Some reviews that don't warrant a full post here we goooooo (PANA=plat and never again)
Ni No Kuni II
(April-June 2023)
The first game: great, emotional, story that makes sense. This game: uuuuuhhhhh????? I made a crucial mistake of not checking on the battle system before I bought this because I was not happy when I found out it's an action JRPG. This may be a PANA game.
Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney Trilogy
(July-September 2023)
*rubs hands together* Oooh yeah!!!! It's impossible to not know about AA due to the objection memes but mainly you can't go about a single day reading about rivals to lovers yaoi fanfiction without at least mentioning the 2001 wonder which is wrightworth. It's a rabbit hole that has tempted me multiple times, but I never actually went about playing the games until I realized I own a PS4 and a PC and I have my own money now. Ignoring my personal feelings about owning video games (was very close to spending more time and money ordering a physical version), I thought "it's just a visual novel, it can't be too hard, and I've played worse games" so... here we are, 5 games later and brain chemistry forever changed.
After the disaster which was Ni no Kuni II, this was a salve of some sorts. Was I more relaxed or wound up? I couldn't say...
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| The line that started it all... |
You play as the titular Phoenix Wright (also known as Nick) with his trusty companion/assistant Maya Fey, handling absurd court cases and dealing with equally absurd prosecutors and judges. There's long-time rival Miles Edgeworth, who launched the iconic ship with his 'unnecessary feelings' line; his sister Franziska; and mysterious white-haired anime man Godot. Nick also has to deal with comically incompetent detective Dick Gumshoe... actually, everyone has to deal with comically incompetent detective Dick Gumshoe. Sometimes Mia, Nick's mentor and Maya's sister, comes back from the dead as a spirit to save their sorry asses. Maya is sometimes replaced by Pearl, mostly when she's kidnapped and/or framed for murder (and so is the defendant).
The games are a rollercoaster from start to finish. Most games have a total of 5 cases (aa2 only has 4), the first episode being an introductory/tutorial case and the last usually a long one that ties all the other cases together into a neat bow. The cases may look cut and dry, but it never is, not even the tutorial ones. The question is never "is there a twist?" (because there's always a twist) but "how big is the twist?" or "how many twists are there?".
With just three games packaged in a trilogy and costs less than your average triple A video game, you too can have your brain juices permanently changed forever, no prior gaming experience needed. I am serious. Play Ace Attorney. It's great.
Assassin's Creed III Liberation (HD Remaster)
(October 2023)
I've wanted to play this game since forever but I don't own a handheld and I wasn't going to drop my 'physical releases only' mentality back when the remaster released, so I paid the ultimate price, 9 years later, by paying for a digital release of AC3 remaster which has Liberation in the bundle. I'm not proud of that. The story's bland but the least they could do is spruce up the graphics and interface. I know they have AC3 and AC4 assets of Aveline, why aren't they using it??? And that god forsaken game interface... the original was released for the PSVita. FF Type-0 had a better remaster and it was originally a PSP game.
This is a PANA. At least now I have no regrets regarding not being able to play Liberation. And then I proceeded to finish AC4 too.
Bayonetta
(October 2023)
I'm in the habit of playing old ass games, so here we have a 14-year-old hack-n-slash featuring hot witches, f-bombs (which warrants its 18+ age rating) and sexual innuendo. I was really bad at the game during the first time and I still am during my second and third time. I don't play hack-n-slash and never will, this might be the only exception because I like tall, sexy women.
The mechanics are fun, although somewhat frustrating for my skill level; music is great; amazing character designs -- Bayonetta and Jeanne are hot as shit, the angels are so fucking ugly (in a holy abomination kind of way)... my only gripe? Platforming sections. I have scuffed depth perception and the 'floaty' jumps are not helping.
The premise is unique for it's time: hot witch with hair for clothes that also doubles as weapons. It knows which demographic it wants to tackle, which is why we have a single hand mode which does everything for the player with only one button... you get the idea.
Five Nights at Freddy's (movie)
I realized too late that it's a horror movie when I saw it with a friend, but I actually smiled through the whole thing. The scares are effective, the lore isn't botched, and for the first time in a long time, I could put two and two together to predict the story beats. Never played the games, never read the books, but I watch theory videos on the lore and own one of the complete guides, so I am sufficiently informed on the story.
Never thought we'd see the day where an indie video game gets a good movie adaptation.
This Is How You Lose the Time War
(October 2023)
This became a twitter sensation thanks to one Trigun fan and now we have Wolfwood cosplayers carrying the book and printing the cover on their Punishers. It's no masterpiece but it definitely got me good at the end. You want a real enemies to lovers story where the two girls legit want to kill each other, here's your book.
Short and sweet and not as frustrating as the other books in my reading list, it actually has a romance that bears fruit! What are the odds!
Ghost Trick
(November 2023)
By the creators of the original AA trilogy comes another mystery adventure game, this time with puzzles and time travel! It's not in visual novel format and more of a 2D point-and-click side scroller. You play as a ghost who possesses items and perform 'tricks' to move around the world, or sometimes, to save a recently deceased person from their fate. You do this by rewinding back to 4 minutes before their death, using ghost tricks to reverse the person's fate, oftentimes with hilarious (and unexpected) results.
Majority of the game is all hehe-haha despite the overall theme of death, right until the last five-ish chapters, where it's just plot twist over plot twist over plot twist. There's even more twists than your average AA case so you know it's good. Also you don't expect a game like this to turn on the waterworks but I cry at the weirdest things, so I had puffy eyes the following morning after beating the final chapter.
Play Ghost Trick and have your brain juices permanently altered again (if you've played AA beforehand). Or, if you're dumb like me, prepare to be frustrated.
Fruits Basket
(February 2024)
Not making a separate post for this 20+ y/o manga. Everything that can be said or analyzed has been said and analyzed a thousand times over. I have always wondered what made this romantic shoujo so iconic, that a 2019 reboot was possible, almost 20 years later. Turns out you don't have to be a traditional shounen series to fucking decimate grown ass men.
It's everywhere on the internet, but I have never seen any major spoilers regarding the darker aspects of the story. What the romantic shoujo genre hides is a family curse and the ways people cope with abuse and loneliness. You can bet that every character in this story needs meds, therapy, couples therapy and then some for all the shit they had to go through. There has never been a shoujo series that made me cry literally every day for the 4 days I binge read it.
The tears don't stop after you finish the manga oh no. The more you think about it the more you reach enlightenment. The opening song to the 2001 anime, the meaning of the title, the underlying message of love in all its forms, warm and pleasant and twisted and cruel. It is definitely up there in my anchor list alongside Tales of the Abyss.
If I had to complain about anything, it's the trope in furuba of adult-highschooler relationships... common and romantic (?) for its time but absolutely ick for us now. From the top of my head: Tohru's parents (student-teacher) and Arisa (17-18) and Kureno (26). Arisa at least doesn't get together with Kureno until she graduated high school, but there are no excuses for Tohru's parents, who were 8 years apart... but the younger party was at most 15-16 when they got married. WHAT. 90s-early 2000s shoujo manga is something else...
Look past this ick and you have a tearjerking, heartwarming story about people trying to find love.
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