on fire, and the other hurled a spinning blade out that would fly back to me like a boomerang. With seven different characters to try out, I’m excited to check out what other sorts of attacks they offer and see how differently each one plays.
As my time was short and only really involved a run through a dungeon, I didn’t get a chance to check out many of the other features that Towa is promising players. There is a progression system that allows players to unlock and upgrade abilities in the Hub area of Shinju Villages, crafting that allows you to forge and upgrade the various characters’ swords, and even a system that allows guardians to form bonds with the tolksfolke. How all this plays out, we will just have to wait and see in the final release.
Despite there being no shortage of new roguelikes on the market, I found Towa and the Guardians of the Sacred Tree to be a solid offering with enough tweaks to the established Hades formula to pique my interest. Between the roster of characters with their attacks, along with assist pairings, it seems like this will offer a good amount of flexibility and replayability. To say nothing of the multiplayer functionality – both locally and online – that we weren’t able to try, this game feels pretty jam-packed.
I can’t wait to dive in and explore this world and its story when Towa and the Guardians of the Sacred Tree launches on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, Nintendo Switch, and Steam on September 19.
One of my favorite things to do at gaming shows is to simply meander around and see what surprises and discoveries I stumble on. During Summer Games Fest’s Game Days, I had a little time between appointments and got to exploring and came across Spine, a cyberpunk action title that is currently in alpha. I sat down and tried it, and walked away from it as one of my surprises of the show.
Developed and published by Nekki, Spine is an action game with a Cyberpunk vibe, where you play as the rebellious street artist, Redline, who is equipped with a sentient device on her back, referred to as a SPINE. In the small segment I played, the general gist is that someone resembling Redline killed someone, and now everyone’s trying to kill whoever that was, which unfortunately includes her, and she has to fight her way to the truth.
Even in its current alpha state, Spine feels like a throwback to the PS3/360 era — and I mean that as a compliment. To get a sense of what it plays like, imagine the combat from the Batman Arkham series – the brutal takedowns, light and heavy attacks, and a focus on counters – and throw in the brutal gunplay of John Wick, and you will have a pretty solid grasp on what to expect. As Redline fights her way through clusters of goons, she will steal their guns, which she will then incorporate into the various combos you use. Throw a couple of punches and flow into a shotgun blast to the chest, or whip out your dual pistols for a little added flair. The takedowns are especially gruesome, and you can tell that the team at Nekki has taken a lot of care in animating them, and even in this demo, there was plenty of variety, and I only remember seeing one or two repeats. Speaking to one of the developers, he mentioned that the final game will have a large variety of these animations to keep things from getting stale.
As someone who studied film in college, I always appreciate when developers do neat things with their cameras. Be it multiple perspectives, interesting camera moves, or lensing choices for shots. In one area of the demo, which I believe was an apartment, the camera, instead of the over-the-shoulder perspective that had been used up to that point, swung upwards and adopted a more isometric view. I could see when people were coming up behind me, and it was clear where the doorways were, which gave the game a more arcade-like feel to the whole experience, despite only changing the camera. While I only got one taste of this, I am curious to see how else Nekki will play with the game’s camera in future segments of the game for its final release.
The demo ended on a boss fight, the culprit that everyone had mistaken me for. Taking part in some sort of lobby (it felt very much like the Matrix’s lobby scene), the boss would go invisible, throw exploding drones at me, and require me to pick the perfect time to try and counterattack her and avoid her flurry of attacks. It was undoubtedly the most challenging portion of the demo. It was a good test of what I had learned so far, having to adjust a bit on the fly as my regular combos and attacks weren’t working, and instead requiring me to really pick the moments when it was safe to hit back. I hope that all the bosses will test me like this one did.
Spine still has some time yet in the oven before it’s ready to come out, with the team aiming for release sometime next year. I may not have been aware of the game before finding it on the show floor, but its neon cyberpunk world was quickly added to my Steam Wishlist after getting my hands on it. I look forward to seeing what Nekki manages to pull out with Spine, and how the combat and gunplay continue to grow and evolve up to the game’s release next year. If they manage to maintain the combat variety and flair, Spine could end up being one of next year’s action-packed surprises.
When it releases, Spine will be available on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, Steam, and the Epic Game Store.
When Control released back in the summer of 2019, my friends and I fell in love with the wild oddities and mysteries of the Oldest House. Now, as we wait patiently for its follow-up, Control 2, Remedy has released FBC: Firebreak, a new co-op experience that lets players dive back into the house — this time with friends. While the concept is exciting, the game as it currently stands is a bit rough around the black rock’s edges.
Picking up about six years after the events of the first Control game, the Oldest House has been locked down, and you and up to two other players as Firebreakers, agents sent in to deal with the strange happenings in the house. Firebreak is a purely cooperative endeavor where teams of up to three players complete one of five (at the time of this review) possible missions, each containing one, two, or three stages. These missions vary wildly in goals, from fixing fans to dispersing heat buildup to shooting post-it notes and a giant monster made out of them. Their outlandishness fits perfectly in the world that Remedy has crafted, especially with what we already know about what goes on in the Oldest House. Don’t worry, though, if you haven’t played Control, as there really isn’t much story here in Firebreak, and you don’t need to know anything outside of “weird things happen here” to enjoy yourself.
To tackle these missions, players have the choice between three classes, or “kits”, that determine their primary role during the mission: Fix Kit is good at fixing broken down equipment with his hammer and deploying a turret to deal with the enemy mobs; Jump Kit is about recharging devices and shocking wet enemies; and the Splash kit could be thought of as the hearler/support role, rinsing off hazardous ailments from team-mates and soaking enemies so they can be electrocuted. Each kit has its unique tool, and eventually, a unique tool and a powerful ultimate ability, once you purchase it from the requisition shop. Still, outside of those three kit-specific items, anyone can equip any weapon or perk, so long as you have them unlocked.
There are two areas in which I have found Firebreak to excel: one is its ability to capture the strangeness the team created with Control, and the other is that this game incentivizes a well-rounded team composition. Missions are drastically more manageable when you have a well-rounded team of one of each kit. This becomes almost a necessity at the higher difficulty levels, and when you add corruption, which throws another wrench into the mix with strange objects you need to deal with for bonus resources to craft with. I appreciate when a game rewards party composition, as it makes the multiplayer experience more rewarding and meaningful. That said, playing solo is an option (though not quite balanced just yet), with each role able to complete any requirements. Depending on your kit, some tasks may take a little longer to perform.
Now we get to those rough edges that I alluded to in the beginning of this review – FBC: Firebreak suffers from what I have coined as “Yea, but…” syndrome. This affliction is where a game has a bunch of good ideas, but each of those ideas is hamstrung by some mechanic or decision that sours it a bit, and stops it from reaching its potential. Let’s take the missions, for example, as I’ve mentioned, they do a great job of capturing the strangeness of the setting wonderfully…BUT in the first and second stages of each mission, you do the same thing. In a game where you will be expected to grind and replay missions over and over, the fact that 60% of each mission you are doing identical tasks, every time you play it, gets old quickly. Shooting notes, chucking radioactive little balls into an engine, or fixing fans is only fun for so long.
Other examples of YBS are that you and your fellow Firebreakers are pitted against some pretty neat-looking enemies, and the risk of being overwhelmed is ever-present. However, the gunplay never quite feels right, with shots not inflicting enough damage or lacking a sense of impact. Or how the perks you can equip on your kits are meaningful and do make a difference, BUT they aren’t all that exciting. Take, for example, “Asbestos Hands,” which reduces the penalties when you make a mistake while repairing, charging, and extinguishing things. Helpful, 100%, but it would be so much more fun if you see the asbestos covering your hands, or something changes in response to that perk. Similarly, things like switching equipment faster, reloading faster, or collecting ammo faster are beneficial, but it’s just so…un-Control like? Is getting extra ammo capacity a worthwhile reward for grinding my character to level 37? Compared to everything else, so many of them just feel plain and flavorless.
I’ve completed each of the five missions, all three stages of each, and I think for the time being, I’m done. FBC: Firebreak is one of those games that I feel has the potential for greatness, bubbling just under its surface. Playing with a squad of my friends with all of us on voice chat was a good time, full of tense moments trying to revive one another and moments of revelation when we figured out what we needed to do to complete an objective. That said, it also is a game I feel would have been better served launching in early access for a bit, giving the team some time to flesh out the experience a bit more, fixing the odd bug or graphical hiccup, and locking in the balance, before launching the the “retail” game. I am excited to check in on the Oldest House from time to time and see how the game continues to evolve after launch. You never know what sort of havoc the Hiss will cause next.
Thank you to the game’s PR firm for providing us with codes for FBC: Firebreak to use for this review.
For fans of soulslike games, there is no shortage of studios that are looking to put their own spin on the popular genre, vying for attention. Announced back in 2021, developer Leenzee is close to releasing their take on the soulslike with Wuchang: Fallen Feathers, and during Games Days at Summer Games Fest, I had a chance to get some hands-on time with the title. While I may be feeling a bit of souls-fatigue, Wuchang’s unique mechanics and setting may just be enough to pull me back in.
Set during the Ming Dynasty in the land of Shu, Wuchang puts players in the role of Wuchang, an amnesiac woman suffering from an affliction known as Feathering that has caused feathers to grow on her arm. Her quest to regain her memory will put her on a path that will require her to kill all sorts of horrors and foes, many of which are inspired by Chinese mythology. The visuals and aesthetic alone, with its lush green forests, temples, and waterfalls, all of which look gorgeous, set it apart from its more dark fantasy-inspired peers.
My favorite aspect of Wuchang, and the biggest tweak to the established formula (at least in the small bit I played during the demo), was the removal of a magic bar, with it instead replaced by a charge-based economy. Spells and weapon special abilities utilize these charges, with stronger options requiring more of them. Recovering and gaining charges comes naturally during combat, including by dodging out of the way of an attack as one of the primary methods, with some skills that you can learn allowing you to gain them simply by attacking.
What I appreciate most about Wuchang’s approach is that I never felt out of options like I would if I had to use a consumable item to regain my MP. I was never locked out of using my preferred spells or weapon’s special attack for a fight, because I knew a good couple of dodges or swings of my longsword, and those options would be back on the table. Working moments or combo strings into an attack, specifically to regain a charge, feels so much more rewarding than trying to find a moment’s breath during a boss fight to swig a potion. Though if that is more your style, there are items you can get that will serve the same purpose.
Leveling in Wuchang seems to be more expansive than FromSoftware’s offerings, and I found it to be more akin to, say, the Sphere Grid from Final Fantasy X or Path of Exile’s Skill Tree (but nowhere near as gigantic or menacing, so not to worry). I’m a sucker for options in my RPGs, so any game that has a branching skill tree for me to mess around with, I’m here for. Each of the five types of weapons has its own tree that you can invest Red Mercury into — Wuchang’s version of experience — that will expand the combo potential of weapons of that type, such as long swords or spears, or grant different properties. One of these properties I touched on briefly a moment ago, which allowed the second attack in a specific combo to gain a charge.
I’m looking forward to diving more into these skill trees and really seeing what sort of wild combos and tricks I can figure out and unlock in the final game.
While I may be feeling a bit burnt out on soulslikes these days, thanks to Wuchang’s change in scenery and those gameplay tweaks, I really want to get my hands on the final game to sink some solid time into. I really want to dive in and see what sort of combos all of the different types of weapons offer and see just how deep the skill tree system goes. Only time will tell if Wuchang’s wings are strong enough to soar alongside the genre’s greats — but after my demo, I’m hopeful.
Wuchang: Fallen Feathers is due to arrive soon, on July 24, 2025, for the PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, and Steam.
The original Onimusha is one of the first games that I played back on the PlayStation 2 that genuinely felt next-gen. Characters like Samonosuke looked like actual people, not just clumps of polygons. Monsters were terrifying and emotive, and the backgrounds (at the time) I thought were photographs of real places. I loved each new entry of the series Capcom released, including the GBA’s tactical RPG, so when the franchise went dormant after the fourth mainline title, Dawn of Dreams, Onimusha was always one of the series I desperately wanted to see come back. Now, almost two decades later, the Oni Gauntlet returns with Onimusha: Way of the Sword, and I had a chance to see some brand new gameplay during Game Days at Summer Games Fest.
Onimusha: Way of the Sword follows a new protagonist and historical figure, Miyamoto Musashi (whose appearance is based on Japanese samurai movie legend Toshiro Mifune), before he became the well-known samurai he was destined to be. Taking place in the early Edo period (placing Way of the Sword chronologically after the Dawn of Dreams but obviously before the modern France portions of the third game), the evil Gemma demons are back. It is up to Musashi to uncover what the Gemma are after and how to stop them.
The demo we saw was hands-off, but it was being played live by one of the team’s developers and lasted about 15 minutes. Besides obviously being made with modern technology and sensibilities, from the bit we saw, it seems to check the Onimusha boxes I’ve been waiting for. Swordplay that is quick but rewards patience and waiting for your time to strike, finding time between attacks to absorb souls, the heavily damaging Issen counterattacks, and beautiful environments are all here.
Way of the Sword looks to have a couple of new tricks too, such as the brand new Break Issen. This new technique, which was shown off against the demo’s bosses, allows you to target specific parts of the boss’s body, damaging them and causing unique effects depending on where you target, once you have filled a gauge by deflecting attacks or dishing out damage on them. It reminded me of FromSoftware’s Sekiro, which features a similar mechanic that rewards parrying attacks. Still, Onimusha’s added element of breaking different parts does give it a bit more flair and depth.
The only resulting effects were that the attack would cause a large chunk of damage to be done, or cause a large number of souls to fly out from the boss, letting you heal a bit or replenish your various bars for special attacks. I do hope that different bosses will have more targets, and increase the number of potential impacts you can expect. I will be a happy samurai if these go so far as to dramatically change encounters, breaking a weapon to remove a specific attack from the boss’s repertoire, maybe. Regardless, I think the concept is neat, and we will just have to wait and see how well it is incorporated in the final release.
The area where all this carnage was taking place was Kiyomizu-dera Temple, a real-world location that you can visit. The team has taken great care in faithfully recreating this temple, working closely with staff at its real-life counterpart to capture all the architecture and details of the surrounding grounds. Just without the destruction or demon stuff, of course. It may not be pre-rendered backgrounds anymore, but these environments are just as beautiful as the ones I remember from my teenage years with early games. And, being so close to resembling the actual place, it just gives me another spot to visit.
I love that Capcom is beginning to revisit and revitalize these long-dormant franchises and am very excited to return to the world of Onimusha. Capcom is looking to have set itself up with a killer year ahead, releasing not only Onimusha but also Resident Evil Requiem and Pragmata (two games we also got to check out during Game Days). While we may not have a set date yet for Onimusha: Way of the Sword, all appearances point to it shaping up to be a worthwhile return of this beloved franchise.
Onimusha: Way of the Sword is set to release in 2026 on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, and Steam. Remasters of the original Onimusha and its sequel, Onimusha 2: Samurai’s Destiny, are out now for you to play with updated modern control options and up-res’d high-resolution textures.
It has been four years since Capcom first pulled back the curtains on their brand new IP, Pragmata. Details have been scarce up until recently, but finally, at Summer Games Fest this year, players got a much better look at Diana and Hugh and what to expect in terms of gameplay. In addition to a new trailer, Capcom also allowed us to get some hands-on time with it, and after shooting and hacking through some futuristic robots, this game has made me a believer.
It has been over a decade since Capcom last tried their hand at a science fiction game, and it feels even longer since we got a new IP from the Japanese studio. I will admit, my early thoughts on this game were that Pragmata was going to be another third-person shooter set in space, just with some Capcom flair thrown in. Mysterious little girl, dude with a gun teaming up to kill some robots. While the demo was brief, it proved me wrong—its gameplay was far more engaging than I had expected. In particular, Pragmata’s hacking mechanic.
The robots that you encounter as you explore the space station seem to be rather resilient against the weapons that Hugh can carry, from futuristic pistols and shotguns, to net guns that slow a small portion of space. To really dish out the pain, you will need to rely on Diana to hack them, which opens an enemy’s armor to reveal its fragile inside components. Targeting spots like a robot’s arms or legs will see them blasted off, impacting how much of a threat they are to you. Hacking, though, isn’t a passive affair where you just hold down a button until a bar is full.
Having Diana hack an enemy brings up a window on the side of the screen with a small grid puzzle presented to you. In order to successfully hack an enemy, you will need to maneuver a cursor and connect with a specific location marked on the grid. This by itself would be more interesting than just watching a “HACKING” bar fill up, but Pragmata goes further by adding additional special types of nodes that, if you manage to pass your cursor over them as you make for the goal, will provide you with added buffs.
By default, the special nodes that appear increase the damage done to the enemy for a short period of time, but as I explored the demo area, I also came across items that added more of these special nodes that I could take advantage of. These were consumable nodes that once used would be gone, but I love the idea of being able to stock up on these items to fill out the hacking grid and blow them all on a boss.
What makes the hacking minigame stand out specifically for me is how it happens in real time, meaning you have to complete these little puzzles while continuing to dodge and deal with the dangers around you. The demo clearly was taking place early in the game with the most basic of enemies, but these puzzles were just complex enough that I had to divert my attention away from combat briefly to find the optimal path to get all the nodes I wanted, which does a great job to add tension and elevate encounters with even the most basic of enemy. I was playing using a DualSense controller, and hacking used the face buttons, meaning I could still move around and shoot as Hugh. If things ever got a bit too dangerous, I could pause my hacking attempt, move out of my current threat, and resume.
Perhaps it’s because I’ve been playing games for a long time and I’ve held buttons and watched more bars fill up than I can count, but I appreciate when developers manage to add active elements to a mechanic instead of a passive one. It’s part of what made me fall in love so much with Expedition 33’s turn-based combat, and it’s what has made Pragmata’s hacking system more alluring as well.
Pragmata turned out to be one of my most pleasant surprises at Summer Games Fest, and has changed from being just a passive curiosity of mine to a title I am eager to see and play more of. The sterile metal hallways and sleek robotic chassis are a stark departure from the primal forests and mutated monstrosities of the Japanese developers’ more recent titles, with no less care put into them. The Capcom of 2025 is a vastly different entity from the one of the early 2010s, which produced its last futuristic title. While much of Pragmata’s story remains under wraps, Hugh and Diana’s mission is shaping up to be an intriguing new IP and has the potential to join Capcom’s other legendary franchises.
Be sure to check out our other SGF coverage, including a look at Resident Evil Requiem!
Pragmata releases in 2026 for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, and Steam.
I think it is safe to say that Capcom has claimed the crown for the King of Q1 when it comes to releasing powerhouse titles to start off the new year. This year, it was Monster Hunter Wilds, last year Dragon’s Dogma 2, and before that, the Resident Evil 4 remake. I could go on, and we already know what the game will be for 2026! Debatably, the biggest announcement to come out of Summer Games Fest this year was Capcom’s big reveal of the next entry in their Resident Evil series with Resident Evil Requiem. During the Game Days event, Capcom went even further by allowing members of the press to check out a behind-closed-doors extended gameplay video, and it further cemented in my mind that this game is going to be one of the biggest releases of 2026.
From what we know so far, Requiem puts players in the role of Grace Ashcroft, the daughter of Resident Evil Outbreak’s Alyssa Ashcroft, an investigative reporter for the Raccoon Press. Grace, now grown up and an FBI analyst, has been investigating strange deaths linked to a mysterious virus. The pre-recorded gameplay we were shown opened where the reveal trailer left off, with Grace strung up and in a rather dire predicament. After a quick cutscene, Grace had freed herself, and off we went.
The environment shown was much more put together and more reminiscent of the Spencer Mansion of the original Resident Evil. Bedrooms were tidy, there was a large room with clean marble floors, and halls that are mostly in good shape, especially compared to, say, the Bakers’ home from RE VII. Still, despite the building’s lack of decay, there are plenty of pitch black areas, chandeliers swinging menacingly, and closets that have a 50/50 chance of a freaky jumpscare (I nearly jumped out of my chair three times).
Creepy hallways and dark rooms will only do so much in a horror game; you need some horrific-looking creatures to really seal the deal. That role was filled by a giant, mutated woman who chases you around, first introduced via a gruesome scene where her claw grabs and devours the remains of a dead scientist. Her appearance alone was enough to cause many of us in the theater to jump. The fact that she would periodically stop hunting you and disappear before surprising you later on by dropping from the ceiling made exploring all the more tense, fulfilling Requiem’s “Mr. X” role, at least for this early area.
The content that Capcom showed off in this demo was a bit of a letdown, coming off more of a checklist to prove that what we were watching was, in fact, a Resident Evil game. Fuse puzzles, spooky hallways, and a new Mr. X stand-in. Check, check, and check. It’s not as though any of those are blemishes on the game; the game is gorgeous and, even in the snippet I saw, is overflowing with a terrifying ambiance that only Capcom and Resident Evil can capture. You can tell that Capcom has nailed down what they want this series to be, and Requiem looks to deliver more of the good stuff to players. My issue is that it feels like they played it a bit TOO safe. I wanted to see something new, just a little taste, of what new things Requiem looked to bring to the table. Instead, it was more of Requiem’s take on established early game staples of the series.
The surprise they saved until the very end of the demo was that Resident Evil Requiem will allow players to toggle between first and third-person views straight from launch, freely from the options menu. This option was added in a patch later to Resident Evil Village (Resident Evil VII has it as well, but requires downloading a fan mod to do it, making it only available on PC). It’s neat that the feature is included from the get-go, but again, nothing we haven’t seen before.
Resident Evil Requiem looks to be on track to deliver yet another stunning and terrifying experience that I have little doubt will be in the discussions for next year’s Game of the Year awards. The reveal trailer has plenty of little gory goodies to pick through and craft theories around in the meantime until we get a more substantial look at new gameplay. Was I hoping for more from Requiem’s debut gameplay? Sure. Has it turned me off from the game? Not in the least.
Resident Evil (9) Requiem will be launching on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and Steam early next year on February 27, 2026.
Deep in the farthest reaches of space, a clash of cosmic proportions is taking place, where teams of contenders face off against one another in a bid to claim planets and power, when the dust settles, will you be the conqueror or the conquered? This is Alpha Clash: Cosmic Conquest. Launching tomorrow on Kickstarter, Cosmic Conquest, published by Rising Empire Studios, was kind enough to send me a prototype copy to check out. As this was a prototype, components, and rules are all subject to change and improvement between now and the final release.
Set in the same universe as the Alpha Clash TCG, comic book, and novel, Cosmic Conquest pits 2–4 players in a race to collect enough victory points—referred to as Gambit Points in this game—in order to claim victory. Players have a large variety of methods to explore for obtaining those points, including dealing damage and taking out rival contenders, holding down planets, or even healing during their turn. (This last option was a particularly nice surprise, as I can’t recall another game that actively rewards healing like this. Healers matter too.) Each of the 18 contenders offered in the base box falls under one of three classes—Sentinel (the Tank), Destroyer (DPS), and Savior (Healer)—with skills tailored to that specific role.
Each contender has two forms: their Unrivaled and Awakened forms. Always starting on the weaker “Unrivaled,” you initially have access only to a unique passive ability. However, by spending experience tokens, you can awaken any of your given contenders, unlocking additional special abilities (each with a cooldown) to help turn the tide in your favor during fights. I especially appreciate the work the team has done to give each contender their own flavor and personality, with each board including details on that particular character’s lore, physical traits, and unique, dynamic artwork for both their Unrivaled and Awakened sides. Little touches like this go a long way in fleshing out a game.
For players who love rolling dice, Cosmic Conquest will speak directly to your soul, as this is a dice-chucking game through and through. Combat sees both the attacker and defender rolling a bunch of dice, counting and comparing symbols, and then using their powers or equipment cards—bought from the Armory—to augment and adjust their rolls. To add further spice, planets that players can conquer (nine were included in my prototype) provide passive bonuses to any team holding them. For instance, Synthoria hinders opponents’ Awakened contenders by limiting the number of dice they can reroll while defending against your attacks. This all culminates in quite the action-packed skirmish game that fans of Ameritrash games will gravitate toward.
What grabbed my attention right away with Cosmic Conquest—before I dove into the mechanics or gameplay, before I even opened the box—is the game’s fantastic art. It comes as no surprise, considering the team at Rising Empire Studios is building off an IP that includes a comic book, among other things, but the bright and dynamic look of all the contenders and 80+ Armory cards really stands out and grabs the eye. I would put the visuals up against any of the other heavy-hitter comic book houses—it’s that impressive.
Luckily, though, Cosmic Conquest doesn’t just rest on its good looks. At its core, it’s a dice-chucking skirmish game that scratches the itch for rolling a bunch of dice to see what happens. It does all this without bombarding players with overly complex rules or bogging down the flow of the game, meaning that by the end of the second or third round, my friends and I had a great grasp of how the game worked. We could start formulating our strategies to win instead of just trying to figure out how to play.
Most of the strategy in Cosmic Conquest, I found, came less from the gameplay itself and more from contender drafting (picking the three characters on your team from the 18 included in the base game) and optimizing your methods to build Gambit Points. With so many characters to pick from and cards to pull from the shop, the game does a great job of keeping each play session distinct and exciting. I can see a meta evolving around the contenders, with optimal party compositions and counter-picks aplenty. That said, a lot of your success in Cosmic Conquest will rely on luck, so players who prefer strategy-based outcomes may find it less appealing. Even with the ability to modify or augment your rolls, much of the game comes down to the will of the dice and the cards available in the Armory. Cosmic Conquest is a fun time, though, if you know what to expect going in.
As much as I enjoyed Cosmic Conquest, I have a few small critiques I’d love to see addressed in the final release. One is more of a curiosity than an issue with the game’s systems. The game includes representations of the various contenders (my prototype contained lovely acrylic standees, though the final release will also offer plastic miniatures), which are slotted into little boards that are moved around the planets on the game board. However, outside of just showing the various parties, there’s no current reason for these to exist. They almost feel like an excuse to include miniatures in the campaign (and who doesn’t love a sweet-looking mini?).
You never split up your team or drop off single heroes on different planets. When one contender “dies,” they immediately come back to life, and the trays or standees seem to exist simply for aesthetics. I’d love to see mechanics that allow individual contenders to hold planets or give a strategic reason for moving them around. Otherwise, a simple plastic token could serve the same purpose and save space, especially compared to 18+ miniatures. That said, the back of the rulebook promises additional game modes in the final release, so perhaps one of those will give them more purpose.
My larger complaint has to do with contenders “dying”—or rather, the lack thereof. When I hear a name like Cosmic Conquest or the term “contender,” I picture large-scale clashes. In most contests, if someone gets knocked out, they’re out. Here, however, contenders only lose any equipped items and revert to their weaker “Unrivaled” state before returning to the fight with nearly full health. Even this downgrade feels inconsequential, especially in the late game, since it costs the same five experience points to awaken them again. While combat is fun, this system makes it feel anticlimactic, as it lacks real risk or danger. At worst, you’re doing your opponents a favor by removing the cooldown from their skills. I’d love to see a variant with permadeath for contenders or a mechanic akin to Magic: The Gathering’s “Commander Tax” where you would have to pay an increasing cost to revive them each time they come back.
Final ThoughtsAlpha Clash: Cosmic Conquest—even in its prototype phase—is a game I’d happily reach for during a game night with my crew. It’s perfect for when we just want to have some drinks and roll dice. While it relies heavily on luck, there’s still enough depth—thanks to the variety of heroes and planets—that I found myself wanting to set it back up immediately. I look forward to seeing what the final ruleset offers, from additional game modes to tweaks to contender death and maybe even more planets for variety. Overall, I think Rising Empire Studios has a solid skirmish game on its hands that expands the Alpha Clash property in an exciting new way.
You can back your own copy of Alpha Clash: Cosmic Conquest when it launches on Kickstarter tomorrow (2/25/25)!
As someone who was born in the late 80s and grew up in the 90s, to say that I was a fan of Power Rangers would be a gratuitous understatement. From the toys to pajamas, bed sheets to Halloween costumes, I devoured everything that those teenagers with attitudes adorned. Fast forward a couple of decades—okay, more like a few—and those colored spandex-wearing heroes still hold a precious place in my heart. So when I first discovered and tried Renegade’s Power Rangers: Heroes of the Grid board game, it quickly shot up to become one of my favorite titles in my tabletop collection.
This cooperative skirmish game lets anywhere from one to six players team up to tackle a set of villains rampaging around historic locations from the various seasons (and comics) of Power Rangers, while battling mobs of weak enemies like Putty Patrollers. I adore all of the expertly detailed plastic minis of the Rangers (each sporting a plastic matching their Ranger color) and the enemies as they move around the board, as well as how every Ranger—and every version of that Ranger—has unique abilities and decks of cards they use. It all just makes the whole experience incredibly replayable, with a really good balance of challenge while not bombarding players with overly complicated mechanics.
Now, after numerous expansions and more Rangers and villains than I can count being added, the curtain is finally closing on this wonderful game with Power Rangers: Heroes of the Grid – Eternal Rangers, launching today on Kickstarter.
The official statement from Renegade Games:
“The Heroes of the Grid game first launched on Kickstarter in August of 2018. In a matter of hours the game surpassed its $100,000 goal and proceeded to unlock 27 stretch goals. Three further campaigns, over 50 product releases, and five years later Renegade has decided to end the game with a fourth and final Kickstarter celebrating the community around the game and giving them the tools to continue to expand the game on their own.
Since the announcement of the campaign in October of 2024 the team behind the game has talked about 18 new figures in the core box, lots of stretch goals, and bringing some of Power Ranger’s biggest and baddest monsters and enemies to the field with this last expansion.
The name Eternal Rangers doesn’t come from a pre-existing Ranger team but instead comes from the idea that this being the last Renegade release does not mean that it’s the end of Heroes of the Grid entirely. Backers will receive the tools to expand and keep the game alive at their tables, including customizable templates for cards, rules guidance from the design diary of Jonathan Ying, and guidance on how to make not only custom Rangers, but custom monsters as well.
With the campaign only running from January 28th to February 27th fans and retailers are encouraged to back as soon as possible. Everything in the campaign is 100% Kickstarter exclusive and won’t be sold on the Renegade Games webstore or through classic retail distribution. “
It’s bittersweet that this game is coming to an end, but I am still excited by what the team has in store. From the cards that have been shown off already, I’m eager to try out new Ranger variants such as Grace Sterling as Mighty Morphin Red or the Pink and Green versions of Olivia Hart. But perhaps the most exciting aspect of this final expansion is that we will be given rules and templates to create our very own Rangers and villains to play going forward, turning Heroes of the Grid into a community-driven experience. I can’t wait to see all the creative and unique Rangers that players will come up with, completing teams that Renegade wasn’t able to, or teams based around the Super Sentai originals.
Fans can take solace, at least, in knowing that only Heroes of the Grid is ending, and Renegade’s Power Rangers: The Deck-Building Game and their Power Rangers Roleplaying Game series are both continuing, with the Through the Shattered Grid TTRPG sourcebook due out in March. In the meantime, let’s celebrate the great run that Heroes of the Grid has had and give it a morphinominal sendoff with Eternal Rangers.
As I have spent more and more time perusing the tabletop area at PAX over the past few years, one booth has always caught my eye. Adorned with black curtains and decorated with skulls, this booth belonged to Archon Games. Finally, at this year’s PAX West, my curiosity got the best of me, and I sat down to try out a demo of their cult-management deck-building and area control game, Eschaton. In no time at all, I was sending my cultists out to spread the good word of my cult. My deck was bustling with relics, followers, and more, and I was sold on the game. It made such an impact on me that I even featured the game in my highlight piece (found here). Alas, my campaign of cultish supremacy was cut short due to my schedule, but thanks to the folks at Archon Games sending me a copy, I could finally complete my domination and prove my worth to the Dark One.
Game Info:* Players: 2-6 (best at 4) * Time: 60-180 mins. * Designers: Diha, Petras Vaznelis, Adam Watts * Artists: Tracy Burnham, Diha, Adam Watts * Publisher: Archon Games
What comes in the box:* Rulebook * 1 Realm Map * 204 Conclave cards * 90 Arcana cards * 23 Event cards * 11 Omen cards * 1 Armaggedon card * 6 Reference cards * 6 sets of 25 colored cubes * 13 Plague tokens * 18 Curse tokens * 4 Territory Dominance tokens * 6 Deck Playmats * 6 Sacrificial Pyre Playmats
At its core, Eschaton is a deck-building game mixed with area control, where each player strives to spread the influence of their cult across the land before Armageddon occurs. Starting with similar decks, you’ll play cards and spend resources to purchase new cards, sacrifice relics, and wage war in an effort to have the most favor with the Dark One when the end times come and Armageddon begins. In other words, Eschaton is a lovely, cheery game—perfect for the holidays!
In terms of the deck-building aspect, players will construct their decks from two pools of cards: the Conclave and the Arcana deck. The Conclave is where most of your new cards will come from and serves as a shop full of 14 new types of cultists you can acquire, as well as powers such as Plague and Curse that you can cast. This store will feel familiar to anyone who has played Dominion (considered one of, if not the first, deck-building games), where all the options are presented to you and are available until they run out. Some powers, like March, can be picked as many times as players want. Each card has an associated cost that a player will need to pay using Influence, along with various stats that will aid its owner when drawn—from being able to play cultists on the map to earning influence and more. It’s standard deck-building fare if you’re familiar with the genre.
The other pool of cards, the Arcana Deck, will compose far less of your active deck but is just as important. It contains relics that buff you, special demonic creature cards to add to your deck, Aura cards that provide ongoing bonuses, and more. Pulling from the deck requires the use of the “Divination” trait on a card and is more random, though there are ways to improve your pull chances. I enjoyed having two different sources to acquire cards from. It adds strategic depth to the game—do you focus on building influence to buy more from the Conclave or invest heavily in the Arcana deck for its relics and boons?
One way Eschaton deviates from deck-building norms is how it handles removing cards from your deck, referred to as “sacrificing” in this game. While other deck builders typically offer ways to remove cards, Eschaton is the first I’ve found that lets you remove a card whenever you wish, without requiring another special mechanic or card to trigger the effect. In fact, sacrificing specific cards—known as Relics—grants additional bonuses for the rest of the game, such as a passive increase to a stat or extra uses of a specific action. I really enjoyed this tweak. It made optimizing my deck much easier, which is one of the goals in a deck builder. The bonuses are just icing on the cake.
The other half of Eschaton involves area control, with players vying to spread their cult throughout the region on the game board. Cards with points in Aggression let you add or move cubes representing your cultists or remove members of an opposing cult. Holding a location on the map, done by having the most cubes in a spot, grants points at the end of the game, and some locations provide bonuses that can make all the difference in the long run. I enjoyed the inclusion of area control in Eschaton, but I wish there was more depth to it—especially when dealing with other cults. Taking out an opponent’s cultists feels anticlimactic since it’s resolved simply by removing cubes at a rate of one per point of Aggression, with no dice rolls or opposing actions.
All of this effort—building your deck and holding territory—aims to earn the most victory points when the “Armageddon” card is drawn from Eschaton’s event deck. There are numerous ways to score points; hoarding Thrall cards bought from the Enclave, securing land, or sacrificing relics are all options available to you, but perhaps the most lucrative method is completing objectives on Omen cards, drawn at the start of each round. Eschaton also offers fun variants, including one emphasizing holding territory, making the game more area-control-focused. There’s a surprising amount of depth packed into a relatively small box.
Most of my gripes with Eschaton aren’t about gameplay but its approachability and accessibility. Perhaps my biggest issue is the cryptic symbols used to denote card actions. Actions like Zeal (depicted as a chain), Divination (a book), or Influence (a stack of bricks or gold bars) may make thematic sense but aren’t intuitive for new players or those returning after a break. Aggression, denoted as clashing swords, is clearer. While this confusion clears up after a few rounds, I wish the game included clearer symbols or player aids explaining them.
The Conclave store of cards can also become unwieldy. With 18 card types, laying them out nearly doubles the game’s footprint. An additional mat or board—even a folded piece of paper—would help organize things. A 3D-printed card holder or an insert like Dominion’s, which organizes and labels cards, would speed up setup and streamline play.
Lastly, players who sleeve their cards should note that Eschaton’s insert isn’t accommodating. Sleeved cards stick out of the insert, risking damage. I mitigated this by placing the game board under the insert and leaving some slots partially empty to allow cards to lean slightly, but it’s not perfect.
Deck-building and area control are two of my favorite board game genres, and Eschaton merges them into a fun and strategic package I’ve become smitten with. While the dark aesthetic may turn some off, I found it striking—it’s what first grabbed my attention at PAX. It’s an aesthetic and theme that my collection is lacking in. For those seeking more depth or asymmetrical gameplay, Archon Games offers the Sigils of Ruin expansion, and a cooperative expansion, Iconoclasm, is coming next year! As someone who loves asymmetrical cults and more abilities, I’m eager to explore Sigils of Ruin and can’t wait to see what Iconoclasm has in store. In the meantime, Eschaton—and all its culty goodness—has earned a place on my game shelf. I highly recommend it to any fan of deck-building games.
This copy of Eschaton was provided to us by its publisher, Archon Games.
Tis the season for the temperatures to drop and the weather to worsen, and the idea of going outside is becoming less appealing. One of the best indoor activities you can find is getting some friends together and playing a board game. To make the most of your time indoors, here is a handy list of five games that we recommend to keep your spirits bright or ideas for something to get those cardboard enthusiasts in your life.
Magic Foundations* Beginner Box Price: (around) $30 USD * Starting Collection Price: (around) $50 USD
Magic Foundations, which hit shops earlier this month, is by leaps and bounds my favorite Magic: The Gathering product release in modern times, not only because of the great list of cards, both new and old, that are featured but more because what this line of products represents – a perfect set of stepping stones for new players to get into the game. Starting with the Beginner Box is perfect for anyone, young and old, that are curious about Magic and wants to dip their toes into the game. The Beginner Box offers a splendid “how to play” step-by-step tutorial game to learn alongside and a handful of half-decks that can be mixed together once everyone has the game’s general flow down.
For the players who want to take the next step in their Planeswalking journey, Foundations also has you covered with the Starter Collection. This collection is for the person that knows they enjoy the game and wants to try their hand at making their own deck. Coming with 350 cards, a couple of booster packs, and more, this collection box will set anyone up for some fun holiday morning deck building goodness.
And lastly, for everyone else, Foundations as a set includes a wonderful set of reprints that will make longtime fans eager to crack some packs of their own. I’m personally hunt for a copy of Doubling Season and the new Twinflame Tyrant cards, so I plan to pick up more packs myself.
Regardless of skill level, Magic: The Gathering Foundations has a product for everyone, and is an easy recommendation this holiday season.
Foundations of Metropolis* Price: $49.99 USD * Players: 2-4 (Best with 3-4) * Time: 60 min * Age: 14+
One of my favorite games in my tabletop collection is Arcane Wonder’s behemoth of a game, Foundations of Rome. A massive game (with accompanying massive price tag) that is full of impressive miniatures of Roman buildings that you and the other players will use to build out your unique version of Rome. While I love the gameplay and visuals of Foundations of Rome, it’s size and price tag make it an imposing beast for new players or to even transport places. Thankfully, Arcane Wonders has realized this and created a new game that retains all of the fun elements but makes it cheaper, smaller, and far more approachable. That game is Foundations of Metropolis.
Foundations of Metropolis has players building a grand new city full of libraries and coffee shops in an effort to earn the most points by the end of the game. In place of all of the plastic of Rome, Metropolis opts for solid and sturdy cardboard pieces, complete with double-layered player boards to keep all the player tiles nice and tidy during transport. Learning Foundations is quick to learn, on their turn each player takes one of three possible actions to help them earn as many points by the end of the game:
- Construct a building on their lots
- Buy a Deed to a lot on the board
- Gain income
Foundations of Metropolis is a great game and offers enough strategy to keep hobbyist entertained while also being simple enough to understand that kids and newcomers to tabletop games will have a great time too, and as a special mention, the team at Arcane Wonders has incorporated some clever solutions to make this a very color-blind friendly experience too. It may not have the same table presence as its Roman older brother, but Foundations of Metropolis is a great game to check out and bring to any holiday family and friends get-together.
Middle Ages* Price: $34.99 USD * Players: 2-5 (Best with 3-4) * Time: 30 min * Age: 10+
I first played this nifty little game back at PAX West and was quickly smitten with it (and I promise it wasn’t because I won). In Middle Ages by Studio H, you and up to 6 players will take turns drafting tiles to build out your feifdom with the goal of earning the most money , which serves as Middle Age’s victory points. Much like Foundations, Middle Ages is a straightforward teach and relatively quick to play! Perhaps the part of this game I enjoy the most is how all the various tiles interlock with each other and play off of one another, leading to not only quite a beautiful looking place, but one that offers a deceptive amount of depth. It’s a fine gateway game to serve as an introduction to the board gaming hobby, making it a great gift for someone who is just really interested in the time period even if they aren’t known to partake in cardboard and dice normally.
Middle Age’s box is nice and compact as well making this a great option if you are meeting some friends at a brewery or coffee house, easily fitting in a standard-sized bag or backpack. The cardboard used is sturdy, and the screen-printed meeples add a bit of extra whimsy to the whole package. And, speaking from experience, this game fits perfectly into a work lunch hour.
ARCS* Price: $60 USD * Players: 2-4 (Best with 3-4) * Time: 60 – 120 min * Age: 14+
Arguably the most complex game offering on this list for tabletop, ARCS is the latest game from Leder Games, creators behind games like Root and Oath, where you and up to three other players take on the roles of space-fairing civilizations bidding for control of the galaxy. For fans of more strategic game offerings this will be up your alley, as you build, exploit, and destroy your opponents all in an effort to earn the most victory points and claim victory.
Where Arcs differs from its peers is in how players take actions on their turns, opting for a card based, almost trick-taking, approach. Players are dealt a random hand of cards at the beginning of each round with each card containing a suit which dictates the actions you can take when you play it, pips denoting how many times you can take those actions, the strength of the card (more on this in a moment) and lastly symbols which show what point-awarding opportunities can be activated when the suit is declared. It’s a system that may not be for everyone but when it hits, it really hits.
Arcs offers plenty of options that increases the game’s replayability as well, from asymmetrical leaders and powers, different board setups, and even an expansion that turns Arcs into an evolving narrative experience. Leder Games has proven time and time again that they can deliver exceptional and rich games to their fans and Arcs is no different and players looking for that next space adventure may want to check out Arcs to fill that void.
Sky Team* Price: $29.99 USD * Players: 2 players * Time: 15 min * Age: 12+
For those folks that may not have a large game group or simply prefer a more intimate 2-player experience, you can’t get much better than Sky Team. This strictly cooperative experience tasks two players with landing a plane through various scenarios that escalate in difficulty. To do this, each player will be rolling dice and slotting them into the plane’s systems to deploy the landing gear, keeping things balanced, and more. The big twist is that you and the other player can’t speak to one another about the dice you’re playing.
Sky Team has won a ton of awards ever since it first came out last year, including the “Oscar” of board games – the Spiel des Jahres – and with the new Turbulent Skies expansion that released this year, there are more experiences than ever you can fly through. Similar to Middle Ages, the footprint of this game is pretty small, meaning its a great option to through in backpack to take with you, and with games taking only around 15 minutes to play, you get through a bunch of tries in a short amount of time.
This is a great option for those folks in your life that prefer to work together as opposed to against one another. It also is a wonderful “date night” game, Sky Team by candlelight really elevates the whole experience.
5) Mass Effect: The Board Game – Priority: Hagalaz* Price: $49.99 USD * Players: 1-4 (Best with 2-4) * Time: 45 – 60 min (per mission) * Age: 14+
Campaign games are pretty popular these days, a genre of board game that tells a sprawling story over the course of numerous gameplay sessions, with your characters and other items carrying over from one to the next. The new Mass Effect board game – Mass Effect: The Board Game – Priority: Hagalaz – puts players in the space boots of Shepherd once again (both male and fem-Shep available) and crew to tackle and unravel the mysteries of a remote Cereberus outpost in what is perhaps the most approachable campaign board game out there. It also tells a pretty cool Mass Effect story too, complete with branching response options and the Paragon/Renegade system from the video games.
Taking place of the course of handful of unique missions (with side loyalty missions you can choose to undertake with your crew as well), a full playthrough of Hagalaz can be easily done over the course of a weekend, or even a day, which is a claim that very few (if any) other in the genre can tout. Choosing from popular characters from the series, you will be taking out Geth and Cerberus troops, rushing to computer panels, and dismantling large giants around Hex-based maps that are all conienvantly provided in a handy booklet meaning no setup required. Your team will unlock abilities as you progress, resulting in a rewarding and faithful experience of the source material.
For a more indepth look, check out my review of the game HERE!
I wasn’t playing many RPGs back in March of 1992; I don’t know many four-year-olds who were, to be fair. But when Dragon Quest III was released on the Game Boy Color in 2001, I dove in and soaked it up. I fell in love with the exciting world and its connections to previous entries, the flexibility in my party choices, and the pure RPG experience it offered. It made me fall in love with the series even more than I already had by that point. When it was announced back in May 2021 that the game would be getting a brand-new remake in Square Enix’s glorious HD-2D style, it quickly became one of my most anticipated titles. Now that it has finally arrived and I’ve played it, I can confidently say the game has been worth the anticipation. Mostly.
This latest rendition of Dragon Quest III retains much of the charm and feel of an RPG first created in the late ’80s while smoothing over some of its earlier versions’ more archaic design decisions. Compared to its more modern siblings, DQIII’s gameplay feels relatively simple and basic, with a story that is classic fantasy goodness—the hero, following in his father’s footsteps, travels with a party to rid the world of a great evil and save everyone—and gameplay with random encounters and turn-based combat. For fans of grinding in RPGs, DQIII feels like a warm hug you can snuggle into and enjoy, thanks to the nature of how your party works in this game.
Instead of opting for a defined party of characters with distinct personalities and backstories, the rest of your forces—apart from the main Hero—are composed of mercenaries you create from one of the game’s nine classes (eight available from the start). These characters don’t impact the story, react to events, or serve as anything more than troops on the battlefield—an approach common in the early days of RPGs. Out of the selectable vocations, new to this version of DQIII is the Monster Wrangler, which uses monsters to help in combat. It’s a fun class, but I preferred the old classics. I love that you can now customize the look of the party, selecting different body types, head options, and hair colors before assigning bonus skill points to their stats upon creation. To create your ideal party, with all the skills and stats necessary to tackle the toughest challenges (including the new Draconian Quest difficulty), you can expect to be grinding a lot and re-specing your characters into new jobs at the Alltrades Abbey to ensure you have everything you need.
For longtime fans of Dragon Quest III, there is more new content to experience than just the Monster Wrangler. The monster arena, which was present in earlier versions, has been revamped and expanded, allowing you now to recruit friendly monsters worldwide and place them into teams to duke it out in battles. I spent a lot of time in these arenas as they were a great way to earn money (if there’s one thing the Dragon Quest series is known for, money is vastly more important than in many other RPGs, as gear gets expensive quickly). The arena and outfitting your team also incentivize one of the HD-2D remake’s new features: special spots on the map you can discover that earn you great loot or new monster friends. Though I usually avoid the world map for long periods in most RPGs, tracking these spots and other loot spots had me searching off the beaten path and exploring every nook and cranny I could find. New post-game bosses and trials await players looking for extra challenges in addition to the hard mode (Draconian Quest difficulty). While I won’t spoil specifics, know that these will satisfy anyone looking for a tough fight. Both new and returning players get a lot of value from this release.
Given that this game is releasing nearly 40 years after the original Famicom game, expectations and systems have evolved somewhat, and this remake adopts modern conveniences to align the gameplay with the times. For example, the transportation spell, Zoom, can now be used indoors, where previously it would cause the party to hit their heads on the ceiling (a fact that the game cleverly addresses). Having a marker pointing to the next story location is also a welcome addition. Other quality-of-life improvements include access to a world map and local map whenever you want, a forgiving auto-save, an adjustable battle speed setting, and difficulty options that make the game more approachable. These additions make this by far the easiest entry point to classic Dragon Quest, even compared to the first three games available on the Nintendo Switch.
However, there are some quality-of-life omissions that I wish had been included, as I’ve come to expect them from other Square Enix titles and remakes. I quickly became frustrated that I couldn’t repeat previous actions during combat or instruct my party to continue using the same orders each turn. Automating combat this way is something Square Enix has incorporated in most of their recent remasters, including the Final Fantasy Pixel Remasters, and in a series as grind-heavy as Dragon Quest, it baffles me to see it omitted here. Another helpful feature from the Pixel Remaster titles is seeing how many chests or items are in a given location. While the Thief’s “Nose for Treasure” ability exists, being able to check the map for missed items is a pleasant convenience I missed. Do these omissions ruin the game for me? Not even close. But seeing what does and doesn’t get tweaked when Square remakes a classic game is interesting.
Now for my most divisive critique: while this is a lovely remake capturing much of what has made the game beloved for so long, it’s the most disappointing “HD-2D” release Square Enix has made since introducing the style with the original Octopath Traveler. My issue is less with the monster or character sprites (though I was disappointed that the most detailed sprites are only shown from the back, without even seeing them perform their actions) and more with the backgrounds and environments. In other HD-2D titles, the characters and worlds feel like an evolution of 2D-pixel art masterpieces, with environments extended into the third dimension. However, this release, which even includes “HD-2D” in its title, uses a more standard art style and textures for its world and buildings. This makes the only “HD-2D” part of DQIII the monster, character, and NPC sprites, and honestly, if it hadn’t touted the “HD-2D” style and simply called itself a “remake,” my critique would disappear. It’s not that the game looks bad or that the team hasn’t put out something they should be proud of; it’s just that as someone who loves the aesthetic Square Enix has crafted with Octopath Traveler, Live A Live, and Triangle Strategy, Dragon Quest III doesn’t live up to the standards set by its predecessors.
As the fourth iteration of this legendary RPG, Dragon Quest III: HD-2D Remake is a lovely tribute to a long-beloved game. Dragon Quest fans will no doubt pick it up, and thanks to its improvements, it also makes a great entry point for newcomers. Those who have only played later games like Dragon Quest XI may be taken aback by the more aged mechanics and story, but Dragon Quest III remains a worthwhile quest. If you’re at all interested in the HD-2D remakes of Dragon Quest I and II, releasing next year, this is a must-play first. While it may not hit all the marks I hoped for, Dragon Quest III: HD-2D Remake is a lovely remake of a legendary game, despite being a somewhat disappointing HD-2D game. Even so, I have enjoyed revisiting this world and eagerly await next year’s games.
Thank you to Square Enix for providing us a Nintendo Switch review code.
It has been a year, nearly to the day, since Wizards of the Coast first revealed their collaboration with the comic behemoth Marvel, and today at New York Comic Con the cover has been pulled back on the first entry of this new multi-year friendship with the upcoming Magic: The Gathering x Marvel Secret Lair drop. Secret Lairs are a small and specially tailored collection of cards with this particular release featuring beloved and classic Marvel heroes that include brand new creature cards for Captain America, Black Panther, Storm, Wolverine, and Iron Man – all of which include the new “Hero” creature type. Each character will have their own Secret Lair as a part of this Super Drop, with each Secret Lair coming with that specific hero, which comes with an accompanying set of five cards, four of which are Marvel reskins of existing cards and one unique token. All Secret Lair drops are $39.99 in non-foil and $49.99 in foil with a limited print run with bundles available for folks who need to have them all! After getting a chance to take a look at these cards, as a longtime Magic fan, it looks like this team-up is already resulting in some spectacular, some may even say amazing, that should play great in any game at your friendly neighborhood Friday Night Magic.
First up we have the first Avenger himself, with “Captain America, First Avenger” (rocking the one red, one white, and one blue mana cost), who utilizes a new “Throw” and “Catch” mechanic that lets players dish out damage by hurling pieces of equipment is equipped on him at his foes, and then freely equip some gear (the same or something else) afterward. While there are an incredibly few equipment cards (that I know of) that have triggering effects when they are unattached or re-attached to a character, it’s hard to argue that this mechanic isn’t perfect for Cap and I can’t wait to throw everything from Crystal Slippers to Bilbo’s Ring at my friends, and how perfect is it that we even got a Mjolnir card earlier this year that we can throw too!
It is appropriate that, much like in the comics – at least more times than not – that “Iron Man, Titan of Innovation” pairs so well with Cap in this drop. Leaning heavily on Tony’s penchant for invention, Iron Man is all about making better and better pieces of gear, or artifacts in this case, by sacrificing one whenever it attacks, to let you search your library for a new one that be slightly more expensive. Tutoring for cards you want in a Magic deck is always a potent tool to have, and having it as a recurring ability makes it all the better. Throw in some graveyard artifact retrieval like a Goblin Welder, Argivian Archeologist or Open the Vaults, and you can get them all back! Considering this card shares color identity with “Captain America, First Avenger” means that they would pair great together in a Commander deck, at least until they start going at one another again.
Black Panther, Wakandan King coming in with a Green and White color identity, takes things in a different direction, opting instead to deal out the +1/+1 counters to the creatures of his kingdom, or deck in this case. T’challa stockpiles these counters on land that you control whenever it or another creature you control enters, and then all at once, using his secondary “Mine Vibramium” ability, can place them on a target creature with the added benefit of gaining life. Having these counters go onto your lands instead of on a creature or some sort of special mine token, certainly offers your stockpile far more protection from different responses your opponents may otherwise have. The prospect of Black Panther alongside Doubling Season, which, in theory, could take advantage of that card’s doubling counter feature twice (once when the counters are first made on the land and next when a counter is placed on the creature) terrifies me.
Behind every gate king is a strong queen, and T’Challa is no different with Storm, Force of Nature bringing the rain – and the pain – in his drop. Storm being a 3 / 4 with flying and vigilance on its own would make it a solid card but the real terror comes with her “Ceaseless Tempest” ability, which makes it so that the next instant or sorcery spell you cast after she hits someone during combat copy it as many times as the number of spells you had already played that turn – this mechanic is appropriately known as “storm” for those unaware. Throw on an Aqueous Form on her to make her unblockable, and hurl some cheap red spells beforehand and you have a recipe for a devastating blow in your second main phase as you put the Storm in “storm”.
For the last of the heroes included in this Secret Lair, we have the angry Canadian himself, Logan, with “Wolverine, Best There Is”. Coming in as a 2/2 for a red, a green, and one, Wolverine is one of those cards that you want to take care of as soon as you can because the longer he stays out, the scarier it becomes. Straight out of the gate, “Unrivaled Lethality” doubles all damage that this card deals (and that can stack with double strike), not just combat damage, making it actually more like a 4/2 for three mana, but thanks to its next ability to easily get more counters when it deals damage to another creature which can quickly make this card a powerhouse. That said, considering it has to be against a creature and not simply target, means you won’t be getting the benefit from hitting players themselves, or opponents can simply choose not to block with one of their creatures and that means no counters, but with spells like “Duel for Dominance” or “Ent’s Fury” that forces Wolverine to attack an opponent’s creature or enchantments like “Fire Whip” can mitigate this restriction pretty easily. And, of course, what would Wolverine be without his healing factor, so of course this card also has Regenerate, which will help you keep those hard-fought-for counters should he get taken out (and avoid that annoying Commander tax, if this card is your Commander).
Artists such as Bud Cook, Anna Steinbauer, and Pauline Voss, have created stunning new Marvel-inspired artwork for Magic classics such as Storm on the Red-staple “Lightning Bolt” spell, Tony’s chest reactor as this Secret Lair’s “Sol Ring,” and Wolverine in his classic yellow-and-brown costume tearing his way out of a sentinels mouth in “Berserk”. These look to be perfect companions to the new creature cards that I’m sure many people will begin brainstorming ideas on how to make into incredibly fun decks to play; I know I have.
We still know very little about what else will come from this multi-year collaborative endeavor between Wizards and Marvel outside of “collectible products and tentpole sets” promised in the initial reveal last year. Still, if this first offering is anything to go by, I think fans of both Magic and Marvel comics will have much to look forward to.
The Marvel Secret Lair Superdrop goes on sale on November 4 at 9 am PT over at Wizard’s Secret Lair store, with folks able to snag a special “Earth’s Mightiest Emblem” card (a variant of the Commander format staple, “Arcane Signet”) for every $199 they spend, so be sure to tune in, true believers, if you hope to snag yourself a set of these debut first-appearance cards of Marvel and Magic’s collaboration.
Wizards of the Coast has finally revealed at New York Comic Con today the first issue in the much-anticipated multi-year collaboration arc between Magic: The Gathering and Marvel, featuring the upcoming Marvel Secret Lair Superdrop. This Superdrop will allow players to snag cards revolving around five of Marvel’s most recognizable and beloved characters, including Captain America, Iron Man, Black Panther, Storm, and Wolverine. With each drop, players will receive a brand new Legendary creature—each with the new “Hero” creature type—and reskinned cards featuring that hero and others from the Marvel Pantheon.
Of the cards shown, the one that sparked my imagination the most was the brand new “Captain America, First Avenger” and his new “Throw” and “Catch” mechanics, which let him hurl equipment at up to three targets. It’s a fitting skill for someone who has partly made his name by hurling his shield for over 80 years. For three mana, Cap will unattach (i.e., unequip) a piece of equipment he has, dealing the mana value of said gear divided among one, two, or three targets. Then, at the beginning of your combat step, he can attach (i.e., equip) an Equipment you control. It doesn’t even have to be what you threw—or that you threw anything at all.
I’m not aware of many, or any, equipment cards that have effects triggered by becoming attached or unattached (though I’m sure there must be something), so I can’t comment on how strong this mechanic will be in the long run. However, as someone who values a hilarious mental image over a sound strategy, Captain America, First Avenger had me giddy with ideas from the get-go—what crazy things can I hurl at my friends? Here are the five artifacts I most want Captain America to throw at my friends.
Note: For maximum chucking, throw in “Training Grounds (1 blue)” and “Puresteel Paladin (2 white)” to reduce the Throw cost to a single colorless mana, and reattach the equipment he throws for free. That way, you can keep hurling things at targets for a single mana. Conveniently, both cards fall within Captain America, First Avenger’s color identity, so they work in a Commander setting.
Mjölnir, Storm HammerWhile it may not be the actual Mjölnir, this feels like a no-brainer considering what transpired in Avengers: Endgame. Though it may not be a heavy damage dealer with only four mana, it would just feel wrong not to sling around Thor’s hammer.
Excalibur, Sword of EdenFor your big damage dealer, you can’t get bigger than Excalibur, Sword of Eden from the Assassin’s Creed set. This mighty 12-drop’s cost is reduced by the number of historic (artifacts, legendaries, and sagas) cards you have in play, and in a deck full of equipment artifacts for Cap to chuck at opponents, you could get this out cheaply. With the Puresteel Paladin and Training Grounds combo mentioned earlier, you’ll be tapping a single mana to hit something for 12, over and over, as Captain America hurls swords at people. Glorious.
Cloudsteel KirinCloudsteel Kirin’s mechanic, which prevents anyone from winning, is interesting, but that’s not why this equipment creature made my list. Instead, it’s simply because I love the thought of Captain America throwing a robot horse at someone. I’m a simple man, and I get great pleasure from silly ideas like this, which will be a running theme throughout these entries.
Crystal SlipperAs the wise Austin Powers once said, “Honestly, who throws a shoe?” Well, now you can proudly say it’s Captain America. While the Crystal Slipper, with a mana cost of only 2, may not hurt much, its added benefit of granting a creature haste could still be useful—or you can leave it attached and just picture Cap rocking a pair of crystal heels as he chucks robot horses or Excalibur at your opponent. I think I like that idea more now that I’ve thought about it.
Chariot of Victory
This three-drop provides all sorts of beneficial effects—first strike, trample, and haste—for a creature riding it, all for the measly equip cost of a single mana. In any Voltron deck, it’s almost a must-have, aiding in victory, as its name suggests. But in Cap’s hands, it becomes a Chariot of PAIN as he hurls a medieval cart at your best friend, who hit you with that annoying 1/1 when you had no creatures out. That’ll teach them. THROW, CAP, THROW YOUR MIGHTY CHARIOT!
There are many options from Magic’s history that are ripe as hilarious objects for Captain America to throw at your opponents, from suits of Power Armor to frying pans, chainsaws to candlesticks, or even a whole wardrobe of magical textiles. Your choices expand even further if you combine Bludgeon Brawl and Mycosynth Lattice, allowing you to hurl enchantments and artifacts like Sol Rings for fun!
All of these Secret Lair drops (each hero gets their own drop) will go on sale starting Monday, November 4, at 9 a.m. PDT on the Magic: The Gathering Secret Lair website. Secret Lair drops are $39.99 in non-foil and $49.99 in foil, with a limited print run and bundles available for those who want them all. This is just the start of the Magic and Marvel collaboration, and I can’t wait to see what other sweet stuff Cap can throw at people!
As a child of the late 1980s and having grown up in the 1990s, seeing games dig into the rich and weird culture of 90s imagery is wild to me. When Digital Extremes first pulled back the curtain of their upcoming Warframe 1999 expansion, it was like a shot of pure nostalgia shot right in the arm, and every new bit they have shown at their own Tennocon this past summer and recently at their debut appearance at Tokyo Game Show, the more and more I am pulled in.
A brand new demo for Warframe 1999 goes On-Lyne (see what I did there?) today, so while you wait for it to download, check out this short interview with Rebecca Ford (@rebbford), Warframe’s Creative Director, where I got to dig a bit deeper to see what other nostalgic goodies people can expect – from more banger On-Lyne tracks to beepers/pagers. Then hop over and try it out yourself, earning those sweet bonuses!
Scott: With the Proto Frames and their dialogue, will the lines be more generic for broad situations or will the lines be more tailored or self-aware of the situations (ie. if there are multiple Arthurs applied in a group, or multiple members of the HEX together, will they banter, Will the Gemini skins directly respond and comment on the things happening in the Origin system and all the future tech they see, etc.)
Rebecca: The Gemini skins do have contextual gameplay banter, yes! But they won’t necessarily be interacting with each other if another player also has a Gemini skin. Our main goal with these skins is to enhance the core Warframe experience with something super novel and fresh for both veteran and new players. So regarding the “what” or “how” around them interacting during gameplay and within the Origin system, you’ll just have to see for yourself in 1999!
Scott: You have announced that 1999 takes place in the fictional world of Hollvania, but will we learn anything more about this world outside of it? What other countries or political powers may be around, or any of the world’s history?
Rebecca: Höllvania is a city on an alternate version of Earth – it’s sort of like our Earth, but things are a bit off and different here. One could hypothesize that this Earth might struggle with a lot of the same things we struggle with – power, conflict, money, suffering, revenge, greed – whatever it may be. We’re getting a glimpse at a new faction, The Scaldra, that clearly have some larger stakes in place throughout this version of Earth, but we don’t really know much about them yet or who they are or what they really struggle with. Without giving away too much, we have always gravitated towards telling relatable, human stories through the weird abstract sci-fi lens that is Warframe. We will absolutely continue to do that.
Scott: Is 1999 and Höllvania being developed / looked at as a place that future stories will take place in for future updates as well, or is it going to be a one-off visit?
Rebecca: We’ve mentioned that, figures crossed, that as long as players dig the Protoframes, that we plan to explore more of Höllvania and introduce more of these characters. We’ve gone back to locations before to expand them out further, like Deimos in Whispers in the Walls! We will definitely be coming back!
Scott: How many On-Lyne songs can folks expect to hear in the final release?
Rebecca: I don’t think I can answer this directly, but I hear you, PARTY OF YOUR LIFETIME is a certified bop. Players can expect to see a variety of ‘90s music genres explored in Warframe: 1999 – we looked at punk, rock, grunge, pop and other genres with five original tracks on the way for the Update overall. So please look forward to our incredibly gifted music team flexing their talent.
Scott: As someone who grew up in the ’90s , I’m a big fan of things like Power Rangers, Pokemon, Cartoon Network, and such. Will players get nods and glimpses into this alternate world’s take on these staples too, like we are with boy bands, instant Messenger, and mall culture?
Rebecca: I’m not going to speak directly to this too much, because Easter Eggs are Easter Eggs – discovery is a part of the fun! So we did work with Valve and were able to integrate the cardboard cutout of Gordon Freeman of Half-Life notoriety as a subtle nod to the late 90’s. In the TennoCon demo we also showed off some of the arcade games in the Höllvania Mall, which are absolutely inspired in some way or another by our favorite classic arcade cabinets. Is there quite possibly more to find in this strange new world we’re creating? You’ll see!
Scott: Can we get pager/beeper cosmetics to put on our frames or change the throwing stars into Nokia phones?
Rebecca: This has come up once or twice or thrice among the team, even things like Razor Scooters as melee weapons, Tamagotchis as armor adornments, playable ‘90s style RPG mini games in the arcade, etc. Trust me when I say we’ve gone through nearly every piece of iconic imagery from that decade and have either tried it or are sitting on it for the right time. So not a yes, and not a no, but you know we love to have fun and we promise to have the most fun in 1999 before that clock strikes midnight.
Samurai have got some of the best branding out of all of the old world warriors from yesteryear. Most are presented as noble and prideful, deep-thinking and curious, stoic and disciplined, hardened and lethal. History might object to much of that as a matter of common course, but as far as fiction, and especially video games, are concerned, samurai can’t get any cooler. We’ve had lots of games that make being a samurai seem like the most awesome thing a person could be involved in, but Shogun Showdown might solidify its place at the top of that list, at least as far as their martial prowess is concerned.
The turn-based nature of a roguelike makes a great bedrock for a game about executing one’s enemies as quickly and stylishly as possible. My character’s every move costs a turn, meaning every step taken in the small arena, every attack made or prepared, and even turning to face the opposite direction all trigger responses from enemy characters. Like other small-time tactical classics like Into the Breach, you know exactly what each foe plans to do with their next turn before it happens. The dance becomes knowing the array of possibilities from each of the enemies, when to expect their offense, and having a way to prevent it or avenge the damage it does. This is pretty easy early, but by the time you get to the middle of a run, bad guys come in so many forms and can do such an array of things at any given moment that surviving rounds can be perilous.
As you progress through stages, you can add tiles to an ever growing hand of offensive and defensive options that can be as straightforward as swinging a sword or a spear in a particular direction to laying down traps or vanishing into a cloud of smoke to avoid incoming damage. You can stack up to three at a time that will execute in whatever sequence you arrange. Once used, they go on cooldown for a number of rounds, and the balance of staggering out my offense in waves that can keep enemies on the back foot and cover for my already used abilities is the kind of katana-sharp gameplay that comes alive after a few hours and a dozen or so runs. It’s rare that what’s effectively a turn-based deckbuilding combat system can feel as stylish as a character action brawler, but I think Shogun Showdown its very close on more than one occasion.
So many of the attack options you encounter are more than simply just dealing damage in front of or behind you (or both at the same time). There’s also all of the ways that attacks and move you around the cramped field, bouncing you into or sometimes through enemies, or even tossing them around as well. Without spending a tile of your own attacks, you can manipulate your foes into dispatching each other by carefully watching their movements and timing the blows correctly. All of the little decisions you have to make to narrowly escape danger or to clobber an offender just in time mimics the classic samurai movie tea house flash combat sequences better than any action game could, in the same way that the turn-based John Wick Hex is probably the closest we’ll get to a game that makes you think like the titular assassin under fire.
What’s also impressive is how much restraint Robatino shows in its design choices. These sorts of games can easily bloat into a floating paper lantern full of the hot air of various meta mechanics, multiple currencies, or top level run specific items that can make min maxers brains tingle but mine recoil in fear. Shogun Showdown shows none of that overzealousness, keeping everything that isn’t combat focused very simple. There’s only a handful of item types like potions that heal health or that can help make enemies vulnerable in a number of ways. There’s only one currency, gold, that can be spent on everything that you would have the option to pick up or alter. Every run can unlock new potential skills that would be added to the pool of funds during the next run, but that’s the most random anything gets. That means I’m not spending hour ten discovering new things that could or couldn’t change the way I play but will distract me from any material progress I’ve made. Instead, I’ve only ever felt like I was getting better, learning and memorizing enemy spawn patterns and knowing that there’s not going to be a weird wrench thrown into a run that I couldn’t plan for that will ultimately ruin it. These are parts of roguelikes that I certainly do enjoy on the whole, but I never once missed it here.
Visually, the staid but deliberate design does wonders as well. Simple shapes of dark pagodas, verdant forests, or swinging dungeon cages mixed with bold shades that mimic sun sets or dank caves really sets the mood. Enemies and player characters alike aren’t made of many pixels, but they are so well-designed and evoke old fantastical Japan just as well as higher fidelity, bigger budget games.
The crown of the roguelike king of 2024 may have already been firmly placed on the tasseled head of Balatro, a truly remarkable game in its own right. But you should let Shogun Showdown surprise you with its brisk but mighty combat, because there’s truly nothing like it on the market right now.
Shogun Showdown is available now on Steam and Nintendo Switch.
*Note: I was sent a prototype version of this game to play, and as such, the components and rules may change before the final release.
As a long-time video game player, I have never entirely understood or grasped the allure of playing a board game solo, with my issue always revolving around the setup part of board games. I really don’t want to go through a long process to set up a game just for myself when I could simply play a video game (gotta get that instant gratification and all). But after I was approached about trying a prototype of the upcoming small-box, solo-only, science-fiction board game Voidpilot’s Legacy from Sea Stories Creative Studios LLC, I figured I would give it a shot. After a few plays, I came away pretty impressed, albeit with some aspects I’d love to see adjusted before its final release.
Designed by Alex and Skylar Gurly, with art by Abram Buck, Voidpilot’s Legacy puts you in the captain’s chair of a starship that has to succeed—and survive—through eight “runs” of the game’s event deck. The game makes you feel like a captain as you allocate energy to different parts of your ship, balancing risk versus reward and ensuring you keep everything in check.
A game consists of completing eight “runs,” all culminating in a final big fight against the Pirate Lord. Each run tasks you with navigating nearly 20 events. These events range from finding work at a space outpost, salvaging life pods, and even dealing with contraband or fighting off space pirates. As you progress, these event cards will upgrade and change, with higher-level runs sending more formidable ships your way or requiring better rolls to succeed (along with higher risks). You’ll need to ensure your ship improves to meet these new challenges. Completing events earns you rewards that can be used for repairs, hiring crew (crew can be sacrificed to reroll your dice), loot cards that enhance your ship, and more. It all results in a pretty robust solo experience. However, I wish there was more variety in the duplicate cards—perhaps if rewards were slightly different, had an option for upgraded variants, or if runs included a random assortment of fewer cards. Even after playing it, the prospect of going through almost 160 cards to complete a game feels like a lot.
One neat aspect of the game is that, depending on the number of victory points you gain by the end of a successful game, you “unlock” perks that you can use in your next run. These perks offer bonuses, like increasing the amount of fuelyou start with or gaining additional rewards in early missions, which are fun. But at the same time, if you’re proving how good you are at the game, I would like to see “rewards” that increase the challenge. If I kick butt and earn the “Legendary Voidpilot” title by scoring 70+ points, I probably don’t need the extra perk of being able to clear my “Wanted” status at any time by spending a resource. What if, instead, I was “Wanted” for the whole game and couldn’t clear my name at all, making things more difficult for me and forcing me to contend with the authorities?
My biggest issue with the game isn’t with the mechanics themselves but with how the game is presented. Realizing that the copy I played is a prototype, this could (and hopefully will) change in the final release, but I found it far more confusing than it needs to be to set up and figure out what things are. Cards are double-sided, with most also having top-side and bottom-side versions packed with different icons: icons for rewards, success and failure criteria, victory points, how to turn the card, the proper orientation, and more. Without a rulebook in the box (I really hope the final release fixes this and includes one), I had no idea what I was looking at for a good bit. Even after reading the rules via the QR Code on the box, it was tough figuring out what needed to be mixed in, what I needed to keep aside, and what got shuffled in. I would love it if each of the different cards featured even a slight specific-colored border to dictate what they are (i.e., silver border for your ship options, blue for events, gold for loot, etc.), which would make it easier to identify things at a glance.
I’m still not entirely sold on the idea of playing a board game solo, at least larger ones, but Voidpilot’s Legacy has shown me the value of small and compact ones. For a game that comes in a box not much bigger than a modern cell phone box, Voidpilot has impressed me with its options and variety. Even when fully set up, it’s a game that can fit on a bar hightop or coffee table, and with full games never taking me longer than 45 minutes, it’s a solid choice if you’re looking for something fun to kill time with. This game has earned its place in my backpack, so I’m always ready to set out into the stars when the mood strikes me. Voidpilot’s Legacy launches soon on Kickstarter, so check it out or watch a recent playthrough the team did to see if this adventure may be for you, too!
Ever since the first Octopath Traveler, I have truly believed in the wonders of Square Enix’s HD-2D aesthetic. The brilliant melding of Square’s expertise with pixel art and 3D models has enamored me and continues to do so. That’s why, after getting a chance to try the upcoming Dragon Quest III HD-2D Remake at PAX West, a game I love in a series I love even more, I’m so bummed that this remake is also the first game in this style that feels like a bit of a step back for the HD-2D treatment.
In all the HD-2D games I’ve played, the visuals seem to fit together—from the backgrounds to the sprites used on the world maps and in combat. It all comes off as a cohesive aesthetic, and I found this cohesiveness lacking in Dragon Quest III. I want to also draw the distinction between “looking good” and “being cohesive.” My issues with the demo largely have nothing to do with the game’s visual appearance – it looks good! My issue is that bits and pieces of the visuals look like they have been pulled from different games, and the resulting aesthetic looks to me as such. There are two areas that stuck out particularly so with said clashing visuals, the first of which being the environments.
In other titles like Triangle Strategy, Live A Live, and Octopath, the environments—while being 3D—still had textures that gave off the appearance of pixel art. This approach helps tie the 2D sprites you control into the world, grounding them in the game’s reality. But in an odd twist, this has been omitted from Dragon Quest III. Instead, the environments—from the towns to the dungeons and even the world map—while still 3D, lack those pixel-inspired textures and opt for more “realistic,” almost generic-looking ones. This results in the character sprites standing out and feeling a bit out of place, reminding me somewhat of Eiyuden Chronicle from earlier this year.
The other area that stood out to me was in combat, particularly the sprites used for your party members. In combat, instead of using a similar version of the sprites used outside of combat (which I think looks really good), the sprites appear to be of a considerably higher pixel density. I found this especially noticeable in the Hero’s cape and the mage’s cloak in my party, both of which had a far wider range of gradients and smoother animation. They stood out against the monsters’ designs, which appear to be more in line with your party’s sprites outside of combat. And again, all of this is set against a background that doesn’t try to appear in a pixel style. It was all just very strange to me. Taken individually, every instance of pixel art in the game is wonderful and expertly crafted. But together, I just find it jumps from one style to the next, with the end result feeling disjointed and less cohesive than the other HD-2D games.
Now, to be clear, I have no issue with the gameplay of this latest classic remake—it’s still the same brilliant game that fans have fallen in love with and a great time to play. The care that the team has taken with expanding things like the Monster Arena—which is now a far richer and deeper experience—and the brand-new Monster Wrangler vocation, which delivers a unique system to work into your lineup, are welcome surprises. And that’s to say nothing of the other additions that Square has been keeping a tight lip on, which we’ll have to discover for ourselves!
The Dragon Quest III HD-2D Remake remains one of my most anticipated games of the year, and the HD-2D aesthetic continues to be one of my favorites in modern games. I’ll be sinking my teeth into the game when it releases on November 14, and I wouldn’t be surprised if it doesn’t let me go until the new year.
Back at the very start of the year, one of my goals was to dip my toe into Square’s long-running SaGa franchise finally, and to thank my vigor in completing this goal, Square has graced me with not only one new SaGa game with Emerald Beyond (check out my review HERE) but also a full-blown remake. While at PAX West, I had a chance to check out a 30-minute demo for Romancing SaGa 2: Revenge of the Seven, a modern recreation of the second game of the SaGa franchise, and I came away feeling far more comfortable playing this than I did in my first half hour of Emerald Beyond.
Developed by the team that brought us Trials of Mana a few years back, this latest rendition looks to offer several elements that I found to make this a more approachable and modern-feeling take than any previous attempt. To set the stage, I have played roughly an hour or two with the 2017 release of Romancing SaGa 2, which was the West’s first (official) taste of the game, and regardless of how many times I tried, I always bounced off of it. But, even with having only spent a short time with Revenge of the Seven, I can already tell that I want to spend more.
The demo I played gave me two choices—to deal with a goblin horde attacking the city or investigate a sunken ship later on in the game. I opted to deal with the goblins. Aside from the redone visuals (which, by the way, look great), the major new thing that I took note of was the additional information that is provided to the player during and after combat. In the original and 2017 remakes, not much information or UI was presented to the player, and actions for a turn were assigned all at once, as opposed to a character’s turn. This has all been fixed with the inclusion of a more traditional Square Enix interface, complete with a bar that shows turn order, character bars displaying health and SP at all times, and even a small light bulb next to skills that have a chance to “Glimmer” – the SaGa series’ method where a character will have an idea mid-combat and learn a new skill. These all may not sound like ground-breaking additions, but they do truly help make the game more newcomer-friendly, and I’m thrilled they’re here.
Difficulty has also been adjusted, with the new default “Normal” setting being toned down a bit from (what I’ve been told) the relatively punishing difficulty of the original game. For fans of the original, you can still get that same challenge, however, in the added “Hard” mode, which specifically mentions that it is based on the original game’s settings.
Now, from everything I have heard, Romancing SaGa 2 is a complex beast, with its inheritance system and such. Unfortunately, with only 30 minutes to spend with the game, I wasn’t able to experience those systems. Hopefully, the considerations that the team has taken regarding updating the interface and gameplay will continue onward through those areas as well. At the very least, what I did get to see has me a lot more excited and open to diving into this new remake.
While I came away from my time with Emerald Beyond early this year with a positive opinion, it still was an experience where I felt like I kept having to figure out how to have fun with it – like I was trying to cram a square block into a round hole situation. I eventually came around on the game, but it took some struggles to get there. Even in my short time with Romancing SaGa 2: Revenge of the Seven, the game feels far more grounded in my comfort zone of RPGs, with stats and information clearly given to me, a good amount of challenge, and unknown horizons spread out before me. Luckily, I won’t have to wait too long before I can continue on in my saga into the SaGa series with Romancing Saga 2: Revenge of the Seven, releasing on October 24 on PlayStation 4, 5, Nintendo Switch, and on Steam. And if you want to get a taste right now, you can download a demo right now!
There were few things that I took more joy in as a kid than imagining epic battles between my action figures – struggles to the death, unlikely alliances, and harrowing underwater clashes in the kitchen sink. A similar excitement comes over me when I play the trading card game Universus. While it feels nowadays that you can’t go many places without seeing or hearing something about multiverses, crossovers, or the latest Fortnite skin featuring that one movie character you’ve heard of, Universus provides outlandish crossovers that previously could only exist between my action figures and imagination.
With a story worth its own article – from changing hands, going dormant, rights being bought by a single person, surviving off of the passion of its community, and finally landing at its current home with UVS Games – Universus is the original multiversal card game, hitting the scene back in 2006 under the label “Universal Fighting System (UFS). Earlier this year at PAX East, a chance encounter – thanks to large printouts of some of my favorite Critical Role characters – introduced me to the game, which has quickly become one of the standout card games that I follow.
As a longtime Magic player, I will say that Universus hasn’t been the easiest game to wrap my head around. The way it handles turns, enhancing attacks, and has various numbers and effects found on all of the cards are completely different from MTG. This is to say nothing of the fact that currently preconstructed decks and packs don’t include a “how to play” or rules reference booklet, requiring newcomers to hunt online for adequate teaching resources (a problem that looks to be fixed with decks in 2025).
In Universus, each player will have a character that dictates how much life and how big of a hand you have (for Magic players, it’s kind of like a Commander, minus the color restrictions) with the end goal being to deal enough damage to your opponent to bring their character down to zero life. Where Universus bucked my expectations and threw me for the loop is with its resource management, known as foundations. You can play as many as you want in turn so long as you can draw cards with high enough values to meet or beat that difficulty to play the card. It really is a lot different from other TCGs I’ve played and as I doubt I’m doing the whole system justice, your best bet will be to just check out the official “How To Play” guide on the game’s website or watch the wonderful video over at the Tolarian Community College YouTube channel.
It is thanks to all of the various anime, video game, and pop-culture-focused decks Universus has that continues to draw me in. Some card games use the concept of crossover as a novelty, helping boost interest and bring in new players, while Universus has made this practice its lifeblood- it’s DNA.
Universus lets my friends and I answer tough questions like who would win in a fight, Mecha Godzilla or Vash the Stampede? Or if Vax from Vox Machina teamed up with All Might from My Hero Academia, could they stop Mikasa from Attack on Titan and Spike from Cowboy Bebop? These outlandish situations have only grown with each subsequent deck that Universus has come out with or announced, including Jin and Jun from Tekken 8, Star Trek’s Lower Decks, Street Fighter, and more Critical Roll coming in the next year.
Just to give you a better sense of Universus, here are all the IPs that the game includes:
- My Hero Academia
- Yu Yu Hakusho
- Attack on Titan
- Godzilla
- Critical Role
- Cowboy Bebop
- Trigun Stampede
With these ones releasing soon:
- Tekken
- Star Trek
- More Attack on Titan
- More Critical Role
- Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
- Guilty Gear Strive
- Street Fighter
- Solo Leveling
And this doesn’t take into account any of the legacy offerings from when the game was known as UFS that include the likes of Mega Man, Soul Calibur and more!
Universus does something special that no other card game has managed to do for me – it’s made me dream up those outlandish situations that I used to have with my action figures when I was little. When I pull cards that show off one of the character’s staple attacks or a card of one of their teammates to provide help, it just hits differently from something like Fortnite where my beloved character is mowing down another character. It ignites that same imagination I had from my childhood, something that I covet and miss so much more now as I find myself in my mid-30s. It may not replace Magic as my go-to TCG, but it has certainly become one of my main card games I like to play when I can.
Dark streets, rich vendors with loot aplenty, and pompous fools that deserve a bludgeoning are all a part of a typical night in the brand new second edition release of Dark Deeds – a game about thieving and trying to get away with it. Created by veteran designer Andy Chambers and artist Mark Gibbons, this new edition from developers Rookery Publications and published by Modiphius Games quickly sank its daggers into me and is proving hard to shake – appropriate for a game about pilfering.
What’s in the Box:
- 1 Street Board
- 58-card Tavern Deck (40 Plot cards, 18 Dark Deed cards)
- 42-card Street Deck
- Three 15-card Citizen Loot Decks
- 5 Reference Cards
- 1 ‘Most Suspicious Minion’ Coin
- 60 Suspicion Marks
- 2 Six-Sided Dice
- 1 Rulebook
I am always on the lookout for new games that are easy to transport, quick to set up, and can be played in about an hour (aka during lunch at work). As much as I may love large games that can take up an afternoon, sometimes I just don’t have the time or players. So when I find a fun new game that not only can provide a rich and worthwhile experience in about an hour, I will likely impulse buy it in a heartbeat. Dark Deeds meets and exceeds in all of those areas.
The goal of Dark Deeds is pretty simple – show that you’re the best thief on the street by having the most victory points by the time the big evil Brute Squad appears and leaves the street. There are several ways you can earn said points, including robbing unsuspecting merchants, artisans, and clerics; completing contracts from your Patron – the head of your thief group; and “taking care of” rivals and police officers. Robbing and knocking out folks will not only get you points, though, but also increase your notoriety, and if there is too much heat on you, you risk getting thrown in jail and losing your spoils from the night so far. Once you’re done on the street, players will retreat to the safety of the local tavern where they can restock on new contracts, plot cards (more on these in a moment), or simply lay low and reduce their notoriety.
To better your chances, you will need to outfit yourself with tools to make you more stealthy (and more deadly), and luckily those folks on the street are carrying some sweet loot that will do just that. They also have those previously mentioned plot cards you can get from the Tavern, such as “Mine!” which lets you steal a loot card from another player, or “Sod Off!” which will cancel out someone else’s plot card when used on you. These prove instrumental in your plans succeeding, helping either to hinder your opponents, protecting you from them, or giving you a boost in completing your own escapades. Plotcards, paired with the dice rolls that accompany all mugging or assassination attempts, give Dark Deeds a nice mix of both strategy and luck, but one that I never felt deviated too far into one or the other. Decisions such as whether or not to get a guard or nemesis to chase you so that other players can’t get their points but risking losing points if you don’t handle them by the end of the game give Dark Deeds a lot of risk-reward moments that I appreciate. I really enjoyed how the plot cardscreated multiple ways to handle situations. One of my favorite tricks was to use copies of “‘E Did it!” right at the end of games to send a nemesis or guard chasing me over to another player at the last minute to hit them with the point penalty. Even then, there was always a risk of doing something like that, in case the person was holding a Dark Deed contract like “Enemy of the Elite,” which would win a player points if they had two Nemeses chasing them. The whole game is just a good time with a lot of layers to it that I still haven’t gotten tired of.
For those who may be familiar with Dark Deeds’ first edition, some tweaks and adjustments have been made to this new release. The biggest of these changes comes with how loot is handled. Previously the loot was part of the tavern deck and were random draws, but now they have been removed from the Tavern and instead separated into three decks – one for each type – with you being able to take a card from (either the deck at random or one of three possible cards that are on display) when you successfully rob a person from the corresponding group. For a more in-depth and complete list of changes, check out this article from Modiphius here.
Considering their previous work on things like Warhammer, it should come as no surprise that Dark Deeds is incredibly atmospheric and features some killer artwork that really sells the game’s dingy, back alley thieving vibes. Each of the 150 cards (up from the first edition’s 100) features grimy-looking individuals and gnarly thieving tools, with an artificially aged look that really helps sell the overall vibe that this is a dreary place that upstanding folks shouldn’t find themselves in. Perhaps my favorite card art is for “Sod Off,” which features and grimy man flipping two birds and sticking his tongue out.
There is a pleasant mix of strategy and luck that you have to contend with in Dark Deeds, making sure that you outfit yourself well enough to contend with your targets while making sure you complete your contracts before the end of the game. Any unfulfilled Dark Deed contracts or Nemesis targets that are chasing after you when the game ends will reduce your points, so while it may be advantageous to pull a high-cost nemesis from the street or contract from the tavern, if you aren’t equipped to deal with them, or have a plan how to, you may end up hurting yourself instead at the end. Even with the best-laid plans, things can go sour, too, as you will still need to roll the two dice in order to get your final value result. If you’ve ever played a game with dice, you know how dice can be fickle mistresses.
Dark Deeds has earned its place among my other “go-to” games for lunchtime game sessions and brewery hijinx. Thanks to its ease of setup and play, along with the great mix of gameplay and aesthetics, everyone I have introduced it to has asked, “Can we play again?” right after finishing. I’m thankful to Modiphius for bringing out this second edition. From what I’ve heard, the first edition had become pretty hard (and expensive) to find, and I think this is a game worth playing at least once.
Thank you to Modiphius for providing us with a review copy of Dark Deeds 2nd Edition! Get your own copy from Modiphius Entertainment or check your local game store.
I’m not an adventure game or visual novel head, if I’m honest. I’m not sure what it was about Minds Beneath Us that made me want to step out of my norms and give it a try. It looks good, a sort of tactical use of flat colors and shading really gives an eerie, dream-like aura to its futuristic setting. Lots of games that heavily feature big landscapes or detailed portraits – pretty standard visual novel stuff – look good, but this does more than just off the page. It whispers something the adventure itself screams once you get into it, and I think that’s what lured me.
Any good sci-fi setting is one that feels like a commentary on particular aspects of our current society. Blade Runner’s moral duel about the specifics of humanity in a world where a corporation can make people never feels too far fetched, especially in a modern world with a global business class that is running, not walking, towards technology that grows every more capable of replicating functions that used to be done by flesh and blood people. In 2049, Minds Beneath Us imagines a world where an entire city can be run by a fleet of individual AI, each with their own tasks, buildings, and even personnel to manage. As with our modern 2024 Earth’s growing AI presence, the fictional city of Weipei’ it doesn’t really replace the need for human input or labor all together, but rather changes where the divisions of this labor are.
Marxist interpretations of divisions of labor suggest that the concept of hierarchy in the workplace only exists to strengthen the position of the capitalist class – those who own all the stuff and the places that make the stuff. In Weipei, that class it as small as its ever been, and seems populated not only by CEOs but by AI themselves. Jason Dai, whose shoes you walk in for a part of the adventure, is looking for work and applies for a consultancy role in a big power plant. The woman he meets about the role, who runs the day to day operations of the building, is constantly at odds with the AI that also runs the day to day operations of the building. It decides who can come and go from room to room, or who’s inquiries or applications get elevated to higher decision makers, or even what departments potential job seekers should be assigned to. She is constantly overriding and second guessing the machine’s judgment. Even though they essentially share the same seat in the C-suite, the actual human has to assert themselves often so as not to be completely obsolesced by the algorithm.
Jason would potentially be working what is essentially the sort of role a call center for a social security or unemployment office would have, assessing applicants for eligibility for another role further down the labor totem pole at the plant. In order to earn the job, he has to do it on the spot with zero training and only minimal guidance given to him by a friendly potential peer. Whether he does it well or not is up to the player, but the concept itself is scary enough. Jason, applying for the kind of job our capitalist society would consider “low skill” because it requires no formal education or prior experience to do, has perform the role in order to earn the role, hoping that the soft skills he’s developed in his life up to this point would help him intuit how to essentially be a psychiatrist to strangers. The people he’s tasked to screen are asked to simply talk about themselves without real prompt of direction, hoping that they can simply intuit what the company is looking for in them in order to give them a spot at the bottom rung of the business. That rung, by the way, is to sell their brain power as energy, becoming human batteries to keep the city’s many AIs running. Humans are still involved in all this, but they’ve simply been turned in cogs in a greater machine, sometimes uncomfortably close to literally.
The kinds of people you interview are a desperate sort, but not all that out of touch with our reality. A man losing his farm to pollution caused by capitalist expansion. A young woman who’s angst about her economic future lead her to make desperate and misguided decisions. And elderly lady whos pension isn’t enough for her to live without economic insecurity. Minds Beneath Us imagines a future where technology changes how society fundamentally operates, but comes to the correct conclusion that easing human suffering will always be lower on the list of the priorities of the capital class than increasing profits. Jason sitting behind the glass and assessing the worthiness of people who want to sell their ability to think and move, potentially their lives, to a company that only barely considers them people at all is just so on the nose.
This is all before even addressing the greater sci-fi macguffin at play here – that Jason isn’t really Jason so much as a consciousness placed inside Jason’s body by an alien organization that uses beings like him for war and espionage. The Jason that sells his body and labor to a big faceless power company has already done so to the military industrial complex both in his world – hes a former vet – and out of it as a subject in the alien organization.
Before it even really ramps up into it’s way-out-there sci fi tale, it sets a stage that tells its own story without having to resort to shape shifting bio weapons or overseers from beyond reality. The city of Weipei – gorgeous, grungy, and gruesome, feels like a hop, skip, and a jump away from any modern city today. As our real lives continue to be encroached upon by capitalist devices intended to replace us, its hard not to find these seemingly mundane set dressings of Minds Beneath Us’s story to be the most chilling parts of it.
I am someone who has backed arguably far too many board games through crowdfunding. I find joy in large boxes packed full of plastic miniatures or sleeved cards, and hearing things like “complex” and “takes all day to play” makes me salivate. But I still have a soft spot for smaller and more party-tailored games for those times you just need that quick hit of board game goodness or are with a group of folks that aren’t quite as deep or interested in the hobby and are just looking for a fun time. In those situations, You Gotta Be Kitten Me, developed by longtime game designer Justin Gary and published by Stone Blade Entertainment, is a solid contender.
Perhaps the biggest hook of Kitten Me is the cute pictures of puppies and kittens that adorn each card and the game’s box. On the cards, adorable fur babies can be wearing bowties, hats, or glasses in three possible colors – green, red, and blue. This combination of outfit accessories and colors makes up the crux of Kitten Me’s gameplay. Three cards are dealt to each player, and from there, each person will take a turn guessing how many of something there are in the hands around the table – ie, “I think there are three blue bowties” – with the following person having to increase the amount of their guess, even if it is for a different accessory or color. When someone believes that what the person has guessed is too outlandish or you don’t feel it is possible, a player can shout, “You’ve got to kitten me!” at which point everyone shows their card and the symbol/color of what was just called is tallied up. If it turns out that the person’s guess was less than the value on the table, the person who called the tally loses a card, but on the flip side, if the person whose guess it was turns out to be more than what is on the table, they are dealt one less card each turn. From there, a new turn is dealt out, and the process repeats. The last person with any cards in their hand is the winner.
You Gotta Be Kitten Me falls squarely in the “good as a party game for folks who don’t play games” category for me. At only about $15 USD and playable with 2-10 players, it’s a pretty painless game to pick up for a game collection, and with a small box, it doesn’t take up too much space. It’s a game that would fit in perfectly on the small game shelf at your local coffee house or bar.
While it approaches things from a bit of a different angle – guessing as opposed to bluffing – playing Kitten Me always reminded me of games like Bullsh** or Egyptian Rat Screw that you can play with a standard deck of playing cards. It gave me a similar sense of “pushing my luck” and the “will they/won’t they” when it came to see if anyone would call me on my guess. That moment is when you hold your breath before the next player takes their turn, and your safety is present in all the games.
The element of counting cards and keeping track of what has been played and called is different (since a majority of the deck in Kitten Me remains unplayed and in the center of the table). The reference card that each player gets with the quantities of everything listed, does help you guesstimate what could be in folks’ hands. That makes Kitten feel more of a game of chance and borderline blind guessing, as opposed to some of the more strategic elements that can be found in the previously mentioned standard deck card games.
What surprised me the most after a bunch of Kitten Me games was that it wasn’t the game itself that I found myself getting tired of, but the theme – those cute animals and their hats. The theme, while adorable, isn’t something I gravitate to in the games I play, and it felt more like a novelty than adding anything really meaningful to the overall product. I think kids will love it, and as I mentioned before, I think folks seeing it on a shelf at a coffee shop will want to pick it up, but for more consistent or regular play, it started falling flat relatively quickly. This decline isn’t helped at all by the fact that you get a lot of repeating dog and cat pictures. If each card was unique, I think it would add some longer legs to the experience. At the end of the day, I think Kitten’s mechanics could be easily applied to just your standard deck of playing cards without much of a loss in the game’s mechanic quality.
You’ve Got to be Kitten Me is a cute and enjoyable game for quick bouts at a party that is easy for board game novices and hobbyists to play together. I think its saving grace is its low price point and small box because nothing about it would make me want to pay more. The mechanics are solid enough, though, that if this game were ever to release a version with generic shapes and colors in place of the animals and accessories, I would pick that version over this one.
You’ve Got to be Kitten Me is available on Amazon, Target, Walmart, and your local game store.
Thank you to the developer for sending us a review copy of You Gotta Be Kitten Me!
Developed by Darkrose Studios and based on the 2022 Dark Horse graphic novel of the same name, The Winds of Numa Sera is a brand-new strategy game for 2-4 players that is currently finding success on Kickstarter. Darkrose Studios was kind enough to send me a prototype of their upcoming game to check out, so let’s get into things!
What’s in the box:
- 4 Dry-erase Kingdom Mats
- 4 Dry-erase Markers
- 1 Map Board
- 70 coins
- 1 Custom die
- 182 Cards that include:
- 10 Stronghold Cards
- 12 Hero Cards
- 20 Class Cards
- 80 Exploration Cards
- 35 Skill Cards
- 25 World Forge Item Cards (aka equipment)
In Winds of Numa Sera, you and up to three friends vie for control over the fantastical world of Ethera, each player assuming the role of a powerful kingdom, and each kingdom being more tailored to complete one of the game’s four objectives. To win, players will be equipping their heroes, improving their stats, and increasing their income to be the first to complete one of four possible objectives: being the first to slay three enemy heroes, capturing four strongholds, mastering a skill by getting it to level 4, or unlocking all five player classes.
On your turn, you will explore, drawing a card from the exploration deck that contains cards you can use in battle to aid you, events that will help you, hazards that hurt you, and more. From there, you will either choose to build and gain money and upgrade your tech tree, or attack and go after the other players’ heroes or the strongholds. A bit of randomness is thrown in for good measure with a modifying dice roll during combat and powerful battle cards that you can play to tip the odds in your favor (or counter your opponent’s cards). It keeps things exciting, and the outcome is never a sure thing. The whole experience of playing Numa Sera feels like a mix of a tabletop RPG and a strategy game, and I am here for it!
For a more in-depth breakdown of how to play, check out the official how-to-play video featured on the Kickstarter page, made by the great folks at Shelfside.
Here are a couple of suggestions for things you may want to try if you pick up Winds of Numa Sera yourself. I’m not a big fan of using dry-erase markers on my games, as they can stain games after some time and are a bit annoying to deal with. Numa Sera tasks you with writing down your stats and marking the skills you take using said dry-erase markers, but instead I opted to go for using dice. I ticked them up a pip when my stats increased and placing them on the skills I learned,both avoiding staining the prototype I have to send back, and I found it easier. The second tip is to blind-draft the three heroes you get to use. Each kingdom only has access to three; the only option you get is the order in which you stack them up to use. If you find yourself wishing for more options (seriously, I would love it if each kingdom had, say, five choices to pick three from; it would add some fun extra strategy), then simply blind draft or deal out heroes to players instead. Just to spice things up a bit.
Even before you open the box, Winds of Numa Sera shows off its gorgeous art design and that lovely high fantasy aesthetic. These high-quality visuals on the box continued to impress throughout the rest of the game with all the artwork on the various cards and boards. Overall, Winds of Numa Sera has knocked the presentation out of the park. This is all enhanced by the excellent construction of the components that Darkrose Studios has opted for. The player boards and map boards were all sturdy with vivid and bright colors, and the cards felt sturdy and pleasant to shuffle and play with. Granted, the copy I played with was only a prototype, but hopefully, the final release will retain the same quality, if not better.
Perhaps the aspect of Numa Sera that I appreciated the most during my time with it was just how easy the game is to teach. Teaching is a necessary, but my least favorite, part of introducing a new game to my buddies, so I really appreciate it when a game is easy to figure out and introduce to people. Turns are straightforward – activate ability triggers, draw a card, perform the attack or build action, done. There’s enough choice without being overwhelming, meaning analysis paralysis is less likely. By the second or third go around the table, everyone I played with tended to settle in with a solid grasp of how things work. The quick rules reference sheet that is included also helps a bunch, but at least with my prototype, only a single copy was included. Hopefully, the final release will include four of them – one for each possible player. When paired with the game’s impressively small box (Coming in with an 11.5’x 9.5’ x 3’), DarkRose has condensed a lot of play into a very manageable and transportable package that can easily fit into a backpack or on your standard Kallax shelf.
Numa Sera is a lot of game, literally. When set up, it takes a lot of space, and I mean A LOT. Too much space, I think. Using a mid-game scenario as an example, someone with some equipment, skills, and other goodies they would have reasonably earned at that point, a single-player board and accouterments (using the arrangement recommended and shown in the rule book) takes up around 26.5’ x 17.5’ of space. That is the space of a 1.5 Gloomhaven or Twilight Imperium 4th Edition long and just as wide, laid out flat in front of every single player. All of that before even factoring in the main game board, which is 16’ x 11’, before setting out the card decks that grow it even more! For as transportable as the game is, the size of its table presence makes it far less friendly to take with you to a friend’s house, and taking it to the bar or coffee shop for a game night is even less feasible. I think some avenues could be explored that would cut down on this size too: I don’t believe every card needed to be tarot size, or perhaps the playboard could be reduced to only two boards instead of three. The space required to play and the distance that will undoubtedly occur between the players leads to my biggest issue with Numa Sera, and significant regarding the game’s accessibility – the text.
At even a standard distance from my cards – from where I sat in my chair looking down at my cards on the board, it was tough to make out what each one said—between the small text and the odd choices of background colors with the white text, made cards a bit of a chore to decipher without picking them up. In any strategy game, having a good idea of what your opponents have is critical to devising an effective answer to whatever they have cooking, but it’s hard to do that if you can’t tell what their stuff does. Sure, you could ask them to hand you their cards or read them, but that gives them a peek into your thoughts. I would prefer if they leaned more on larger and clearer icons instead of so much text – things the team already has in the game. From an accessibility standpoint, if you have poor eyesight, this will be a real problem for you, and I hope this gets addressed for the final release.
Numa Sera may say on the box that it is for 2 to 4 players, but I wouldn’t recommend this for anything less than 3. At two players, one of the core actions you can take, trading, just fizzles out. When I was playing against only one other person, there simply wasn’t much of an incentive for us to want to trade with the other. I never wanted to give them something that would put them closer to winning, just to put myself closer, too. At three players, you can form alliances to slow the player in the lead down. That’s not to say that the game isn’t fun to play with two players; in fact, most of my plays were between only my wife and me, and we still had a great time, just not as much as when our friends joined us.
For folks who aren’t fans of games with a ton of upkeep or keeping track of game triggers and different effects, Numa Sera may not be the game for you. This game features a number of cards, including some heroes and most strong holds, that have something happen at the beginning of your turn. Usually, this involves putting coins on various cards, which, if things ended there, wouldn’t be too much of an issue. Still, things become a bit more of a challenge considering that each card, especially the strongholds, has specific conditions for using their associated coins, which, when combined with the small font, can make it a hassle to keep track. I would have liked it if they added a passive cost reduction to cards or something instead. Just to keep things a bit easier to deal with.
The Winds of Numa Sera offers a solid strategy experience that provides a good amount of replayability between the different factions you can play with and alternate pathways to victory that you can take. It’s easy to teach, allowing you to quickly get the game going, even with new players. Since the version I played was a prototype, issues like the readability and the space requirements can be addressed before the retail copies reach backers and retail. At the time of this review, the Kickstarter is still live, so check out the page, link down in the description, or try it out yourself, digitally, over on Tabletopia.
Blemishes aside, The Winds of Numa Sera provides a fun balance of strategy and character building, all wrapped up in beautiful art and quality components. I enjoyed my time in Ethera and would be happy to have it on my shelf to bust out for game night when it officially releases next year.
In 2024, being a soulslike must be a lot of pressure. Not only are you being compared with some of the most popular and highly regarded games ever made, including the expansion to one of the greatest games of the generation coming out months before, but you’re surrounded by games of similar style looking to make a name for themselves. Deathbound follows the strategy of a lot of what you’ll find among it in the same tag on Steam: a dark world ruled by secrecy, and a stamina based sword swing system that turns battling dangerous foes into a game of patience and pattern recognition. It does struggle at nailing these things consistently, even before considering the ups and downs of the novelties it brings to the well-worn genre, but it does charm with it hits just enough to soften the blow of its misses.
THE thing that makes Deathbound stand out in a field of games that might look and feel similar at first blush are the essences, the many characters that meld into a bizarre gestalt of consciousnesses that bicker with one another constantly, but also strengthen (or sometimes worsen) one another’s weaknesses in combat. Instead of having one static avatar which stats you can spend experience on that make a chinese takeout menu of weapons with various different levels of effectiveness in your hands, individual characters forced to take turns sharing the same moral coil provide different offensive and defensive options. This provides far fewer opportunities to explore the weirder sides of min-maxing and build theory, but it does allow for an experience that feels reasonably challenging in a way that is acutely tuned to the player. As with more linear action games of old, the dungeon you explore knows what kind of tools you’ll have at your disposal because it’s designed to make you use those tools to the fullest, unlike more open ended action rpgs these days where the kind of playstyle you choose is its own difficulty slider.
Each of the essences – you’ll find seven in total – excel at some specific. Bloodthirsty zealot Therone’s defense is solid as a rock, and is the perfect guy to take point into uncharted locations. Ranged magic from Haodai can keep consistent damage up from a safe distance, or if you really want to take a risk, use the residual heat casting spells creates to blow you and your enemies to bits. You can assign up to four of these characters at a time and switch between them at the touch of a button. Thanks to the sync system, which allows you to chain attacks and dodges together while syncing, there is an extra layer of strategy to essence selection akin to a tag fighting game like DBFZ. Though each character has a different tag in attacks and effects, I never felt like I had a good handle of which character was coming in. Eight or so hours in, I still don’t really know what determines the tag order.
Every character feels pretty strong and capable, but no single one of them can spend too much time on the field because attacking and dodging takes lots of stamina, meaning you’ll spend way more time waiting for good opportunities to strike than simply overwhelming your enemies with attacks. Stamina is also tied to health, meaning the less health an essence has, the less stamina they have. They can regain health passively when they aren’t the active character, but this happens at a pretty slow pace, meaning any time a member of the squad takes real damage, it puts a lot of pressure on the team as a whole. Your flask style healing item will restore the health of the active character, but will take health from your inactive characters to do so. All of this risk means that teamwork really does make the dream work in Deathbound, and all of the switching and slashing really worked for me, too.
Characters can synergize with one another based on what order you bind them, so long as they actually like one another when placed adjacently on the tiled punnett square-shaped essence chart. If two essences next to one another don’t get along, then they’ll be in conflict. Both synerized and conflicted warrior gain passive buffs or debuffs, and I spent very little time fussing over them. Same goes for the skill tree, which is a limited web of general buffs for all of your characters which stretch out into sub-trees that get more fighter-specific. Lots of these feel like just making numbers go up without any real noticeable change in strength, especially when it comes to stats for which there really is no explanation, like whatever attack weight is supposed to be. This sort of generalized stat boosting also makes my eyes glaze over when looking at the accessories. Even though there is some agency related to how you upgrade the rings and trinkets you find, allowing you to mix and match between two different tracks of buffs a total of five times between them, I really couldn’t tell if I was being helped all that significantly or not by the equipment, and didn’t want to risk upgrade materials to find out I made the wrong choices down the road if I did start to see something.
All this stands in stark contrast to the specific character traits that you can unlock with memory points. Every trait you activate, like giving Lullia an extra life if she falls or adding poison to Anna’s melee attacks, adds a strong tool to your arsenal that feels immediately strong, even if the process of finding memory points in the world is a hassle, since they only appear if the right character is leading your group of wayward spirits.
The cast adds a lot of texture to what is a largely bland story in a world that is a dark mix of fantasy and science fiction. Opposing cults, one that worships true and final death and one that pursues eternal life by any means, have torn a massive techno-medieval city to pieces in their struggle against one another and your heroes are all members of the various factions who were caught in the crossfires. These characters aren’t always well written or interesting, some are even straight up unlikable, but their often pretty simple personalities do help to make the lofty lore of the surrounding conflicts more approachable. Listening to two people who would certainly kill each other if they weren’t stuck together argue does help set the stakes of all this post-apocalyptic carnage.
It doesn’t really help the world itself feel cohesive, though. The jist of locations your in is that they used to be a prosperous stone and metal techno city and is now a broken place covered in haphazard wooden fortifications put up by the occupiers. It’s a jarring clash of styles, maybe purposefully so, but I never came to love any of it. Character and monster designs are hit and miss too. Your regular soldiers, mostly of the Cult of Death, are all pretty standard sword and sorcery knights. The abominations of the essancemancers are usually more dynamic and feral. Some even surprise, maybe not always in form but in function, like when I saw a giant Slender Man-esque beast and was shocked to learn the hard way that it’s arms can stretch across the length of the room I was in. Bosses can occasionally meld form and function in a way that tells a story like The Impending Truth, who starts the fight trying to figure out where you are without to use of its eyes or ears and gradually regains it’s senses as the fight progresses. Not enough bosses do this mind you, of the handful i’ve seen this is the only one that does anything more than just be big and have lots of attacks, but Im staying open minded as I continue my progress.
All soulslikes have a similar camera issue that turns your point of view into a merry-go-round if depending on your distance between you and your lock on target. Deathbound sometimes ups the ante, the camera snapping around with a mind of its own, one that is behaving as if it wants to guide you towards important things happening – an enemy around a corner, perhaps. But just as often it would spin itself unexpectedly, throwing me off my path and sending me trudging into a wall if I’m lucky (off of a ledge if I wasn’t). It’s manageable on the whole, and really only a problem in tight spaces, but its always interesting to see how many mechanical tropes live on through a genre just by way of the similarities in which they’re built, regardless of tone and theme.
Deathbound likely isn’t going to change your mind about games like this if you’re already wary of them. If you can’t get into the very cream of the crop like Elden Ring or Dark Souls, then something like this, that is at least a tier below in quality in every way, isn’t going to show you something you haven’t seen before. But for Souls Heads looking for a fun experiment with the formula, I think character morphing combat is a fun twist that you won’t find anywhere else.
Since 2013, Warframe has been one of those games that you either play hardcore or don’t play at all. Many players bounce of it’s very obtuse and repetitive early game, but the ones that can stick with it are rewarded with some genuinely mind-boggling storytelling, stellar world building, and dizzying mechanical depth that, when attempting to recount and bit of it to their peers, they often feel the need to punctuate a long screed of lore with a “Weird, right?” It’s a coming of age story both in it’s long-running, multiverse-spanning narrative and the many times it’s tinkered with its own core systems while also dabbling in various sub-genres not often seen in its live service wheelhouse.
I’ve been a devoted son of the Lotus for many years now, so Digital Extremes slipping in a new mini game system as casually as they did a whole ass roguelike mode or a Batman-style crime scene snooping mini-game isn’t as eye-popping in isolation. But Warframe: 1999, at least aesthetically, isn’t just any expansion, it’s a 90’s-flavored sugar high of industrial ninja action, iconic pop music, and romance.
“Who had a computer at 9 years old and gave their family computer a virus downloading a Backstreet Boys song?” Creative Director Rebb Ford replied when asked whose idea it was to feature a gritty city in a near apocalypse in 1999 that’s being terrorized by a parasite-infested boyband during a Q&A session with the press. “They could be in the room with you right now.” On-Lyne’s smash hit “Party of Your Lifetime” is both a pitch perfect replica of the saccharine chart toppers of the TRL-era, and an ominous piece of ludonarrative in its own right. When you listen to it a dozen times like I have, the fact that the song’s lyrics slowly morph from harmless bop to insidious threat over the course of it’s three and a half minute runtime is one of many Easter eggs for you to revel over.
For a game know for truly outstanding music, “Party of Your Lifetime” is the crown jewel of late-90’s musical treasure trove, but the rest of the soundtrack from in-house composer Matthew Chalmers hops into Alice in Chains style-grunge and TOOLs slow, atmospheric, riff heavy pace, making this tortured city of Hollvania at least sound the part.
That turn of the century vibe radiates through the screen from every corridor of the headquarters of The Hex, a syndicate of soldiers tasked with holding back the end of the world. The dilapidated mall has walls of broken tiles and thick, archaic cabling provided power for thick CRT monitors and arcade cabinets. Anything not lit but the harsh glow of halogen lights is cloaked in shadow, and its hard not to see 1998’s Blade in the cracked tile walls. Advertisements for Big Bytes Pizza point energetically back to a time where Pizza Hut has lacquered oak tables and stained glass light fixtures hanging from the ceiling just a little too close to your head. Member’s of The Hex themselves, especially their moody leader, Arthur, is clad head to toe in a body suit straight out of Metal Gear Solid. Much is said of he and the Warframe Excalibur’s resemblance to Grey Fox, but when the gameplay leaves the hideout and takes to the streets of Hollvania, the inspiration goes far deeper. On Arthur’s trip to the final boss, he’s stopped by what I assume to be the villainous Major Reklusa, dressed in Soviet-style garb that is both animalistic – a venomous snake in this instance – and too sexy for military use. Kojima staples, through and through.
The aforementioned Hex are a the thin, technoflesh-colored line between the future of civilization and the encroaching techrot chaos delivered by Dr. Entrati. Each member resembles a warframe that long-time players would easily pick out of a line up. Arthur’s Excalibur is more obvious than say Aoi’s Mag or Elanor’s Nyx, but onces they express their skills just a little bit, the references are as clear as a starry night. How they connect to the frames in the story is still an unanswered question, but Ford and company thinks you’ll find something resembling an answer during the course of the 3 to 4 hour adventure.
The Hex less Avengers and more X-Force, where they take their job with a deadly seriousness, but don’t let that get in the way of some light banter between shots and slashes. The steam is familiar and competitive with one another in that way that tight night groups of people can be, each brimming with unique and vibrant personalities that become easier to like with every line of dialogue. Warframe is full of characters like this, but 1999 is unique in two ways. One is the push for a voice cast that goes above and beyond the normal reaches of the game, with heavy hitters like Nick Apostolides (Resident Evil 4), Alpha Takahashi (Cyberpunk 2077), and Ben Starr (Final Fantasy 16). And another, is the inclusion of flirting and romance systems, a first for the series that looks to add yet another system to its collection.
“It’s my first time!” Alpha said when I asked the trio how it felt to be characters who could potentially be the target of a New Year’s smootch if the player plays their cards right. Details are still sparse on the mechanics of the romance system, but the gist is that your character – who will not be a member of The Hex – will be able to interact with them via an AIM-style instant messaging system. How often and to what extent will reveal itself as we get closer to launch.
Ben Starr elaborated on playing a character who needs to be emotionally vulnerable enough to become a love interest to the player: “It’s really fun as a performer to take the things that we recognize in the action setting and pull them back a bit. And show a little bit of sensitivity is really fun.” Figuring out what makes Arthur laugh and cry as a party of sort of “romantic” side journey is an opportunity he was happy to have. Along the same lines, Nick wasn’t worried about a perceived box people might put him in as a consequence of being so associated with an iconic character like Leon Kennedy for as long as he has been. “I’ve had a lot of good fortunes in my life. Every single opportunity I’m afforded Im so grateful. So if certain characters are similar to other ones, so be it.” That said, he’s worked with many developers who love to collaborate with him and get him into the creative process outside of the grunts and growls, and that’s where he gets his moment to flourish. “I’ve been very lucky to work with a lot of developers who are open to outside influence and take suggestions. They don’t tell you ‘This is what you’re doing’ they ask ‘what do you think?’”
Warframe 1999 is expansion content, but its not accessible unless you’ve some specific story stuff up to this point, so if you’re a new or lapsed Warframe player getting lured by the siren song of 90’s nostalgia, you should start chopping away at The New War and other vital content now. Once you get there, 1999 has some fresh new stuff to add to your collection. The Kawasaki-inspired Atomicycle, The Hex’s preferred two-wheeled transport, will be available to you to drift and bullet jump through the streets of Hollvania, and other open zones like The Plains of Eidolon and Cambrion Drift. If you just can’t get enough of the cuties from The Hex, the new Gemini Skins all you to switch one of the six corresponding skins into their 1999 counterparts, meaning Lettie’s power bangs aren’t trapped in the past. There’s also a brand new Warframe, Cyte-09, that will be available to collect and corresponds with 1999’s Quincy, easily the most mysterious of the bunch. And finally, On-lyne’s veiled threats in “Party of Your Lifetime” become action as the infested boy band breaks into the present as the Technocyte Coda, challenging you to travel across the system and stop them akin to the Kuva Lich or Tempestarii hunts in the past.
All of this looks to ring in the New Year when it launches this Winter 2024.
Trading card games like Magic: The Gathering, Digimon, Final Fantasy, and others are perhaps my favorite genre of tabletop goodness. Being a child of the late ’80s and growing up in the ’90s, I attribute this love to my fond memories of “attempting” to play Magic with my older brother and dad at the time and playing matches with my friends on Boy Scout camping trips. It’s a passion that has stayed with me and evolved over the course of now three decades, and it’s what keeps me always on the lookout for more colorful cardboard I want to try. This vigilance is what made Hero: Tales of the Tome, designed by Jimmy Ellerth, catch my eye back a few PAXs ago. It’s an all-in-one card game that offers much of the strategy that my favorite TCGs provide while only requiring a single copy of the game to enjoy.
The base game of Hero features five unique characters that 2-5 players can choose from, with the objective of the game to be the last character standing. Each character will grow in power over the course of the game’s rounds, unlocking new spells and abilities to use while also increasing the amount of resources they can generate, letting you use more cards as the game gets farther in. In typical TCG fashion, games are played over a series of rounds where each player takes turns drawing cards from their deck, conjuring powerful spells, summoning creatures, and attacking their foes. From a distance, Hero may sound a lot like other card games of the genre, but it features a few special features that make it a unique beast that will still appeal to fans of those other games.
The most obvious aspect that sets Hero apart is that each player is playing and pulling cards from the same deck. Opposed to requiring everyone to construct and bring their own unique set of cards, Hero instead presents everyone with a single deck that everyone will draw from, requiring you to strategize and plan on the fly with what you’re given. If you find the shared deck gameplay a bit too heavy on randomness and chance, you can opt for a draft-style game instead. Players compose their own decks from the shared single deck in this mode, requiring careful planning and strategic decision-making. This adds a layer of depth and complexity to the game, making it a rewarding experience for those who enjoy a challenge.
What may throw experienced TCG players for a loop (more so than even the single shared deck), and took me the most time to wrap my head around, was assigning your blocking creatures at the END of your turn. Instead of assigning creatures to block for your hero in response to your opponent declaring their attack, you will need to attempt to plan ahead and figure out what is the biggest target before your opponent has acted or even played their cards. This unique gameplay mechanic really changed up my thought processes and approach compared to other games I play, making me have to be more proactive in my play and less reactionary.
I am a big fan of games that provide a big experience but come in small packages and/or are easy to take with me. Hero’s original release – and the one I initially picked up years ago at PAX – came in a small and incredibly portable form-factor, barely bigger than two decks of playing cards stacked on top of each other. It is a perfect size to throw in my bag to take with me to work or my local brewery. It’s perhaps a little too small, however, leaving no room for the additional hero cards that you could buy in the Hero Expansion Pack or being able to hold the deck when sleeved. The 2nd Edition addresses this issue, and for about the same price you get a larger box that has no issue fitting sleeved versions of all the cards – including the Hero Expansions – and gives you additional wooden tokens to use. It may not fit in your handbag anymore, but it will still easily fit in your backpack or any board game-designed bag. Outside of the box size, the cards, rules, and overall contents are the same, so which edition you go with really comes down to your preference!
Hero: Tales of the Tome has found its way into my collection of mainstay “take with me” games whenever I head somewhere. Jimmy has also been busy working on a brand new standalone expansion, Hero: Reign of The Onyx King, that looks to add a brand new asymmetrical game type where three players team up against one who takes on the role of the Onyx King in addition to 200 new cards, 4 new heroes, and new mechanics to strategize around. This giant new expansion will be arriving on Kickstarter soon so be sure to head over to the page and follow the project if you’re interested! Hero: Tales of the Tome removes one of the biggest hurdles in introducing new players to the trading card game genre – the deck building – making it a great trial game while still providing a rewarding and exciting gameplay experience for seasoned vets. With its ancient tome-looking box, and relatively low price point of $30 USD, Hero: Tales of the Tome is worth your time to check out if your in the mood to sling some spells.
Hero: Tales of the Tome can be purchases off of the official website, Barnes & Nobel, or Amazon.
A copy of the 2nd Edition was provided to the reviewer who had previously purchased the 1st Edition.
The Modern Horizon line of releases for Magic is always uniquely exciting, thanks to its focus on reprinting classic cards. These reprints serve an important role in the meta of Magic – making old cards legal again in the modern format of the game, but also helping to reduce the aftermarket costs of some cards from their ludicrous values down to somewhere between affordable and slightly less ludicrous. For me, cracking Modern Horizon 3 packs – the latest release of the line – turned out to be a much more introspective experience than I expected.
I was a late bloomer when it came to learning to read, so seeing the gnarled visage of Treefolk, the decrepit rotting bodies of zombies, and the regal-looking elves on Magic cards were my first introductions to the high fantasy genre. This genre and the creations in Magic: The Gathering continue to influence my career and inspire me today. That said, ranking high among my favorite creature types in the pantheon of Magic: The Gathering – alongside the ranks of dragons and slivers – the cosmic threat known as the Eldrazi I’ve always found to be a bit of fresh air. I’ve appreciated the jolt of science fiction and borderline elder horror vibes they put in the game. Their heavy inclusion in MH3 initially drew most of my attention, but as I opened packs, seeing all the reprints and next to my piles of cards featuring the likes of Fallout Power Armors, 40k Necrons, and Optimus Prime, my thoughts went back to those old days of Magic. Times when my imagination would see hordes of goblins climbing on the backs of lumbering creatures made of oak playing out in front of me on pieces of cardboard. Now, that image was cloudy and muddled with all manner of other properties and characters from other series and mediums. I found myself wondering if Magic had deviated too far.
Before anything else, I want to clarify that while I have found the cards from Universes Beyond to be fun (check out my thoughts on the Fallout cards here), I still haven’t quite come to grips yet with the plethora of properties that can now be found sprinkled throughout my friends’ decks. Gandalf teaming up with the likes of Optimus Prime or the Necrons from Warhammer 40k may be novel and silly (and I openly admit that I am currently working on a deck that tries to incorporate every property Wizard’s has brought to magic just for fun), but I miss the days when the “wild” cards were squirrels or other random critter types. Back when Magic felt more self-contained.
There is a part of me that wonders if all of these Universe Beyond and cross-over releases are simply Wizard’s way of chasing after what’s hot right now (ie multiverses and IP crossovers thanks to the likes of Fortnite and others). They explored this years ago, with all of the different planes that early sets of Magic visited, and the game still maintained its identity. It was able to define itself without the need to throw in a character from your favorite Saturday morning cartoon. Does having Ezio from Assassin’s Creed fighting alongside The Ur-Dragon improve the game, or does it just make it look silly? I don’t know. Perhaps this is just my “old man yelling at clouds” moment, but I don’t know if I would have been as enthralled by the fantasy genre when I was young seeing him alongside fantastical creatures like dragons and merfolk.
Maybe it’s because I play primarily casually with friends and keep away from the “Modern” format for the most part (the cost of maintaining a modern deck scares me), but Modern Horizons 3 is the first of this series of releases that I’ve explored. This may also be why it has especially hit me in the nostalgia bones. Seeing fresh versions of classics like Phyrexian Tower being pulled from packs again or the resurgence of the highly requested fetch lands takes me back to those Boy Scout camping trips where we would all hangout playing Magic, and those moments in our local game shops cracking packs and being excited to see that awesome mythic that the other pulled—some of those pulls are being reprinted here in MH3. But perhaps what all this nostalgia fodder has made me realize and miss the most was simply having time to enjoy a set of new cards before the next “hot new set” came out.
There was a time when, between one set and another, you could have upwards of three months, giving my friends and me time to strategize, formulate, test, and enjoy a set. Now, you are lucky to get a full month between releases. In the span of less than three and a half months (105 days if you want to be exact), players will have four releases to digest and try out (Outlaws of Thunder Junction – April 19th, Modern Horizons 3 – June 14th, Assassin’s Creed – July 5th, and the upcoming Bloomburrow – August 2nd). Sets with unique mechanics, aesthetics, and exciting cards to build decks around but with no time to let them breathe and build a passionate following around. I realize I don’t have to get cards from every set, but just because I don’t have to doesn’t mean I don’t WANT to. I’ve played these games for going on three decades now, I love my collection; I want the nice new cardboard, but I also want the time to enjoy said new cardboard, too. A luxury that I feel is becoming more and more out of reach.
As I sit here in my local coffee shop contemplating and reflecting back on my years of spellslinging and planeswalking, thinking about all the fun reprints I can put into my decks, Modern Horizons 3 is already old news thanks to Assassin’s Creed now being out. There’s a lot in MH3 I enjoy, but what I’ve gotten most out of the set is just the trip back down memory lane that it has taken me on. I miss a lot of old Magic, even though I still like many of the new cards and mechanics introduced in modern-day Magic. But even if those days are long gone, I think I’ll still be playing Magic in another thirty years. And I think I will pick up these Modern Horizons sets going forward, if for nothing else than these nostalgic trips to my childhood and to simpler times.
Snag some Modern Horizons 3 goodness on Amazon or from your local game store!
Thank you to Wizards for providing our writer with Modern Horizons 3 product.
To my dear readers, listeners, and friends,
I really never thought I’d write this letter, or that when I shared this news, it’d be under very different circumstances. But people change, and time flows endlessly in new directions. Here is the TL;DR:
I am leaving IrrationalPassions.com. I am stepping down from shows, podcasts, and writing, and I am leaving the video games industry as a whole. This is not a bad blood situation, this is a choice I have reflected on and made on my own. The website will continue to exist, and the capacity to which it will continue to operate is in good hands.
I wanted to take this final letter and reflect a bit, to explain why I made this choice, and where I’m at on a personal level. In my mind, it’s a drop in the bucket, who cares right? But after talking with some people I do realize that, even in some small way, I have likely had an influence on some of you and I want to say and give a proper goodbye. Did I ever think I would make this choice? No, but a lot has changed, particularly myself, and especially in the last 6-12 months.
First of all, I want to firmly say I am doing fine. I am healthy, the healthiest I have ever been actually, and I have never enjoyed life as much as I am now. If you follow me on social media, which you can anywhere at @AuriMeansWind, you know that discovering I am a trans woman and transitioning has been a massive part of my life. It’s been a joy too, and I have never felt this good about my identity, my future self, and my personal happiness ever. I can say with confidence, my mental health is better right now than it ever has been before. I am a new woman (literally).
Through that, I have learned and grown a lot, and my relationship with video games has changed as well. Honestly, I am a lot less interested in them at the moment. Part of that may be it being an off year, part of it may be me in my 30s, part may be my transitioning, and part may be the absolute dogshit year the games industry has had in regards to taking care of its people. Another part of it is my dear friend Brian Jackson passing this past February, and him being my go-to person to talk and be passionate about games with. All of it together has led to me just… not really care anymore. I’ve felt very lost when it comes to games for a while now. I don’t listen to gaming podcasts, I feel checked out on the podcasts I am a part of, and I could not give any less of a shit about video game “discourse” anymore.
Things like genocide in the world, rampant transphobia across the United States and wider world too, and so much more occupies my brain and keeps me from engaging with gaming as a medium and a hobby in the capacity that I was before. That, and I just haven’t been enjoying them as much. I can’t put a firm hand on the empty feeling I get with them a lot now, but it’s been a pretty big bummer for me.
This isn’t at all to dismiss the people within the gaming space, or those staying here at IP, this is just the internal conflict I am going through right now. Some members of the gaming space are doing a ton of amazing activism within it for Palestine and for Trans Rights, but the dissonance of it all has completely disengaged me from the industry. I have changed. And I am not the person passionate about writing about games, about being an editor, or about being a host in this space anymore.
To be fully honest, I’ve been pretty checked out since I burned out in 2020. Obviously Irrational Passions hasn’t taken as many shots, done as much production, or made as many exciting moves, and I can’t help but blame myself for just being an obstacle in the way of the people that did want to expand and try new things, but as the decision maker I just held things back and prevented those opportunities from happening. I’ve decided to listen to what my heart has been telling me for years, and officially step down and walk away because it’s simply what I need to do right now. It is definitely a choice that makes me very sad, but it is one I am certain I need to make.
Does this mean I won’t ever write or podcast about video games again? Or find some place in gaming that fits who I am now? No, probably not. That being said, I currently have zero plans to do any of that, and that’s kind of exciting. I’ve been doing this since I was 17, and I’m 31 now. I haven’t ever really had a time as myself, both as an adult and as Auri, to just be a fan and enjoy video games. I’m really excited to be able to do that. Hell, I might even listen to a podcast to find out what the hell is going on in a way I haven’t since high school.
Does it mean I’ll never go to a PAX or a Summer Games Fest? Maybe, and even though it was always my dream to sit on the GiantBomb couch with my friends and colleagues, seeing some Irrational Passions alum make it there has filled me with a pride that I cannot describe to you.
To know or at least even believe that I have had a positive influence on anyone within the video games space, or that something I have written has been something someone out there has loved, makes me radiantly proud. I loved what I did when I was doing it, loved finding new and diverse voices in video games and helping bring them to the forefront. I wish I could have done more of that in particular. But for a kid from Maryland who had absolutely no fucking idea what she was doing from the jump, and figured it out as she went thanks to amazing friends and even better colleagues, I think I did all right. I mean, 14 years is nothing to scoff at.
Before I go, I want to take some time to thank the people that deserve to be thanked, and as far as I have ever been concerned, the real stars of the show:
First, and maybe the biggest thank you, to Scott Guthier and Evan Wall. Three friends from middle and high school go on to start a podcast and it is the best decision I ever made. I am infinitely grateful.
Tony Horvath and Joseph Fait, who took a risk and joined in the show and helped drive it and me forward. Most importantly they just showed up every week to have a good time and talk about video games, and they were damn fun to do that with.
Kam, Jacob, Quin, Brendan, Aneudys, Zack, Niall, Billy, Youssef, Logan, JC, and Jess, for their many contributions to the site, their individual and unique voices, and for believing in me.
Jarrett Green is one of the best humans I know, someone I consider a close friend, and honestly, family. He is out there killing it every week, and I am so proud to just know him, to be able to read his words before everyone else on occasion, and bask in his hilarious and pointed prose.
Mike Burgess is the hardest working motherfucker I have ever met. He is an incredible friend, an amazing video editor, one of the most fun people to talk to, and someone I will continue to annoy to play Destiny with me until the day I die.
Scott White is one of the warmest and most amazing people I have ever had the honor to know. He is kind, gentle, funny, and a staunch ally. Watching him become the amazing dad I always knew he would be has been a special treat. I’ll always make time to talk about Trails with you Scott, don’t ever doubt that.
Jurge Cruz is a treasured friend, and was there for me through some really difficult times this year. He is a hard worker and an even better human, and continues to inspire me just as a human being, as a person in video games, and as a dear friend. I am so incredibly proud of you Jurge.
Brian. What more could I say? You were the best of us. I can’t thank you enough. I will treasure your friendship forever. I miss you so much. I hope I made you proud.
Some other folks I wanted to thank, outside of the ragtag group of incredible people who have passed through this site:
Greg Miller, thank you for believing in me. For being a friend, a confidant at times, and just one of the warmest and most supportive people I have ever known. They say never meet your heroes, I’m glad I have one that’s actually pretty fucking cool.
Thank you Ryan Davis. I can’t believe it’s been 11 years since you passed, but you were the first person in the video game industry I met at PAX East 2012, and you mentioning me on the Giant Bombcast will never not spark joy in my heart forever.
Roger Pokorny is one of my best friends and one of the best people I have ever known. Thank you for being the first person I told I was stepping down, and for being kind and listening even though it was so hard for me to talk about. You’ve been with me for so much of this, and I can’t tell you how inspiring you always have been. You’re a star, and I’m so proud.
There are more people and they deserve a better thank you, but I still hope to get out there and give some hugs in person. My mom, my real life friends, everyone who supported me on this journey, it feels so strange to walk away, but sometimes the strangest things make the most sense.
It’s crazy to think that my first ever thing I wrote here was 14 years ago, a Blacklight Tango Down review that was not very good to be honest, you can’t even read it anymore. I was just a dumbass 17 year old boy. Now I am a markedly smarter 31 year old woman. I wouldn’t change any day here for the world. I’ve had some incredible memories, like every PAX, every PSX, every Extralife, including one where Greg Miller, his wonderful wife Gen, and their dog, flew across the country to hangout at my house for a weekend. Some favorite moments here below:
- Being on KFGD, still and always forever a highlight. This was so much fun.
- PAX East 2018, I really think we did some great work in this time.
- PAX West 2022, post-the end of the world. My last PAX I attended.
- PAX East 2019, I remember how much planning we did for this.
- PAX East 2020, who knew it’d be just a few weeks shy of a global pandemic!
- Recording a podcast during KFL2, for the chaos factor. Don’t look this one up, I told a bad story on it.
- A little side dinner with the IP family at PAX West 2022! This one is special because it’s when I came out to the IP folks, and they were wonderful <3
- Hanging out with Justin, who I miss dearly.
- PAX East 2014, the first group of writers IP had, and this was a real proud moment for me.
- Roger Pokorny and I relaxing in the early morning hours at ExtraLife 2018. Always the best.
- A little shot from the podcast when Greg Miller sat at my podcast table.
- Jarrett Green is just the best. Truly you can see the quality of every bit of writing on the site go up starting in 2014. He taught me soooo much of what I know now.
- The squad at PAX East 2018. I love this silly picture.
- PAX West 2018, the big IP/OKB crossover episode.
- Ryan Davis was the best, and he was so damn photogenic. PAX West 2012
- The final hours crew saying goodbye on the stream of ExtraLife 2017. One of the best weekends of my life.
- Wrapping up ExtraLife 2013, so many people here I love.
- The all-told group photo of ExtraLife 2017. This was my magnum opus.
- The recording of IPP Episode 100. Way back in July of 2012, oh how young I was. :)) I’ve met incredible people through writing, social media, and even just playing games, and proved to myself and the wider world that true, precious friendships can be made in an online space, and become some of the realest you have in your life. Video games are more than just a distraction, they’re a gift, worked on by sometimes one, and sometimes thousands of people that pour years of their lives, their hearts, and their souls into these beautiful miracleworks that make magic real, fantasy tangible, and dreams a reality. I love them, and will keep them in my life forever, of that I am certain.
____
And here we are. This isn’t goodbye, of course not. It’s just an “until we meet again” type-deal. I’ll be around. You can follow me @AuriMeansWind, it’s certainly true that I’ll have a lot more shit-posting time on my hands. Thank you for reading, and listening. Every piece, every word, every dumb little tangent and four hour show. Thank you. As I’ve always said, with a bit of a twist, play your games, stay passionate, follow your heart, be kind, and I’ll talk to you again… next time. <3
Yours forever grateful,
it has been my honor,
Auri O’Neill
Destiny, in its many forms, has been around as a living game for 3556 days. That’s just shy of 10 years, and The Final Shape expansion of what Bungie is calling “The Light and Darkness Saga” acts as the end cap of these ten years of Destiny and Destiny 2.
So, how’d they do? There are a lot of factors that go into your enjoyment D2: The Final Shape. Do you play a lot of the Seasons in Destiny 2? Do you care about the story? Are you really into playing around with gear, weapons, and abilities? If you’ve been keeping up with the game on these fronts, it’s gonna be a hit. But that’s a lot of factors that ultimately feel secondary to the feat of just having a living world tie up a story after so long. I am one of those folks that plays every seasonal story, that is hanging on the edge of every word in every cutscene, that gathers my group of five other friends together on a sometimes weekly basis to tackle Destiny’s premium end game content.
So for a player like me, one that started with Destiny’s first expansion, The Taken King, I can say with certainty that they absolutely nailed it.
This is going to be a long one, so I’ve split things up into categories. Let’s start with the first thing you’ll do in The Final Shape, the campaign.
The Campaign
Setting the stakes very high with “The Final Shape” (concept) looming over everything in the universe Bungie has built up in these last ten years. In short, it is a calcification of all things; a freezing of all time, space, and creation into a condensing nothingness of vivisected life that the series’ antagonist, The Witness, has pursued using the powers of Light and Dark, and is so very close to enacting. We, after over 16 months since the Lightfall expansion, finally follow The Witness into the Traveler, a concept that has been knocked around for the better part of a decade, to end its scheme once and for all.
This takes us to the new destination, The Traveler’s into the beautiful and thought-defying Pale Heart. The campaign is a series of seven missions, with a little break in the middle to run around the world a bit and do the new Strike somewhere in the middle, and your first brush with it is just a bee-line for the end. Each mission is to be immediately followed by the next, and even if you try and go somewhere else mid-campaign the game warns you, “hey you’re leaving The Final Shape campaign and you should really do that first.”
The Final Shapes campaign starts out a little slow, recreating some of the original Destiny 2 campaign by having you reassemble the Vanguard, with a recently resurrected Cayde-6, and try and bring the team back together. Thematically, it is exploring the old crew along with Crow, a seasonal character that finally gets his time to shine in a proper campaign, and having them confront their greatest fears. On one hand, seeing all of this again after it felt pretty explored before is where some of the early slog was most felt, but on the other, having the focus on the characters be front and center is exactly what The Final Shape needed. I love that the moments shared between Cayde, Zavala, and Ikora feel pulled right out of the lore cards, which often feature some of the most interesting or unexpected “moments” in the series hidden as a text block in some menu somewhere. Here, they are front and center. This is some of the most direct and best storytelling Bungie has put into a campaign, forgoing the need for someone to explain to you what is really happening.
It’s interwoven with some of the best mission structure any campaign has had yet. There are mechanics to almost every mission, and unique mechanics, symbols, and encounters throughout the campaign that you don’t see anywhere else, which previous campaigns have all shied away from. Even the replayable campaign missions you get access to after you finish the story have more new mechanics layered on top of these, just underlining Bungie’s commitment to integrating some of the best Destiny has to offer, which are it’s unique raid mechanics, into the part of the game you spend much more time playing.
The seven story missions are often focused on close encounters, with massive threats provided by the new enemy race, The Dread. They can push you out of cover, either by using crowd control techniques we as Guardians have employed over the years like massive area of effect grenades, by freezing you, or even just yanking you out of cover with their Strand pull. They feel like DOOM-like high pressure situations, where you need to think fast and slay quickly to survive while demanding you either work with your teammates or remember the ongoing mechanics to progress. Some of the later missions have some of the most satisfying fights and arenas I’ve seen outside of a raid in Destiny, and after two very fun campaigns back to back in Witch Queen and Lightfall, that’s saying something.
I really think the campaign is electric due to the strength of Zavala, Cayde, Crow, and Ikora as characters, complemented by the new subclass Prismatic, which you unlock right at the beginning and expand as you play each mission. These are the heart of every assault on the tower, every mission and Strike, and all of the expansions and seasons leading up to this moment. I may have been worried that there would be too much “do you remember this??” with the environment design, as you start in an overgrown version of the Destiny 1 tower, but right off the bat the level design meshes familiar and surreal to a really astounding degree.
Prismatic
Let’s sidestep to the new big feature introduced within the campaign, and that’s the Prismatic Subclass. You unlock and can fully equip and customize Prismatic about 90% through the first campaign mission, and you just have it from then on. This feels like a direct response to how both Stasis and Strand, the two most recent subclasses, were teased throughout the Beyond Light and Lightfall campaigns, but not unlocked until after the campaign was completed.
I cannot overstate how good of a change giving it to us right away is. A big part of Destiny 2 since the introduction of Stasis has been “buildcrafting”—customizing the different core and passive abilities of your subclass, alongside your armor, weapons, and armor mods, to create a machine of enemy slaying that fits the situation at hand. While you really don’t get a full scope on everything you can do with Prismatic until after the campaign is done, just having the freedom of both tinkering with it, and also using it while exploring and moving between mission objectives, is so liberating.
The idea behind Prismatic is combining “light” and “dark” into a wholly new power, Transcendence. Prismatic gives you a list of five aspects on each class, which don’t fully pull from the five subclasses, but give you a slice of each so as to create a sort of custom, multi-class that can fit the needs of multiple situations. To give a brief example, because these get pretty complicated pretty quickly, on Warlock you start with both Bleak Watcher and Feed the Void, which lets you both turn your grenade into a freezing-ice turret, and allows ability kills to fully heal you. Quickly you can populate the battlefield with a Stasis turret, freeze a group of enemies, and then shatter them, with the shatter damage causing you to fully heal instantly.
After the campaign is done and you can unlock all five aspects, supers, and grenades available on Prismatic, the amount of wild combinations any player who has been invested in the game for the last few years can explore is vast and super fun. These kinds of combinations have only been dreamed of, and through the last year in particular, Bungie has introduced different keywords from each subclass into weapons that have allowed for some of this multi-class dream to feel possible. Now, in the chaotic post-Prismatic world, I don’t think we can ever go back.
On the level of what’s unique to Prismatic, you have a mini-super called Transcendence, that is a separate meter you charge by dealing both Dark and Light damage, either from subclass abilities, or from your weapons. Once both meters are charged, you can Transcend, and enter a state of heightened power, allowing you to throw a special class-unique grenade to deal both Light and Dark effects. It also bumps up your damage and resistance, and I love how this loop of dealing different damage effects becomes a new focus of your gameplay. You really need to reactively work toward building Transcendance, which can be super easy depending on your weapons and set up, but can also be a challenge if you aren’t distributing your damage correctly. The result is a wholly unique gameplay loop on the game’s already most-unique subclass, making Prismatic feel like such a fresh addition to any and all gameplay loops Destiny has seen. It also lets you create builds within Prismatic that let you play to that specific strength, going Transcendent, and can have you ability-spamming to your heart’s content in no time.
The Post Game
After completing the campaign, The Pale Heart destination opens up more fully, littering itself with secrets and also more pieces of Prismatic to unlock. Everything here is maybe the best part of The Final Shape expansion. You have new Exotic quests, some obvious and some hidden, you have a totally new progression system in Pathfinder, and a completely new way to engage with combat on the Pale Heart itself with the removal of Patrols and the introduction of “Overthrow”.
Firstly, The Pale Heart is a completely solo instance-destination, a first for Destiny, so you don’t need to be competing for kills like you normally are on destinations. You’re completely free to take your time, explore, engage with pretty fun combat that isn’t too challenging, and find the litany of secrets strewn about the world. There are Prismatic fragments everywhere, and you have just tons of objectives to engage with to find them, whether they be the Cysts, which are like mini-challenge rooms that each have two versions, or Overthrow, which is an escalating public event that has no time limit and you can execute on in each of the three main areas of The Pale Heart. Then there are extra mini-objective challenges strewn across the entire map, like Darkness chests that require you to complete small minigames to open.
All of it is a rousing success because it’s all fresh and new ideas, sometimes even incorporating raid-like mechanics into trivial tasks. Plus, it’s all doable at your own pace. There are very few timers, few pressure points, few things that demand multiple party members (though there are definitely some). It’s hard to describe how special that first week was, because the Campaign ends with effectively a huge set up for the Raid, which launched the first Friday after The Final Shape released. There was a massive countdown timer to the moment the raid went live right on the directory map, and a mission objective in your quest log asking if you’re ready to take on The Witness.
That leads us to the more unique activities the Pale Heart offers after the Raid launched and was completed. One is the Dual Destinies Exotic Mission, which launched the week after the raid, and is the first ever two-person only activity in Destiny. It is an ingenious mission that has you and one other player moving through several extremely fun combat scenarios, performing unique duo-mechanics, that reminded me a lot of things like It Takes Two, ultimately leading to a very fun twist at the end that I refuse to spoil if you haven’t seen it. The reward here are the Prismatic-only Exotic Class items, which can be infinitely farmed from this mission with no weekly limit, and introduce double-exotic perks that allow Pirsmatic to even further bend the rules of the game. Some Exotic Class items can combine perks from other classes’ exotic pool, with over 60 possible combinations per class.
The other activity is called Excision, an activity that launched after the World’s First clear of the Raid, Salvation’s Edge, which we’ll discuss in a moment, and acts as the “true final mission” of Destiny 2 The Final Shape. It is Destiny’s first ever 12-player PvE activity, allowing you and 11 other Guardians to enter a battlefield to finish off The Witness once and for all. To say that this is a fantastic and bombastic finale is honestly an understatement. It’s incredible, focusing more on fun and fan service than actual challenge (although there is a very difficult version of the activity you can play as well) and is a perfect capstone to the expansion. The conclusion that plays at the end of it is emotional, poignant, and beautiful. It’s a wonderful ending to the expansion, and helps solidify it as maybe Bungie’s best Destiny expansion ever. I cannot wait to see what other 12-person activities we may see in the future.
The Raid
That brings us back to the raid, Salvation’s Edge, the final ascent to confront The Witness, and it’s a best case scenario of a raid: an absolute banger. We’ve really seen the gamut of raids from Destiny, with epic and massive raids like The Last Wish from Forsaken to even most recently the frenetic and combat-focused “assault-the-keep” style challenge in the reprised Crota’s End raid from Destiny 1. This takes all the lessons learned from these raids to create an extremely challenging and memorable experience, that feels like you’re ascending Ganon’s Tower to fight the final boss. It’s really all I could have wanted out of a “finale raid” for Destiny.
The encounters are built around team-coordination, this time layering fast-paced objective completion. Almost every encounter demands that every member of the fireteam participate in some way, whether it be because players are chosen for rolls randomly, or because there are six different things to do in the fight. It’s pretty incredible how much this escalates, culminating in Encounter 4 of the raid, Verity, which is a “puzzle encounter” that requires three players to coordinate on one half a puzzle, and the other three to coordinate on the other. This is one of the most incredible Destiny experiences I have ever had, going so far as to incorporate each individual Guardian’s appearance into the mechanics of the battle, as well as each Guardian’s unique ghost.
Salvation’s Edge is also beautiful, encompassing this massive area that overlooks the entire Pale Heart destination, at one point allowing you to see the entire destination from a single spot. The whole raid is entombed in a massive tower, and ascending it is the most video game final-boss-approach we have seen in Destiny. It’s all just awe-inspiring. It’s a real treat, and is maybe the hardest raid Bungie has ever made. It’s an excellent finale, but the Excision mission lets players engage with the final boss of the raid on a more approachable level, so everyone can get a taste of it, which I also really love.
Final Thoughts
Destiny 2 is still a lot, it’s still a complex, action-MMO, and it’s still very hard to penetrate if you’re new to the franchise. But The Final Shape feels built from the ground up for the players who have stuck it through, who love the secrets, the mechanics, and the buildcrafting. And it’s a better expansion for it. I’d even go so far as to say, it’s the best expansion because of that.
The ending is poignant, emotional, and one I’ll remember for the rest of my gaming days. After playing this franchise for nine years, I walked away extremely satisfied, and also hopeful for the future of Destiny.
This game was reviewed on a PlayStation 5 system with a review code provided by PR.
As a child of the 90s, I have grown up with and experienced my fair share of trading card games, starting with the granddaddy of them all, Magic: The Gathering, starting in around 1994. I was there when the Pokemon craze was born (I actually enjoy playing the card game, not just collecting the cards!), my friends and I have sent one another to the Shadow Realm with Yu-Gi-Oh. Even to this day, I have fallen in love with the Digimon and Final Fantasy TCGs. It was thanks to these experiences that when I received a copy of Millenium Blades from Level 99 in the mail and took a look at it, I instantly knew that this game might just be the most meta board game of all time and 100% my jam.
To set the playing field real quick so you have a rough idea in your head, think of Millennium Blades as if Level 99 took Yu-Gi-Oh – the anime hijinx, artwork, and trading card game aspects – and made it a competitive board game… about playing a competitive card game. Think of it this way: instead of the primary focus being pitting your deck against someone else’s – slaying their creatures, casting spells to inhibit them (while there is still a bit of that) – you are trying to make a deck that will earn you the most points that represent how well you perform in various tournaments. Taking into account that rounds meta elements (in the universe reasoning being that these are basically whatever the popular type of card at the time of the tournament) to try and get a few more points along the way. Your placement will reward you with victory points, and whoever has the most victory points at the end of three tournaments wins the game.
For those who may be familiar with various board games, Millennium Blades could be thought of as a mix of a deck and tableau (i.e., a Euro-style) board game. The game is split up into two main phases: the deck-building and the tournament phases. The deck-building phase faithfully recreates that feeling of cracking packs in your favorite TCG – cards are “bought” using stacks of fake currency and are purchased while being faced down so you don’t know what you are getting until you “open” or flip the cards over. You aren’t stuck with the cards you have, however, and are able to sell them to an aftermarket available to everyone, trade with a player for cards and friendship cards which grant additional Victory Points at the end of the game, or “fuse” them into stronger cards by discarding them.
Another unique gameplay element to this phase, and one that I haven’t encountered before, is the timing element associated with this. This phase is handled in real-time instead of players taking turns buying or selling cards. When deck building begins, a timer starts, and you have 20 minutes to complete. I found that this added countdown was a creative solution that helped keep things really moving and prevents analysis paralysis. It won’t be for everyone, but it’s also a feature I wouldn’t mind more games adopting. Once the 20 minutes are up, you will have a set of eight cards that will serve as your “deck” in the next main phase, the Tournament phase, and a set of cards that act as a special collection of cards (because any TCG player also has a bit of a collection of cards to also show off) to earn you some points.
In the Tournament phase, you and the other players take turns playing a card from your eight-card decks until each player’s table of six spots is filled. While each player may have access to eight cards, the extra two cards you have access to serve as a sort of sideboard to give you some flexibility to adjust your strategy if needed. Cards will play off of each other, triggering effects, earning you RP, and fighting other cards, among a variety of other things, and at the end of the tournament, whoever has accumulated the most RP wins the Tournament and nets the most Victory Points.
While I may have fun with the actual “playing” of Millenium Blades, the setup by default is far more daunting than the real-world timers of the game. The moment you crack open the box for the first time, you are greeted with over 600 glossy cards that need to be sorted and stacks of money that need to be put together using the included bundle stickers. Now, there isn’t much you can do about the stacks of cards you need to unwrap and organize, unfortunately (although I really wish that Level 99 included dividers of some sort to help keep track of where all the different cards are). Still, I did devise some tricks that I figured I would share that make it more alluring to table and play.
After about 44 minutes of taping stacks of fake anime money together, I realized that for as much as I may appreciate what the developer was going for – recreating that feeling of dropping big money on cards – with each stack I put together, the less interested I was becoming in the game. As someone with a 10 month old child that unfortunately doesn’t have the dexterity or attention to do this step for me, I opted to instead simply replace the paper money with Poker Chips from an old set I got back in High School. I even used the same colors for the monetary values in a 1-chip to 1-stack conversion. This method even freed up some extra space in the box, but I did keep the sticker rolls and the paper dollars in case I ever want to swap them back.
My next small piece of advice is to get an automatic card shuffler. Running you anywhere between 10 to 25-ish dollars (or upwards of $200 if you want something super fancy), this small device will save you so much time getting Millennium Blades ready to play. Each game utilizes some 400 cards out of the 600 that are included in the base game that all need to be shuffled , so having a gizmo that will do a lot of the heavy lifting for you will be well worth the investment.
You may have picked up the casual mention of the “base game” a moment ago, and that’s because Millennium Blades also has a number of expansions that add additional cards to mix into the rotation but also new game modes for Solo and Cooperative play. Thanks to a recent successful Kickstarter, these previously discontinued expansions are coming back and are currently available on Level 99’s website for preorder.
The whole experience of Millenium Blades spoke to the TCG player inside me while providing the board game player with a strategic and complex game to enjoy. Millennium Blades is certainly not a light game, and those interested in the premise, puns, and visuals should be aware of that before jumping in. Millennium Blades can be bought on Level 99’s website (and preorder the expansions), Level 99’s Amazon page, and potentially at your local game store.
Thank you to Level 99 Games for providing us with a copy of Millennium Blades to check out!
Untapped Thoughts is a feature that simply presents one nerd’s rambling thoughts on the latest set of cards and the enjoyment I got out of them. Do not expect a deep dive, cost analysis, or breakdown of the value you may find; instead, expect more of what I did and didn’t like about the cards, with perhaps a dose of side tangents mixed in.
Cowboys and Wizards are a pairing that you don’t see very often in the usual discourse among nerds, which really is a shame. Luckily, though, Wizards of the Coast’s latest release, Outlaws of Thunder Junction, sends man fan-favorite Planeswalkers and creatures into the Wild West, complete with a host of new faces as well. What has resulted is one of the most fun and silly sets I’ve cracked packs for in a long time. It’s a real bonanza of a good time.
As someone who enjoys a good ol’ mill deck, Thunder Junction’s smorgasbord of offerings speaks to my soul with options that not only exile or mill cards from opponents but also then let me go ahead and play them. Sometimes, even for free! There are few things I take as much pleasure in while playing a game of Magic as using an opponent’s deck against them, and Thunder Junction gives me all sorts of new ways to do so. As I sat there, cracking packs and taking a look through the aptly named “Grand Larceny” Commander Deck, my head swam with all sorts of ideas on new decks to build or older cards to splice into the premade one to really kick the milling opportunities into high gear. This all may turn me into a lightning rod, but man-oh-man, will it be fun when I get to bring my friend’s big creatures or gnarliest spells out against them? Some personal favorites of mine came from Cipering Arcane Heist onto my Smikering Spelljacker to get a lot more utility and exiled spells to take advantage of, along with Mind’s Dilation that sticks around due to being an enchantment and the fact that it will trigger when someone plays a spell even when it isn’t their turn.
Jumping off from the “Grand Larceny” deck being thematically appropriately named, I have to really commend Thunder Junction for the creative new mechanics the team has come up with that channel that Wild West vibe. I am a particular fan of “Spree,” “Plot,” and “Saddle,” the former giving you a spell that is rather cheap to cast, but for additional mana amounts, you can add new effects – almost like you are going from one heist to another. Plot, on the other hand, is all about setting up a dastardly plan that you can unleash on a later turn by paying a lower mana cost but having the card sit out in exile land for a while. With the fact that the card is exiled, it has the added benefit being that it can’t be removed in the meantime, and paying the mana cost prior means you can, in theory, play a metric crapton (an amount that’s more than “some” and less than “all the cards in your deck”) all at once. The “Plot” mechanic is a great option for other enchantments or creatures that have an effect that triggers after the first type of spell used in a turn, giving you the option to hold on to it and have it pop into play as a sort of trap sprung on your opponents.
When it comes to “Saddle,” which, to be fair, is, in essence, just “Crew,” but with animals, means that I can, in theory, make a tower of mounted animals! I don’t believe there is anything that says a saddled creature can’t then be used to saddle another one, either. I admit, the strategic value in having a saddled creature saddle another one doesn’t hold much value, seeing as you are required to tap a creature to saddle them on another but from purely an imagery standpoint, it’s totally worth it. What’s not to love about the idea of a goat riding a bear, which is riding a flaming horse?
On a more quality control side of things, one area I’ve been impressed with is the foiling on the cards in Thunder Junction – more specifically, the lack of curling the cards have gone through so far. This issue, which even the recent Universes Beyond: Fallout set suffered from, appears far less pronounced here and is a welcome sight. Hopefully, in the sets to come, this issue remains a thing of the past, and I don’t have to anymore worry about having to smash my pretty foils under my stack of Dungeons & Dragons books to make them playable.
Outlaws of Thunder Junction is some of the most fun I have had with a set in a while, with its fresh new plane and Western aesthetic. Many of the designs and new characters (I am a big fan of Doc Aurlock, Grizzled Genius, the bear doctor) landed for me, and I hope this isn’t the last time we visit this Western-inspired world. The new mechanics are fun and Wizard’s nailed making them feel appropriate, hopefully they will stick around for a while and don’t get thrown into the pile of other quickly forgotten mechanics”.
Outlaws of Thunder Junction is a rootin-tootin good time and an interesting melding of the magical characters of Magic: The Gathering, and the folks have a bit of time yet to enjoy it before the upcoming premium Modern Horizons 3 set comes out, so get out there and crack some packs, buckaroo!
Thanks to Wizards of the Coast for providing us with some cards from the Outlaws of Thunder Junction set to check out and play with.
Doty, take this down –
Initially released in 2019, this new edition of For the Queen, designed by Alex Roberts, has found its home at Critical Role’s tabletop publishing house, the Darrington Press. For the Queen sells itself as a “collaborative storytelling game” game that presents 2-6 players with open-ended questions you will need to answer – such as “When did you know you would never forgive the queen?”. Each response is 100% left up to each person and how they interpret the question, and they can answer as logically or as nonsensically as they wish. The entire experience comes in a small, sturdy box that can easily fit in most bags and be “learned” in moments. The big standout with this little package has to be the queens themselves. In addition to some new prompts, this new edition of For the Queen features 25 all-new queens, all done in different styles, giving each one a distinct and diverse personality. Some queens are your traditional high fantasy queen, while others rock the boss lady queen pantsuit or a more abstract cyberpunk option. The artists have knocked each one out of the park.
While I’m impressed with the presentation and build quality of For the Queen, I have a hard time considering this product as a “game” as there isn’t much “game” stuff to it. I would imagine that when someone is asked, “do you want to play a game?” they imagine something that has a winner or losers that has a defined goal that they are aiming to achieve – either in a competitive or cooperative setting – maybe earn some points or roll some dice. These are all things that For the Queen is missing. There is no victory condition or threshold you are racing towards; in fact, there’s no winner or loser. Instead, you and your friends will simply take turns answering the prompt on the card flipped over, and then you draw the next, repeating until the card that asks, “The Queen is under attack. Do you defend her?” is flipped.
While I don’t view For the Queen as a “game,” don’t take that as “I don’t think it can’t be entertaining” or “I don’t see a point” – in fact, it’s the opposite. For the Queen shines as a fantastic improv and role-playing learning and practice tool that would be PERFECT for any session zero (the session of a new TTRPG campaign where everyone makes their new characters) or even just as a way to help someone new to role-playing become more comfortable pretending not to be themselves. I can see many scenarios in my own group of players where these sorts of improvs could help get them into and explore the personalities of their characters without needing to necessarily put in the open (or create on the spot) more of the intricacies of the backstory or motivations.
For those individuals who may be intimidated by role-playing in a group or feel like they may not be quite as good, For the Queen is an excellent method to exercise in the comfort of a one-on-one session too. There is enough variety in terms of the questions that let you address and practice all sorts of situations or even expand to act them out.
I don’t see myself busting out For the Queen at my next game night with friends, as its experience isn’t quite what we look for in a game when we play, but I have no desire to get rid of it from my collection. For the Queen offers an excellent resource that has earned it a spot on my shelf of TTRPG goodies and tomes, and honestly, it will probably see more use than even my favorite board games do.
For the Queen is available tomorrow on the Darrington Press official store
Thanks to Darrington Press for providing an early copy of For the Queen.
So…this should have been out a good bit ago. That was the goal, actually, but a steady rotation of illnesses through the family and wrestling with an 8-month-old who just wanted to move and explore the house got in the way. Just pretend it is still early April, and we are all fresh off the hype train that was PAX East, alright? Perfect!
As with any PAX experience, I find myself reflecting on the memories and awesome games I got to check out. In the post-COVID world, PAX East seems to be defining itself more as an indie-focused event with fewer big-name developers showing off upcoming releases, and 2024 was no different. Luckily, some great indie titles still left a mark on me, and here are a few that I think you should know about!
Heading OutAs a sucker for striking art direction and a lover of roguelikes, when I heard about Heading Out – a roguelite driving game – my curiosity was instantly piqued. Now, I’ve never been much of one for driving games or visual novels, which are the two main gameplay systems in Heading Out. But something about Heading Out just pushed me to check it out, and I’m glad I did.
Developed by Serious Sim and published by Saber Interactive, Heading Out tasks you, the Interstate Jackalope, with traveling the roads of the United States and outrunning your inner demons to reach that specific run’s destination. In typical roguelike fashion, the stops and events you encounter on your way are randomized and can include things like towns to resupply in, inns to sleep in to let you drive longer, races to improve your reputation, and visual novel-esque scenes. These scenes will put you in situations like whether or not you stop and help a person on the side of the road will come up. If you stop, the supernatural cloud chasing you across the country that is the physical manifestation of your fears will get closer to you, but your reputation among people may improve, netting you some perks in that next town you visit.
What I wasn’t expecting with Heading Out before hopping into my demo was that this game isn’t particularly child-friendly. During my time with the game, I came across a family that had seemingly all been murdered while stopping to get some water, and I accidentally ran over a girl’s dog and opted to help her bury it – both of which were presented through static black-and-white comic scenes. Heading Out’s Steam page further warns folks that this game is not going to be a chill ride across the USA, recommending it for mature audiences,
“The story of Heading Out addresses racism, mental health (anxiety, depression), inequality, and other social issues… One of the game’s villains uses hate speech against minorities. Most adult characters use vulgar language.”
The entirety of Heading Out looks almost like a comic book, using primarily greyscale for its visuals, with the exception of a few elements where bright and vibrant reds, yellows, and blues appear to draw your attention. As someone who isn’t the biggest driving or VN fan, it was 100% the visuals that pulled me in to give Heading Out a try.
Coming away from Heading Out, while I don’t think that this game is quite for me, it still left me impressed with how well its seemingly odd mix of gameplay works in the end. I will be curious to see how its story and messaging around racism, mental health, inequality, and the plethora of other societal issues lands and is received when the game releases this week on May 7th, but at the very least, I can say that Heading Out looks good and is an interesting new take on the roguelike genre.
Pipistrello and the Cursed Yo-YoOne of the things that I love the most about PAX is randomly stumbling on a really cool game that I had never heard of and being instantly hooked. This year at PAX East 2024, that game wound up being Pipistrello and The Cursed Yo-Yo – a top-down action game in a similar vein as The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap – that puts you in the shoes of a blue mouse demon thing named Pipistrello as you take out some crime lords with your yo-yo.
Developer Pocket Trap really has nailed the feeling of those classic GBA action games, which have a distinct feel and visual style. It’s different from, say, one you may find on the Super Nintendo – a special sauce, if you will – that I can’t explain as much as I can just feel. In the demo, there were a few areas to explore and check out. I opted for the dungeon skyscraper that saw me jumping across metal beams, triggering switches, and trying (and failing) and swatting away airborne foes that were pestering me. The whole experience took me right back to the days of tackling Zelda dungeons on the go, and it all felt really good to play.
The big hook of Pipistrello is utilizing and customizing your yo-yo using badges to augment its properties – such as giving it thorns – to help you in your quest. With classic yo-yo moves like walking the dog, I loved being able to hurl the yo-yo at enemies from a distance or how it’s used to interact with the environment, such as turning cranks that are out of reach. On top of all that, the game also features what appears to be a rather robust skill or leveling tree, too! Be still my beating heart!
Pipistrello and the Cursed Yo-Yo doesn’t have a set release date yet, but it can currently be added to your Steam wishlist, and fans of GBA-era action platforms should get on that right away!
Lucid – Game of the Show
From the moment I was pulled into an impromptu demo showcase of it back at PAX East 2022, I knew that Lucid from Matte Black Games was going to be special – with its gorgeous pixel art and nods to some of my favorite retro games, there was something that just pulled me in. At long last, at this year’s PAX East, I finally got my hands on a controller and got to try it out. It turns out that it is far better than I was expecting, and I was right. This game IS something special.
Lucid (categorized as a “Celestroidvania” by its creator, Eric Manahan) drops players into the fur coat of Oenn as he seeks out answers to the calamity that tore apart the world. While much of the story still remains a mystery, what is clear right from the get-go, even in the demo, is that Lucid is just a joy to play. Movement is the star of the show, and it felt that every new room or area I entered was another opportunity to test and refine my reflexes or just show off. Jumping and dashing around, resetting my jumps, bouncing off enemies – it all just played like a dream. No joke, the fact that Lucid is still a ways off and feels SO good to play is an incredible testament to the talents of Eric. It handles better than a lot of AAA titles after they’ve launched with exponentially larger budgets and teams!
As a kid of the 90s, I adored picking up on and noticing small nods and homages to the games that Lucid clearly takes inspiration from, such as the Mega Man X-esque font that was sprinkled throughout the demo and the totally not Super Metroid world map. Sitting next to Eric as I played the demo, I lost count of how many times I looked over at him, and we just smiled, both acknowledging that I saw what he did there.
Now, tight and responsive gameplay with nods to classic titles is cool and all, but unless they look good doing it, then what’s the point, right? (a healthy dose of sarcasm right there, just in case you couldn’t tell). As a sucker for pixel art, Lucid’s “crystal-punk” aesthetic blew me away during the demo, with detailed environments, attack effects, enemies, and Oenn’s frilly coat all displayed in those sweet, sweet little colored blocks. Seeing as the intro forest area and its denizens look so good, I can’t wait to see what the other regions all look like in the final release.
It’s not hyperbole when I say that, not since Shovel Knight as an indie title excited and impressed me as much as Lucid did, and I’ve only had an hour’s worth of time with it. Already, it is clear that Eric has the skill, passion, and talent to have been able to get Lucid to the state where it is already with so much time left in its development. Everyone I spoke with, including peers and friends alike at PAX, sang Lucid’s praises, and I am happy to lend my voice to that chorus. If there is one downside to Lucid, it would be that it isn’t in my hands right now, but I know that the wait will be worth it because, like I said before, Lucid is something special. Everyone needs to keep their eyes on this game and Matte Black Studio.
Much like randomly walking around a bookshop, stumbling on a new book you’ve never heard of, and falling in love with it, I adore walking around conventions and stumbling on new board games and video games I have never heard of before. There is something intoxicating to me about discovering something you had no knowledge about just minutes before – almost as if it was blinked into existence right then and there. Back in March at PAX East, a small game made of wood caught my eye and my interest and didn’t let go. That game was Hexopolis, which is currently on Kickstarter.
Designed by Andrew Coeytaux, Hexopolis is an abstract strategy game for two players that gives off a chess-like impression, only with a more artsy flare. Composed of four types of components – the player tokens, stackable tiles, bridge connectors, and connectors that serve as walls – each player’s goal is to either trap the other on a stack of tiles or to pounce on them from a higher stack. The premise is simple to explain, but much like chess, it’s a game that is difficult to master
The game begins a completely open slate each time, with the first player laying the first tile that the rest of the game will expand off from going forward. From there, players take turns laying their tiles to build towers, bridging towers together, or locking them down in a push-and-pull dance that can change at a moment’s notice. More often than not, in the matches I played, a player’s advantage could quickly change hands from one turn to the next, making the games feel tense and exciting. Granted, much of those thrilling moments came after my friends, and I had played some rounds and started forming strategies and seeing the patterns to watch out for. During those early learning games, though, games would be over pretty quickly, thanks to a stupid move or not paying attention.
As someone who enjoys a good chess game now and again, I appreciate the similar depth that Hexopolis offers. I won’t say that it’s as deep as the 1500-year-old game, but seeing strategies and planning moves ahead gave me that similar rewarding feeling in my gut. Right alongside those facepalm-inducing moments of stupidity when you hand over the win after a poorly planned move.
Hexopolis is a game made entirely out of laser-cut wood, which, besides making it smell great (yes, I have on occasion taken a whiff of a board game or two), the burnt wood edges and rustic look make it one of the most unique games in my collection. Hexopolis is a game where a finished match could be confused as an art piece on your coffee table and would be perfectly at home in a trendy coffee shop or in that dimly lit brewery you like to frequent. In an age where the push for sustainability is becoming more prevalent in the board gaming space, Andrew and Hexopolis have taken the idea to the extreme, with the collectors edition of the game even coming in a wooden game box.
For all my praise, just like any game, there are aspects that I found to be more troublesome or lacking. Perhaps the most annoying aspect of Hexopolis comes when you need to use the connectors to link one tower of tiles to another that are varying heights, requiring you to remove tiles to reach the next open connector port – a feat made exponentially more tiresome if the more connectors there are on the tower. This issue is due to the shape of the connectors, which, while making the connections more secure and stable, prevent you from being able to slip them together. As my copy of the game is a prototype and not a final retail release, I would love to see these adjusted slightly to make it easier to use without deconstructing the towers. And then there is the underlying fear of breaking a piece I have, begging the question of how resilient the all-wooden components are.
Hexopolis is one of those games I am thrilled to have among my board game collection and one I would happily have on my coffee table (if I didn’t have a grabby 9-month-old that would LOVE to taste all the pieces). It’s a game that will only become more enjoyable as I play and devise new strategies, and I look forward to bringing it to my local drinking hole to play with my friends. For fans of other 2-player strategy games, Hexopolis is worth your eyes.
Hexopolis is available on Kickstarter, which has already met its funding goal!
Having grown up in the 90s, the Golden Age of Square RPGs, I became incredibly familiar with many of the developer’s heavy hitters – the Mana, Chrono, and Final Fantasy franchises. The one that always eluded me was the SaGa series, having only a passing familiarity with the games, barely more than just “yes, they exist.” With last year’s reveal of a brand new game, SaGa Emerald Beyond, and all of the remasters that are now easily playable, I resolved that 2024 would be my year to play some SaGa games, and having played Emerald Beyond, what I can say is that “man, this wasn’t what I was expecting.”
For a long time, I was on the fence about whether or not I would do an actual review for Emerald Beyond. It was a game that I bounced HARD off of the first ten hours of and had a tough time dealing with, but it was also one that every SaGa fan I spoke with had fallen in love with. A prevailing statement I kept hearing was that the SaGa games were divisive and polarizing, with people who liked SaGa really liking them and the folks that didn’t, well, didn’t. It’s a passionate fanbase, and I’ll give them that. I wanted to be in that club. So I pushed through, and after a dramatic readjustment and level setting of my expectations from Emerald Beyond, I came out the other side with an appreciation of some parts and an indifference bordering on disappointment on others.
On the scale between novice and expert, I would place myself far closer to the expert side of things, especially with RPGs. Yet, even I struggled to grasp Emerald Beyond’s multiple systems and mechanics. Much of this headache comes from a somewhat lacking and confusingly laid out Tips and Glossary section. It wasn’t uncommon for me to have to spend nearly a minute bouncing around from topic to topic to find the answer I sought, with it more often than not leading to a still vague revelation, if there was one at all.
One such example is Emerald Beyond’s item trading, which is the answer to your traditional RPG shops. There’s a brief explanation describing something akin to an auction house, where I can post items on a board and eventually receive offers for items in return. I couldn’t tell you if the offers are random if there was any way to get certain resources to be offered, or if there is any benefit to increasing your trade level outside of being able to offer more items up for trade.
Another perplexing omission that I never came to grips with is the apparent lack of bestiary or scan ability that could give you details on the foes you face. Attacks in Emerald Beyond can have all manner or properties associated with them, like slashing or piercing, or abilities that harness the elements of nature. All of that is great, and the large amount of skills your party members can learn provides you with a lot of optimization potential. Still, without a resource or the ability to discover your enemy’s weaknesses, that potential is hampered. It makes what could have been a great strategic element into a chore that requires outside information.
After locking in to give it another honest try, the biggest turnaround from my old opinion of was Emerald Beyond’s campaigns and writing. I was aggressively annoyed with it. I couldn’t stand the odd phrasing of lines, the out-of-nowhere remarks from characters, and the rather nonsensical flow of the stories, all of which are presented in static conversations between two images against a backdrop. I had just assumed that, similar to Square’s other series, the SaGa games were more serious affairs and that Emerald Beyond had derailed from that course. An assumption I learned from friends was wrong, and that SaGa games tended to be more of this on-the-nose style and that Emerald Beyond wasn’t an outlier but a pretty solid example of the series.
I gave the strangeness more of a pass. I relaxed and let myself chuckle from time to time when the lines landed right, and I basked in the graces of the charm of the SaGa series. I wouldn’t say that I ever fell in love with the stories, writing, or its characters; I never found myself really invested in the goings-on of the Conjoined Worlds or the plight of the Dismal King and his Generals. Emerald Beyond expects you to playthrough each individual campaign multiple times, letting you unlock and experience slightly different events during each New Game+ run you complete. For those who love the stories and want more, Emerald Beyond rewards that dedication. I simply accepted them for what they were and left them at that, like an old man accepting the cringy music his grandchild listens to – I don’t have to like them, but I can accept that other people like it and be happy for them.
The stories are all presented through characters and NPC still pictures against various backdrops, more often than not, without being voiced. Even when parts are voiced, whether it’s in a story moment or at the end of combat, the character’s mouth won’t move. I don’t mind this approach, but its execution here just doesn’t quite hit what I expect out of a Square Enix game, and I wonder if it is due, at least in part, to Emerald Beyond also having been developed to be played on mobile devices and not strictly on PC and console.
By far, my favorite part of Emerald Beyond is its combat, and quickly scratched my grinding catharsis itch. SaGa staples Glimmer and Formation systems return, which sees your characters randomly devise new attacks mid-combat and reposition your party to receive different boons. However, the real showstopper is the inclusion of the battle timeline. Every attack that you and your enemies use will take up a certain amount of space on the Timeline, and by overlapping and lining up attacks with allies, you can cause special combos to take place, which can string together more attacks and is a crucial system to master. Seeing as enemies can also take advantage of this combo potential, you will need to take advantage of attacks that can interrupt attacks, delay their actions, or just devise some other way to insert some sort of breakup in their string and save your party.
While it took some time before I grasped the intricacies of everything in combat, I fell in love once it clicked – it’s spectacular. As an avid fan of grinding in RPGs, I especially appreciate Emerald Beyond allowing me to endlessly grind in special areas of each world I visit. This will give me more resources to enhance my gear, trade-off, Glimmer new attacks, and just try out strategies. Coming up with the best party makeup to make them as broken as possible never got old, and I was constantly chomping at the bit, waiting to learn the next move and see how I could work it into my flow.
SaGa Emerald Beyond is a game that, despite my issues, I came away appreciating far more the longer I played, and I owe a lot of that to my SaGa-loving friends whom I spoke to. While I admit I never ended up becoming invested in the personal stories of the protagonists, reframing my expectations at least allowed me to enjoy them enough for what they were. But there are other areas that I simply feel aren’t up to snuff for a Square Enix game, especially from one of its legacy properties. Pixel borders showing on the trophy graphics, compression artifacts on some character portraits, the floaty, almost ice-skating-like disconnect with the movement while navigating the area maps, and of course, the previously mentioned lack of a bestiary. I don’t know how much of this results from the game having to be made for so many platforms, including mobile iOS and Android devices, but I hope that the next game can ditch those platforms because I would love to see what a premium SaGa experience would look like. Issues aside, I still found myself feeling that tug to play more, to grind a bit more, to get that next weapon, and wanting to spend more time in the conjoined worlds. It may not be perfect, but SaGa Emerald Beyond has marked the beginning of my own SaGa adventure of experiencing more that this series has to offer.
The Nintendo 3DS found itself home to a treasure trove of fantastic RPGs, even more so if you bring over the ones from the DS thanks to backward compatibility. Even within the genre, you could find old classics like Dragon Quest VII and VIII or brand-new favorites like Shin Megami Tensei IV and Radiant Historia: Perfect Chronology. However, RPG diehards could also spend hundreds of hours discovering smaller niche experiences. One such niche game was Legend of Legacy, a spiritual sibling of Square’s SaGa titles. Now, nine years after its initial dual-screened 3D release, the legacy makes its grand return in high definition with the Legend of Legacy HD Remastered release.
When it was released back in the fall of 2015, Legend of Legacy piqued many folks’ interest thanks in part to the large number of industry veterans who had previously worked on the (at the time) untouched SaGa series – including the series designer Kyoji Koizumi and illustrator Tomomi Kobayashi. The gameplay in Legacy wore its SaGa influences proudly with its turn-based battles, random stat growth leveling approach, and special skills learned seemingly when the game felt like it. It was a game that fans enjoyed for its gameplay as opposed to its story, which some found to be lacking – if borderline non-existent. All those statements remain faithful, for better and worse, than they did back then, with the only benefit of the remaster being that folks can have a better idea going into Legacy as to the sort of game they are getting into.
Visually speaking, from Legend of Legacy’s pop-up book aesthetic to its environments and almost Bravely-like chibi character designs have all made the jump to HD incredibly well. I have always been a fan of this game’s art style, as it reads well on the small 3DS screens, but everything pops here, with the ability to now play on a big TV. The text is clear, and the game performs well with no noticeable slowdown or lag during my time on my OLED Switch.
The reduced number of screens present also hasn’t posed an issue for this remaster release. The original 3DS version relied on the lower screen to predominantly present information to you. It lacked any gimmicky touch-screen shenanigans that the developers would have to concern themselves with a remaster. All that information is now displayed on the bottom of the combat or separate menu screen – typical of how 99% of the other single-screen RPGs handle information.
Outside of the visual update and the shift to a single screen, the only “improvement” this HD port provides is a better in-game help menu to clear up the game’s more obtuse and confusing areas. While any improvement is welcome, it isn’t as if it blows all other help menus in RPGs out of the water, and I had to bust out my 3DS copy to see how much it expanded on what was previously there. When the in-game help menu is the only notable addition to a remaster, it puts into perspective how bare-bones this release comes across – especially considering the $49.99 price tag.
With so many remasters, ports, etc, of classic games in the market today, it’s hard not to feel like the Legend of Legacy HD Remastered is a bit of a rip-off. Releases such as Dark Forces Remaster or Tomb Raider 1-3 Remastered – both costing you $29.99 each – add new features, cut content, redone models, and more. If your argument then is “but those aren’t RPGs,” then look to 2021’s Legend of Mana remaster (also $29.99) with its new animated opening, the addition of the Ring Ring Land minigame, among others, or Chrono Cross: The Radical Dreamers Edition that was even cheaper at only $19.99 but added several features and cosmetic improvements as well.
My enjoyment with The Legend of Legacy comes from the cathartic RPG grind it gives me and its charming aesthetic – this was true with the original 2015 release and remains just as much so with The Legend of Legacy HD Remaster. This new port plays lovely and looks good to boot, and so long as you know the experience you are in for, it can be a fun game to revisit. But, in 2024, where SaGa games – both new and old – are more accessible than ever to play and have more impressive (and affordable) remastered offerings, I find this game hard to recommend.
This game was reviewed on a PlayStation 5 system with a review code provided by the publisher, NIS America.
Even though it was nearly four years ago now, watching the heroes take their first steps out into the bright new world Final Fantasy VII Remake created, I vividly recall the feelings of bewilderment, excitement, and wonder of what was to come. It has been four long years of watching analysis and theory crafting videos. At long last, the second entry in this trilogy, Final Fantasy VII Rebirth, has arrived, and it surpasses its predecessor in every way, resulting in the best Final Fantasy experience I have had in a long time.
Rebirth doesn’t wait long to throw players into the thick of things. After a brief prologue, players are reunited with our heroes, Cloud, Tifa, Barrett, Aerith, and (now fully playable) Red XIII, who arrived at the Inn in the town of Kalm. Cloud recounts the group of his past – one of the most memorable (and important) moments from the original Final Fantasy VII. The following series of events expands and elaborates on the source material, and – this will be a relatively common occurrence for the rest of the game – left me amazed with both the production value and how expertly the team has woven together the old with the new.
To tell this grand story requires a far larger cast, with the playable cast nearly doubling. So many recognizable supporting characters make their debut that I lost count. Fans who played through Remake’s Yuffie INTERmission DLC may even stumble upon some familiar faces if you look hard enough. Whereas Remake relegated you to Midgar’s gray plates and neon lights, Rebirth lets you explore most of the planet in the most robust open world the series has seen since Final Fantasy IX.
Broken up into sprawling large zones, I loved how each region felt brand new and familiar simultaneously. I fell in love all over again with the red cliffs of Cosmo Canyon, the golden sands around Costa Del Sol, and the jagged peaks around Nibelheim. Each zone comes complete with a special summon that you can learn about and fight (thanks to our favorite returning robo-boy, Chadley, and his combat simulator), along with unique monsters, caches of treasure to discover, Chocobo stops to repair, and more. I’m not exaggerating when I say that fully completing each can easily add 20 or more hours to your completionist playthrough. It’s glorious.
Even though I adored exploring and making discoveries while out in the world, it wasn’t without the occasional headache either. There were times when I would be trying to find my way to a point on the map but couldn’t figure out how to get there for the life of me. This confusion was in part due to the in-game map being a static top-down shot that lacks a clear representation of the verticality many of these regions feature, or paths that travel under an overhang. I would love to see an update and add some sort of guide that would generate a little orb or guideline that helps lead you in the right direction.
Gorgeous as these large nature-rich places are, what really took my breath away are Rebirth’s recreations of the iconic towns and cities that you stop at over the course of the story. Each region typically features a main “hub” city with smaller settlements and spots to discover along the way – which can serve as fast travel points. Walking around Kalm, seeing the streets filled with people, hearing conversations, walking by the shops, and just taking it all in was a splendor that never got old. These city centers never felt like simple places that I could get my next round of side quests from before setting back out – they felt like actual destinations in their own rights. I was always looking forward to seeing what the next place would be like. They made me realize how much I missed good Final Fantasy cities, and I can’t applaud the team enough for so expertly recapturing the spirit and essence of these incredibly nostalgic places. Everything is as 9-year-old me imagined when I played the original game all those years ago.
Rebirth’s story is a blending of what’s expected with tweaks and revelations that result in a tale that will leave both players familiar with the source material and those experiencing things for the first time reeling from its twists and turns. Similar to Remake, Rebirth balances points of levity – like Tifa and Aerith calling Cloud an asshole for rummaging around Tifa’s belongings – with moments that have you holding your controller in a death grip or holding back tears like you’re cutting an onion.
Recognizable moments – such as Red dressing as a soldier and walking on two feet – have been further expanded on and fleshed out, with some having monumental impacts on the world and shaking up the lore we all know and love. There were numerous instances where I simply sat there for minutes, trying to process what I had just witnessed. .
Rebirth sees the return of the impressive combat from Remake that blends action combat with turn-based strategy, now expanded with the new Synergy Attack system. Returning characters Cloud, Tifa, Barret, and Aerith on the surface, all felt familiar and comfortable to fall back into. Cloud maintains his punish-heavy counter gameplay, Tifa with her combo-centric attacks, Barret and his long-range tanky support, and Aerith with her ranged magical shenanigans. With the cast expanding now to include Red XIII, the animatronic Cait Sith, and returning ninja Yuffie to the mix, each one feels unique and brings their own gameplay to enjoy.
The Synergy Attacks shake things up, allowing you to have party members combine their abilities to launch special attacks with unique properties – such as Cloud and Red teaming together with Red sending orbs of magic towards Cloud, who responds by using his sword like a bat and whacking them towards enemies. Utilizing these attacks will fill both characters’ ATB bar and, by further using those ATB abilities, allow characters to pair together in Chrono Trigger-like Duo attacks with one another in a Limit Break-like attack.
These new Synergy Attacks and abilities are so strong, in fact, that it almost makes the magic unnecessary – especially with the addition of the elemental spell abilities each character can learn that don’t use MP to cast. There is still plenty of customization available that you can spend time tweaking and tailoring to your needs with the other materia, but it is disappointing that magic feels like it has been put to the wayside somewhat.
When I wasn’t busy tracking down Sephiroth, taking in the world’s natural beauty, or taking care of dangerous fiends, I was partaking in one of Rebirth’s many, MANY mini-game offerings. Seriously, this game may just win the award for most minigames in an RPG with returning classics from the original game like Chocobo Racing and the rest of the Gold Saucer’s offerings, the return of Fort Condor from Remake (albeit with a reduction in options), and new entries like Gears and Gambits and Rebirth’s main offering, Queen’s Blood. These are just some of the options available to choose from – with most also including subplots all their own.
While I may have a minor gripe here and there with Rebirth, the overall experience is a magical one that easily is one of my favorites of recent memory. Whenever I heard a new rendition of a classic melody or witnessed every surprise change from the original, I became increasingly invested in the game. I expected a great game with Rebirth after how surprisingly good Final Fantasy VII Remake turned out, but yet again, they exceeded my expectations.
As I rolled the credits in Rebirth after 60 hours of play, I was coming down from the hype high I experienced from the last few hours of the story. I was teary-eyed, and my mind resembled the tornado of Whispers at the end of Remake – trying to process and figure out what I had just witnessed and what was coming next. Final Fantasy VII Rebirth improved on every aspect from its predecessor, which was already fantastic, leaving me with my favorite Final Fantasy experience in a long time. I don’t know where the final act will take us, and the wait for the last part of this trilogy will be painful, but if Final Fantasy VII Rebirth is any indication, it will be well worth the wait.
This game was reviewed with a review code provided by Square Enix on a PlayStation 5 console.
I’m always on the lookout for board/card games that are small, fun, and quick – aka the perfect games to throw in my bag and take with me to the local brewery with friends or to bust out during lunch. Last year, I came across a small-box card game, Pocket Paragons, developed by Brian McKay and published by Solis Game Studio, that fit that bill perfectly, with games that take less than 10 minutes, even less time to teach, and easily fit in a Deck Pro deck box. Now, Solis is bringing their new project to Kickstarter, and fans of Radiant Black and other characters from Image Comic’s Massive-verse should take note of The Massive-verse Fighting Card Game (Powered by Pocket Paragons).
Massive-verse FCG (along with the other sets of Pocket Paragons) is a head-to-head combat card game where you and your opponent attempt to reduce the other life points to zero by utilizing the skills and abilities of your chosen character. Each player chooses a card from their character’s premade “deck” consisting of seven cards and plays against the other players’ hands. Cards in Pocket Paragons are assigned a “type,” with each one doing better against another, sometimes outright canceling them out and countering them. Interactions between cards can also generate Energy, the resource required to use a hero’s Ultimate ability. The whole experience of playing Massive-verse FCG feels like a mix between Rock-Paper-Scissors and War (the card game) with some additional complexity.
Matches can be played as either 1v1, where each player chooses a single character to use, or the 3v3 Legacy option, which lets you draft a team of three, with each player needing to take down the other team in order to win. The 3v3 structure allows each defeated character to pass along one of their cards to the next character, replacing their card of the same type. This mixing up can provide additional strategy, requiring you to also plan ahead in order to make the strongest final fighter you can. It’s a nifty mechanic that I can’t think of any other game doing.
Regardless of which game type you choose, full matches rarely last more than 10 minutes, with most over in just a few minutes. Great for those 30-minute lunches at work or while you’re waiting for friends to arrive.
For fans of Pocket Paragons, Massive-verse brings with it a nifty new mechanic for its heroes, a double-sided passive ultimate that each character has in addition to their normal ultimates – a first for the series. These special passives, “transform” when certain criteria are met, adding to that Power Ranger/Kamen Rider motif of the heroes. While it isn’t a very “in your face” addition, it sets the Massive-verse characters apart enough that I find myself wondering if, down the road, at some point, a pack will be released that will add a similar card to existing sets.
From a visual standpoint, Massive-verse is a big step up from the previous Pocket Paragon sets that Solis has released, with each card featuring gorgeous artwork pulled straight from the comic series. Due to the size of the property, Solis has worked directly with the creative team behind the comic to help design the layouts and with input to make sure that this game is as true to the source material as it can be. The Massive-verse FCG also features brand new original artwork from renowned comic artist Dan Mora, all of which make it look far more premium.
Massive-verse isn’t Solis Studios’ first collaboration effort involving their Pocket Paragon system with previous endeavors including Penny Arcade’s Acquisitions Incorporated, Rivals of Aether, and Zephyr Workshops A.E.G.I.S. (read our preview HERE). Each version, including Massive-verse, is built on the Pocket Paragon card-battling system, letting you mix and match your favorite characters from all the sets to create your ultimate team of fighters.
The one gripe that I have with Massive-verse and its siblings is that the game feels far more reliant on luck and guessing right than it does on outright skill or strategy. Each encounter, much like Rock-Paper-Scissors, really boils down to “I picked right, and you picked wrong” – even with the additional perks or effects that cards can offer. Because the games go so quickly, I’m never overly bothered by a focus on luck, but I certainly wouldn’t mind some additional depth added to the game – perhaps adding a mode that lets you draft and build your deck from all possible powers instead of having set decks.
Massive-verse FCG (along with the rest of my Pocket Paragon sets) is one of those games that I always keep in my backpack since I never know when I will have a few minutes to kill with friends. The ease with which it can be picked up and played, even for new players, is remarkable, and thanks to the gorgeous artwork. Massive-verse really makes the game all that much more appealing for new prospective players at a quick glance. The addition of the transforming passive really helps sell the vibe that you are playing as Power Ranger-esque heroes, and that is something I can always get behind.
The ease and speed in which the Massive-verse Fighting Card Game can be taught and played make it an easy recommendation for anyone who is looking for a great game that they can bust out on a moment’s notice. Massive-verse is launching on Kickstarter soon!
Thank you to Atlas Games for providing Scott with a copy of Godsforge and the expansions that were used for this review.
The Godsforge – the final source of the precious Etherium resource – is dwindling and under a constant state of tug-of-war between powerful spellcasters trying to claim it. This is the lore behind the 1-4 player (expandable up to 6 with expansion) dice and card battling game Godsforge, from Atlas Games, designed by Brenden Stern. With no shortage of dice-battling games available for tabletop players to choose from, how does Godsforge -2nd Edition- faire in the struggle for something more sought after than even Etherium – play at your game nights?
Info:Players: 1-4 (+1 per expansion)
Time: 20-40 min
Age: 14+
Released: 2023 (2nd Edition), 2019 (1st Edition)
Price:
- Core Set (2nd Ed.) $39.95
- Core Set (1st Ed.) $27.95
- Return of the Dragon Gods Expansion $19.95
- Twilight of the Great Houses Expansion $19.95
What’s in the BoxCore Game (2nd Edition)
- Instruction Book (12 pages)
- Round Cardboard life tracker and component organizer
- 4 sets of 4 colored 6-sided dice
- 4 colored markers that match the dice
- 1 Black die
- 1 Deck of Godsforge cards
- 4 Player Aid cards
- 30 crystal Veilstone tokens
Twilight of the Great Houses Expansion
- Instruction pamphlet
- 1 additional set of 4 player dice
- 1 additional colored player marker
- 1 Deck of TotGH Godsforge cards
- 8 double-side Great House cards
- 8 additional crystal Veilstone tokens
Return of the Dragon Gods Expansion
- Instruction pamphlet
- 1 additional set of 4 player dice
- 1 additional colored player marker
- 1 Deck of RotDG Godsforge cards
- 8 additional crystal Veilstone tokens
Right away, even before opening the box, I was enthralled by Godsforge’s aesthetic – with its mixture of minimalist color accents contrasting against monochromatic components. The cards themselves feature highly detailed creatures and structures alongside Godsforge’s intricate arcane glyph spells.
Godsforge puts players in the robes of powerful spellcasters whose end goal is to be the last one standing. Using dice, each player will simultaneously roll a set of four six-sided dice, with the ability to reroll a single die twice or two dice once, to meet the card requirements in their hand to play. These cards include spell or creature cards, referred to as “Creations”, that can defend, attack, or provide other benefits. Think Yahtzee meets Magic: The Gathering but without having to worry about buying booster packs or the hassle of building a large deck.
Once each player has selected the cards they wish to use by setting it face down in front of themselves, they will reveal them and pay the cost noted on the card. Examples of these costs include small straights of dice numbered in a roll, dice equaling a certain value or perhaps enough odd or even valued dice. But, there is a twist that makes getting these dice combinations more than just luck-based.
There are two special sides on the dice (new to this Second Edition for clarification sake, the First Edition used colored standard D6s) – the Etherium (or single pip) side counts as a wild, and the Veilstone (or six pip) side which has a variety of uses. When you roll a Veilstone symbol (or a six), it can be used either for its six value or redeemed to gain yourself a special crystal resource, which can be spent to either raise or lower the value of a single other die by as a part of a card’s required play cost.
The game can be further expanded on with Godsforge’s two expansion sets, Twilight of the Great Houses and Return of the Dragon Gods. Both of the expansions use the same, including a new deck of cards that can be mixed in with the core game’s, adding additional types of cards, including the Great House cards, which grant each player a special boon from the start of the game and cards that can improve and upgrade their stats over time. Alternatively, you can opt to play with just those decks on their own.
The additional mechanics added from the expansions are welcome, but I wouldn’t say they made the game more complex or added much depth, just more options. They are nice to include, but I wouldn’t say they are “Must-have” expansions.
When it comes to dishing out damage, Godsforge does something rather unique that I haven’t experienced before in these sorts of battling games – you can only attack the player on your left (and you can only be attacked by the one on your right). I appreciated this “forced enemy” approach as it removed players from ganging up on one person and cut down on potential chaos in a four-person match.
Sometimes, in battling games like Godsforge, especially at higher player counts, being knocked out early on can lead to a lot of sitting around watching others have fun and not playing. Atlas Games addresses this with a special mechanic that kicks in after the first player has been taken out of the game – it increases the damage done to players by 7. In a game where players only have 30 life or less (higher player counts have players start with less life), that is a big deal, and goes a long way to speeding things up. There is very little risk of a person being knocked out early and having to wait a long time while the other players finish.
Teaching Godsforge is a pretty painless endeavor, with its thin rulebook and not overly complex rules. Roll your dice, pick a card you want to try and play, and re-roll if needed – using any wilds or veil stones to adjust the values – and be the last person standing. Explaining the rules, even with a full group of six players, should be quick and pretty painless (for board game standards), taking less than 10 minutes when I taught my friends.
Incorporating Godsforge’s two expansions, Twilight of the Great Houses and Return of the Dragon Gods, doesn’t complicate matters much either. Simply shuffle the respective decks into the one that comes with the core box, or use them on their own. The added mechanics for the expansions (Upgrade cards and card synergy for RotDG and the great houses, life loss, and restriction cards in TotGH) don’t change up the game dramatically enough to require their own explanations outside what is on the card. The biggest addition comes from the eight double-sided great house cards that let players choose a house to play as, granting them a unique bonus. Each expansion’s cards have a unique symbol in the upper left corner to denote where the card came from, making splitting things apart is simple enough to do.
When it comes to Godsforge’s quality, it does a fine enough job but didn’t blow me away. The cards feel sturdy and smooth but have a bit of a sheen to them that I never found made them hard to read. They felt good to play and shuffle. They feel better quality than the dice and plastic tokens, which were deceptively light.. As an avid Dungeons & Dragons player, I have held a lot of dice, and Godsforge’s dice just don’t have that heft that I associate with a D6. Although I do appreciate the almost highlighter-esque color scheme that Atlas Games went with, I don’t think I’ve seen any like it before.
The life tracker token looks and feels like you are holding a single Smarties candy. I would have preferred just a turn dial to keep track of life instead – less of a chance of getting lost (or eaten). The Veilstones are nifty enough, though part of me wishes that this second edition left them the shiny gold in Godsforge’s First Edition instead of the clear yellow you get here.
As I have played more board games, I’ve become increasingly appreciative of games that I can get to the table fast and, even better, teach to new players easily. Godsforge checks both those boxes with a fantastic aesthetic to boot. Games don’t take too long and can easily be played (even at higher player counts) during a lunch period, and if you are particularly crafty, all you really need to play are one of the decks of cards and four dice, and you are good to go! Technically, you don’t even need the Core box to play Godsforge and can opt to buy one of the expansions instead, saving yourself $10 in the process – this is handy if you’re on the fence about the game and the $40 investment of the main set.
Players who prefer games of skill and strategy may be turned off by the heavy luck-based gameplay found in Godsforge. Even with its inclusion of the wild side of the dice and the Veilstone’s ability to augment a value, Godsforge boils down to drawing better cards than your opponent and rolling right to play them. A variant rule exists that lets you start with ten cards and discard down to the standard four, giving the game a slight strategy infusion, but since it is a one-off, it won’t fix the chance-heavy nature of the game.
This may be a more personal gripe, but there is a lot of wasted space in the boxes of Godsforge – the expansions being especially egregious. Each expansion only includes a deck of cards, four dice, one smartie token, a few more Veilstones, and an instruction pamphlet, yet the boxes are a couple of inches deep and the size of half of the core box. They could have easily been half the size and still had room to spare. It is also odd that the core box includes dedicated spaces for the expansions’ decks but not the extra dice or life tokens that the expansions come with.
As an experiment, I put all of the necessary components from the core box of Godsforge in a standard UltraPro deck-box to see how well, if at all, things would fit. With no issue at all, I was able to fit the full deck of cards, all of the Veilstone tokens, and all of the dice for a 4-player game in the box with room to spare. The only parts I had to omit were the rulebook and the circular life tracker disk – both of which could be adjusted for the smaller container. Shrink the rulebook into a foldout rule sheet or booklet, and instead of the disk, just make small dials. With two Ultra Pro boxes, I could include both expansions with me for a fraction of the size as well.
In truth, the idea of shrinking Godsforge down to a small box game like this would make it a lot more appealing to me. It lacks some of the depth and complexity I may look for during a game night with friends, but it’s an almost perfect game to whip out of my bag real quick at the bar or at work during lunch for a quick game. Something that the larger boxes aren’t quite as conducive to. I almost always carry a deck of Magic cards with me, and I could see myself keeping this small-sized Godsforge in my car going forward now.
I hadn’t heard of Godsforge before this review, and after playing several matches of it, I am happy to say that I came away impressed. I really love the artwork and aesthetic, and the general flow and pacing of the game are quick, making Godsforge a good choice when you don’t have much time but still want to play something with your friends. While I wouldn’t mind if a future expansion adds more strategic elements to the game or new variants are devised to shift the game away a bit from being so luck-based, the dice rolling wasn’t as big of a turn-off for me as it may be for others. Regardless, Godsforge is a lovely addition to my game collection that I can see myself coming back to for those quick hits of gaming goodness.
It’s finally here, after 13 years we can finally see what happens on the other end of Alan Wake’s story. Mike and Auri sit down to discuss the long awaited sequel, Remedy, and how far their games and storytelling have come.
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After spending over 150 hours playing Wayfinder I believe it has a lot of potential to find its place even in the crowded live service games market. However, the team at Airship Syndicate has a long battle ahead of them through the gloom of technical issues before it’s in a good spot.
Wayfinder is an action MMORPG and is a blend of Warframe’s character collecting and weapon crafting, and randomly generated dungeons with events and challenges you’d find in some roguelike games like Hades or Risk of Rain 2. These dungeons, called Lost Zones, are where you’ll spend most of your time. These and Hunts, which are boss battles with more challenging mechanics, can be done solo or match-made with up to 3 other players and you can mix and match your favorite Wayfinders to play as with any weapon you’ve crafted in your arsenal. There are plenty of different melee weapons where you’ll dish out combos with swords or two-handed axes, or if you fancy ranged combat, you can choose from either shotguns or rifles hitting those perfect reloads. The dungeons themselves offer a decent amount of variety but you’ll definitely see a lot of the repeated tile sets across the current available zones. I do think they were able to do a decent job of making each environment in a lost zone feel distinct. From the first one being a maze-like castle crypt with traps and hazards everywhere to the later game lost zones that have much more open areas making it feel like you’re actually lost in this creepy snow-swept forest.
There’s a total of six Wayfinders currently available to play and more will be added with each new season. Yes, this will be a seasoned-based live service game with new content being added throughout like new weapons to craft, new dungeons, and bosses to take on. This will be a free-to-play title once it fully releases early next year so the game does take once again from the Warframe playbook letting you skip the grind by purchasing in-game currency to instantly unlock Wayfinders and weapons. During this early access period, you need to purchase one of the founders packs to play the game, ranging from 20 to 150 dollars, getting you various kinds of goodies at each of the several buy-in tiers and all bundles get you access to this game version of a battle pass and tokens that let you instantly unlock any of the characters you choose. While I don’t blame anyone for groaning hearing about another live game with another battle pass I will give Airship some credit here as once you purchase this pass it will not expire once a new season kicks in like how a lot of other live games treat their battle passes. Instead, once you have multiple reward towers you can choose which you want to work on at any given time. Overall, I think the lower buy-in tiers are more worthwhile if you want to play or try the game as of right now cause a lot of the higher-tier rewards are coming later in this early access period. You’ll have the option to upgrade later if you so desire.
During my playtime, I focused on two different characters. Wingrave He is a tank and healer hybrid from the starting roster with abilities that heal himself and a skill that lets him taunt opponents, drawing their attacks and letting allies heal as they land hits on taunted enemies. Venomess, unlocked through the battle pass, is a ranged fighter who benefits from using guns and has skills that apply poison effects to deal a lot of damage and control areas of the arena by putting down poison clouds. I really enjoyed Wingrave’s playstyle but I also tend to lean more towards tank characters in these types of games. I like being able to help my teammates in the thick of it when fights get hairy and he has a really fun set of skills to play in that role. If these character types don’t sound interesting, there are others to choose from like Niss who is a damage dealer with a focus on dual dagger melee combat, and Silo who is another ranged fighter who has debuffing abilities and uses explosives. This is definitely where Wayfinder shines the most with its fun action combat and the mix of different character playstyles you can choose from.
Wayfinder puts the early in early access. A lot of gameplay systems feel either partially done or missing important aspects and need refinement. Things like sorting through menus for accessories you’ll equip to your characters or Echoes – mods you slot into characters to boost stats – can be a pain to navigate right now. They even recently patched the game to put a cap on the max of these items you can hold because hardcore players were already amassing so many of these that the game was kicking them back to the main menu, and even tanking performance for them and other players when in the main hub together. Generally, the game needs polish in the performance department. When running lost zones it runs okay on PlayStation 5, but when in the main hub or larger zones the game’s frame rate takes a hit and has some stuttering in some heavy combat moments. The most prevalent performance hit is when in the main hub. If you go up this large portal, you can use it to matchmake with other players. The game will freeze or lock up for a couple of seconds before you can move again and interact with anything.
Many systems in the game need refining. Echoes drop from enemies at different rarities that you will slot into your characters and weapons but do so completely randomly. While they drop aplenty, there’s no way to target a specific rarity by hunting specific creatures or upping the difficulty to the highest tier on a lost zone. This even applies to things like crafting materials for the characters and weapons themselves. So it makes taking on these higher difficulties feel less rewarding and worthwhile.
The only thing difficulty currently benefits is the overly complicated currency system. There is a currency called spectra in the game and it has a completely unnecessary amount of varieties to the point of making none of them matter. Here’s how it breaks down, let’s say you choose the first codex hall lost zone on a tier 1 difficulty that drops a basic type of spectra called silver spectra. If you up the difficulty tier it then becomes a “shining” or “exalted” variant of that type of spectra each of these only drop from the specific difficulty tier you’ve chosen. To add and extra layer of confusion, when you add a modifier to your dungeon run or boss hunt, you will still get the variant type of spectra from a certain difficulty tier but you also get a type of spectra that drops because of the modifier you put on and these also come in the difficulty tier variants. If that wasn’t enough, what specific lost zone or hunt you’ve chosen also can change which variant of spectra drops making over 60 different variants of this single currency type. This mess is also on top of the unique material drops you’ll need from a specific boss or event in a lost zone that you will need to acquire to craft a specific weapon or character. So while yes, the core of this game is about grinding crafting materials from certain activities, this layer of currency just feels entirely needless because all of these variants, add an extra layer to keep track of that is confusing and does not really add value to the gameplay loop of farming materials.
Leveling multiple characters and weapons is also kind of a slog right now as once you complete the main quests in the game, which grant you huge experience boosts, you’ll lose out on this extra xp on your other characters and weapons; all the characters and weapons have specific materials you need and come from specific bosses. Thus, once you unlock stuff you might want to actually use you’ll have to replay a lot more of the early content over and over to get these things leveled. Leveling the reward tower is also a slog right now because the current content gives very little progress and the game doesn’t have dailies or weeklies. So while I’ve hit around 150 hours in the game and have maxed out two characters and weapons, I still haven’t finished leveling the pass.
They have at least outlined their plans to remedy a few of my complaints with their roadmap for the game during early access, specifically things like better ways to level additional characters and weapons and streamlining spectra. But as it currently stands, I’d recommend Wayfinder only to people who enjoy grinding in looter games and MMOs and not much outside of this audience. If you’re mildly curious I’d just look to keep up with their social channels for updates or play very casually while things are getting updated and refined. But I’d say as for myself who has over 3k hours in a game like Destiny 2, and always wants to find a new game in this genre to sink into, Wayfinder has a ton of potential. It already stands out for me from its contemporaries due to its gorgeous art style and comic book-inspired look. Airship Syndicate has a lot of pedigree in this department having made things like Darksiders and League of Legends spin-offs, and when you look around at the live service genre landscape and see nothing but hyper-realistic sci-fi shooters or gritty post-apocalypse settings, even the most dreary looking areas of Wayfinder stands out to me even if not wholly original.
I once again find myself rooting for another live service game to find success even with the volatile nature of games in this genre. There are a lot of rough edges here but there’s also fun too. The third-person action combat feels good, and the setting and art direction are gorgeous but only time will tell if this game can receive the polish it needs and refinements to its core systems. I think we truly won’t be able to tell if Wayfinder can survive the gloom of early access until larger updates are made when a new season launches later this year probably and beyond that when it has its full launch early next year. Regardless as a live service sicko, I will endure some of the issues to provide feedback cause I really hope this game finds its footing and has years of updates ahead of it.
- This game was played and captured on PS5 and is also currently available on Steam on PC
As someone who was quite young at the time, it is hard for me to identify what the magic sauce of Super Nintendo RPGs of 1991-96 was. It was an era of video games when Chrono Trigger, Final Fantasy VI, Secret of Mana and Dragon Quest 5 & 6 were all released in the same span of years, there was a breakthrough. There was excellent pixel art, there was more bold storytelling, there were new ideas to the turn based systems, and there were a lot of people just enjoying RPGs. There’s something that’s hard to replicate about that era of role playing games that is missing from the modern 100 hour odysseys but still exists as a foundational memory for generations of RPG players.
Sea of Stars is as if you reached into the past and grabbed that underlying feeling and really channeled everything you had into making the 2023 version of that video game formula. Sea of Stars brilliantly feels like one of those Golden Age JRPGs of the Super Nintendo, but made with the benefits of today. On top of that, it’s unique, it’s heartfelt, and it’s so so fun to play in a time where there are tons of fun RPGs to play. Sea of Stars is different from all of them, and excellent in its own ways.
From the beginning, Sea of Stars’ story is framed around a sacrifice. Valere and Zale, blessed with lunar and solar-based superpowers related to their births on the Winter and Summer solstices, are separated from their childhood friend Garl and are locked away in a tower to train for ten years to become Solstice Warriors. Despite this strong background Zale and Valere struggle to develop as charages during the journey in comparison to later additions to the party like Garl, or the mysterious Pirate/Ninja Seraï, who are far more interesting and elevate the plot a lot more. I think there are some missed opportunities with characters broadly; I would have liked more time with characters just talking to one another, building up the tension and relationships so that when the biggest story beats happen, they’d hit even harder. Still, it feels like a more traditional approach. It feels classic and streamlined, and it helpsSea of Stars separate itself more from modern contemporaries.
I really like what Sea of Stars does story-wise, because it feels very relevant. It reads like a pandemic game to me. It deals a lot with trust, what it means to break trust, and earnest frustration with why the people with the power to change things seem to refuse to do the right thing, all themes that really resonated with me. Multiple crucial points of the story had me absolutely devastated and sobbing. For everything familiar in the larger narrative, something wonderfully earnest and to the point happened to surprise and delight me.
All of these are complemented by some of the most impressive and polished visuals of a pixel art video game I have ever seen. Sabotage’s previous game, The Messenger, leverages dueling 8bit and 16bit styles to create intricate backgrounds to great effect, but Sea of Stars just goes extremely hard into this unbelievable amount of detail in the world, characters, and every animation. There are too many moments of incredible animation to capture, but I wanted to include some as animated gifs that certainly won’t do the game justice, but show off just how much variety of visual presentation there is.
Then there is the soundtrack and this one is killer. Eric W. Brown works with Chrono Trigger composer Yasunori Mitsuda to make some simply legendary music. From the expected areas, like a beachy series of waterfalls, to underwater, to the desert, every necessary touchstone of a SNES game is here, but the surprises that come into the music as the game gets darker and weirder in the later chapters are just excellent. The boss-specific tracks are all so very good, and the amount of music here is just as surprising as the number of locales. There is just a ton packed in here, all of it very memorable, and some of the music even calls back to The Messenger and its soundtrack too.
Most RPGs live and die by their combat, and Sea of Stars not only lives, it thrives. It leans in the direction of the Mario RPGs, with action commands available through timed presses with every attack, requiring different timing for each character’s unique attacks and specials. It also throws in combo attacks, which don’t use MP but rather a sort of “special meter” you build by staggering opponents and landing action commands. Then the third and final pillar is “live mana,” which is effectively three charges of energy you get from just using basic attacks that you can absorb almost anytime to power up whatever your next move is, be it a big attack or a super-powered heal.
All of these systems are very basic, and introduced gradually through the first four hours of Sea of Stars, but continually become satisfying strategy-makers through dozens and dozens of hours of combat. Not only does each boss have some special mechanic or structure to it that makes it more of a unique fight, but with free party member switching almost any time, combat always feels like you have tons of options at any given moment. Maybe you have a boss that is weak to poison damage, but has three arms that will buff it each turn. You can use Zale and Garl to attack the arms and destroy them, build up some mana charges, then absorb them as Seraï and land an extra-strong poison attack with the additional charge. That or you could prepare one of the full-screen super moves or a combo attack. There is plenty of strategy with such a straightforward system, all the while new enemies are being introduced constantly, all with different attacks and weaknesses that require new timing to be learned all the time.
Sea of Stars is constantly adding fresh and fun ideas to its turn based battles, all while building on things you’re familiar with. Entering new areas is extremely fun, because you’re getting new music, new visuals, and new little puzzles with each enemy to solve. I felt this 40 hours later when I was wrapping up all the secret and optional areas at the end of the game.
You’ll go from one stop to the next with the perfect topper to any 90s-inspired RPG, the world map. Each area flows into the next, as you eventually travel from continent to continent, from the Coral Cascades, to the port town of Brisk and its lovely pirate music, to Wrath Island, the land of dark curses. Just as you start to feel the world is small, something changes, a new part of the world map opens, or puzzles on the map itself light the way to the next adventure.
All that care into the music and the visuals of each destination carries over to exploring them too. Not only are they full of little puzzles, secrets, and extra treasures to find, but you actually have to explore, interact, and maneuver your way through the world. It’s more than just finding keys and hitting buttons, and I am just so grateful for it. It was super fun cleaning up the enemies in an area and circling all around it to find hidden areas, things you didn’t know you could interact with, and optional little paths to secrets.
Truly, the environments are just so stellar, and it extends to walking around them, exploring them, fighting in them, and of course hearing each area’s different theme music.
Closing Comments:
Sea of Stars gets to be amongst that cherished few that feels like a game ripped right out of another era, with the benefits of time and modern design, and just so much love. It’s one of the most polished, fully-featured and jam-packed games I have played, and I was so happy to turn every corner, find every combo move, and explore every environment endlessly. The story, the experience, and the heart coming off of Sea of Stars is so potent, it rocked me emotionally. I loved every time I got to sit down and play this game, but left supremely satisfied by the end. It is a masterful RPG, video game, and indie title, and one that I would happily recommend to anyone and everyone.
This game was reviewed with a review code provided by Public Relations for Sabotage Studios, on a PlayStation 5 Digital console.
Whether it is in a digital video game format or played on a tabletop, I love hidden role/social deduction games. So when I had a chance to try out the upcoming Deceit 2 with members of the development team at World Makers, I jumped at the chance. After sneaking around an eldritch asylum and struggling…
I’m always telling anyone who will listen: “Chess is ok, but I think it should have lore!” Punkcake Delicieux, developers of Shotgun King: The Final Checkmate, heard my pleas around the middle of 2022 and launched their roguelike inspired by the world’s most popular abstract war games on Steam. Over a year later, I’m experiencing it on my Switch, truly the perfect place to play a game that is at its best in short, concussive bursts.
The story of the Black King being driven mad by the betrayal by his people and his encroaching enemies in white is a great reason to give this king some motivation to expand his moveset past the ability to move one space at a time in all directions. Primarily by trading in his holy scepter for a shotgun, and bringing the rampage to his opps directly. That’s really all there is to it. Instead of going any further to craft some sort of actual story, let’s just admit now that anything further would be too much further; most of the world building opportunities are taken in the simple but sometimes darkly evocative art and slight or silly animations.
Each stage of your run (called floors here) gives you a non-standard arrangement of chess pieces that move in their classic patterns to take you out before you can do the same to their leader, usually another king. Taking away the predictability of your standard chess set up and having to rely on more in-the-present threat assessment and decision making gives Shotgun King a fun puzzle game vibe in the same ways that Zack Gage’s Really Bad Chess and Damian Sommer’s Chesh do. Mix all that with the delicate dance of your own movement and offense—moving, shooting, and reloading spends turns and every piece on the board moves at different speeds and on different turns—and you have a lot of tactical bang for your brain’s buck.
Every floor conquered leaves you with a choice before moving on: you must take a gift to help you on the next floor, and a curse that slowly (or sometimes quickly) grows the strength of the next group of enemies. They are paired at random, so one’s ability to mitigate the potential ruin of the other is largely out of your hands. It’s tough to know which boons are worth the cost on your first several runs. Expanding your ammo count, turning your shotgun into a sniper rifle, or adding a moat in the middle of the board are all examples of pretty interesting and game changing abilities that can feel great sometimes, or completely undone by the poison pill you’re forced to swallow it with. Adding more pawns to the board doesn’t seem like a terrible idea until you’re forced to take a debuff down the road that will promote them to the new king after you take down the first one. Only time, and many failures, will help your predict board states down the line based on these variables. Some roguelikes feel largely “solved” once you find the handful of overpowered buffs that help you win a run consistently. Twoish hours and a couple of clears under my belt, this doesn’t feel like one of those games.
After storming all ten floors and taking down the boss, your fury doesn’t have to end. You can jump right back in with modifiers that make everything just a little harder in the classic Throne mode. Or you can take on some of the other specialty modes, like an endless survival challenge or chase mode, which is a bonkers escape mode where you must outrun an increasingly dense horde of enemies coming from all sides. I don’t know that any of these modes give Shotgun King the staying power of something like a daily puzzle or leaderboards, but they are fun takes on the original formula that grabbed me pretty tight, even if it was for a limited time.
Shotgun King: The Final Checkmate is a challenging and fruitful take on one of the oldest games in human history. The art and story are a bit dark, but lighthearted, yet the clever and tricky roguelike tactics are dead serious. I can’t think of a better break between the endless assault of bajillion hour RPGs that all seem to want to drop at the same time, flaying your free time to pieces like buckshot from ten paces away. If you need a quick hit of brain scratching without the requisite time sink, pull this game’s trigger.
Shotgun King: The Final Checkmate released on PlayStation, Xbox, and Nintendo Switch August 24th, 2023.
At long last, The Legend of Heroes: Trails into Reverie is available for Western audiences, serving as a brilliant conclusion to this arc of the series, with a tense and twisting story with drips and teasing what has yet to come next. But I want to clarify: do not play Reverie as your first entry…
Paizo’s Pathfinder, once nakedly a Dungeons and Dragons clone and now fully fledged fantasy property of its own, has been featured in some of the sneakily best roleplaying games of the past few years. Kingmaker and Wrath of the Righteous were stiff competition for Pillars of Eternity in the truly traditional CRPG space, but unlike…
Hello all, editor-in-chief here, checking in with a little bit of business that I consider important and would like to make the occasion of with a small post just outlining the info. If you haven’t heard, I am transgender! Yay! It is something that’s been going on in the background for a little while, and…
The tabletop and board game hobby has seen a resurgence in the past decade thanks to games like Catan, Gloomhaven, and others which have shifted the perception of what the medium can offer. Thanks to the pandemic, digital versions of these games and the virtual tabletop space saw particularly strong growth due to the limits…
One of the highest hurdles for a long running game is to onboard new players without scaring them with the sheer amount of stuff that exists in it. With The Duviri Paradox, the latest Warframe expansion from Digital Extremes, they tackle this problem head on. They also address the other lingering and more existential quandary of how can a game known for reinventing itself over and over again do so in a way that feels new and modern?
Warframe is easily among the strangest science fiction settings I’ve ever experienced. The story of our solar system (but in the very far future) features clone soldiers, a cult that literally worships money and profit, and space ninja robot corpses piloted by psychic teenagers. All the ills of this dark future are the fault of the Orokin, an evolution of humans that love body modification, and being the absolute worst.
Its story, which is intimidatingly dense with lore about secret societies and ancient empires, is all due to the rippling consequences of one starship, the Zariman, crossing the veil of this reality into the Void, and eventually coming back Event Horizon-style, bringing a whole bunch of terrible things with it. That last part is a bit of a recent revelation, introduced with large content and story updates The New War and The Angels of Zariman in 2021 and 2022, respectively. The story up to that point was told in patch work quests that would maddeningly dance around important narrative bits but rarely commit to something clear and definitive, story wise. Unreliable narrators and lots of time between big story updates helped create a mystery that likely did as much to keep players like me asking questions and digging around for answers as it did obfuscate developer Digital Extremes efforts to figure out where they were going with all this exactly.
The answer was something you’ve seen a lot in stories today – this canon timeline isn’t the only one. But as is signature of Warframe, even their multiverse is fucking weird. Enter the Duviri Paradox, a sort of pocket dimension beyond even the multiverse that serves to add some color to Warframe’s reality-bending story arcs of the last few years while also attempting to spice its gameplay up in the most dramatic way since it launched in 2013.
Duviri itself is a series of floating islands ruled with an iron fist by the mysterious Dominus Thrax, whose emotions are inextricably linked to the world itself. When he is joyful, the world is green and verdant, and the sky is blue, when he’s afraid the colors of Duviri are muted and a sickly miasma chokes the sky. Of the four available open world areas, Duviri is certainly the most visually dynamic.
Content wise, it’s also the most unique. Like other open regions, it’s teeming with stuff to collect, but instead of going to a hub city to get quests that dump out to the region (ie. Cetus to the Plains of Eidolon), all of the activities are initiated in the region itself. Be it from odd shrines that need you to find pieces to make it whole again, or an escaped prisoner that needs you to fend off the law while they secure their exit, Duviri’s missions are truly some of the more diverse in Warframe’s history. That isn’t to say they are wholly different or more creative than shooters of its ilk, but Warframe vets will be doing things they haven’t done in the Origin System, at least.
You’ll also be doing them all as The Drifter, the alter ego of your Warframe’s pilot. Instead of dawning biomechanical super armor to dismantle waves of enemies, your combat escapades will be more scaled down and personal. To account for the fact that you aren’t an armored space colossus in this form, melee and ranged combat are largely reworked, with more emphasis around parrying incoming attacks, guard breaking, and interrupting with your trusty sidearm. Moving across the islands is made easy thanks to mighty Pegasus-like steeds called Kaithe, which can take flight and glide across the vast plane quickly.
Completing any task, like finishing a side quest, opening random treasure throughout the world, finding unique lore items, or even fighting roaming bands of enemies will grant you and your party a “decree.” Decrees are buffs that add traits to you, which can be stacked together and mixed/matched with other traits during your run, roguelike style. Some blend into each other nicely and can be easy to see how they play off one another; decrees that add status effects to your attacks and ones that do extra damage or cause extra effects to enemies inflicted by a status are obvious pairs. They stick with you for the length of your run, and don’t reset until you successfully retire from the circuit on your own terms or die trying. Unfortunately there’s no obvious way to guide your builds towards any consistent coherence. You can’t block certain decrees from showing up, and it doesn’t seem that decrees you’ve picked previously have any effect on those that will show up down the line. Almost every decree is good, and they all give some sort of benefit, but it also feels completely random.
There’s a second side to Duviri, the Undercroft, which is completely different from all of this. Here you take randomly selected Warframes and gear through an increasingly difficult gauntlet of mission types in the Void-themed environments of the land that exists just outside of Duviri. This is where you’ll do more hardcore farming for new gear, and it’s a welcome way to jump into the game brand new if you aren’t a Warframe head yet. For those who are veterans, this is a hit and miss activity. I personally liked the opportunity to pick frames and weapons I don’t have or don’t use to give them a whirl, it’s certainly enticed me to investigate farming for new gear in the future. But if you roll a frame or weapon you already have, you’re limited in how you can mod it. If you haven’t already created a mod loadout for it, then you’ll be stuck with the default selection, because you can’t mod it when you queue up for this expansion. This is a bigger problem for those looking to do Steel Path (read: hard mode) content because having great mod builds is key to survival.
You can choose to explore both of these worlds separately, but the so-called Duviri Experience lets you alternate between both the overworld of Duviri and the Undercroft. This can be time consuming, but is really the only way to get some of the new, more exotic materials necessary to craft the new items. I found it to also be the most risky in regards to bugginess. As ambitious as The Duviri Paradox is, it is also one of the jankiest games you’ll play this year. In its current state, you’ll find that side quests fail to load, or will bleed into one another, ultimately corrupting both. Phases may not load, leaving you stuck in a limbo where the only way out is to abandon your whole run and leave without the final prizes. This can be very disheartening since a full run of The Duviri Experience can easily push towards an hour of game time.
It’s interesting to see the debate about the state of games launching undercooked and full of bugs that completely miss The Duviri Paradox. Maybe it’s because Warframe players have been waiting a very long time for this update, and are just happy to be here? Maybe it’s that games as a service is a sort of development relationship that has nurtured a unique sort of patience with its community and audience. Whatever the reason may be, I think the largely on target critique of game condition falling dramatically low of expectations applies to The Duviri Paradox just as much as it does Jedi Survivor or Redfall.
That, of course, hasn’t stopped me from pouring dozens of hours into the Paradox already. The roguelike elements make long grinding sessions feel more convenient and dynamic, and the new overworld is unlike anything else in Warframe’s dense content lasagna. I can’t say I’ll be as devoted to the grind in a month, but at least they have me happily in my frame, bullet jumping and ninja flipping right now.
A little over two months after Destiny 2 Lightfall’s launch, I finally peeled my feelings off the wall and decided to turn them into words. I think my conflict over what to say and how to say comes a lot from the community’s mixed and often polarized response. When you’re so invested in a game that lives and breathes like this, a lot of what you see or hear day to day is from that community. It was exhausting. It was hard for me to parse how I felt with the constant overreaction in places like Twitter, Reddit, and YouTube, that went from excited theorycrafting of what Lightfall could be to a hot or cold war very quickly.
The community response had a huge effect on how much I enjoyed Lightfall, which is of course partly my fault but it complicated my feelings enough to where I needed to take a break from Destiny and mull over how I felt about Lightfall, Season of Defiance, and what is to be the coming year of D2 seasons and content leading into “the finale” of the current Destiny saga.
Let’s start with The Lightfall campaign itself.
The Campaign
The center of the division I think is with the campaign, which most long-term Destiny players blasted through on that first day of release. Your Guardian heads to the newly discovered city Neomuna on Neptune to stop The Witness’ plan to link themselves to The Veil. Finally our enemy is at our front door, but while the seasonal story covers the war at home, the campaign is our second-front war to deal with a mcguffin.
I think a lot of expectations going into Lightfall were that it would be some tragic but massive war that ends in our enemy’s favor. It’s more of an action-movie romp across a neon-city, trying to beat the enemy away on all sides from taking the thing that the bad guy wants. It’s not complicated, I don’t think it’s reinventing the wheel, but it sure is fun. The eight missions really lean into different types of action-cinema influences, from jumping around on the edges of skyscrapers (albeit too briefly) to secluded beachfront lookouts that turn into a warzone, to huge tank fights through the backstreets of Neomuna. They ended up being my favorite front-to-back series of missions from any campaign yet, including the final boss. There is a frenetic nature to them that is exhilarating, especially in the updated Legendary Campaign mode, which has been tuned since Witch Queen to be a bit more forgiving.
For what it is, the campaign is a great, fun time. Does it make for a good penultimate event to the end of the “Light and Dark Saga”? I don’t really think so. The Witness’ endgame, The Veil, has some deep roots in Destiny history from some old concept art for the first game, potentially being a full new enemy race. But even though it’s been the subject of conjecture for years, and used in promotional materials and positioned as a very important thing, we get no answers about what it is or why it’s important by the end of this section of the story.
As a long-time Kingdom Hearts fan and also a fan of Destiny’s long-term storytelling, this didn’t get under my skin really at all. But it did for a lot of folks and they made that very audibly clear in every space a conversation about Destiny was happening in regards to Lightfall. It is certainly some kind of storytelling sin to refer to your mcguffin many, many times and never really explain what it is or why it’s important. It is set up as a mystery to unravel over time, but I think in a penultimate story, it’s a very risky move to do something like this. It leaves you wanting after the campaign is finished.
A lot of the narrative time in the campaign is used to connect with Strand, the new subclass added with this expansion. It’s been two expansions and two and a half years since Stasis, the first “darkness subclass” was added to Destiny back in 2020. For me, Eramis taking the darkness and us kind of unceremoniously “taking it too” felt like a pretty hollow introduction to using the powers of the darkness. Stand gets a lot more love, but it feels like a right thing, wrong time situation.
Strand represents the “weave of the universe”, very similar to the idea of threads of fate you might see in a Dungeons and Dragons setting. This kind of thing is exactly my shit. Yet even though it’s treated like an unwieldy weapon we must master that represents something, we don’t get as deep into its mysterious nature as I would have wanted within the scope of the story. So much of the time of the campaign is us playing with our new power and not really explaining it or the purpose of the Veil. Too much cooking at once.
Fighting Tormenters is a highlight of any given mission.
Overall the Campaign is a fun action adventure with killer setpieces, but the story doesn’t deliver what I was expecting. Did it crush my love of Destiny? No, but it sure seems like it did for a lot of loud people, and that certainly hurt my relationship with consuming Destiny and Destiny content. I think for what it is, Lightfall is super fun, and for what it needed to be, it’s a miss. I won’t lament the success of Witch Queen versus Lightfall because they feel like two totally different things, but if Lightfall built its storytelling around one of the two things it tries to juggle, I think it would have felt more satisfying.
Strand
I’d say the second pillar of Lightfall is the addition of a new subclass. To me, this is the most special of events in Destiny, and it served as a major vehicle for me getting into more endgame activities back when the first Darkness Subclass, Stasis, came out in 2020. Strand is a huge part of the campaign, with you accessing charge points frequently throughout at least six of the eight campaign missions. These points temporarily give you rapidly charging abilities and supers, allowing you to spam-magic your way through fun setpieces. This time in Lightfall, instead of just doing this, there are lengthy sections, like the final boss encounter, where you do get a Strand setup that has slightly more resemblance to the endgame suite of abilities, but just like Beyond Light, you must finish the final boss and campaign mission to fully unlock Strand.
I didn’t like this introduction before with Stasis, and I don’t like it here. It’s handled marginally better, where over time each of the two starting aspects and one different fragment per class is introduced and explained so you do learn the abilities of the subclass. Stasis’ hollow ability-spam boss sections didn’t give an accurate impression of the class at all. Still, the decision to hold back the Subclass until post-campaign was the wrong one, and I think in the expansion that introduced Loadouts, a huge quality of life feature I’ll talk about a bit later, this was the perfect opportunity to break the mold and let you feel like you’re unlocking parts of a skill tree through the campaign, instead of gating it into post-campaign filler grind.
Also like with Stasis, you need to farm a lot to unlock all 14 of the fragments for Strand, which make up the major modifiers. Again, it’s easier here, you get the currency to buy these fragments by doing just about anything with Strand, and more so on the new Destination, but it just feels a lot like a half step forward. Unlocking things may not be a problem for long term players, but this is the brand new toy and you’re holding it back from everyone until they commit several hours to the campaign and beyond.
But these are all the negatives I have to say about Strand, because to get into the introduction of the class, the element, and the damage type across the game, it’s been surprising and excellent.
The surprise comes in with how well it fits into the play of the other subclasses. From the outside looking in, my concern was would Strand have enough of its own identity, ability-wise, to not just feel like “Green Void” or something like that. Strand introduces many interesting new interactions, first of which is the grapple. While it is a grenade ability and does fall victim to cooldowns, Strand as a whole gives you a ton of interesting ways to charge your grenade abilities faster. The grapple doesn’t change Destiny into the vertical, sky-bound grapple-fest of Spider-Man, but it gives you a really intricate tool; one you can use aggressively, to gain that height and distance you want in short bursts, or even just as a speedy means of escaping harm. It fits well into Strand’s overall kit, which is harassing your enemies from all directions.
One of those tools comes from “unraveling” your opponents, which makes small needle-like threads shoot in and out of them, doing extra tick damage, spreading to nearby enemies, and creating a buzzing storm of damage over time that gives Strand its own identity amongst scorching Solar or jolting Arc. It serves a diametric pair of buff and debuff, with “Woven Mail”, a temporary 60% damage resistance, and “Severed”, which forces enemies to deal 33% less damage. This trio of verbs exist alongside each class’s strength, and I got to play two of them, Warlock and Hunter, Warlock being my main class. This all goes without mentioning “Suspension”, where you can use threads to pull up just about any non-boss enemy and hold them in the air, absolutely bullying them in a way you just couldn’t in Destiny before. It’s phenomenal.
The Warlock serves as the master of threadlings, creating small mobile creatures that attack enemies you shoot. Broodweaver feels like an appropriate class name as you are conjuring up these little guys all the time, and I really like it. There is certainly more to Strand, different grenades, throwable objects you can create, but each class touches these effects differently, and from playing alongside each, and as each, the full picture is very well realized.
Like Stasis before it, Strand won’t be fully released until the end of the year; I’m definitely excited to see what gets added to Strand, but the subclass released with Lightfall feels full and interesting, with a strong identity that makes it a competitive choice amongst four already very good elements to choose from. That, and it didn’t break PvP, which is basically a miracle.
The Quality of Life
What makes Lightfall significant beyond other expansions in my eyes is how it revamped Destiny 2 as a whole. So many changes to the menus, the interface, and visuals that really shake up the routines long-time players have with the game. I’ve split this into the quality of life things I want to highlight, and the changes to the way things work, like difficulty, existing strikes, for down below.
The champion of Lightfall for me is Loadouts. Every previous player will get six loadouts right away, and ten are unlockable. This was the first thing I grinded, and having a loadout that features your armor, the mods in them, even the ornament choices, shaders, all the aesthetics, plus guns and exotics tailored with aspects and fragments of the subclass; it’s the whole package. I immediately made a loadout for each of the five subclasses, and it has made it a delight to jump between them, grind out playlists with easy change ups, and just run raids in different moods thanks to loadouts. Up until Lightfall’s release I’d keep the same loadout on for weeks because I just didn’t want to change everything around for the tenth time that day.
This couples a bit with the new mods system. It definitely felt weird at first, but it fits a new modular style that can simulate what mods were before their rework in Lightfall, but also allow for min-maxing certain abilities in a way you couldn’t before. Want more weapon damage for as long as possible with each multi-kill? That’s doable. Want to focus completely on grenades, either through using them or saving them for the right moment? Also doable. It makes it harder to jack-of-all trades a class, certainly not making it impossible, but I do look forward to them adding new mods in coming seasons.
The true impact of these reworked mods is offset a bit by the also-reworked artifact mod system. Before they were mods exclusive to the current season that were on some level required for higher level play, and now they are passive perks that unlock permanently until you reset your artifact and change them. For example, instead of slotting in the “Anti-Barrier Pulse Rifle” mod into your arms armor, when it’s unlocked on the artifact, all your pulse rifles will just be anti-barrier, no arms-mod required.
This certainly frees up a lot of space, but part of this season’s artifact lowers the cost of many subclass-specific mods, like all Void Mods, or all Grenade Mods, which means the impact of the new mod system is certainly going to fluctuate season to season. It also feels like a slightly-forceful push of the only viable subclasses for High Difficulty content, considering the same subclasses incorporated into the artifact are the ones you’re directly rewarded for using in all of this season’s end-game activities. There is more to say about this, but to summarize it succinctly, the artifact this season makes it pretty hard to run Stasis and Arc, and you really feel that when putting together loadouts and using mods geared for those subclasses. It inherently divides the subclasses you should be using because of this, and I don’t feel great about that.
Overall, the quality of life introduced by these features is genuinely game-changing. When you’re just doing regular playlist activities, it is a lot more fun for me because I am jumping around classes and really reaching into the depth of my massive arsenal I’ve accumulated in the last few years of Destiny, and that is an exceptional feeling.
Changes to Content
Now to touch on the more controversial aspects of the Lightfall expansion, which I’d say starts with a complete rework to difficulty across the whole game.
Previously, Destiny worked off your level, and generally if you grinded things out so you were over-leveled for activities you could play them at optimal-level. They’d still be hard, moreso because of modifiers like extra damage from certain enemies or elements, but they’d be manageable because you put in some ugly amount of time to give yourself an edge.
There were very specific activities that actually ignored your power level, instead setting you at a specific power below the activity, essentially leveling the playing field, making it the same difficulty for everyone who entered. Grandmaster Nightfalls, generally the hardest content in Destiny 2, set you 25 levels below the activity. Then there were Contest Mode Raids, which was the raid during the first 24 (now 48) hours of release, so everyone racing to be first was on the same difficulty curve, a slightly lower 20 level disadvantage. Then, with Witch Queen, we got Legendary Campaign Difficulty, threading a pretty magic needle with difficulty setting everyone at 10 levels below the activity, creating what I’d call a fair and fun challenge through both Witch Queen and now Lightfall.
Lightfall has now reworked all activities to use this same scaler for difficulty, where the Power Level of the activity always puts you at a disadvantage. Legend and Master Nightfalls, Master Raids and Dungeons, activities that did not impose this level disadvantage, now do.
A place where this has worked for me is Nightfalls, now feeling more in line with recent Seasonal Activities. This was discussed before the release of Lightfall, where those activities had imposed a 5 level disadvantage, making them challenging but only enough to make them feel a bit more special and engaging. Nightfalls now have that same feeling, and I like it a lot. I certainly have Grandmaster Nightfall experience, though I’ve gone on record saying the difficulty curve there specifically made them more slog than fun for me, but I enjoy them from time to time.
Where this hasn’t worked as well is in some of the more casual activities that feel really off after longer time is spent in them. I think it’s contributed to some accelerated fatigue with the game, and makes it a little more tiring to play. I don’t completely mean this in a negative way, but Destiny takes a lot more out of me through certain grinds because I feel a lot more pressure in those activities because of difficulty spikes.
Dares of Eternity, one of the optional weekly Pinnacle activities, went from a bonkers six-person activity on Legend difficulty to an absolute slaughter, teammates going down left and right. What used to be 15 minute runs have become 24-27 minute activities that don’t ever get easier because it’s just always that difficult now.
Bungie has already communicated a lot about this in their wonderful stream of information on a weekly basis since launch, and adjustments have already been made and will continue to be made. But currently, to grade the state of Lightfall in these first few weeks, that exhausting feeling has definitely left its impression.
This comes alongside the rework of two older strikes, essentially making them modern by using newer Cabal units, and improving them a lot. It gets muddy with the difficulty balance being adjusted here and there and into the future, but I am excited about playlist activity updates, and I am excited to see this approach return for the first time since The Taken King.
What the introduction to the ranks looks likeWhen you rank up, it does feel like a big event.The other major rework outside of difficulty is a sort of reworking of Triumphs. They have been effectively folded behind a new screen in your menu, The Journey tab, that is the home of Guardian Ranks. This is another one of those half step forwards, as these ranks are supposed to act as your introduction and effective post-game tutorial of what you’re actually supposed to do in Destiny.
The first six ranks, which are skipped by veteran players, act as a, “Hey, here is how you actually play Destiny 2,” tutorial for new players. It has them visit destinations, loot Lost Sectors, claim and complete bounties, and those parts of it I think are well made. It’s the latter half, ranks 7-11, which will apparently reset every season, that is where I feel a little confused.
Many of the tasks to advance these ranks are things like “Complete Nightfalls” or higher-difficulty activities, and some are even tied to the new accommodation system, but that’s already been reworked pretty heavily in the six weeks since release. It all just feels weird, and tedious, and so far hasn’t been a system I’ve felt the need to engage with. The only reward here is clout, which just doesn’t do it for me personally.
The Raid
The new raid, The Root of Nightmares, is an absolutely great time. It will forever live in the shadow of Vow of the Disciple, a top tier raid I think that felt like a cherry on top to Witch Queen, but RoN has its own strengths.
The Raid centers around Nezarec, who has been teased for a long time in Destiny 2 and especially over the last year of Seasons. It’s really cool to see a boss built up like this, and while the fight with Nezarec is kind of easy, considering the whole “Final God of Pain” thing in the name, it has multiple facets to it. Your role in the fight can certainly affect how fun it is for you, and as the player who gets to tank Nezarec’s attention like a true Raid Boss, it can be quite fun going head to head with Destiny’s Boogie Man.
The real treat here are the story told and the visuals to behold. Nezarec’s story ties very intricately into the mysteries of Lightfall. It calls back to The Witch Queen, continuing the mystery set up by Savathun at the end of that campaign, and really makes Nezarec out to be the Boogie Man lurking in every shadow of this universe. The destination itself is The Witness’s pyramid ship, which gets a big moment in the opening cutscene of Lightfall, and as you traverse it you spread Light and Dark throughout it. It has some amazing visuals, combining the Darkness Architecture established in Vow of the Disciple, and introducing a kind of madness to it that makes it feel like a Part 2 to that story.
The encounters are fun, but simple, using much more straightforward mechanics. It was nice to take a break from having to memorize 20+ symbols, but most of the mechanics in RoN are not the blow-your-hair back creativity of past encounters. It sits cleanly in the middle of my favorite raids in Destiny, but I’m excited to run it more and more, and I’ll say this, the weapons across the board are excellent. I don’t think I’ve liked this many raid weapons in a single release. It makes up for the more lacking arsenal of the rest of the expansion features, and makes the crafted weapon chase all the more sweeter for me.
Season of Defiance
The last thing to touch on here is Season of Defiance, which is included with the Standard Edition of Lightfall this time around and much like previous Expansion Seasons of Destiny, is shorter and serves more as a companion to the expansion.
The story has already played through by the time of this publishing (which is, in fairness, pretty late into the season) excluding a potential end of season set up, and it served its purpose as an introspective and somber story. I’ll revisit the season likely in a future and more regular column but it is a weaker expansion season. It does have a pretty killer exotic mission that also suffers a bit from recent difficulty changes. The base secret mission itself though is excellent, and felt like the cherry on top after I had wrapped up most of my post-Lightfall activities.
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Closing Thoughts:
I still feel frustrated with the state of the Destiny community. I don’t think I’ve quite found my catharsis with the just weird vitriol and distrust against a game that wears its heart more openly than most live games out there. I certainly have my qualms with Lightfall, but the state of internet toxicity has bled into it to exasperate the feeling. I’m glad to have taken a break, revisited activities and parts of Lightfall, and found it very, very fun.
Lightfall feels like a big stepping stone, and overall more a half-step forward rather than the full step it could have been–even still, Loadouts, Strand, Root of Nightmares–it all helps Destiny refresh some things it really needed to. There is still more change that needs to happen, and the wonkiness can certainly be felt here, but I’m still happy to log in every week and see what comes next.
This game was reviewed on a PlayStation 5 system with a retail copy of the title purchased by the reviewer.
Alex O’Neill is joined by Raccoon City Radio Cohost Andrew Taylor to discuss their thoughts and feelings on Resident Evil 4 Remake.
1:11:10 – Spoiler Conversation Begins
1:37:56 – Spoiler Conversation Ends (Still some boss video playing though!)
Audio Version:
MP3
RSS
Apple Podcasts
Spotify
Reviewer’s Thoughts:
Andrew and I well discuss it in the video here, but what makes a 10 a 10? Especially for a game that, in its time, was well considered to be a 10. Well I had some issues with the original Resident Evil 4, coming to it a few years later with the Wii release, but this Remake reimagined the game into a non-stop thrill ride that I just absolutely adored. My experience playing on Hardcore for a first run through felt like a tense, unending battle for my life and survival, and I loved every second of it. Even when I was pushed against a wall and died multiple times on any given fight, the dynamic nature of the encounter design in RE4 kept every run a little different, equally as exciting, and super rewarding to finally beat.
The game certainly isn’t for the feint of heart, but every added fight, room, encounter, and mixup for returning players I found to be a treat, and even as a standalone sequel to 2019’s Resident Evil 2, this is one masterfully crafted successor.
This game was reviewed on a PlayStation 5 system with a retail copy of the title purchased by the reviewer.
The Legend of Heroes: Trails to Azure is the latest release from NIS America that exists in that weird space of essentially being a “Part II” game. Playing Trails from Zero, which finally made its way West last September, is a must. Keep that in mind because some of the major points of this game hinge on having played the first, and so this review will necessarily touch on some of those plot points.
As the second half of the so-called “The Crossbell Arc” in the Trails series, Azure takes place two months after the ending of Zero, and picks up where the four core characters left off, in the The Special Support Section, or SSS. Lloyd, the charming and heroic leader, is closing up loose ends from the cult that tore through the city of Crossbell the previous year. His cohorts have been busy as well. Elie is tending to the political tensions, Randy is training up new recruits for those lost from the incident, and Tio is abroad with intent to return in a few weeks. Two returning characters, Noel and Wazy, join the SSS permanently in the meantime.
Much of the groundwork is laid out in all previous Trails titles, if you’ve played one, you tend to know how the game is going to play out. Each major chapter, your characters get support requests that act as the major quests in the game, with the freedom to explore Crossbell City and the surrounding area to complete those quests. Trails to Azure, like other Trails sequels, has your characters starting at level 50, with kitted out orbments and magic attacks all set up already, with only more and more to unlock as the game goes on. It furthers it as a “Part 2” style game, and thankfully saves a lot of the time spent on introducing mechanics and quests, how to turn in quests, and all of the systems from the first game by just introducing them all in the first couple hours.
I’ve always appreciated how Trails approaches its sequels; it doesn’t waste much time assuming you’re just skipping the first Crossbell game and jumping into this, because that would be insanity. Instead it warmly eases you back into the world of Crossbell, there are characters to check in with, old friends and faces to see, and in this case, new members of the party to introduce them. Above all else, Azure and Zero have made Crossbell one of the most interesting locations in this world.
The geo-political landscape of the continent is the heart of the story in Trails to Azure. Crossbell is stuck right between two huge countries, The Empire and The Republic, and they both are vying for territory in Crossbell, both on the surface, with political pressure and lobbying, but also in the seedy underbelly of Crossbell. The SSS is always acting in the best interests of the people of the city, with the first major event that happens in the story being a massive and tense trade conference between all the major countries of the continent, and takes place within Crossbell. It helps set the stage for all these political tensions, and these moments of interconnectivity and realism between the different locales in the Legend of Heroes world is maybe my favorite part about them.
On the surface, it may not seem interesting to invest yourself in the political climate of this world, but Trails always paints it from the perspective of its lead characters. Most of the SSS are from Crossbell, and of course have a vested stake in its politics. You see how the tension of the past has trickled down to normal citizens through the core characters, their relationships, and the people they’ve lost. When the new mayor declares independence for Crossbell, against the wishes of the Empire and the Republic, it sets the stage for the big drama of the story to happen. It feels like a big moment because it’s been built to, not only within this game, but in Trails from Zero before it.
Without getting too in the weeds with spoilers, I’ll say that there is definitely a tonal shift from the down-to-earth storytelling of moment to moment questing, and then the big, over the top, larger than life villains and plots that come into play later in the story. There isn’t a perfect transition here, with characters having reveals of being some bigger player in the world all along, or turning coat into a villain, which sometimes feels more in service of the plot than the characters themselves. What I loved most about Trails from Zero was its focus; it had the four main characters and it developed their relationships really well, both individually, and as a team. With two new members of the SSS, I was hoping Noel and Wazy would get the same treatment, but I don’t think they do. They have reveals and moments, but it feels more beholden to the extremely over the top antics of the villains and their secret plot. Wazy barely gets any time to actually develop, and it made both him and Noel feel more like side-characters that just happened to be party members rather than true new recruits to the team.
This is a bit of an issue with the Trails series as a whole, where magic and history play a huge role in the stories taking place across the continent, but it faces a good amount of friction with the much more grounded storytelling that happens before things hit the fan. Most of your time you’re just helping people fight monsters, or find lost family members, but now all of the sudden there are ancient magical runes throughout the citystate and super-monsters appearing all over the place. The two don’t bridge to one another as well as I’d like, and while I think the characters are also exasperated by this, I don’t think it lends itself to as strong an overall story.
Still, the human heart of it all is grounded by KeA, a character the SSS saved in Trails from Zero, and usually little kid characters you want/have to protect are hit or miss with me, but I think KeA is fantastic. She is super lovable, has great interactions with all the party members, and feels like a good emotional anchor for the storytelling, even if the villains are much less interesting.
Trails isn’t just its big story though, the little stories are just as critical to enjoying the experience. I went out of my way to play this like the old school RPG it is, and tried to talk to every ancillary character whenever I could. There are several “Hidden Requests” throughout the chapters of the game that make up the bulk of the optional content in Trails to Azure, and they’re some of the best parts of the story. Many of them just flesh out characters or parts of the world that are more in the periphery, but what I loved and appreciated was how doing these optional objectives would change or enhance the dialogue that happens along the main story. So much optional dialogue opens up by just talking to key characters after important events happen. This goes as far as an optional series of quests that helps the main characters solve the mystery before it is revealed as part of the main story, changing the dialogue in a pivotal cutscene. In the grand scheme of things, this is pretty small, but Trails to Azure respects the player’s investment; if you spend time learning all the secrets of Crossbell, you’re absolutely rewarded for it. This is a lot harder to do with big budget modern RPGs, and seeing what feels like a “small game” achieve this so well is precisely what goes to make the Trails games so special.
Another personal favorite “side story” so to speak are the Chest Messages. Both the Crossbell games and the three Trails games before it feature funny little messages hidden in treasure chests that you can read in empty chests after you’ve opened them. These range from terrible puns, to meta humor on the storytelling, to even a whole mini-story told through 61 separate chest messages you have to piece together. Moreover, toward the end of the game, they become a message from the fan-translation team, The Geofront, that helped make the original translations for these games and were brought on to ratify that translation for the official western release of Zero & Azure. It’s a wholesome thank you to the fans and to Falcom that made this happen, since these games have been missing English releases for over 10 years, and even if you don’t know the circumstances of how these games finally got translated, for the fans that do and have been waiting, it feels like a little love letter to them.
On the actual mechanical side of things, Trails to Azure introduces a new type of Quartz, which are the equippable items that let you cast magic, called Master Quartz. These are huge passive buffs that can help fill in the gaps in a character’s repertoire and also help them specialize a bit more when it comes to combat. Turns out, this is the first Trails game to introduce them, as Master Quartz are present in some of the future titles, and as a system it makes a huge difference in combat.
Having passive buffs, in addition to just way more flexibility to the combat, since you start at a pretty high level, led me to understanding and getting much more invested in combat. To me, this will always be the weakest part about Trails, considering there are just so many status effects, and often the challenge of combat is just crowd control before you get overwhelmed. I don’t love and will never love entering a normal mob combat with six enemies and they all go before my team and just wipe me before I even get a chance to attack, and that still happens in this game, but you’re also given a lot more tools to combat that.
Giving a character a passive evasion buff, giving them all armor and accessories with evasion buffs, and casting spells that make them more evasive, can turn an ally into an “evasion tank”, where they are pulling all the enemy attention away while also being basically untouchable. You can then spec other characters into spellcasting, allowing one member of the party to pull aggro, and the rest of the party to do damage from range. The different quartz and orbment options allow for something like this a lot earlier on in the game, but this is just one example of a build you can make, just a very effective one. There is a lot more experimentation available to you, but also because the game kind of opens up at the end, you’re free to power yourself up a ton before some of the final challenges, and I really appreciate this. Most Trails games lock you into the story at a point, but here you can get better gear at any point through the final dungeon, so if you’re struggling you have plenty of options available to you.
Closing Thoughts:
Trails to Azure is a great sendoff to the Crossbell arc. It’s wonderful to finally see these games get translated and officially brought to the West, as the missing middle piece to The Legend of Heroes: Trails series. The overarching “big bads” are not great, and there isn’t a seamless jump from the down-to-earth plot into the more anime, over the top finale, but it’s still a fun time because the characters provide the heart of it. If you’ve never jumped into the series before, I think Trails from Zero and Trails to Azure are a great, consumable, and much more approachable mini-arc to start the series with, and I don’t think you’ll leave disappointed.
This game was reviewed on a PlayStation 5 system with a review code provided by The Publisher.
Welcome back Guardians! It’s another month, and we are on the precipice for what may be Bungie’s biggest expansion to Destiny 2 ever, at least on a mechanical and story level. I’ve had a lot of great conversations about the state of Destiny 2 with Mike Burgess on our D2 Podcast HELM to Tower, which if you’re curious you can see here (and on podcast services). The feeling is, if you want to get in on Destiny before this 10-year story arc comes to its full conclusion next year, there is no better time than with Lightfall.
For this rendition of my still-to-be-named Column, I want to talk about some of the things you may want to do before Lightfall launches, starting with the more casual activities and progressing to the more hardcore or resource-heavy preparation. I also want to talk about what you should be doing on Day 1 of Lightfall, where you’ll want to start and hopefully help with some priorities to chase. So let’s get to it!
Getting Ready For LightfallThe day this goes up we should be just under a week away from the servers of Destiny 2 going offline for the 24-hour downtime before Lightfall. That’s Monday, Feb. 27th at 10am Pacific Time. There is certainly a ton of over-preparing you can do, if you’d like, so like I mentioned before I’ll start with some of the more general things you may want to do, and then escalate up to things that newer players need not worry over.
Missing Weapons
So “Weapon Crafting” got it’s big introduction when Witch Queen came out, and while some hate the system, some (me) love it, and I want to universally shout-out at least one gun from each of the last four seasons, that may not be easily accessible anymore after Lightfall launches and these seasonal weapons are sunset. Bungie has updated D2 so you can buy one piece of each gun’s pattern every day at respective vendors, as opposed to one a week, which will require you run some of the activities from corresponding seasons. But with the time left, if you’re reading this when it comes out, you still have time to buy out at least one crafting pattern for each season, so here are four guns I recommend getting. You don’t have to craft them now, but you can get the patterns and worry about that later by just dismantling five red border rolls!
Here are the four I’d consider must haves:
Sweet Sorrow is from Season of the Risen, and it’s one of my all time favorite add-clearers in the game.Season of the Haunted has a few goodies, but Calus Mini-Tool is considered one of the best add-clearing weapons in the game. It blends perfectly with Solar 3.0Arguably there aren’t many great weapons from Season of the Plunder, but I really do love Blood Feud. It’s a beast with the updated Stasis fragments and is so fun to overflow the magazine of.While everyone else is going to tell you to get the IKELOS SMG from Season of the Seraph, I wouldn’t be a proud member of the Glaive Gang if I didn’t vouch for this Glaive. Get it!Keep in mind, gaining the ability to “buy” these red borders and earn progress toward each pattern will require you to play or have played each respective season, but if you’re trying to get stuff before Lightfall, these are the weapons I’d consider worth it.
Bounty Prep
One of the most quintessential “Destiny 2 Prepper” activities is going to destinations, grabbing and completing bounties from them, and then hoarding them in your quest tab to redeem after the expansion releases. This is absolutely not necessary, in fact, I fettered on putting it this high on the list so as to avoid giving any newer player the fear of having to do tedious bullshit before an expansion… but, here is my thought on it: it’s tradition!
I know it’s kind of silly, and all bounty prep will get you is a bunch of experience points when you redeem them after you’re able to level up again, giving you just a bit of a head start on unlocking Artifact Mod s or items in the season pass. It’s non-essential, absolutely, but I know plenty of newer players that have probably never even done a weekly bounty before. To me, this is the same as wrapping the Christmas presents and putting them under the tree at night. It gives me both dopamine and the warm fuzzies of having something to unwrap upon the New Expansion.
Weekly bounties, which take maybe 10-20 minutes to complete on each destination, reward thousands and thousands of experience points each, and I say if you’ve never done it before, head over to Europa, The Cosmodrome, and The Dreaming City and grab the weekly bounties to save from those locations. The more seasoned players will likely grab 60 full bounties for each of their three characters, which I don’t even do since I really only play Warlock, but it’s low effort, and if you’re like me and just want to play some Destiny to ward off the lack of sleep the anticipation is giving you, I think it’s a totally fine thing to spend your time doing.
If you’re looking for specifics, here are the exact bounties you want to keep (not including Clan bounties):
- Two weekly bounties from The Cosmodrome
- Four weekly bounties from the Moon, two from Eris Morn, and two from The Lectern.
- There are seven potential weekly bounties you can get from the Dreaming City, but unfortunately you’ll only be able to get two at this point to save. If you’ve been doing Ascendent Challenges each week for the last five weeks, you can have a total of six Ascendent Challenge weekly bounties, and one additional one for The Blind Well.
- There are four potential weekly bounties you can get from Europa, but like the Dreaming City, you’ll only have access to two if you hadn’t gotten some before this week.
- This leaves you with 52 quest slots reasonably available, assuming you have no major quests left to complete. I’d suggest filling these slots with seven daily bounties from Zavala, The Gunsmith, Shax, and The Drifter, making sure to avoid repeatable bounties and only grab daily bounties (these are worth more XP). Don’t get more than seven each because redeeming more can cause problems next season. The remaining 24 bounty slots you can fill with daily bounties from Devrim on the EDZ, Shaw Han in The Cosmodrome, Failsafe on Nessus, or Fynch in Savathun’s Throne World.
- The website destinyrecipes.com has dedicated itself to helping you pick out the best bounties and also give you a check up on readiness if you’re a more hardcore player.
I’ll go over when exactly you’ll want to redeem these bounties in the Lightfall Day 1 Gameplan section, but if you want to see all the bounties I’ve prepared, see my accompanying video for this column below!
The Materials Grind
This is where mileage is going to vary quite a bit. I think if you’re pretty new to Destiny, the toughest thing to keep up with is the amount of materials there are and how/where to get them. Luckily, a ton of materials are just getting deleted come Lightfall, streamlining the systems we have now to hopefully be much clearer. Here is what you’ll want to prepare yourself with:
- Enhancement cores – these sometimes drop from deleting legendary weapons, and you need them to masterwork weapons. The only way to consistently get these is to play, and save them up.
- Enhancement prisms – these are needed to masterwork armor, and I definitely don’t see these lasting many more seasons. You can get them from Nightfalls, and are a grind to get.
- Ascendent Shards – probably the most valuable material in Destiny, lovingly called Golf Balls. Only Master content will reward these, and you’re capped at 10. If you’re grinding Master and Grandmaster Nightfalls still, save as many of these as you can for topping off your armor and exotics.
- Ascendent Alloy – after Lightfall, this will be the only crafting material for weapons outside of just standard Glimmer and Resonant/Harmonic Alloy. I’ve been using LFG (looking for group) via the Destiny 2 Companion App to find teams to run Master Wellspring, which are pretty quick and reward these regularly. Hopefully there will be new ways to get them in Lightfall. The only other material worth mentioning are Upgrade Modules, but luckily you’ll get plenty of those just from playing Lightfall itself, so let’s cover that next!
Lightfall Day 1 GameplanBoth the Lightfall expansion and its accompanying season, Season of Defiance, will go live at 10am PT on Feb. 28th, and you’ll be able to watch both myself and Mike Burgess, along with our Resident D2 Titan Main Ren team up to play the entire campaign in an all-day stream right when it goes live on Irrational Passions’ official Twitch Channel!
But as for what you need to know, there are some things I want to go over since a lot of folks may have missed the Legendary Campaign with Witch Queen.
Play The Legendary Campaign
You have the choice of playing standard campaign and Legendary, and I highly encourage everyone to play on Legendary, yes even the brand new or more casual players. You can jump down to the easier mode anytime, but let me line up the rewards you’ll get for beating the campaign on Legendary:
- A Full set of blue gear that is at the “Raid Ready” power level. This is not gear you keep, but can immediately infuse to get your character ready for endgame as soon as you finish the campaign. This was a new feature of Witch Queen, and it is fantastic. Right from the jump you’ll be able to feel pretty caught up with everything.
- An Exotic of Your Choice. When Witch Queen came out, two exotic armor pieces were added for each character class, one stasis and one not, and with Lightfall, it seems like the same will be true, only one will be Strand, and one will not be. Regardless of what you choose, we’ve been told that the armor will have high stats, and of course immediately unlock for that character.
- More of the new Strand subclass unlocked for your chosen character. I assume this means you’ll have both aspects and several fragments ready to go when you beat the campaign on Legendary, as opposed to potentially half that amount if you beat the campaign on standard difficulty. We still don’t really know what this means exactly, but consider it more icing on the cake.
- Double rewards every mission. With the way campaigns work post-Witch Queen, each mission has two to three “major encounters” that, upon completion, will drop a chest with high power gear to help you level as you play the campaign. On Legendary, there are two chests for every character, and they will have more loot and more upgrade modules, so you’ll be able to infuse and move on to the next challenge. On regular difficulty, you may need to take breaks to grind out some more gear to keep your level up.
Some visual aids for how Legendary rewards are given out.Some visual aids for how Legendary rewards are given out.Obviously with all these rewards, Bungie wants you to play on Legendary, but like I said, you’ll be able to break off and come back if you’re having trouble.
Legendary difficulty scales up with the number of fireteam members, so if you’re running with a group you’re getting the tankiest enemies and the biggest challenge. The campaign will always set you 10 Power Level below every mission, which seems to be how the Neomuna destination patrol difficulty will be set as well. If you’re nervous about it, try patrolling around Neomuna a bit to see how the challenge level treats you.
The only real moments to watch out for are those major encounters, where every member of the fireteam only has one revive token, just like Raids, and if someone is down for longer than 40 seconds, the whole team wipes. It’s certainly a challenge, but it feels fair, and you won’t have to worry about Champions.
Start Season of Defiance
Outside of the Legendary campaign, you want to make sure you start Season of Defiance, or Season 20, as soon as possible. Why? Because once you do, you’ll receive the Artifact for that Season, allowing you to pour your hard-saved experience points into it and unlock as many artifact perks and extra power levels as you can while working your way through the campaign.
If it’s anything like Season of the Risen, which launched alongside Witch Queen, after the first mission of Lightfall you should be able to play the first mission of Defiance. Wherever the vendor is in the H.E.L.M. (it sounds like it will be The War Table) you’ll most likely receive the artifact from them, and at that point it will be safe to cash in your bounties. Remember to leave two or three quest slots open so you’ll be able to start both the campaign and seasonal story. Also remember to redeem your bounties at a destination, not in orbit, so you get the maximum amount of XP.
Keep in mind this really only applies if you’re saving a ton of bounties, but you should try and start the season and get the artifact to receive those passive gains as you play the campaign.
Finish Unlocking the Strand Subclass
The only other thing I know I’ll be focusing on for that first big day is unlocking all the fragments for Strand. We’re still not 100% sure on how this will be given out to players, only that it should be a lot smoother than how Stasis was given out. Whatever new activities and the sort that unlock after Lightfall, we’ll all have to figure out and explore together, but getting Strand, whether it be through bounty-style quests or just purchasing those unlocks, you should make it a priority so you don’t have to worry about it later.
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That’s really all you need to know going into Lightfall. We’re just over a week away, and I am so excited. Stay tuned to this week’s upcoming H.E.L.M. to Tower for our final thoughts going into the expansion, come hangout with us on Twitch when Lightfall goes live, and most of all, have fun out there Guardian.
See you next month for my full Lightfall review after the raid launches on March 10th!
Join us on a trip to Nintendoland! Your monthly source for Nintendo News and games chat from IrrationalPassions.com! In this episode, We discuss Nintendo kicking off 2023 with a banger of a direct! From decide which of the announcements were Spicy or Sour as well as talk about games we’ve been playing like Fire Emblem Engage, Overwatch 2, & Metroid Prime Remastered!!Spotify
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Video Version on YoutubeFeel free to follow us or the guests on this episode on Twitter: Irrational Passions – @IrrationalPod – Mike Burgess – @MikeIP_ – Alex O’Neill – @Alfighter27 The music used in the episode was created by Bulby follow them to check out more of their work at these links below: Bulby – https://www.youtube.com/user/MrBulbamike // https://twitter.com/Bulbamike
Welcome fellow Guardians and non-Guardians alike, to my brand new monthly Destiny 2 column! I hope that this will serve as a month-to-month discussion on the goings-on of Destiny 2, and I hope to be able to produce a sort of “companion video” to each of these pieces to incorporate some other thoughts and submitted thoughts and feedback. I’m also going to work to make this pretty friendly to my fellow in-the-weeds Destiny 2 players and those that check in annually for the campaigns and expansions. Both are definitely valid player experiences, and both tend to run into different issues with the game that all still frequently come up in the D2 community conversations on a month to month basis. And hey, maybe if you’re one of those folks that is just curious about what’s going on in Destiny, this will draw you into some of the seasonal updates to the game, which are some of my favorite moments actually playing Destiny.
As a primer for my history with the game, I jumped in at Destiny: The Taken King, after playing the original beta and being turned off by what I felt was going to be a lack of content at launch. I’ve played every expansion since, but when D2: Beyond Light hit, which added the first new subclass in the game since Taken King, and also hit right near the front of this here Global Pandemic situation, it also was my gateway to playing through each seasonal story. It was a cocktail of the pandemic, Beyond Light, and also the release of the PS5 version of the game, which had much faster menus, loadtimes, and finally runs at 60hz on consoles, that got me addicted to Destiny but also invested in it for the RPG and MMO mechanics throughout.
Since playing much more frequently from December 2020 onward, I’ve collected seals, masterworked full sets of armor and weapons, grinded out materials, played master and grandmaster content, and I think truly gained respect for Destiny not just for the breadth of its content, but also for the depth of it. A lot of newer and more casual players don’t get to see a lot of that depth, so forgive me if I indulge a little too much talking about and incorporating it here.
I thought a good starting point, here just a month and a half away from the new Lightfall expansion, would be to talk about five great and exciting things happening in the game, and also the five biggest problems myself and the D2 community generally has with Destiny at the moment. We’ll start with the good, and then get to the bad!
The GoodWitch Queen Expansion As a Whole – I’m sure many folks that might be reading this have heard that the most recent D2 expansion was excellent. If you haven’t, well I’m happy to report it’s one of the best Destiny campaigns to date! There is a whole separate conversation to have about Sunsetting and the removal of D2’s first two campaigns, The Red War & Forsaken, but The Witch Queen felt like a return to that form in a lot of ways. Not only did it provide a ton of new weapons, armor, one of the best raids in the game, Vow of the Disciple, and a great campaign, it also began the reworks of D2’s original subclasses, and set the stage for Lightfall.
Tied up in all this was a new approach to difficulty, an aspect of the game that gets brought up a lot in frustration in the D2 community. The “Legendary Campaign” difficulty, reworked in the Witch Queen, left out a divisive part of D2’s endgame content, “Champions”, and instead set the player at 10 levels below all missions no matter what, giving a consistent and scaling challenge with the number of fireteam members. It was a great change, and both myself, Mike Burgess, and fellow D2 Guardian Ren actually streamed our full three-person playthrough of The Witch Queen Legendary when it launched last year!
With the addition of Hive Guardians, a new enemy type of Hive that actually use the same supers and abilities as you, the tension gets pushed to max, all without having to worry about limitations on your loadout because of Champions, which are something I’ll actually be talking about a little bit later.
It’s a great experience, maybe still not a great “entry-point” per sé, but now knowing that Shadowkeep will not be sunset, and will always serve as the starting point for entering players, there is at least a good escalation of quality were you to jump in now.
Weapon Crafting – Having the option to fully customize and max out a weapon is genuinely a great addition to Destiny. It feels sometimes odd in-game, but being able to work through a raid and craft your favorite weapon from it first after some weekly run with friends is a great loop to perfecting some of your favorite weapons in the game. With the huge step up to seasonal weapons just across the board, especially in the last year of D2, and having all of them be craftable, it’s easy to pick out favorites. I don’t know if I’ve loved an auto-rifle in D2 as much as I do Sweet Sorrow from Season of the Risen, but having that level 92 crafted roll of my design is an sign of a favorite for me now in D2.
It’s definitely a grind to get many of these, and casual players I can see just never grinding to craft something, just because it’s such a time investment. The system as it is has seen many refinements since its launch in Witch Queen, and still feels a lot like a “1.2” version of itself. The community wants easier ways to get materials and to level up crafted weapons, but in the same breath, having a “masterworked” crafted weapon with the new “enhanced perks”, typically just extending the effectiveness of some of your tools in combat, feels great. For long-term players it is really nice knowing there is a guaranteed path to your own personal “god-roll” or perfect perk set of a weapon.
Difficulty Changes from Season of the Seraph –So difficulty, as it always seems to be in games, is a controversial topic in the Destiny community. Many players feel a lot of the game’s activities are too easy, and much of the endgame, essentially hard mode activities, aren’t worth the reward. I definitely agree in some cases, and as what feels like a test, Bungie implemented some new difficulty modifiers in the general activity added in this most recent season. These “Heist Battlegrounds” have a modifier that always sets the player five levels below the enemy combatants, and while from the outside in that may seem pretty brutal, it turns into a pretty great balance in execution.
A lot of the general content in the game, whether they be strikes or some of the previous seasonal activities, are pretty easy to absolutely dominate with the ability-heavy gameplay D2 features right now. This five-level disadvantage goes a long way to keep you on your toes and make the moment to moment combat much more fun without going overboard. I’m excited to see more experimentation in this area, and this is a very recent change, to give some perspective.
Typically these modes feature special enemies called Champions, and the ramping difficulties just kind of have more Champions, but the approach was totally different here, and I think it bodes well for future updates to our current playlists. For reference, this is very similar to the modifier the Witch Queen campaign used, and it works here too.
Sheer Quantity of Loot –I think this is absolutely the thing any and all members of the community agree on right now, and that is the loot is good. Obviously in a loot-heavy game that kind of thing is important, and usually when it’s working its best, you don’t even notice it except for here or there, but with the changes made this year in Destiny, some of the rewards here are the huge draw to certain activities.
One of those big changes this year to weapons was crafting, certainly, but also the fact that we are getting either one raid or one dungeon each season of the year, we are getting both seasonal pools of great weapons to collect, but also endgame level gear to chase. Dungeons are a highlight, since you can run them as many times as you want and always get new drops. There have been some great additions to the weapons pool too, like new linear fusion rifles that fire in a burst, the addition of glaives (which I love), and of course the crafting aspect to raid weapons.
There are some wild weapons, from exotics to just common seasonal drops, and they’ve been much more memorable to me as a long time player of the game, tying new perks and traits to the seasons they come from. I just think above all else, this is a place D2 is in just a really great place.
New Subclass Reworks/Buildcrafting – Saving the best for last, the reworked subclasses have been an absolute lifesurge to Destiny 2 over the last year. It may be a lot harder to take in for newer players, but seeing the original three subclasses get the “subclass 3.0” treatment, where powers and abilities become much more customizable, has been a treat. The system launched with Stasis, so making and tooling certain builds around Stasis was already proven, and it’s telling how well all those systems work in general with how well they adapted to the new and improved Light subclasses.
This has led to Buildcrafting becoming a massive part of Destiny, and honestly it may be my favorite part of it. With new weapon types and new pieces of exotic armor, you can really elevate an “Arc Warlock” into the lord of thunder fantasy that you hear described from Destiny players. The right tuning and weapon choices can really lead to total domination of a battlefield, and when the three classes work in conjunction it really feels like magic. I’ve played a lot of Destiny 2, so big shake ups to the abilities, how quickly you can use them, and more over the potential of what they can do has deepened the game in a way that really connects with you.
This all on top of knowing that Lightfall is adding another new Subclass with Strand, I think there is a direct line of excitement for that from everyone playing and watching Destiny 2 right now.
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The BadDestiny is Still Impenetrable – I could write this whole article about this and there would certainly still be more to say, but I think it’s a good place to start with issues, and know that from this point forward, I will try and cover more specific and in-depth issues.
This is the obvious. Destiny has a really terrible onboarding system. Previous expansions, including the campaign that the original 2017 version of Destiny 2 launched with, “The Red War” have been removed from the game. That means you can’t actually jump into the D2 and start from the beginning, you’re kind of skipping the first two acts of a many-part story, and so the opening mission to the game is a re-imagined version of the Destiny 1 opening mission. It then drops you out into the world with really no good foundational explanation on what to do, what order to do things, how any of the global systems really work, or how to get yourself ready for any shape of endgame.
In a game I love, it’s something I can say with confidence is abysmal. Destiny 2 is complicated, just like any other MMO, and the onboarding is I’d say a lot worse than the competition. There is a new system coming in the year of Lightfall called “Guardian Ranks”, that seems to be some kind of quest-log equivalent that can maybe guide you along the path through parts of the game, but it may not be enough.
It’s a hard problem to solve, and right now the best answer anyone has come up with is, “find a friend who is really into Destiny and have them teach you,” and honestly, that is probably what I’d recommend too. Hopefully these posts may serve as my input.
The PvP Elephant in the Room –For a lot of the long-term D2 players PvP is the filler activity that’s supposed to be fun, and while I don’t necessarily count myself amongst the many, many PvP players and content creators in D2, I’d like to at least report on their feelings, because I’d be remiss not to. PvP is an integral pillar of Destiny, I honestly believe it, but it always feels like a commitment that is only half there. Any player wishing to do all the seasonal challenges, or weekly rewards, will have to play some amount of PvP a season. So if we have to engage with it anyway, we should talk about it.
One big aspect of frustration is the meta of winning PvP right now, which is more ability spam and passive play. There are the changes to Airborn gunplay, which used to be a fun almost Halo-like aspect of the gameplay, that has all but been removed because of a system rework to get ahead of the new Strand subclass. There could have been better communication about why the changes were happening, and it feels like a community-tested system, but hopefully positive changes are on the way.
The big thing to me are the lack of any maps. Both Gambit and Crucible need many, many more maps. Gambit only has four maps and you need to reset your Gambit rank twice a season to complete all challenges, and I’ll tell you, you’re gonna see a lot of those maps. The majority of the PvP maps are from Destiny 1 or D2 vanilla, with only one new option added since Witch Queen (along with one reprised map). The new map is called Disjunction, set in the swamps of Savathun’s throne world, and its large size exacerbates some of the mechanical problems of PvP. I really like the map, but it has turned most of the community against it. I think introducing new places for firefights should be absolute priority #1 for both modes.
I’ll also just mention briefly, there are still a lot of matchmaking issues, Skill Based Matching Making, poor connections, and server stability/crashes on top of everything mentioned, but I do feel this will be addressed, one by one.
The Playlist Grinds – On top of the PvP grind having all the player-based problems listed above, there is also just the overall fatigue of the playlist grinds in general. While I feel like I covered the four-map issue with Gambit, there are also no real rewards for me worth chasing in that mode. It sees one new weapon a season, and while the Strike and PvP playlists have gotten some hit weapons, along with “endgame” modes for each, Gambit has seen neither of these things.
Even still, there are maybe two or so rewards across the three playlists worth chasing, and it is not enough. Strikes face the problem of being beyond easy to veteran players and just incomprehensible to new players, since some Strikes are so old they feature the now dead Hunter Vanguard Cayde-6. They need some sort of refresh to feel modern, beyond just adding the battlegrounds from last year’s seasonal content, which further makes Strikes incomprehensible by the way.
All these playlists need more love, and the only “high-difficulty” option between the three are Grandmaster Nightfalls for Strikes, which leads us to the next big issue…
Champions/Champion Mods – PREFACE: So on Wednesday the 18th of last week Bungie put out a huge article outlining how it’s changing a lot of these issues in the game come Lightfall, so take this all as a reflection of the game in its current state.
I’m going to try a quick, comprehensive history on what these enemies are, for reference. Starting with the Shadowkeep expansion, we get these seasonal items called “artifacts” that all feature a five-by-five grid of season-limited mods for your armor slots that are mandatory for all endgame activities. At least, some of them, typically the first row and easiest to unlock. Why? To be effective in combat against special enemies called champions. There are three types, with a random two per-enemy race in the game. Unstoppable champions, which require Unstoppable Mods, Overload champions that require Overload Mods, and Barrier champions that, well, you get the point.
These mods will shift season to season, like Unstoppable mods requiring you to use a hand cannon one season, and then pulse rifles the next season. While activities like Raids and Master Dungeons aren’t going to suddenly rotate the enemy race, different Strikes will serve as the end-game difficulty Nightfalls each season.
It may seem like a good idea at first to shift the meta to different weapon families each season, but instead creates a frustrating limitation for what you can take with you into endgame activities. The freedom and modular nature of the endgame build crafting goes out the window in many cases when your weapons and armor are beholden to champion mods. It often also limits which subclasses you can take with you.
It bleeds into a different problem which is that Grandmaster Nightfalls and Master Raids, the two major activities that feature Champions, just aren’t really that enjoyable. In addition to being arbitrarily harder by pumping up enemy health or, in the case of Grandmaster Nightfalls, setting you 25 levels below the enemies, most of the ‘added challenge’ is just ‘more champions’. Oh this room had two Overload champions before, now it has eight, and they’re harder to stun, have more health, and if you don’t have an SMG you can kiss this completion goodbye.
The adept weapons you can receive from these activities can sometimes feel like great rewards and sometimes it just doesn’t feel worth it at all. The strike weapons in particular do not receive the love that seasonal and raid loot pools do, and it makes the chase just hard to be worth it. That, and a comparatively too-tall difficulty to something like Legendary Campaign make GM Nightfalls lose their appeal after a few seasons.
The Seasonal Model/Mechanics – All of what I talked about with GMs and Master Raids is always exacerbated by this very topic. I don’t think this specific aspect of the game gets to me as much more long-term players, but for anyone playing the game for a few years this will eventually become a sticking point.
Every season you can pretty much always expect a seasonal artifact with the new “meta-defining” mods in the fifth column, things like “Weakened Clear” from the current season, which allow grenade launchers to apply a stackable weaken on just about any boss or enemy. While fun for this season, it isn’t always as much of a hit as Weakened Clear, and it’s accompanied by some seasonal vendor, that you’ll get a three-by-eight grid of upgrades with, and they’ll all be time-gated by the first six to eight weeks of seasonal story updates. On the story front, it’s slow paced, with it turning out to be more of a diceroll each season on what the missions that will equate to story missions will look like. Regardless, you’ll be running at least one three to six man seasonal activity every time, and it’ll usually amount to the equivalent of a strike with champions.
Every season features the same artifact layoutIt might feel very complex from the outside in, or even petty, since it can amount to a lot of overall content season to season, especially compared to other games with a similar model. I think the core of the problem is how similar it all feels from season to season. You can almost predict what some of the mods and activities will look like. The outlier and shining star of the last year of Destiny has been the commitment to one new dungeon or one new raid each season, which have been generally excellent and fun-to-grind activities, just with the caveat of questionable or unexciting rewards in some cases.
The seasons, while generally a vehicle for a story that I am personally very invested in, need a mixup in some way, just to get away from the two straight years of a formula. The formula works, but has become too much of a slog for anyone playing the game longer than a couple of seasons.
This has definitely been the #1 feeling in the community, and one I ultimately agree with, though I haven’t found myself in such a negative place about it. It’s something that has been commented on and we’ll see some changes to at some point in the coming year, and I am excited to see a mixup to the formula as we close in on the the end of this “Saga” of Destiny.
___________So that’s it, those are the big burning topics, from my perspective and from what I have been able to gather from the D2 Community! I tried to range them from easiest to understand to maybe the hardest to understand, and keep it general pretty critical, as opposed to overly negative. There is another whole conversation to have about the negativity in the community and how that tends to bring great parts of the game down, but I want to stay away from that until we see how the reaction to Lightfall goes, and there are plenty of far more interesting things to talk about that lean into the parts of Destiny that I absolutely love.
I promise future pieces won’t be near as long as this one, but thank you for reading, and I’ll see you next month Guardians!
There are few things in this world as cool as giant robots, especially those that can combine to make even bigger robots. Zephyr Workshop released the original AEGIS – Combining Robot Strategy Game back in 2018, and today, the studio will be coming to Kickstarter for the second edition of the title, AEGIS- 2nd Ignition! I had a chance to take a look at a prototype of this updated edition and get a number of games in and came away excited to play more, and while it offers an excellent strategy tabletop experience, it isn’t without its blemishes.
AEGIS -2nd Ignition drops 1-4 players on a hex-grid battlefield with small forces of anime-inspired mecha. Your goal? Be the last pilot standing. You start by composing your team from either pre-made armies, each with a commander mech with special abilities, or by selecting individual units from a pool of 120 different mechs (or more if you have the original edition, which is fully backward compatible!) and pitting custom teams against one another for more strategic gameplay. Once you have your teams set up, you can take advantage of the returning team or free for all skirmish modes or try out the new capture-and-hold Starpoint mode. For the solo boardgame player, there is also a new solo Boss mode that will pit your team against a superpowered game-controlled boss bot too!
A typical game of AEGIS takes course over rounds where the players each take turns activating their mechs, attacking their opponents, and trying to the last pilot standing. Games begin with each player positioning the five basic mech units they’ve selected (either from premade teams or individually selected) around their starting area. AEGIS gets its name from the five classes of mechs that compose your forces, and choosing a good balance will be key to succeeding. The classes include A for Assault types, E for the Evasive types, G for Guard, I for Intel, and S for Support, with each geared for specific situations; E-types tend to fly, allowing them to get around the arena quickly and bypass barriers, but they can’t take many hits before going down while Guard types hunker down in place and can provide cover fight, as examples. On your turn, you generate energy by counting the number of charges each active mech contributes, with this energy pool being pulled from any time a unit of yours moves or attacks.
A mech’s available actions, from movement to combat options, are all presented on their individual card. Attacks come in a wide variety of types, letting you heal friendly units or debuff enemies to all sorts of offense options. Each option will have unique properties that dictate the range the attack can hit, the damage it does, what you have to roll to succeed, and any special effects it may impart. The player whose turn it is goes one-by-one through their units, moving and attacking with them until all units have acted or that player no longer has enough energy left in their pool to act before the turn passes to the next player. This cadence is slightly different in 2nd Ignition’s new Starpoint mode, where control changes after each individual unit is used, but more of the new mode later.
The added bit of randomness and chance, thanks to the dice rolls, maybe a put-off to some, as it can be frustrating when a well-thought-out strategy can be destroyed thanks to a poor dice roll, but I find it to be on the contrary. I lived for the moments I was sure I was going to lose a unit only to be saved by the grace of the dice, and there were times when those roles reversed, and I got screwed out of a win, but what I appreciate is that added feeling of there always being a chance. And if good mecha anime has taught me anything, there is always a chance.
Skirmish matches conclude when either a player no longer has any units left on the field, they no longer have a unit that can deal damage, or they don’t have units that can produce a minimum of five energy at the start of a round.
Perhaps the biggest and coolest selling point of AEGIS comes from taking those smaller mechs and mashing them together to form even more powerful super robots! By expending a large amount of energy in one go, you can take two smaller units that are adjacent to one another and create a stronger one that can utilize the strengths of the mechs that it resulted from. This combining aspect not only gives you tougher bots with all new abilities but combining mechs will remove any damage any of them had received previously and allows your new super-mech to do a free action that will auto-succeed right away. This can turn the tide of a game, but as a trade-off, you will be generating less energy on each of your turns, which is required to do everything from moving to attacking. And that is to say nothing of the fact that you’d have one less body of the field.
The second release also adds the point capture Starpoint mode. Instead of destroying the enemy team, your goal is to take various points spread across the map and hold them for a turn, which will reduce every opponent’s stock of 10 Star points. When the first person drops to zero points, it will trigger the final round, giving each player, including the person whose points are zero, one final turn to try and capture as many points as possible while keeping your total as high as possible you can. Besides the focus on points, the biggest change with Starpoint is that when a mech is destroyed, it will respawn at the start of the next round in your home base. If a mech is destroyed in any other mode, it’s gone for the rest of the game.
I took the game to my local barcade’s tabletop night, and playing with four players made for a great and tense time. It took some time for everyone to grasp all the modifiers (there are A LOT of modifiers) on their unit’s attacks and what they did, but after a few turns, things began running smoother, and turns took less and less time leading to a better overall experience. There were numerous tense moments as we all held our breaths to see the result of a dice roll or times when a bunch of us would grimace after a well place area of effect attack hit all of us.
I remember vividly how I made a critical mistake in one match by utilizing one of my unit’s attacks that would shove a couple of my opponent’s units off the board. I got to eager with my plan, so I skipped the movement phase, and without adjusting my unit’s position first, my own attack caused my unit to be pushed off the board and into oblivion as well. It would go on to cost me the game a few rounds later, but damn if it didn’t feel good in the moment.
Most of my time with the prototype was spent between playing free for all skirmishes and the brand-new Starpoint mode, and I came away preferring the skirmish option. I enjoyed the added risk of the permadeath and how it added an elevated sense of risk to every encounter and made dice rolls feel more important. I couldn’t just fall back on the peace of mind knowing that my favorite mech would be back up with full health at the start of the next round. It made each unit on the field feel more valuable.
The biggest turn-off for me with the Starpoint mode was the end game, specifically the “final round” trigger that happens the moment someone reaches zero points. Instead of either ending the game completely and awarding victory to whoever has the most points at that moment or playing until someone is the last one standing, all players have a full extra round in which to act. More often than not, it turned into a game where whoever had triggered the final round could simply decide who they wanted to win the game, targeting or hindering the other players. I felt like it gave too much power to the player who had triggered the end game, turning them almost into an agent of chaos, letting them, in some cases, decide with their actions who would go on to win the game. It would turn a three-person game quickly into a 2v1 situation or even a 3v1 in a four-person match if you were on top.
My biggest overall gripe with AEGIS – 2nd Ignition has nothing to do with the gameplay itself but with how the box is organized, specifically the standees. With 120 unique mechs, each with their own cardboard standee representation, digging through and finding the specific mechs for the premade teams can take quite a while, especially with more than two players, as you have to pick out the mechs’ cards in addition to their figure. The standees themselves lack an indication of what class the mech is, leading you to scour through the pile to try and find the specific unit whose card you have to match them to for your arm. Even adding a colored border to the standee the coordinates to that class would greatly help speed up the process. The whole process makes me want to just keep every piece of a pre-made team together in a ziplock and never hassle with drafting or creating a custom team, just to make bringing this game to the table easier. As it stands, until I come up with a better organization system, I know that the time it takes to set up will reduce how often I want to play the game, which is a shame.
I thoroughly enjoyed my short time with AEGIS – 2nd Ignition, with its focus on super robots and strategy mixed with elements of chance. With games that can easily take less than an hour to complete (especially once you have a solid grasp on the attack modifiers and abilities), I could easily see myself getting a match in during my lunch period (if I have the teams all sorted out ahead of time that is). Sending units that were on death’s door together to combine to a fresh new super robot and turn the tide of an encounter always left me with the feeling that I was playing a scene from some epic mecha anime that I would have grown up with. It left me wanting to play more.
AEGIS – 2nd Ignition launches today on Kickstarter, with tiers that include this latest release and the much-requested reprint of the original version, optimized and streamlined for easier readability and clarity, similar to the new 2nd Ignition units! Fans of strategy tabletop games and super robots should give this a look, and if you are still unsure, you can try out digital versions of AEGIS on both Tabletop Simulator and coming soon on Screentop.gg!
Join us on a trip to Nintendoland! Your monthly source for Nintendo News and games chat from IrrationalPassions.com!
In this episode, We have our final episode of the year! We chat about Pokemon Scarlet/Violet, Mario + Rabbids, and Ash leaving the Pokemon anime?? We also look back and pick out our Top 10 Switch Games of the year!
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Feel free to follow us or the guests on this episode on Twitter: Irrational Passions – @IrrationalPod – Mike Burgess – @MikeIP_ – Alex O’Neill – @Alfighter27The music used in the episode was created by Bulby follow them to check out more of their work at these links below: Bulby – https://www.youtube.com/user/MrBulbamike // https://twitter.com/Bulbamike
Review Discussions are interview-style discussions hoping to discuss specific aspects of the game in question that may or may not be included in the written review. In some cases, the discussion will be the only critical conversation we put out for a game, in others it may complement a review.
Jarrett & Alex sit down to get into the successes and performance issues of Shovel Knight Dig, the rouge-like spin off the the beloved 2014 release with the heart of the Genesis in it.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ukCjLkESoB4&ab_channel=IrrationalPassionsAlex’s Thoughts:
So I will say, I’ve gotten to play more Shovel Knight Dig, a lot more since chatting with Jarrett, and the performance issues do tend to creep up in more unfortunate places than I’d like. It put just. a slight damper on my feelings toward the end, but ending still very positively.
Shovel Knight Dig is one of those “I didn’t know I wanted it”, combing a lot of what I thought was interesting about a game like Downwell, but adding and mixing its own style, taking way more of those touchstone Shovel Knight ideas and smartly incorporated them into a totally different kind of game.
Once I had dug deeper into the secrets, that’s where I really fell in love. The optional challenges, unlocks, abilities, and many secret rooms are all worth stumbling into, even if there is some brutal moments, frustration, or performance issues. It’s a completely addicting rogue like, but one that doesn’t feel the need to overstay itself, and has just enough to dig through and unlock.
Review Discussions are interview-style discussions hoping to discuss specific aspects of the game in question that may or may not be included in the written review. In some cases, the discussion will be the only critical conversation we put out for a game, in others it may complement a review.
**As stated at the beginning, there are some audio issues with this video, and we do apologize. Also, there will be spoilers later on in the conversation.
Review Discussions are interview-style discussions hoping to discuss specific aspects of the game in question that may or may not be included in the written review. In some cases, the discussion will be the only critical conversation we put out for a game, in others it may complement a review.
God of War Ragnarök is the highly anticipated sequel to critically acclaimed God of War (2018) and the legacy of Sony Santa Monica is on full display. Alex sits down with Kinda Funny’s own Barrett Courtney to discuss the pros, cons, and eventually spoilers of Ragnarök’s biggest and best moments.
Timestamps:
02:19 – Intro
35:15 – Mild or early game spoiler discussions
54:40 – Full Spoilers ahead
Alex’s Thoughts:
It’s a big bummer that our discussion got plagued by audio issues, but I do think most of what I wanted to say I get across. Mostly. One thing we didn’t cover too much was combat, which I really loved in this game. There is a specific ability in both weapons’ skill trees for Kratos, one that lets you burn a combo-like meter to power up the elements of you weapons. It’s kind of a non-obvious, certainly optional skill that I just loved using, and as I got deeper into the game, I found a full armor set that specifically leaned into using that skill.
Much of the customization and depth of the combat felt like that; like I had options and if I really liked a specific skillset, I could completely build myself around it, with different shields, different runic attacks all contributing to a streamlined depth for what was laid out before. I found everything so much easier to understand and build around, just a really rich freedom.
This was the carrot on top for a story that really justified me coming around on God of War as a whole, which is a feat let me tell you. I know since we recorded our conversation there has been a lot of dialogue around Ragnarök being chatty, and too slow, but I think it really doesn’t step too far away from God of War 2018. There is a clear intention for the slow burn and slow approach, playing Ragnarök is like watching two full seasons of an HBO show. It needs to be slow sometimes and it absolutely electrifies the moments that speed things up. It may not work for everyone, but the nuance Ragnarök brought to the structure worked for me completely.
Follow Barrett on Twitter – https://twitter.com/sadboybarrett
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Played by the reviewer predominantly in performance mode on a PlayStation 5 Digital Console with a copy purchased by the reviewer.
Join us on a trip to Nintendoland! Your monthly source for Nintendo News and games chat from IrrationalPassions.com! In this episode, October comes late as we look back at what a weird month it was. From voice actor debacles with Bayonetta 3 to a lot of unexpected games that grabbed our attention! We talk…
In Lonesome Village community is key. This particular one, the Ubhora village was once thriving and happy, but is now empty, victim of a cult devoted to an ancient god who kidnaps and locks up every villager in the ancient Ubhoran tower in the center of town. A coyote named Wes is the only thing…
Join us on a trip to Nintendoland! Your monthly source for Nintendo News and games chat from IrrationalPassions.com! In this episode, We finally got a new Nintendo Direct which shoveled a ton of announcements on us like Pikmin 4, Octopath Traveler II, and Zelda Tears of the Kingdom! Plus there are so many games…
Everyone has their own methods of defeating writer’s block. Some use drugs recreationally, some go outside and spend time in nature, and some do something completely different. TicToc Games’ Writer’s Block, is quite literally centered around it, but has a very unique approach to its depiction as a puzzle to be solved like a word…
Within the first ten minutes of Tinykin, I knew it would be a game I wanted to tell all my friends about and why they should play this excellent little platformer. From running through levels that make you feel like you’re in a scene from Honey, I Shrunk the Kids, to amassing an army of…
Join us on a trip to Nintendoland! Your monthly source for Nintendo News and games chat from IrrationalPassions.com! In this episode, There’s tons of news to talk about like the recent Splatoon & Pokemon directs, more allegations of harassment of former Nintendo contractors, and some more game releases. Plus Mike has been playing Live A…
Join us on a trip to Nintendoland! Your monthly source for Nintendo News and games chat from IrrationalPassions.com! In this episode, We talk about all the hubub around Nintendo sticking to Twitter to announce all their news like Bayonetta 3’s release date & Still no Mario Kart 8 DLC announcements. Plus Alex has played a…
Join us on a trip to Nintendoland! Your monthly source for Nintendo News and games chat from IrrationalPassions.com! In this episode, a lot of Nintendo-related news happened during June but not in its usual form. We discuss whether we need a summer direct anymore and we talk about a ton of games we’ve been playing…
After getting to try it a few short months ago at PAX, I could tell right away that Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder’s Revenge was something special. Little did I know then just how special this game would turn out to be. I won’t cut around the bushes, Shredder’s Revenge is exceptional in every way.…
Join us on a trip to Nintendoland! Your monthly source for Nintendo News and games chat from IrrationalPassions.com! In this episode, We are waiting with bated breath for the next Direct but that just lets us get in some juicy predictions beforehand! We also talk the latest Pokemon news, Splatoon 3, and Alex has finally…
I am going to save you a little time, in case you’re in a rush, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder’s Revenge from Tribute Games and Dotemu was hands-down my favorite game of PAX East 2022 and is one of my Top 10 Games of 2022 and you should play it. Now, if you have a…
Join us on a trip to Nintendoland! Your monthly source for Nintendo News and games chat from IrrationalPassions.com! In this episode, We ended up missing some recent news cause of our recording schedule so we ranked Smash Bros trailers instead! Spotify PocketCasts iTunes Direct Download Feel free to follow us or the guests…
It's time! FromSoftware's hotly anticipated, massively open, and hugely explorative Elden Ring is upon us. After spending some time with it, Alex finishing it twice, Scott about halfway through, we dive into our thoughts on Elden Ring.
Join us on a trip to Nintendoland! Your monthly source for Nintendo News and games chat from IrrationalPassions.com! In this episode, We have a lot of news and games to talk about! Including E3 2022 being canceled, New Pokemon games & Kirby & the Forgotten Land! Spotify PocketCasts iTunes Direct Download Video Version: Timestamps: 1:48…
Review Discussions are interview-style discussions hoping to discuss specific aspects of the game in question that may or may not be included in the written review. In some cases, the discussion will be the only critical conversation we put out for a game, in others it may complement a review. Tunic is finally here and…
I have always leaned more towards the sprite-based Fire Emblem entries than the 3D ones due to their wonderful sprite animations and personality, so when Dark Deity was first revealed I was instantly intrigued by this new indie title. I was disappointed when it was shown to be a PC-only title at the start, but…
Review Discussions are an interview-style discussion hoping to discuss specific aspects of the game in question that may or may not be included in the written review. In some cases, the discussion will be the only critical conversation we put out for a game, in others it may complement a review. The Witch Queen expansion…
I haven’t been shy about my love for Batterystaple Games action platformer roguelike 30XX. I gave it my Game of The Show and PAX East 2020 and sitting down and speaking with the games creator remains one of my favorite moments at Irrational Passions, so when I got a chance to take an advanced look…
Join us on a trip to Nintendoland! Your monthly source for Nintendo News and games chat from IrrationalPassions.com! In this episode, The first Nintendo Direct of 2022 is here and we have thoughts! Plus Mike has played a lot of Pokemon Legends Arceus! Spotify PocketCasts iTunes Direct Download Video Version: https://youtu.be/suNdqk6MmDU Feel free to…
Review Discussions are an interview-style discussion hoping to discuss specific aspects of the game in question that may or may not be included in the written review. In some cases, the discussion will be the only critical conversation we put out for a game, in others it may complement a review. For this review discussion,…
Its a new year! And so with it a new season of Patch Notes! Alex and Nabeshin sit down to discuss various topics across the video games space, their favorite games, or just whatever they want to talk about at the time.
Alex and Quin sit down to discuss the newest game from DrinkBox, Nobody Saves the World!
As per tradition, Alex and Nabeshin have sat down to discuss their favorite games from the very weird year of 2021, reflect on the changing of the podcast, end of IPP, and the very very weird year it was, even after 2020.
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Alex, myself, decided that in lead up to Metroid Dread, I’d play every single Metroid Game, again, and boy was it a trip! I got to sit and chat with my good buddy Nabeshin through the ups and downs of the series, where Metroid Other M is today in 2021, and also how Metroid Dread stacks up (spoilers: it’s the best one).
If you haven’t already, check out the Review Discussion I had on Metroid Dread with newcomer to the series Moises Taveras.
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Follow Alex: @ALFighter27
Follow Nabeshin: @Nabeshin186
Fair warning, this review does contain some story spoilers and discussions.
Review Discussions are an interview-style discussion hoping to discuss specific aspects of the game in question that may or may not be included in the written review. In some cases, the discussion will be the only critical conversation we put out for a game, in others it may complement a review.
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Alex’s Reviewer’s Thoughts:
It’s hard to make any buts with me in Metroid Dread. Mercury Steam set out to make a classic to follow up a classic, and they just nailed it. Some of the best movement, mobility, and power-creep in a game like this, I’ve played it four times and regret nothing. Metroid Dread is just a phenomenally well made action 2D platformer, a great return to form for Samus Aran, the best 2D Metroid you can play right now, and just a worthy follow up to Metroid Fusion. It’s all a Metroid fan could ask for, and with Prime 4 on the way, it makes it feel like the holidays.
Follow Alex on Twitter – http://twitter.com/alfighter27
Follow Moises on Twitter – http://twitter.com/platanoranger
Review Discussions are an interview-style discussion hoping to discuss specific aspects of the game in question that may or may not be included in the written review. In some cases, the discussion will be the only critical conversation we put out for a game, in others it may complement a review.
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Alex’s Thoughts In Review:
Deathloop is a very different approach to AAA Video Games, and I like that! It incorporates rogue-like elements into the “immersive sim” nature that exudes in the level design that you may or may not know and love from Arkane’s history. It just doesn’t quite go all the way with it, and feels like it burns bright at first, and then burns right out not long after. Things like loot, or multiple paths, or alternative takedowns for your targets, all get left on the sidelines as the game only gets more focused and less interesting as it goes on. Follow Jarrett on Twitter – http://twitter.com/jarrettjawn Follow Alex on Twitter – http://twitter.com/alfighter27
Join us on a trip to Nintendoland! Your monthly source for Nintendo News and games chat from IrrationalPassions.com!
In this episode, Mike & Alex are joined by former IP alum Jurge Cruz Alvarez to talk about the final Smash Bros & Animal Crossing updates, Mario Party Superstars, Super Monkey Ball & more questionable Online services provided by Nintendo!
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Feel free to follow us or the guests on this episode on Twitter: Irrational Passions – @IrrationalPod – Jurge Cruz Alvarez – @jcruzalvarez26 Mike Burgess – @MikeIP_ – Alex O’Neill – @Alfighter27
Music used in the episode was created by Bulby follow them to check out more of their work at these links below:
Bulby – https://www.youtube.com/user/MrBulbamike // https://twitter.com/Bulbamike
Review Discussions are an interview-style discussion hoping to discuss specific aspects of the game in question that may or may not be included in the written review. In some cases, the discussion will be the only critical conversation we put out for a game, in others it may complement a review.
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Mike’s Thoughts In Review: Kena feels like a modern reimagination of some classic platformer franchise that never existed. I would happily live in that alt-reality where she was one of the leading platformer heroes from my childhood. Kena: Bridge of Spirits is a fantastic story of dealing with grief, and learning to grow from your past mistakes. The game can be quite challenging at times during combat, but I always found myself wanting to persevere so I could explore its gorgeous and intricate world. Being the debut game from Ember Labs makes this an even more impressive feat. I hope to see more Kena in the future.
Follow Quin on Twitter – https://twitter.com/Quantum_Arbiter
Follow Mike on Twitter – https://twitter.com/MikeIP_
Hello all, I am happy to announce a series of streams we’ll be doing throughout the month of October to raise money for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society, a charity to help fight against and research all blood-based cancers. For unfamiliar friends or newcomers, or just folks interested in donating and getting involved, we lost a dear friend, Justin, last February to Diffuse Large B-Cell Lymphoma. Justin was very much a close personal friend of myself, as well as the whole crew of Irrational Passions Podcast, and many more beyond, both within our circle and outside.
This month, and possibly in the future years to come, we plan on raising money for Leukemia and Lymphoma research by playing games Justin loved, talking about the best times and past events with him, and smiling and sharing our love of video games. Think of this very much in the spirit of past events like ExtraLife, which Justin would often participate in.
We’ll be raising money through Tiltify, and if you’d like to donate, you can here:
https://donate.tiltify.com/@alfighter27/october-sigmaomegathon
Right now all of our group streams this month, starting tonight October 6th, will be for this event, as well as some weekly one-off streams playing some of Justin’s favorite games or genres.
In the future, we’d definitely like to do more, but for folks unaware my current health situation just means I’m in a tricky place as far as continuous content, thus some of the missing series and shows of IP from the last few months. I’m unsure how long this will continue, and more big streams this month would be wonderful, but just not very doable for me at the moment. That being said, anyone reading that would like to host your own streams and also participate in our first “SigmaOmegathon October” please reach out to me on Twitter!
With this in mind, here is a list of our planned streams for the month, and know that the schedule may change depending on health issues, et cetera, but will also be updated as new streams are slotted in:
Wed Oct 6th
- Group Stream – Destiny 2
Wed Oct 13th
- Group Stream – Wednesday the 13th Spoopy Back 4 Blood Group Stream
Wed Oct 20th
- Group Stream – Smash Bros New Character Stream
Weekend of October 22nd
- House of Ashes FULL PLAYTHROUGH – featuring Jacob Bryant
No Date Yet:
- Mike, Quin, & Alex Mario Party 50 Turns
- Scott, Jarrett, & Alex Visit Final Fantasy XIV – Just in Time for Endwalker
- Special guest streams!
I’ll be updating the post as the month goes on, and I want to thank folks and followers of IrrationalPassions for A) sticking with and supporting us with love even in some dry times like now, and B) always encouraging us and coming out during our charity events. Obviously some of our events in the past were highlights in the history of IP, and I’m exciting to remember Justin and raise money for a cause that I know means a lot to myself and the team at Irrational Passions as a whole.