Games you're thinking about playing

video games
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Ok time to defend FFX… the laughing scene is legitimately great in context. Up until that point of the game, Tidus and Yuna are admiring each other from afar. They realize they have a lot in common both are trying to play it cool. Yuna is bound by her duty and is trying to hide that Tidus really intrigues her. Tidus is trying to uphold image from Zanarkand, even though he wasn‘t really all that satisfied then and now he’s bursting with conflicting emotions. This is compounded by the fact the two are prevented from getting to know each other by Wakka, Lulu, Kimhari, the church, etc. During the tournament Tidus is accidentally the cause of >!Yuna getting captured by the Al Bhed!< because he wanted to meet up with Auron. Then that meeting is a bitter pill for him to swallow when he learns that >!Sin is Jecht!<, and Tidus naturally and believably flips out but understands he has no choice but to continue on the journey. >!It sort of validates the fact that Jecht is ruining his life all over again.!< He reunites with the group and Yuna is emotionally intelligent enough to understand that Tidus and Auron‘s reunion didn’t go well, so she puts herself out there to cheer him up by telling him to ‘fake it til you make it’, and Tidus purposefully laughs in a stilted way, until she joins her and they laugh genuinely and it closes the distance and pretensions between them. It‘s also a moment when the rest of the party realizes they should let Yuna be a normal girl and let her get closer to Tidus and to accept Tidus as an equal guardian. This brings them together and breaks down the barriers for them, and their relationship is primed to get even more personal once they get to Rin’s inn.

[URL=https://i.imgur.com/Hs2QNTu.png][IMG]https://i.imgur.com/Hs2QNTu.png[/IMG][/URL]

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@“Tradegood”#p129365 I wasn‘t specifically thinking about the laughing scene even. James Arnold Taylor’s stilted narrations as older Tidus, John DiMaggio‘s pacific islander accent, the shoopuff guy, and all the other actors save for maybe Tara Strong and Alex Fernandez’s Seymour all sound super unnatural and like they exist totally within vacuums of each other. And yes their characters were recorded separately of each other but that doesn‘t mean they had to sound it. I dunno it’s been a long time and maybe the novelty of full voice acting was too shocking to my brain at the time but I do still find it hard to go back to.

I'm extra curious about revisiting FFX because the shitty relationship between Tidus and Jecht hits close to home and I want to see if I like how they portrayed it better now that I'm an adult. There was a time when I couldn't appreciate Squall's character either, but I was a stupid 12 year old when I first played FFVIII (don't tell the ESRB I played a T for Teen video game as a pre-teen). Emotional complexity had a habit of bouncing off me back then.

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@“Tradegood”#p129365 thank you for taking the time to type this. It's a good summary and completely agree with most of it.

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@“connrrr”#p129366 Haha I wasn‘t referring to you, but moreso some of the conversations earlier in this thread. I wonder if another factor that maybe made you not like the voiceovers was the audio compression on the PS2 version. It’s cleaned up in the remaster, and it‘s not as dramatic as something like FFXII but I could see that contributing to the feeling that the characters are actors in a booth and not physically together. Personally I love the audio compression, especially in FFXII, because I think it’s a vibe. But I can understand why some might not.

I love the voice cast, they all embody the characters to me, so I can't really judge that. In particular I think Paula Tiso's Lulu shows some great range.

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But speaking of games, I beat We ♡ Katamari Reroll and had so much fun with it. But I think it quenched my thirst for a platform game. I've been thinking of picking up Final Fantasy XVI again, but every time I play an hour or two, I find that I'm just not invested at all.

It's weird because I like the game, but I really don't feel anything about the story after 12 hours in and I don't see much hope for that to change. The gameplay is so easy that I kind of feel like I'm just going through the motions. It's very weird to feel this way about a Final Fantasy game, especially after falling in love with FFII a few months ago. I like the game and would even say it's a solid 7/10 for me, but I just don't really feel motivated to pick it up and play at the moment. I think a time will come when I'm ready to return to it, but that day is not today.

My copy of Baldur's Gate 3 is still borked, and I don't feel like restarting from nothing at the moment, maybe in a couple of weeks I'd feel different. I played a good hour or so of Baldur's Gate 1 but it's rough going back to that when I really want to just pick up where I left off in BG3.

I'm a little hesitant to start a new 2D turn based RPG adventure with both Sea of Stars and Rhapsody Marl Kingdom Chronicles coming out in 10 days... so I'm thinking of finishing up that Metroid Prime Remastered.

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@“Tradegood”#p129375 oh lord, I forgot Rhapsody was coming so soon.

Everyone needs to just stop making games for like 10 years so I can catch up.

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Wading into FF discourse…

re: FFVII - fully agree with the analysis that the "open world" is not so open. "That" moment - the moment people often talk about blowing their minds - when you leave Midgar and the world opens up for the first time, your options are:

  • -

    Go to Kalm (intended path)

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    Go West (nothing to do)

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    Go East to Chocobo Farm (you get turned around)

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    Go back to Midgar (you get turned around)

    • There will eventually be stuff to do in the overworld, of course, but it's not exactly teeming with stuff. Sidequests are drip fed intermittently, not plentiful. This is part of a larger conversation about how people say that the older games were more open/less linear and how that argument just does not stand up to any scrutiny. Honestly, in terms of using your imagination and the effect of the map, I think FFX's linear map had a way bigger impact on me while playing. Traveling the map linearly did a great job of suggesting distance; when I finally reached Zanarkand I truly felt as though I had walked to the ends of the earth.

    re: FFX - first should probably mention (since no one else brought it up) that the PS3/PS4 version is the international version which includes a lot of extra content that I really enjoyed and you'll miss out on that if you play the PS2 version

    @"Tradegood"#p129365 I love this. I am currently resisting the urge to write a whole essay about FFX here, but I just absolutely adore those characters and how they develop. I find the interplay between Tidus and Yuna so interesting because they essentially act as foils for each other, with character development in opposite directions (>!e.g. Tidus becomes more selfless, which culminates in his sacrifice, Yuna, intent on self-sacrificing learns how to value herself above others !<) and with little details, like how their names stem from the Okinawan words for Sun and Moon, the game positions them as opposites but also is deft enough to tell their stories in a way that complement each other. With all of the spiral motifs in FFX, I kinda see the structure of their story as a spiral as well (helped by the Underwater Date scene where their bodies form that shape and by the HD boxart where they also spiral around each other). There are a lot of really interesting things about the story to me. I find Seymour super fascinating because he shares a lot of parallels with both Tidus and Yuna and kinda acts as a foil to both of them as well. This one is a bit out there, but I think the spiral motif extends to the tone of the game as well - in earlier chapters, there are moments that are explicitly ~~we're so back~~ happy and moments that are explicitly ~~it's over~~ sad, but as the game goes on those two emotions start to coalesce and the game ends in a really melancholy place where you both win and lose.

    Also, I like the voice acting.

    re: FFXIII trilogy - play them! I really enjoyed my journey with them and I'm very happy that XIII has been getting more love in recent years

    re: Lightning Returns, specifically - I heard a guy who speedruns the XIII trilogy describe the games like this: "Final Fantasy XIII is a great game. Final Fantasy XIII-2 is a good game. Lightning Returns is, unfortunately, a great game." I fully endorse that analysis. I think Lightning Returns is a little hard to love. First, I'll say that absolutely no game has stressed me out the way that LR has with that clock in the corner. Playing for a long session would mean inducing a headache and leaving behind a pool of sweat, and I just felt gross afterward. Second, I don't really want to like a game where I'm running around in a prom dress or cat ears and a bikini bc plot. But... honestly, I did find it very enjoyable overall. I do prefer XIII's combat, but the LR system is quite fun despite a few nits and picks. The game is... nonsensical (I just googled "does Lightning Returns take place on Gran Pulse" and learned that the LR's world is a _fusion_ of Gran Pulse and Valhalla! Who knew?)
    but... it manages to make the whole thing pretty enjoyable. I'd normally feel the impulse to be a bit more critical, but I think the game was successful at its main goals: keep things light and fun (it disposes of every bad plot point from XIII-2 as quickly as possible), get the emotional story beats to hit, and close the trilogy out with a big finale.

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    @“Tradegood”#p129375 total agreement about the voice compression, that literally could not concern me less for XII or X-2. I didn't even notice it.

    >

    Rhapsody Marl Kingdom Chronicles

    Speaking of English voice acting and thread topic I often think of going back and playing *Rhapsody: A Musical Adventure* because I never finished it back in the day. That's a game I could enjoy dubbed as it has a weekend anime programming block feel to it.

    >

    @“Hunter”#p129398 re: FFX - first should probably mention (since no one else brought it up) that the PS3/PS4 version is the international version which includes a lot of extra content that I really enjoyed and you’ll miss out on that if you play the PS2 version

    For FFX International you can already set the text to English I believe and pbirdman has an English patch for FFX-2 I+Last Mission so playing the PS2 International releases isn't completely without hope if you don't speak Japanese! You just need a modded system or emulator.

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    Just realized how much I think about playing all the Kingdom Hearts games.

    I only ever beat 1 and 2.

    I‘m no longer especially interested in them (maybe I’ll give 2 a shot again someday) but those Utada Hikaru songs are SO GOOD.

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    @“mtvcribs”#p129478 Kingdom Hearts 1 & 2 were actually the only ones they made. the series was a financial failure after 2 and they thankfully stopped making them.

    I played chain of memories on GBA last year and it was great!!! then I beat KH2 for the first time after years of willfully ignoring all but the original game, which was a risky experiment by square but thankfully was forgotten and became another one of their obscure quirky one-offs.

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    I‘m thinking about playing Ling Rise. I heard a song from the soundtrack and kind of liked it, making me wonder what the game’s about. I have watched what limited videos exist on youtube and simply cannot tell. It looks like a crash bandicoot/magical hoppers type runner where you can‘t do anything but run. but you can kind of run on the sides out of what you would presume to be the boundaries!? so that’s neat.

    https://youtu.be/iEnDsKaJpg0?t=27

    I would assume you'd get like... a weapon? something? at some point? no idea. anyway it looks weird so I want to find out what it's actually about.

    [edit:]
    found a nico nico vido that explains you use the little rabbit guy to attack. it continues to look mysterious and I wanna check it out.
    https://www.nicovideo.jp/watch/sm20814107

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    i'm thinking about playing nier automata for like the fiftieth time…i still never did get very far in the dlc, and never did the emil bonus boss, or hunted for all the endings. like…. what if i went for the platinum trophy lol

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    Been thinking of either smoking Valkyria Chronicles or Tactics Ogre. Have history with both, but don't want to commit the time. Thankfully I have a steam deck so portability is a plus. Also been wanting to finally finish Disco Elysium, but unfortunately I pavloved myself into falling asleep every time I play. It was my bedtime game for a while. LOL

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    @“exodus”#p129766 How am I STILL finding out about new (old) beautiful, colorful, low poly 3D playstation games? This looks like a joy.

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    I was thinking about playing a BL visual novel from 2005 called Togainu no Chi because when I was about 19 or 20 I went to an “anime rave” cosplaying as a character from it (it was Gunji, and I had everything for the outfit but the cat‘s claws). I don’t know what got me thinking about that or the game again. But so I have a working Windows 10 laptop now and I thought it would be easy/not impossible to get the original Japan-only version working with the English patch but then I saw the 2020 Jast Blue release for sale on gog so I grabbed that instead lol. I don‘t know when I’ll get around to playing this! I'm also thinking strongly about trying Lamento -Beyond the Void- if I get all the way through TnC.

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    @“phylaxis”#p129774 I'm surprised you could play that many times without doing all that!

    @"Andy B"#p129776 I suspect it's kinda a slog but there's something here that's compelling me and I am going to Japan in like 3 weeks so I gotta do what I gotta do

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    >

    @“connrrr”#p129366 James Arnold Taylor’s stilted narrations as older Tidus

    Ok I'm late to the party here but I actually think he did a great job on those parts. It doesn't hurt that he has no pressure to match his delivery with onscreen lip movements, first off. But I don't think he sounds stilted, I think he sounds reflective, nostalgic-for-a-very-recent-time-cause-Tidus-did-a-lot-of-living-recently, and even somber.

    It works great from the perspective of it being how Tidus is thinking and feeling ||as he speaks into the movie sphere on the precipice of leading Yuna to her self sacrifice. I think it's also significant that, it's really him speaking in a moment where he has in some ways broken and his resolve to not allow Yuna to sacrifice herself or to figure out some alternative solution has meaningfully wavered now that they are just outside of Zanarkand. If I remember correctly, his decision to fight Yunalesca and destroy the practice of the creation of the Final Aeon and whatnot is a spontaneous one (which is very Tidus), but that's all occurring _after_ those reflections are being recorded, diegetically speaking.|| But, more or less in general, those lines are such a departure from how Tidus is depicted in the parts of the game its overlaid over, and it's clear enough that it's him in the future reflecting on what has happened, that it's like, a shining beacon of hope that this annoying dumbass will be undergoing some serious Character Development. It's the chaser that helps the shot of dorky annoying Tidus go down smooth.

    [Fake Patois](https://youtu.be/K4XD5MTMACg) Jake the Dog, though? Oof, that has aged poorly

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    My partner and I recently played through Indigo Prophecy and now the idea of playing Omikron: The Nomad Soul has not left my brain. I also recently just got a Sega Saturn, so tons of Saturn games have been swelling in my brain.

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    @“exodus”#p129790 haha I kinda hate playing a game for a second time and doing new game plus stuff so I always start from a fresh save, and I‘m not really the completionist type. to be fair I’ve probably only played it thru like 4 times tops

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    @“phylaxis”#p129774 I believe there is an NPC in that game that lets you buy all those trophies without having to actually do the specific tasks.

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    @“MovingCastles”#p129824 I mean yeah there is but I wanna see for myself what the tasks are, at least the bonus bosses