#with the situation of the games industry as a whole and zelda being my thing of interest

[ganondoodle]

im quite tired of talking about totk, like im sure you all know by know just how frustrated i am, but something i still strongly believe was the logical, and best thing to do in a sequel.. -

while botw was about you feeling lost in a strange world with neither you nor link knowing anything and both discovering it as you go, the theme of lonelyness and isolation, freeing the spirits of dead friends you need toremember again, in the end finally reuniting with one of the only friends still alive, after a 100 years

totk should have been about community, about working together with zelda at your side, as a companion, after having been seperated for so long, and seeing nothing of the time between titles, this should have been her travelling alongside you, after botw you'd WANT to spend time with her and get to know her more, her being the diplomat, the archtitect, the scientist, the translator of old texts, a historian trying to find out the truth about what her fathers kingdom was built on, to right old wrongs perhaps, for a better future- theres so much that she should have been, so much of her character was primed to go into this direction- and instead she is a pretty prize with no personality you get at the end like this is an 80s cartoon still

(this is disregarding the whole fact that ganondorf, AS WELL, should have been a giant factor in all this, in the history of it all, to explore his character and his actions, to have zelda research and find out about histroy clearly written by the victors- theres so much potential depth here that it dirves me crazy, botw was such a set up for more that was wasted, utterly wasted, for something i wouldnt even want to call paper thin bc even paper has more depth than anything in totk)

#ganondoodles talks #zelda #totk #ganondoodles rants #do not come to argue with me #im done trying to sound all nice about it #im angry and frustrated about this #tin foil hat me is convinced they shipped the “writing” for totk off to some mobile games company bc they wanted to focus on that movie #since the success of the mario movie made them prob more money thant botws sales did #i know it might no line up #which is why i said tin foil hat me thinks that #with the situation of the games industry as a whole and zelda being my thing of interest #its soemthing i wont let go ever #and i have zero faith there will be any good stories to come out of the franchise again #dare i say satoru iwatas presence is dearly missed #espeically knowing how the other main guys think about what games should be #i know miyamoto always had a questionable approach to games #pretty sure it was aounoma who said the “why would you wanna go back to linearity lolol nostalgia blindet idiots lololol” #not a direct quote but you know what i mean #anyway #wont be taking about totk in length anymore #im just tired at this point #getting better at ignoring its existence but it still hurts like a sore spot you forgot you had whenever i hear anythign about it

[rawliverandgoronspice]

Hello.

You and gay-jesus-probably have successfully made me question everything with your view that Tears of the Kingdom is imperialist propaganda, so that's been fun.

Anyway, I decided to share this discussion with the Zelda fans on reddit, and perhaps unsurprisingly, a lot of them disagreed. Here is what they said (I'm Alarming_Afternoon44):

So what do you think? Have I and all these other people just been duped by the game's manipulative framing? Or do they actually have a point?

And if you'd rather not answer this, or would prefer if I censored the usernames, just tell me and I'll delete this.

Hey! Thanks a lot for reaching out, and I'm glad it made you think stuff through!!

Honestly, as I mentioned in this post, I am not super interested about in-world conversations about who oppresses who, because what can be assessed from the game is super vague and more vibes-based than evidence-based. Within the text, of course that the Good Zonais are good and the Bad Ganondorf is bad! But that's my whole point! The narrative has been deliberately crafted so that the zonais and Rauru (and Hyrule) are as blameless as possible (and it's not doing a great job at it overall to be frank; we would not be having these conversations about how offputting it all feels for a non-zero number of people if it did do a great job). More importantly, I want to focus on what sort of real-life narrative it all parallels. Because people make stories, and people live in the real world.

Not going after everyone's throat here, gamedev is hard and the hydras that are AAA game production do end up doing super weird stuff, especially since the thematic ramifications are absolutely never prioritized (and it's also always the same kind of people who make the final calls and push out what can and can't be talked about also). And as fans, we tend to have trouble stepping outside the lens of lore and take a look at the bigger picture sometimes; not as an attack on any individual part of that decision-making process but to just pause, stop, and question our standards, our priorities and the kind of reality (or skewing of reality) the stories we tell each other reflect.

Again: do we want to take videogames seriously or not? If we do, then we need to accept they are a vehicle for ideology, just like any other artform. And sometimes, you push out questionable ideology, sometimes without meaning to, because you didn't unpack your own biases as you did. And it's even fine to do it, nobody is perfect, a 300+ people team spread over 6 years certainly will not be that. But that it wasn't prioritized is, in my opinion, a problem. As a narrative designer, I want games (at least the narrative side) to be held to a higher standard than this. It's literally my job to work with the industry so it can hold itself to higher standards of quality --so the whole TotK situation is quite frustrating to witness from a very pragmatic, work perspective where I already spend my days trying to convince people that things mean things. I have a vested interest here in not having the companies I work for being given a free pass by gamers to do literally whatever as long as it's fun, especially when we're talking about a billion-dollars company suing its own fans left and right for any perceived slight. Nintendo are not underdogs here. It's fine to point out they cut corners and maybe promoted messy ideologies, voluntarily or not.

So long story short: no I don't believe anyone here has a point in regards to what I think is actually important, which is why these choices were made in the first place. If you look at an imperialist text expecting the text to tell you that it's imperialist instead of recognizing a framing used for propaganda by yourself, you're never gonna find any imperialist text ever, obviously not!! I'm sorry if I sound a little gngngn here, but I don't know why audiences have, at large, this feeling that lore and story beat decisions materialize themselves already formed and without any human bias, meddling, intervention, internal politics or approximations (it seems that people can only conceptualize this part if they have actual names to attach to the story, but without clear authors it's like there are no authors and so no bias, which is... a very strange bias in itself). I can promise you that it does not work that way in practice: every narrative department on every big game is a battlefield --some nicer than others, but all of them very emotionally draining either way.

So yeah, I guess that on these grounds, I disagree with every point raised here. Sorry Reddit :/

But thank you for the ask and sorry if I didn't go more into details as to why. The big Why I Dislike Rauru Post and the Gerudo Post might have some more specific rebuttals, but I am not super interested in debating small detail stuff tbh. I feel like it's no use if the frame of reference isn't being understood in the first place.

#totk spoilers #totk #totk critical #thoughts #asks #yeah I just disagree with a lot of these in general but I just don't feel like going through them one by one sorry ;_; #feel like I'm starting to repeat myself #especially for a game I liked okay but will definitively not revisit in the long run #tho @ the last redditor: yes thank you for proving my point because do you actually know about afghanistan's recent history :)) #like... who funded the mujahideens' war not so long ago :))))) and for what purpose :))))))))) #everything said by that redditor is 100% far right propaganda it's not even a little bit anything else it's textbook applied imperialism #it's.... yeah how do you want to have these sorts of conversations when the real life parallels are unackowledged #I don't know it's just.... so frustrating to me that so many people have such a hard time to unpack external influences in media #or do not know how to pull apart thematic framings from in-world fluff #sorry if I sound a little dry but it's just... it's all a bit tiring honestly #I'm glad this made you reconsider things! or that you took the time to read stuff through even!! thank you!!! #and thanks for compiling the whole thing!! #I feel like it's a good way of showcasing well... the narrative doing a good job at defending itself #but not disputing that the entire framing is deeply flawed #at least in my opinion

[numberth1rte3n]

TH1RTE3N'S TR4V3L5: In The Shadow of the Dragon-God

BY NUMBER TH1RTE3N

I have been playing video games my whole life. Since I could pick up a controller with my grubby little toddler hands, the medium has never been far from my grasp. From my first adventures in gaming where I would watch my older cousin play the original Kingdom Hearts on the PlayStation 2, to getting my very own PS2 for my fourth birthday and playing Jurrasic Park: Operation Gensis well into my childhood nights (yes, I DID let my dinos run loose and eat my park-goers, thank you very much). In all my years of playing games across countless genres and developers, there have been few times in my life where playing a game has made me gasp, drop my jaw, make my breath catch in my chest, let a “wow” spill forth from my lips.

Climbing the western edge of the Gerudo Highlands for the first time in Breath of the Wild was one of those times for me. I was following my red pin towards a Sheikah Tower that I needed to unlock. Kind of. I was sort of aimless, wandering the rolling hills of Hyrule, doing that thing I do best when I play massive open-world games like BOTW. That thing being, wandering aimlessly towards the loose direction of my initial objective. I love to lose myself in games. To explore every corner of the map, to drink in the scenery, admire how the score compliments the situations I encounter, and I ESPECIALLY read every bit of lore I can find. Well, at least I try to (looking at you BioWare!) As games get bigger and more grand, and with the apparent renaissance of the open world genre across the industry, I am very grateful for lore journals and notebooks becoming a standard practice.

Wandering through the Great Hyrule Forest for the first time certainly made me say “wow”... sometimes out of frustration!

It was on one of these wanderings that I crested a hill in the Highlands, not even sprinting and using up my stamina, but more slowly and with care, in a strange pseudo-reverence to the talented artists and engineers that built the world that I was wandering in. I remember stepping over the hill with my game camera pointed to what was behind Link. I turned the camera to a gorgeous view of Lake Hylia at sunset. It was a stunning sight, one I decided I would stop and admire for a few seconds. Many real people with real lives and real love for  the Legend of Zelda series spent many real hours of their lives on making sure that the wind blew through the grass on the Highlands at just the right speed, and that the crickets chirped at the right pitch and volume. Someone had to make sure the sunset was the right shade of orange, and I intended to be the one to make note of its hues.

I noticed something right then, out of the corner of my right eye. How long had it been there? My reaction was to turn my camera quickly. Was it an enemy that I hadn’t encountered? Some new form of Guardian? Heavens forbid… what if it was another keese swarm?! My eyes adjusted as the motion blur from the camera pan settled. What I saw wasn’t a new enemy; guardian, keese or otherwise. It was… wait… what is that? Is that a dragon? OH MY GOSH THAT’S A DRAGON!!! And a dragon it was. Snaking its way out from beneath Lake Hylia, was the yellow-green visage of Farosh. 

My first experience with a Zelda game was in 2013, playing Wind Waker HD on the WiiU. The admittedly charming themed console was pre-loaded with a copy of Hyrule Historia, Nintendo’s attempt at weaving a cohesive narrative from the notoriously incohesive franchise. Like I said, I am nothing if not a lore nerd. At that point, I had been a bit-more-than-casual Zelda fan, and had taken some forays into the “Zelda timeline” YouTube holes, where I spent a bit (read: many dozens of hours) of time.

Seeing the Temple of Time in Ruins after fighting Ganondorf within its halls in Wind Waker HD was jarring to say the least.

It’s moments in games like these that I find myself reflecting on what gaming is to me as a medium. I could have experienced a serpentine dragon-god rising from a lakebottom in a fantasy novel, sure no problem. Heck, I probably have already, who knows these days with all these dragon shows and their houses and stuff! But it wasn’t in a novel. My meeting with Farosh wasn’t planned or scripted. Someone hadn’t written it, published the scene, edited that moment with flowery language until it fit their perspective of what the author thought a mighty creature being revealed might look like. It was my wanderings, a beautifully blank canvas left to uncover built with the love and attention of the people that made Breath of the Wild a reality, that allowed me to cross paths with the dragon. Watching Farosh ascend to light up the skies above Lake Hylia was something I will never forget. I will admit, when starting Tears of the Kingdom this past week, I was nervous that my breath would be measured, that my footfalls would be quicker, that I would press the sprint button more and the camera button less. Thankfully, I can say that is not the case, and I cannot wait to pick my jaw off of the floor once more.

Image Sources: The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild

#zelda breath of the wild #the legend of zelda #zelda tears of the kingdom #nintendo #gaming #game writing #video games #writers of tumblr #articles #article writing #creative writing #storytelling #gaming news #gaming article #gaming industry #gaming life #gaming world

[mirandalinotto]

Why I hate the CAOS video essay that came out a week ago

Did anyone else get extremely angry at the way Friendly Space Ninja discussed all of the female characters in CAOS? like, don't get me wrong... I understand most of the points he's making, and agree with a lot of what he says in the video essay (Chilling Adventures of Sabrina: A Frustrating Waste of Potential), but when he speaks about Zelda, Lilith, Prudence, and Rosalind, I don't know... i just get a bad vibe. It's like he's doing a "bad faith” analysis, and it bothers me, because CAOS has so many parts to validly criticize, and yet he missed the mark more often than he hit it, in my humble opinion.

He basically says the same thing over and over again: that the actors were good, but the characters were bad, because they were all boring, shallow, and one-note, or whatever... and it's like... dude? of all the things you could say (especially about Zelda and Lilith in particular), the characters being “boring" isn't really the biggest criticism one ought to have of this show...?!? and it isn't even accurate?

Like why aren't you criticizing the trauma porn? Why aren't you criticizing the butchering of Lilith's mythology? Why are you ignoring all of the character development that does happen (particularly with regard to Zelda, whom he actively seems to hate) in favor of insisting none of these characters have an arc? It’s not beneficial to anyone if you’re going to criticize a show’s characters by actively misrepresenting them!

Which brings me to my next point: one of the things that bothered me the most was just how surface-level his analysis was. You could tell he hadn’t watched the show in a while, and clearly wasn’t interested in celebrating any part of it—which is okay, if you just want to roast Roberto for an hour, be my guest—but why does it feel like this video essay was the YouTube video equivalent of writing a book report on a novel you only skimmed…? He made a lot of generalizations that made it seem like he only watched the first season, and then paid no attention to the rest.

For example, some of his arguments are just so random and insignificant? Like why does he make shallow observations the basis of whole arguments about characters, such as when he goes on about how Zelda says 'Praise Satan' too much and “it got old"...?!?! Like what kind of bullshit analysis is that...? How is that even close to being something worthy of talking about in a video essay that is an hour and twenty minutes long...? Why are you taking such a trivial aspect of her character and making it a talking point in a video that is already much longer than it needs to be?

And while I agree with what he said about Lilith's motivations being inconsistent/unclear at times, and that Zelda's character growth wasn't as linear or developed as it could be, it really feels like he didn't even try to understand these characters at all. I realize I'm biased, because all I do is try to understand them and explain their motivations... but still! If you're making a video about the wasted potential of CAOS, why do you immediately dismiss almost the entire female cast, pretty much out of hand, when they're the foundation of the show...? They ARE the potential?! The good parts about them ought to have been given some credit? Like why does he fail to acknowledge all of the trauma these female characters went through that very much informs their decisions, and instead makes it sound like nothing the characters do make sense? While I might not always agree with every choice these characters made, there usually is something driving them to do whatever it is they’re doing, and particularly in the case of Lilith and Zelda, it’s not that hard to understand why they make irrational decisions sometimes, when they’re literally surrounded by abusers and everything is constantly blowing up in their faces.

Also, something smaller that really pisses me off is that he includes Zelda sending Blackwood out of the room during the birth of the twins as an example of the show's misandry and "bad feminism," but that's literally not what that moment is about? If he stopped to think about it for a moment, the moment is perfectly logical. Zelda is a midwife, who was most likely trained in the 1800s, when men literally weren't meant to be around when the the birth happened, so how is she being a misandrist just by doing what she’s been taught, especially when they’re all in a crisis situation? Men not being allowed in the room is an established part of the history of women’s health/childbirth, and it isn’t exactly obscure knowledge! Men used to be forced/asked to sit in the waiting room during labor, and before that, when home births were the status quo, midwives definitely wouldn’t allow men in the room as a matter of course. In fact, it wasn't until the 1970s that men being in the delivery room became a more normalized practice. So, men being present/witnessing a birth is a far more "modern" thing than I think people realize, and the exclusion of them from the delivery room has absolutely NOTHING to do with women hating men...? like fuck off with that “misandry” argument, in this instance. do some research before you start reaching that far, so as to act like Zelda was being hateful for simply following “industry standards,” if you want to call it that. There are medical articles that still come out to this very day that argue that no one should be in the delivery room besides the person giving birth and the doctors and nurses, because the husband/partner often gets in the way and distracts the medical team at critical moments. (Also men tend to faint or get sick at the sight of the birth, which then forces the team to split their focus in order to see to the unconscious man on the floor.)

And don't get me started on the anti-Zelda rant he goes on towards the end!! While I agree very much that Zelda is a flawed character, he uses an example of her degrading Hilda that isn't even something she actually did?! It's from a dream sequence!?!?!? like dude, did you even watch these episodes/scenes before you talked about them?!? He uses the example of dream-Zelda criticizing Hilda's appearance as a reason why Zelda is such a bitch, and I'm like... seriously? that literally wasn't her? just because Zelda said it in Hilda's nightmare, doesn't mean Zelda said it in real life, and should be criticized for it...?!

But yes, Zelda is abusive to her sister, and classist, and rude, and many of the things that he says--but when he tries to argue that because she's a woman, nobody cares that she's like that, and it’s a problem, because that’s evidence of more misandry… that’s where he loses me. He sees it as yet another issue with Roberto's writing—that he gives qualities that would be condemned in a male character to a female character, and allows that woman to be one of the "good guys" ...but yet again, dude... you're completely missing the point?!? Women are allowed to be flawed, without you seeing it as some gross failure of feminism?

He also at one point claims that Zelda resents Ambrose, and hates having him around, when I would argue Zelda actually really values Ambrose and has a close relationship to him...? Like did we even watch the same show?

I didn't expect to get this heated about a video essay that made a lot of other points that I agreed with (mainly the dragging of Roberto parts). But in my opinion, this guy got really offended by Roberto's fake feminism (which is valid), but then proceeded to tear down all of the female characters for an hour and twenty minutes straight...?! All he did was talk about how they're all misandrists and shallow characters and therefore the show isn't worth watching? like okay... but here's the thing... plenty of women have made it through shows that have misogyny at their very core, and have still managed to find the good points...? Game of Thrones is like the most popular show of all time, even though there's misogyny in every aspect of it, for historical “realism" purposes (*rolls eyes*). Zelda and Lilith's defining qualities aren't solely related to hating men, so it really pisses me off that he made it seem like that's all that shapes them, and that every time they insult or manipulate a man, it’s completely unjustified.

idk. I feel like I just watched an 83-minute roast on a show I love despite it's flaws, and that roast wasn’t mostly focused on all of the biggest flaws that I would’ve brought up, but rather on how all of the female characters are terrible and their misandry makes the show unwatchable.

So let me get this straight: you're hating on the female characters... in order to show how much of a feminist YOU are, as opposed to Roberto...?

Wow. Much feminism. Very enlightened analysis.

#zelda spellman #lilith #caos #chilling adventures of sabrina netflix

[robin-blogs]

Wednesday Lecture - David Blandy – 27.01.2021

This week’s Lecture was about David Blandy. I had personally never heard of him before. At the start of the lecture he started by playing a game called ‘Babel’ in which he read a story and rolled a dice. There was also a Jenga tower to represent the tower of Babel. The game reminded me of Dungeons and Dragons with the story and dice. The story is also about remembering your name as you forgot it when you wake up in the area described.  The journey ended when babel fell. I found this to be a very interesting and intriguing way to start the lecture and as a result it made me feel immediately more engaged with his work. I have always loved board games and card games as it reminds me of times playing with my Nan or playing Dungeons and Dragons campaigns with friends after college. Although this segment of the lecture didn’t connect with my university practice; it definitely relates to my personal life and as a result made me want to see more about Blandy’s work and how he’s incorporated these themes and ideas into his work.

Blandy then went to talk about a recent project he had been working on called “World After” which creates a narrative world in which humans don’t exist on the plant as there aren’t any left. Instead of humans there are instead creatures such as lizard people and to be in place of humans. He also uses this removal of humans to comment on gender norms with an intersex character who changes gender each day. I feel this relates to both my personal life and work as I work with themes of gender and gender norms throughout my own work. I have recently been working on an outfit to show people the effects and events of the Stonewall Riots while also subverting gender norms by being a man in a dress wearing makeup.  Blandy then went on to talk about how he has always been interested in role-play since he was young. He has had inspirations such as Akira; anime and manga cultures, Princess Mononoke, Zelda and Dungeons and Dragons. When he started to talk about his inspirations coming from the series of Zelda games, I felt immediately exited. For a long time now, I have adored The Legend of Zelda series; especially the latest one for the Nintendo Switch; Breath of The Wild. I have certainly been inspired by this series of games myself throughout my art, even if it isn’t visually apparent. Blandy goes to explain how all of the games in the series are all telling similar stories through different reality and through different timelines. This had a direct inspiration and impact on his game he is working on in a collaborative effort called “World After”. From his inspiration from the Zelda series and their use of a timeline, he then went on to create his own timeline for his own game in which he called it the “Cataclysm Timeline”. The choice of this wording made me create a link between the acts in Zelda and within Blandy’s game. Within the Zelda timeline the overarching threat is mainly centred on “The Great Calamity” and Gannon// Gannondorf in which the main protagonist ‘Link’ has to overcome. Although the timeline created for the series breaks up into three sections once the events of Ocarina of Time happens. The three timelines split into one where ‘The Hero is Defeated’ where Hyrule and the Hero decline. There is then a ‘Child’ and ‘Adult’ era for the remaining two timelines. In these two timelines, Link is sent back by Zelda to relive his childhood he didn’t get as a result of fighting the Calamity. The adult timeline is then where Link// The Hero of Time disappears where Gannondorf can rule free unopposed.

After the lecture ended, I wanted to connect more with his work and how he creates his concepts. Before the lecture ended he mentioned how he wanted to do a collaborative effort around Liverpool and have a new species or creature in the game based around the area. As a direct result of this I decided to connect more with his process through this idea. When I think of Liverpool I think a lot about industry mixed with areas of overgrowth where areas are knocked down; often sprouting weeds. I decided to start sketching out a concept around my vision of Liverpool, this made me realise the thought that had to go through the process of character creation. Although this isn’t the first time I have worked around making characters. I have created my own characters in the past with their own writing and basic timelines of events. I have yet to develop them more but as a result of creating them it gave me even more respect for those who do this as a profession, whether as writers or concept artists. When thinking and sketching out my concepts for the character based around Liverpool I found myself thinking deeper into the characters visuals and actions the more I developed them into a drawing. As seen in the picture below, I originally only had his concept as a human with a dandelion for a head. I then developed them more to incorporate more colours and lines as a contrast by adding the green leaves of dandelion weeds around the neck as a kind of collar. I then developed their body to incorporate a mix of broken and new buildings around my personal ideas of Liverpool. Overall, even though it was a smaller version of what Blandy does for his project, it felt rewarding and gave me a greater understanding of his process when I replicated it myself through my own ideas.

When talking more in depth about his game “World After” he talked about how it was about creating a narrative and change. Blandy created this game as a collaborative effort with other artists and writers. Throughout the previously mentioned timeline, it shows what happened// will happen over the next 75 years, based on real world science from what will happen to Earth 8000 years in the future. I found this to be an interesting way of showing and educating people on what could happen to our own planet in the future if things don’t change without it being apparently clear. After the main lecture had finished I decided to attend the Q&A to gain a greater insight to Blandy’s work and how he came to the creation of World After.

Q&A

Q: “Is the idea for World After a result of what would happen if we had to adapt to what we ((humans)) have done to the world?”

A: In a way it is, he explained how it’s like a ‘Deep Future’ in which its 8000 years in the future. It’s a way of reimagining the world after sea-rise and us adapting to different societies and whatever situation was in each ‘haven’ that we were hiding in. Its why each haven and society within them are so radically different since each one has been isolated as a large space for such a long amount of time. They all eventually come out of their havens and come to realise not everything is as they thought it was. They discover all of these different societies that they didn’t know where in the world. Blandy then goes on to explain how it’s a good way of making artistic licence for what could be created.

Q: “Were you inspired by Morrowind or Skyrim at all? A lot of it reminds me of that series.”

A: Blandy went on to say how he had never played Skyrim, he’s exploited it through film but has never played through it properly. He said he thinks it’s been inspired by the whole plethora of fantasy, and he wanted it to have that fantasy feeling. He then commented on the kinds of fantasy ideas around games such as Skyrim, Dungeons and Dragons and Wold of Warcraft and how a lot of their base characters are very racially coded. He comments on general Orc characters and how they are perceived as degenerate and thuggish and how it shows a really racist image of blackness. He wanted to create a fantasy space that didn’t have that ‘baggage’ in a sense and to take away from the alignment of people being naturally good and naturally evil. Blandy then went to talk about how he also wanted to use it as a way to connect with his children more and to get them away from their screens a little more. He enjoyed the feeling of everyone being in the same mental space to play a game together; especially with games over Zoom. He founds it’s been a way of him making a lot of friends and connecting with new people.

Q: “What are you intending with your work?”

A: To draw the viewer in through how it looks or sounds and through that you can then insert some idea that changes their view of the world. A wandering person looking for truth feels interesting to him such as with Final Fantasy VII and how in the end where is the self? He got into Philosophy and geopolitics and society throughout his work. What is the self? He didn’t really find an interest in VR when compared to the brain as he said the brain is one of the best renderers.

Q: Were you inspired by any specific Art Movements?

A: In a way it comes from performance and being interactive. It comes from 60’s performance and working with symbols and language and in an interactive way through that. To him it came like a set of instructions to perform which reminded him a lot of Dungeons And Dragons.

 Overall, as a result of attending Blandy’s Q&A, I feel like I have connected a lot more with his work and I have gained a greater understanding of why he is creating it. I am personally very excited to see where his work with World After goes as it feels so refreshingly different from any other roleplaying online game I’ve seen before. His development of World After relates to me on a very personal level as I have always found a love of video games through the stories they tell such as with Zelda and Skyrim, so it makes me ecstatic to see where World After goes as it combines all of the story based elements of the games I love and adds in a level of acceptance and diversity. There are no human characters to remove the element of racism and gender issues which I’ve never seen from any games like this before. There is also a society of intersex people who change gender each day which I found to be an amazing edition. This can attract people of all genders and identities to help them feel more included and understood. As a trans man myself I loved this edition of diversity. Another part of his world of World After that intrigued me was his use of the timeline relating to real world events that are predicted to happen 8000 years in the future. As mentioned before, I think it’s a really intriguing and interesting way to indirectly show people of all ages the affects were having on our world such as with climate change.

In conclusion, this lecture and Q&A was by far my favourite of this year, and I thought it was the perfect lecture to start the second semester with. Although it’s taken me a while to get back into working from my mental health, I’m glad this is what I had to start with as it had many elements I loved and that relate to both my personal life and practice. I’d love to see more of Blandy’s work in the future.

[transssexualheart]

its not that i have anything against 3d animation as a whole. a lot of it is great! there’s a lot of really beautiful stylized 3d animation out there. a lot of 3d video games look fuckin awesome, and there are some great films too

okami is a beautiful game in a 3d world- it’s stylized and unique and i can’t think of another game that looks like it.

breath of the wild is another aesthetically stunning game, it utilizes bright colors and has this wonderful almost orange lighting effect that is separated enough from the shadows to make clear distinctions of where the light hits- giving this impression of being in a bright world with a shining sun. it has one particular aesthetic that it maximizes, which primarily centers around ancient tech and fantastic color themes. it’s not incredibly stylized but still very distinct, and it has fantastic diverse character design (although that can be said for a lot of 3d zelda games)

this one is a little harder to talk about, i haven’t seen it yet, but from the clips i’ve seen, into the spiderverse looks fantastic. all of the characters look unique, and many of them have an animation style that varies from another characters, which is awesome! it’s visually interesting and new. miles is made to look like he’s directly from a comic book. a lot of them have almost this pop art look to them. 

my issue with 3d animation is that a lot of other films don’t get this same treatment. the whole point of animation is that it gives you the ability to create something for someone to watch that is visually interesting in a way that live action cannot be. a lot of big film industries completely ignore that and get far too caught up in making the effects as realistic as possible. people don’t actually care if they can see every rise and fall of a character’s chest for every breath they take the entire movie, or at least not nearly as much as they care about characters that look different and keep it stimulating and interesting to the mind and eyes, they care about colors and a good established aesthetic. how realistically that hair blows in the wind is nowhere near as important as how the animation and art can express a mood and convince the viewer of it. staying “on model” is not as important as it is to make characters expressive. it makes things interesting, and it gets across a point, maybe an emotion that the character is feeling or a general mood to be set. personally i would argue that realism is one of the least important things in animation. the point is that it’s not realism. to take an art that gives you the ability to make any visual situation possible and to try and recreate what we already have with it and make that the mainstream, that’s a waste. the animation industry presently prefers realistic hair physics on girls to anything new or creative, anything that breaks from the norm and creates something interesting to the eye. that’s not what art is supposed to be. maybe into the spiderverse is a sign that things are changing within the industry, and i sure hope that’s the case, but presently it’s very frustrating.

#rain rambles #long post #sorry im just passionate about this #animation #3d animation

[defenderadora]

°✧｡ [ELIZA TAYLOR, CIS-FEMALE, SHE/HER] IT’S BEEN TWO YEARS SINCE ADORA JOINED VELIA FROM SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA. APPARENTLY, THEIR NAME IS HARLOW WOLFE AND THEY’RE A WARRIOR. THEY HAVE BEEN FIGHTING AS A CATALYST MEMBER FOR A WHILE NOW. DIDN’T PEOPLE SAY THEY WERE NOT A BETA TESTER? I HEARD THEY TURNED TWENTY-EIGHT THIS YEAR. LET’S HOPE THEY MAKE IT OUT ALIVE.

hi sweeties! i’m ray and i’m exceptionally excited to be apart of this gorgeous rp. below the cut is some info about my lil babe harlow adora. if you’d like to plot hit me up or i’ll come to you. 

CHARACTERISTICS

full name :  harlow amelia wolfe

username : adora

velia level : seventy-one

birthplace : sydney, australia

age :  twenty-eight

zodiac sign : cancer

sexuality : bisexual

height : 5′4′

build : petite and curvy

piercings : standard lobe || upper lobe || tragus || helix

tattoos : x | x | x | x

scars : one along her ankle from a childhood injury

song : please don’t go by joel adams

PERSONALITY

positive : determined || focused || survivor || resourceful || protective || brave

negative : blunt || cunning || restless || callous || resentful || grief-stricken || ruthless

BEFORE VELIA

harlow wolfe was born in the suburb of birchgrove to a middle-class family. her father worked in the tech industry and her mother a pediatrician. harlow is the middle child of two other siblings. an older brother (by three years) who has always been a protector (also being someone harlow idolized) and a younger sister (by seven years) who some would say was spoiled growing up. since harlow only had her brother as a playmate at home for seven years of her life, she steered away from the more feminine things in life and gravitated more towards the rougher things. instead of baby dolls or stuffed animals, harlow carried around toy swords and nerf guns, always itching to have a battle with her elder brother. despite her upbringing into more tough activities, she still had a big heart. too many times her parents would catch her nursing an injured animal back to health hidden away in her bedroom closet. for a while, she dreamed of becoming a veterinarian.

at the age of five, her brother, who was eight at the time, got into gaming and she soon followed. surprisingly, her favorite games were those with little violence. anywhere from life-simulation rpg (akin to the sims) to racing games. she also found herself fond of old-timey adventure games where the characters wouldn’t die. instead, they would respawn from the lasted saved spot (think legend of zelda (specifically wind waker), sonic, mario, etc). the next year, at the age of six, is when she met her best friend, darius. while searching for a new game to try out at the towns game store, she bumped hands with a little boy while they were reaching for the same game. almost immediately they became the best of friends, begging their mothers to exchange information so they could see one another again. darius was the one who introduced her to the more violent battle games in their early tweens.

the two stayed close (they tried dating but found it too odd so they decided just to stay friends) up until the age of twenty-five. harlow had met someone the year before who she thought was going to be her forever but darius didn’t trust this individual. turns out, darius’ intuition was correct. the person she met was a criminal who had been to jail numerous times for petty theft. harlow was unaware of this though. one day her prized class ring, as well as her grandfather's watch, her mothers pearls, and her brother's sports cards, went missing then somehow turned up in darius’ possession, causing her to believe that he had been the one to steal the items. turns out, it had been her partner who wanted to sell them off for some cash for drugs, and when they were almost caught, they dumped the items into darius’ bag. 

harlow (stupidly) blamed it all on darius and never gave him a chance to explain his side of the situation. he had dabbled with drugs in the past and had quit, but she assumed he got back into them, something he had promised he’d never do again. once she found out that it had been her partner who stole the items, she assumed that darius had been the one who gave them the location of her families most valuable items and continued to resent him for betraying not only her but her family as well. she blocked his number and banned him from stepping foot on her families property.

VELIA

adora, harlow’s chosen username, was always a nickname she used in any of her game servers. she may or may not have binged ‘she-ra’ when she was younger and become absolutely obsessed with the warrior princess character. she had always been attached to powerful female characters who weren’t afraid to be themselves. the old harlow would have joined velia as a knight of the blood oath or a unity member. however, since she was joining a few months after the betrayal from the two people she loved most in life, she decided to join under catalyst. she had intended to use the simulation to get out her anger from real life drama, that is until she realized she couldn’t leave.

little did she know, darius had also joined the game (under achilleus) since the two had talked about it while promotions were happening. he joined under unity. since he was familiar with her usernames for past servers, achilleus ended up finding her and once he said her real name, she knew it was him. he had been surprised to see that she joined under catalyst but didn’t question her on the matter. this was the time for him to finally force her to listen to him. it took a few months but she finally found her sanity and forgave him for what she thought he had done. she actually found herself begging him for forgiveness for her stupidity. things were going well for a while, she was still angry at her ex so she still found herself not minding being apart of catalyst.

about the six month mark is when tragedy struck. adora found herself unable to hold off a pack of monsters, her life source depleting rapidly until achilleus came to her rescue. while he was able to assist her in their defeat, his life energy shrank to life-threatening levels. he had given adora his only healing potion from his own guilds mystical, which she had used on herself. achilleus died in adora’s arms that day, ending darius’ life in the real world as well. her best friend from childhood that she had just gotten back was gone. 

after that day, her heart turned dark. while she had managed to keep her curser on green for her whole experience, she now didn’t care if it turned orange, or even worse, red. life was becoming meaningless without her best friend in it. without him, she trained harder than she ever had before, her player level rapidly rising. she finally found herself thriving within catalyst, becoming one of their best warriors due to her cunning and callousness.

months past, her curser showing no signs of returning back to green, when suddenly achilleus appeared before her, over the water, while she was fishing. long story short, he expressed his disappointment in who she had become after his demise. which is when she showed the apparition her precious wooden block that she had cut from a tree stump where she carved out each name of the people she has indirectly or directly killed. she remembers all of them. though, she keeps it a secret from her fellow guild members, knowing they wouldn’t approve of her keeping something with sentimental value that weakened her ruthless fighting spirit.

adora continues to see apparitions of achilleus where he is pleading with her to be good, to do better, telling her that he’s afraid she’s losing her humanity. she doesn’t see why it matters since she’s clearly already lost her mind. 

she wishes to be her old self again, to make darius proud, but she feels as though she is too far gone. she can no longer be saved from her demons and maybe she doesn’t wish to be saved.

POSSIBLE WC

tbh i haven’t thought too much about this?? so this is to be determined as of right now. i’m very open to plotting though.

#『❤ooc❤』➔ this is super wordy and lameeee. sorry about this mess pls bear with me #veliaplot #veliaintro #death tw

[aurimeanswind]

Let’s Make Up—Sunday Chats—4/22/18

So last week I had a Sunday Chats all written and done, and while writing the last two closing paragraphs, my web browser crashed and Tumblr, being the platform with apparently no fail safes at all, completely lost all of what I wrote. I was initially going to just rewrite it the next day or the following Wednesday (my next day off) but then life happened and to be perfectly honest I had what we call in the biz a godawful week, so it didn’t happen. I apologize, I took your questions and selfishly coveted my answers when you had taken your time to submit them, and I am very sorry for that.

To make up for it, this week I am answering all of last week’s questions IN ADDITION to the few I got for this week, so hopefully it’ll be jam packed. Luckily I didn’t have a big editorial thought-piece ready for last week, so for this week...

The 10 out of 10

So I’ve been playing God of War, as I’m sure many of you readers have been, and I’m delighted by it in so many wonderful ways. But I think the reviews definitely set an expectation that is really impossible to meet. I’m not treading new ground here, I think that’s safe to say (as is usually the case with my writing) but it’s just the thought I’ve had the most playing God of War.

I think you get this idea that it’s a series of incredibly brilliant moments that tie together beautifully, and while I think much of that is true, a lot of what you do in God of War is run around and fight dudes. As great as that is, I’ve only had maybe two big moments in my ten or so hours with it. But the quality of what I’ve seen so far just gets me excited to see what moments I have coming up, especially since at this point, I really have absolutely no idea what the hell is going to happen next.

What i think gets understated in such a masterful score is just the sheer volume of production value poured into every inch of a game. I think that’s something that’s hard to convey across an entire review, let alone just a score, but boy, there is just a ton of polish and excellence throughout the game, from the small animations, to how Kratos always grabs a cliff’s face and doesn’t clip through it.

It’s really excellently made, and I hope everyone out there is enjoying it as much as I am.

What’s on Tap

So I finished Kingdom Hearts 1

I re-beat this game again, finally going and doing all the additional content, like synthesis, extra bosses, grinding to level 100, etc.

I dunno... I think Kingdom Hearts is great but its “post-game” content is really underwhelming. I think none of the bosses are truly “special” in a way that they are in Kingdom Hearts 2. They don’t have these strategies seared into my mind, at least.

That being said, the design philosophy in KH1 versus its sequel is so completely different and fascinating. It’s far more Metroidvania in its intent to have you backtrack and re-explore already searched areas. It feels almost like it’s from a completely different franchise.

Like... There is ZERO platforming at all in Kingdom Hearts 2. Like, none. I can’t think of a section where you have to jump from a thing to a thing, except maybe the extra dungeon they added in the Final Mix version.

It makes me hopeful that maybe they’ll revisit some of these ideas in Kingdom Hearts 3 but eh. I doubt it.

Kingdom Hearts 2 on Critical

I started this and it’s about as frustrating as I anticipated. It’s not terrible or world ending, as its essentially just Proud mode difficulty with half your total health.

But I’m about to fight Xaldin in my playthrough so basically it’s all downhill from here.

God of War

So yes, I’ve been playing God of War. It is indeed, a video game.

I mean it’s really great. I talked about it a lot on last night’s podcast if you want some more detailed thoughts. But here are some standouts:

The combat is labored in a way that makes it so much more intense and significant. Of all the things that remind me of The Last of Us, it’s this aspect. It’s the intensity of each hit, the feeling of desperation in every slam and slash, and the violence that goes with it feels justified in the God of War universe where it absolutely never has before.

I get a ton of Darksiders vibes from this game, specifically Darksiders 2. The way it introduces side areas, side dungeons, side puzzles, and especially chests, reminds me a ton of how Darksiders approached formulaic Zelda ideas. It works very well here.

The Axe is, of course, excellent. But I’d say it isn’t the throw of the axe that works, it’s calling it back.

The ambient dialogue between your characters feels pulled straight out of a Naughty Dog game, and it feels so derivative of that that it makes me like it a bit less that I’d personally want to. It just feels almost exactly the same, just with different characters, and so far, outside of Kratos and how “deals” it dialogue, there isn’t enough separating it.

Overall very good. I will eventually be writing a review for IrrationalPassions.com. Look for it someday.

Questions

Remember to look for my tweet with the hashtag #SundayChats every Sunday afternoon, reply to it with your question, and boom. That’s how the magic happens.

Last week’s questions:

Ya know last week I’d have a different answer but I’ll revisit that later. In short: stuff is happening. I’m trying to live my life. Trying to do good. Failing a lot, but I’ll keep trying.

I’ve been crazy busy too. I feel like this is the year I am trying to teach myself different and new things, whether they be on a technical level, or maybe software, or something else along those lines.

Thank you for the kind words. As for the future, I think there is another question asking a bit of something like this, but it’s trying to stay busy and trying to make bigger and better moves. Like, E3 I think is out of the question, but PAX West isn’t, and aiming for something like that is really exciting and it gives us a lot of new options and opportunities. Plus, we’ve been trying to have actual meetings on the reg about what we’re doing and what ideas we have.

A big one that Scott White has been spearheading you’ll probably know more about by the end of this month, and there are some new shows and new styles of pieces I think we are all trying to do. As for me, I just want to get better with video stuff, with supporting the team, and with GA, as that’s my main new project.

I like milk. I drink milk, by itself, or in chocolate form, pretty regularly. I’ve been at a restaurant with friends and asked for a glass of milk and everyone laughed at me. I’ve since never done that.

Milk is good.

I mean the biggest one was assuredly The Messenger, which is like, my #1 most anticipated. But I was lucky that my team got to go out there and see stuff and present it to me with cool thoughts and perspectives on all of them. Like, Solo sounds super cool and I want to see more of it, and City of Brass wasn’t on my radar at all but seems really cool. Mike convinced me to see Omensight and that’s just a really rad new entry from a team I didn’t think had it in them.

I mean, I don’t even really know who Kid Rock is. I mean I know of him, but eh. I’ve never heard his music before a day in my life. I hear he is like, not good? Like, not a good person, not necessarily a bad musician. But I don’t want to assume. Is this libel? Am I getting black balled out of the industry right now?

Also you look hella cute Roger. So proud of you.

It absolutely was not. A big thing was I was planning on getting a 4K TV, and since I had the Xbox One X I was happy with just that and then the HDR that my original PS4 could reach. But there was a good deal and if I was already investing so much I wanted to get the most out of my TV. So I swear to god if a PS5 comes out next fall I’ll be pissed.

Brian. Nabeshin. Jackson. So I can know what it feels like to be the nicest dude in the world and also a great uncle.

It’s really sad. But also nice since I can be alone again. But also sad.

A bit of a mixed bag.

Pretty much anything in Final Fantasy 15 looks amazing and delicious. But that Beef Bowl in Persona 4... Man, I’ve had dreams about that Beef Bowl.

This week’s questions:

Shoutout to Brandon Gann, who is in ALL WEEK’S questions for Sunday Chats.

Yes, God of War is great. I think I got into it pretty well above, but yes, I really enjoy it. The combat, above all else, just feels so great. It reminds me a TON of DmC Devil May Cry in that it is training me well and I feel really good at it. Plus the way the weapons work kind of reminds me of that kind of combat too.

It absolutely has to be the SNES. I think I’ve lost countless hours to that system, and it’s something that, as a gift for me, I had my parents go and buy of eBay waaay past its time so as I could sit down and revisit all these classic games. Something I’m still incredibly appreciative of to this day.

But A Link to the Past and Super Metroid are just so formulative of my current taste in games and the things I seek out the most in video games (see: adventure and backtracking) and that was the console I sank the most time into without a doubt. I think GameBoy is totally a great choice, I didn’t have my own until I got a GameBoy color, but the GBA was the one I fell in love with the most, and I wouldn’t really get deep into that until much later.

Hey like, real talk everyone? Hey? Everyone bring it down, it’s real talk time?

Like, I’m doing suuuuper not good. Like actively very bad, and it’s just a whole lot going on. Last week is like, top three, top four worst weeks ever for me, and I had to make a whole bunch of adult decisions that, while I was prepared for them, I wasn’t happy about anything, and everything seemed to just make the situation more miserable. On top of that, I just feel like I’ve been really shitty and a shitty friend to basically all the people in my life that matter the most, and on top of that I have a lot of stress from work and money and blah.

Like, in the grand scheme of things, I’m doing okay, I’ll be okay, but I feel bad, it all feels bad, and it’s pretty shitty. Like, I know this probably wasn’t the answer expected, but it’s definitely the truth.

I’ll do better next time.

In my defense, it’s what I was doing up until I started writing this, and, while I do need to go do the dishes before I get back into God of War because lord knows no one else will, I’ll be continuing my adventure in Midgard until I pass out tonight.

I mean I feel really good about it, so long as everyone involved feels good. Like we’ve certainly hit a lot more readers and have broadened our audience in a way we’ve never been capable of before, and we have opportunities now that we’ve never had before, and I feel really good about that. I’m not super into the numbers, but I am into opportunity, ability to cover games pre-release, go to events, things like that.

As for the end of the year, I feel like, or at least I hope, there is a bit more cross pollination as far as skill, like more folks will be able to support Social, and more folks will be able to do video, or host shows, or whatever that may be. But I want that to all happen within comfort: like Social is Jurge’s thing, and if he doesn’t want to share that because of his ownership of it, I get that, I respect that, and I’m all about that. People gotta have their territory of expertise, and since I’ve been jack-of-all-trading it alone this whole time, I’m all about doing that for myself.

Even though I kind of already have and that’s editing.

The Ninja Samurai from Ghosts of Tsushima (upcoming, I know) and Sly Cooper, because I’m all about creating the greatest Ninja clan this side of the land of the rising sun.

That’s all I got for this week. Thank you all for your patience and understanding. I’ll do better next time. I will try and continue to do these more consistently. I love you all, thank you for reading and supporting and listening and being great.

Until next time, keep it real.

#video games #god of war #sunday #sunday chats #sundaychats #Alex talks

[zaggitz]

VIDEO GAMES 2017: ONE MILLION GAMES ENTER, TEN GAMES LEAVE.

Well that sure was the best year in video games since probably 1998, wasn’t it? Nintendo put out a new console and 3 major franchise entries, basically every anticipated game of the early 10′s finally frickin’ came out, we got 4 new English Falcom games, 3 of which with good locs, and they made a new Nier? What??? 

What a time to be alive.

Let’s not waste any time getting to the list, lord knows VIDEO GAMES 2017 has already sucked out enough time from me for a lifetime.

Before we begin, here’s my lists for 2015 and 2016.

Honorable Mentions:

Persona 5:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jaIo82uT0qs

It’s insane that this game isn’t in my top ten, hell, it’s insane that it isn’t in my top five. It’s less a commentary on Persona 5′s quality and more that the games that did make the list resonated with me a whole lot more. VG2017 truly was too powerful.

P5 is mired with stiff localization problems, but even without the loc in consideration, the thematic through-line of the game gets muddled and becomes a toothless version of the promising rebellious first ten hours the game provides by the time you reach the finish line, which also just happens to come 20 hours too late, in my opinion.

What a great looking and feeling game though.

Tales of Berseria:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oYXwD2CfxOs

On the flipside we have this game, the first Tales game I’ve enjoyed since Tales of Vesperia back in 2008. This game has an amazing story and great characters with a thematic backbone that sticks to your ribs after you finish it.

Now if I didn’t hate the act of actually playing it and having to scour its way too big boring empty dungeons and crappily designed world, it’d be a list maker for sure.

OKAY NOW IT’S TIME FOR THE CERTIFIED BANGERS:

10. Metroid: Samus Returns

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yhQWJG-_Oco

Somehow my least favorite Metroid game got two remakes that both made my list two years in a row?? This game is pretty great in it’s own right though it has a few control scheme imperfections and I could see a switch port easily being the definitive version to get.

The reason this game really makes the list though is because of how it lives up to its title. Finally an official Nintendo Metroid game that comes out and undoes Sakamoto’s vile character assassination of Samus back in Other M. . 

The queen is back, and she has been missed.

9. Horizon: Zero Dawn

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FD0DByDxJBA

An engrossing open world, great stealth/hunting/gathering systems AND robot dinosaurs are just a part of what makes this first outing for what seems like an extremely promising series great.

No, what really sets this game apart from its contemporaries is how it fleshes out its backstory, culminating in the creation of what might actually be the most despicable piece of shit villain ever put to writing for a video game. And he’s been dead for a thousand years so you can’t do shit to him.

Fuck you, Ted Faro.

8. Night in the Woods

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o2UUFFMGcgY

This game hit extremely close to home for me. Forced to come back home to a small, dying town full of people clinging to the good old days instead of doing anything for the generation after them, having this game to play and have it be said out loud that yeah, other people are living this nightmare too, was insanely refreshing.

For as much as we all need a bit of direction sometimes, sometimes what we also need to know being a directionless 20-something asshole trying their best is okay too.

Also Gregg rulz ok.

7. Ys VIII: Lacrimosa of Dana

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dNgph1g422Q

Great gameplay, great music, fun characters, one of the most fun to explore worlds in an action adventure game. This game truly nails the sense of pure adventure Ys is known for.

It’s a shame then that it’s plagued with one of the most laughable translation efforts in the industry, much of the games personality comes from the fact that even a bad localization job can’t overwrite some character quirks, but this still leaves the rest of the script feeling extremely stiff at best and incomprehensible at worst.

I hope the re-translation patch is good. Until then, Fuck NISA and have a good day.

6. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fiU65nQdZE8

I would describe this game as a great first step in evolving the Zelda formula. That’s not even really that accurate, the real first step was in Link Between World’s item rental/no dungeon order systems. 

Nevertheless, BOTW amazes with a sense of scope and exploration no game has ever really come close to, and achieves it almost effortlessly by simply giving you the ability to climb anything.

More music, more proper dungeons, a deeper story and a few durability tweaks are basically all you need to make the next Zelda game the easy best in series.

5. Yakuza 0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MYB-D9qEwzI

This isn’t the best game this year, but it is easily, no question, the MOST video game this year. 110 hours in and only 60% complete, Yakuza 0 is the game that keeps on giving, with an enthralling true crime story that reshapes what we know about its protagonists. It’s pretty much a non stop emotional thrill ride to the finish line.

It effortlessly incorporates the best side story aspects from the many games in the series to come out before it, and utilizes them with a fantastical glee that keeps you with a smile on your face for the whole run. This is easily the funniest game I’ve played this year. Thank you SEGA.

4. Hollow Knight

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1unm0LS10ao

God I can’t wait for this game to get ported to consoles. I bought a new laptop basically just to play this game and the absolutely enthralling metroidvania world design, hand drawn and animated aesthetic, and fantastic npc characters blew me away.

The encounter designs are tough but fair(except maybe the Colisseum) and the DLC so far has been great. I can’t wait for all the post release content to come out so I can play through it all again on Switch and probably PS4. 

It’s insane only 3 people made this game.

3. Super Mario Odyssey

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PhciLj5VzOk

Nothing to say here that hasn’t been said by hundreds of others. SMO is pure joy distilled into video game form.

I can’t wait for Odyssey 2 to come out and somehow blow this one out of the water like Galaxy 2 did for Galaxy.

2. Nier: Automata

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CKOM3lNFajE

An amazing contemplation on what it means to be alive, and a thoroughly satisfying conclusion to a story that, for me at least, has been told since Drakengard in 2003. Game after game of sad tragic stories with bad endings and characters fighting an imperfect world imperfectly and only making things worse while temporarily making things better for themselves.

And really even in those cases there’s caveats.

Caviats???? Anyway.

Ending E of this game finally brings some semblance of peace for this fucked up world where a deranged killer and his dragon fell through the sky and made things the worst for everyone for literally tens of thousands of years. Finally Devola and Popola can sleep. All is well.

1. The Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky the 3rd

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wld2q4mLhYM

Another year, another Trails game at number 1. I’ll be real with you, I’m about to drop a bunch of personal rambly stuff about what this entire trilogy means to me so if you don’t wanna read that, that’s fine. 

This game is basically a perfect epilogue to a game that means a whole lot to me and serves as an amazing capper to an amazing jrpg trilogy.

When I first played Trails in the Sky First Chapter, it was the PC version in 2014. Now in 2014 I was coming off being in college for about 6 years, switching majors a few times and not really being into what I was doing but, yknow, you gotta major in something and then you gotta get a job, that’s kind of what getting started as an adult is. 

So I played this weird little jrpg that was, fundamentally, about a country and the people in it trying to move on from a tragic war years prior, hiding their still fresh wounds in plain sight and just trying to go on with their lives. 

It was an extremely interesting game, for how plot-light it was in the early goings, you got to really feel the struggle of these people and the unseemly past they were trying to run away from or avoid repeating. This underlying conflict builds and builds until we can’t ignore it anymore.

When I played Second Chapter a year later, I had been laid off from a job I got right out of College and had no employment prospects. I hated the fact that I’d spent basically my entire adult life up to that point doing something I wasn’t passionate about and then got let down by the system. 

At the same time, the shame of my situation lead me to close up and not tell anyone about the problems I had, I was broke, I owed two months rent, on the verge of getting evicted, I felt extremely alone.

All this to get to the point that Second Chapter was ultimately a game about pulling out the dark shit we don’t like talking about and saying “it’s okay to talk about this stuff, there’s always someone who will listen.” It got me to get over myself somewhat and actually reach out for help, and I’m really thankful for it not letting me hit rock bottom.

Two years later still, I’m in a much better place, I finally feel happy about where my life is and what I’m doing and oh boy here comes Trails in the Sky the 3rd.

Completing the journey I started back in 2014, I found myself playing a game all about how it’s okay to acknowledge the bad things that happened to us, so long as we learn and move on from them accordingly.

This trilogy has so much heart, and so many memorable characters, and so much to say. It’s so, so special to me, and I was openly weeping when all the characters I’ve come to know and love over 4 years finally parted ways.

Thank you Falcom for making these games, and thank you Xseed for bringing these games to us.

TL;DR

#game of the year #trails in the sky #nier automata #night in the woods #ys #metroid #mario oddysey #hollow knight #yakuza 0 #zelda breath of the wild #horizon zero dawn

[easy-win-games-blog]

Cities: Skylines - Xbox One Edition Review

My gaming patterns are weird. Unless there’s something I’m super passionate about, I don’t often go in on big new games. At the moment I have RDR2 on preorder, and I bought Mario Odyssey right when it came out. But apart from these releases, I tend to either rotate my library of favourites or go in on cheaper things I’ve had my eye on for a while. And sometimes I get absolutely fucking hooked.

This is where Cities: Skylines comes in.

Cities: Skylines is a city building simulator, full of everything you might expect (minus a few features lost in the translation from PC to console). When you start up a new game you pick a region to build in (tropical, temperate, winter, etc.), name your city and specify a few gameplay details before being dropped into a completely blank slate. You build roads, lay out building zones, sort out the financial side of things and place specialised service buildings to make your city thrive.

Gameplay-wise this is definitely a full game, and if you go in on the season pass developer Paradox Plaza have already started doling out great content. The most recent release was the addition of snow and the ‘winter’ areas, bringing new elements to planning your cities including heating and road maintenance. It’s very apparent, however, that a lot is missing when compared to the PC version. I haven’t personally played it, but I can see from YouTube clips and trailers that a lot of content, both launch and post-release, is absent. Something that is in the PC version that I would love to have in the Xbox version is the ability to shape terrain and deeper levels of micromanagement. That said, with the promise of semi-regular updates and expansions I’m confident this game will be much bigger in a year or two.

A minor note, but I would love the option to designate swimming areas for beaches. It feels redundant to pick a tropical beach-lined coast to build along and have no one on the sand or in the water. I’m Australian so this is important to me.

The whole thing is extremely mediative and very rewarding. I am not fully aware of how a city should be properly laid out, road-wise, and constantly get stuck with areas of heavy traffic and carpark-level congestion. But when I’m able to quell these situations, in spite of my naivety in urban planning, the wash of pride and relief I experience is remarkable. There’s just something about seeing hundreds of big-rig trucks slip seamlessly from freeway to industrial district to cargo hub and back to freeway that tickles me all over.

Before picking up this gem the only city building sim I’d played was SimCity Creator released way back for the Nintendo Wii, and I was surprised at how much the two games have in common. While Creator is very much a simplified version of SimCity it’s funny seeing how much it shares with what is by all accounts the best city sim out at the moment. All the core elements are there: building roads in various ways and sizes, placing building zones and service buildings and balancing your city’s books. This isn’t super relevant, but since it’s my only real experience with this type of game other than Cities: Skylines I thought it might be important, just so you know where I’m coming from.

This game is the perfect passive game (see two paragraphs ago). A lot of the games I play (Hitman, Zelda BotW, Red Dead) are games with a lot of down time, or free time if that’s more applicable. Games in which you can do a lot and have a full experience, but not have to pause your podcast every five minutes to take in some exposition. I had been checking out Cities for months before getting it, watching the price go down (because I’m stingy) because I knew it would be ideal for me for this exact reason.

I feel like I’m repeating myself at this point, but I guess the core of what I’m saying is:

If you like your games to be relaxing yet challenging and to not completely consume your life, and you get off on trucks, then Cities: Skylines for Xbox or PS4, or probably even PC, is THE game for you.

SCORE

A debt of only $0.99 — lots of room for improvement.

Have I forgotten anything? Did I neglect the need to connect the residential districts to the power grid? Is there a storm drain pumping raw sewerage all over the elementary school? Leave me a note or give me a beep and let me know your thoughts.

You’ll like this if you liked:

The SimCity franchise

The Sims

Rollercoaster Tycoon

Any kind of management/building sim

- Review & illustration brewed in-house -

#cities skylines #xbox one #game review #easy-win #video games #simcity #sims #rollercoaster tycoon #management simulator #cities

[xb-squaredx]

Gaming in 2019: A Look Back

2018 was a quieter year for gaming. With new consoles on the horizon, Sony and Microsoft were in a transitional period, and while Nintendo hit the ground running with the Switch in 2017, aside from Super Smash Bros. Ultimate at the end of the year, they seemed to stumble a bit. By stark contrast, 2019 has been absolutely bonkers, with tons of quality titles and bigger announcements littered throughout. With 2019 now at its end and the end of a whole decade upon us, let’s take a look back at the world of gaming over the past year, and take in the highs and lows.

BACK TO BACK HITS

In going over all the releases this year, I was surprised at the sheer number of quality titles spread across 2019. New games release all the time, but 2019 in particular seemed hell-bent on keeping customer wallets empty with release after release. January kicked things off with a bang; Capcom graced us with the remake of Resident Evil 2, a gorgeous, terrifying reimaging of the survival-horror classic and it seems 2020 will follow suit with a remake of Resident Evil 3. Speaking of threes, Kingdom Hearts III released and…while many fans seemed happy with it, the hype surrounding it was nowhere near as high as I had always imagined it would be. Of course, the fact that this is the twelfth installment might have something to do with that. But hey, it finally happened and that counts for something. I suppose the same could also be said for the long-awaited and shadily-funded Shenmue III. It doesn’t seem like it made a huge splash; the general consensus is that while the gaming industry grew in-between the releases of Shenmue II and III the Shenmue series itself largely ignored those advancements. A game that, much like Duke Nukem Forever, would have likely fared better had it released in a timelier manner. All this talk of threes and somehow Half-Life 3 remains in development hell…but at least we’re getting a VR game, right? R-Right?

As the year went on, we saw a lot of high-quality action games like Devil May Cry 5, Astral Chain and Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, and for some reason racing games made a bit of a comeback with Team Sonic Racing and a remake of the Crash Bandicoot racers all in one package. Fighting games in particular had a lot of titles throwing their hats into the ring. From the bloody Mortal Kombat 11 to the titillating Dead or Alive 6¸SNK also introduced a new generation to the Samurai Shodown series with a new installment, and Smash Ultimate slowly unveiled a stellar lineup of new characters as DLC throughout the year. Remakes seemed particularly in-vogue this year, from the previously-mentioned Resident Evil 2, to Final Fantasy VIII, Medievil, and Link’s Awakening. I feel that “games as a service” are starting to decline in popularity, however. With Anthem, Bioware’s last hope, bombing, EA had a bright spot in Apex Legends showing up out of nowhere and momentarily drawing players away from the likes of Fortnite, though Epic’s smash hit remains to be truly toppled. With the monetization of these games still under fire, I think the public is starting to wise up about the often-predatory practices put in place that come at the detriments of the games they’re attached to. While these titles continue to be popular, we’re well past the saturation point, and players have a limit to how many of these games they can fit into their lives. They’re called “forever games” but nothing lasts forever…

There was a steady flow of releases throughout the year, but for whatever reason, September was the month where it seemed everything was coming out, with a few notable titles in late October or November. No real droughts to speak of, really. While Hideo Kojima’s crazy new game, Norman Reedus and his Radical Fetus er…I mean Death Stranding caught a lot of people’s eye, and the Pokémon franchise continued to make bank, some smaller indie titles managed to stand out from the pack. Really unique titles like Hypnospace Outlaw, GRIS and Untitled Goose Game come to mind, as was the unexpected collaboration of Crypt of the Necrodancer and the Legend of Zelda franchise with Cadence of Hyrule. Not to mention a certain slipper-wearing skeleton got into Smash Ultimate as a costume. At this point, indie developers can stand shoulder to shoulder with the bigger dogs in a lot of ways. I mean, when indie-darling Disco Elysium can walk away from The Game Awards with four wins (including beating out Reedus’ Fetus), that shows how far we’ve come as an industry in many ways. Every time I stop to remember some of the more interesting games that came out this year, a lot of them come from smaller developers. Seeing how the bigger companies have embraced indie developers, when they were once shunned, is also pretty great, even if relations aren’t always perfect.

THE BIG THREE (and google)

Focusing on the larger companies for a bit, we’ll start with Microsoft…who were a mixed bag this year. On the one hand, Gears 5 seemed to be alright, and on the other hand, Crackdown 3 came and went without so much as a whimper. Then came the long-awaited reveal of their new console at The Game Awards, of all places. Introduced as the “Xbox Series X,” Microsoft seems set on trying to confuse as many people as possible when it comes to discussing their different consoles. Or maybe they’re rebooting the brand to just be Xbox. Whatever helps them sleep at night.

(Expect confused parents at launch!)

Sony largely got through this year without too many issues. They continue to underwhelm with their “State of Play” direct announcements, but in general they have several upcoming exclusive games to look forward to. Buying Insomniac and securing them as first-party is also a pretty big move on the whole, and they ended the year with Death Stranding finally seeing release. Nintendo, meanwhile, provided a bunch of unique game experiences throughout the year. A unique action game in Astral Chain, ghost-hunting fun in Luigi’s Mansion 3 and they even found a way to make exercise fun with Ring Fit Adventure! With fairly solid Directs throughout the year, they’re a lot more consistent in quality and general hype this year in comparison to last, when it seems like all hopes were riding on Smash, which has gone on to be the best-selling fighting game ever, by the way…

I suppose I should pay lip service to Google’s own attempts to break into the gaming scene with their release of the Stadia, a streaming platform that they swear is the future of gaming. It’s billed as a “work-in-progress,” and initial reaction to it seems mixed. Some find delay so bad that games can be unplayable, and there’s been several shenanigans at launch, but maybe by this time next year all the kinks will be worked out and it’ll be hunky dory! Or maybe Google will abandon it like so many other products. I’d be surprised if it’s still relevant by this time next year.

DELAYS, DOWNERS AND DEXIT

2019 had its highs, but a fair share of lows too. Delays seemed to also be common this year. Right as 2019 was starting, Nintendo had a fairly transparent announcement that the long-awaited Metroid Prime 4 was restarting development from scratch. Animal Crossing: New Horizons and DOOM: Eternal also ended up delayed into March of next year, though interestingly enough fans seem to take such announcements much better than in years past. Reactions to delays are often one of disappointment, but understanding, especially if it’s all for the game’s benefit. It’s perhaps for this reason that the DLC roadmap for Mortal Kombat 11 saw a massive delay in character release from the usual schedule, following reports of crunch at Netherrealm Studios. After 2018 shone a light on the often hazardous work environments of game development, it does seem that delays are being used as a way to take some pressure off of developers. It’s too early to say that things are genuinely improving across the board, but it’s a start at least. Not all stories have happy endings though, and the continued fate of Telltale Games remains in a strange limbo. With Telltale Games bought by LCG Entertainment, it appears at least SOME of the former employees have a new home and even a few of their games can live on, however at present it’s not quite known if things are going to be any better for the employees there, so let’s cross out fingers. As 2019 neared its end, it’s also unfortunate that Alpha Dream closed its doors, after years of producing some well-regard RPGS starring everyone’s favorite plumber. The industry can be pretty volatile, even when you often work with the bigger dogs.

For me personally though, the biggest downer this year was the fallout surrounding the Pokémon fandom. Following an announcement that the newest games in the series, Sword and Shield, wouldn’t be compatible with all of the veteran Pokémon, the fandom seemed to split in half, one side overly critical of the games and their apparent declining quality, while the other side seemed overly defensive, casting aside legitimate concerns. It got really ugly, and even though I enjoyed Sword and Shield for what they were, the discourse left a sour taste in my mouth. 2018 made a big show of how rough some game development studios have it, facing tons of pressure for sticking to deadlines and facing crunch periods that leave people battered and broken. With Game Freak having to kowtow to the demands of higher-ups at Nintendo and The Pokémon Company to hit that release window, delays weren’t an option for them, and they even cited various game development problems in interviews before the game launched. But people want their product and they don’t seem to care how they get it. If there’s something I hope the Pokémon fanbase can learn following all this, is that there’s a big difference between voicing concerns over something you love, and harassing people that are trying to make the best of a bad situation. Looking at the bigger picture, Sword and Shield’s “Dexit” debacle isn’t the biggest gaming controversy of the year, but it was the one that affected me the most and it kind of puts a damper on ending the year strong.

TO THE FUTURE!

I’d rather NOT end on a downer though, so looking towards the future, if 2019 is any indication, there’s a lot to be excited for in 2020. For starters, we already know of a lot of hotly anticipated games set to hit next year, most of which seem to be targeting March…g-great! From the long-awaited Final Fantasy VII remake (or…part of it anyway), to Cyberpunk 2077, we also have what are set to be the swansongs of the PS4, The Last of Us Part 2 and Ghost of Tsushima. At year’s end, the PS5 and uh…Xbox…will hit store shelves and while there’s still a LOT we don’t know about either machine, be it specs, features or launch lineup, a new console launch is always cause for celebration. New possibilities! Classics in the making! A clean slate! 2020 will likely be a year to remember just on that alone.

The world of gaming is one I’m always invested in; there’s a lot of grimy stuff I’m not partial to, but plenty of good sprinkled throughout. Every passing year I see many new, innovative games come out of small, passionate developers who want to keep pushing the medium forward. Certain larger companies have also started on a “redemption arc” of sorts, with Capcom leading the charge. The “Big Three” routinely have new and exciting things to show, and we’re at a point where the video game industry is fully ingrained into popular culture. eSports continue to grow and expand, we’re getting rare video game films that don’t suck like the Detective Pikachu movie, and looking back on the last decade, things have come a long way. The greater focus on online continues to allow us to connect and play with others, and the last few years have had more conversations surrounding Cross-Play between the major competitors. If Microsoft and Nintendo can work together, who knows what can be accomplished! We’ve seen the medium mature, or at least attempt to mature, and variety has become more important than ever. After years of dull, grey shooters littering the market, games are allowed to be colorful again! We see studios pushing for diversity, for games with greater focus on mature themes, and while we still have a long way to go in a lot of areas, progress is being made. If Kratos, the God of War, can learn to chill out and become a (moderately) better person, then there’s hope for the medium yet, and with a new console generation and new decade waiting for us, 2019 lets us end on a relatively high note.

Here’s to a great 2020.

-B

#xb-squaredx #blog #2019 #gaming #ps4 #xbox one #nintendo switch #sekiro #devil may cry 5 #smash ultimate #crackdown 3 #anthem #indies #video games #google stad

[leftwriteb]

Industry Trend: Open Worlds & Empty Spaces

With the recent release of both Horizon: Zero Dawn and the impending UK launch of The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild on the WiiU/Switch in the next few minutes, the gaming community is going to be treated to two incredible sprawling universes with little but a handful of days between them. Even if that wasn't enough, a new endeavour into the galactic expanses of Mass Effect: Andromeda could easily be another title to add to the growing list of open world games that have reigned supreme on the "next gen" (or now much rather current) console generation. As someone who plans to get all three of these games, as well as the disc copy of Telltales TWD Season 3, March is going to be an expensive and time consuming month for many.

With the latest generation of consoles having been around for a few years now, we are starting so see games and developers use the tools at their disposal in new and exciting ways. Uncharted 4 showed us that games are prettier than ever. Forza Horizon 3 showed us games are smoother than ever. Games like Limbo and The Witness showed us that older concepts and genres could be reborn and reimagined. Games like Star Wars: Battlefront showed us that you can make stupid amounts of money selling half a game... again.. Oh, and let's not forget that The Witcher 3 showed us games were bigger than ever. That too.

But, that being said, I can’t say I ever completed the Witcher 3. Not even close. And a large part of that was because the game gave me something I had never experienced before: a world that was just too big. That’s not to say the game was bad of course, but I found myself less and less interested in the map and what was held within it because there was no real drive for me to explore and investigate every corner as I often do when playing games. While I absolutely adored the time I spent with the game, in a landmass as vast as it was, much of that space was empty and void of the kind of mystery or intrigue that would usually have its hooks in me. 

In all honesty, this is something far too common in this generations lifespan. When I look at the the games I’ve spent the most time with over the past few years, it’s sadly all too clear that they are also the games that haven’t stuck with me. Unlike games before them, they don’t have locations I vividly remember, or locales I could map out from memory. To this day, I could still build a shockingly acccurate model of Outset Island from Wind Waker if asked to. I can still tell you how where the best vantage point is in Armadillo, the first town you come across in Red Dead Redemption, and describe in detail the layout around it. I could even take you on a worryingly precise tour of most of Pandora given the time spent in the Borderlands games.

But when I look at more recent games, feats like that are far more difficult. I couldn’t tell you the name of one location from Middle Earth: Shadow of Mordor, despite the game being my first Platinum Trophy and one of my favourite titles on the Playstation 4 so far. I can’t recall anywhere particularly memorable from the many hours I spent within Far Cry 4. Even having spent hundreds of hours (and £) on Fallout 4, I remember far less of the map than that of it’s predecessor. It’s a problem sometimes referred to as “open world fatigue”. Far too often we see games having open worlds for open world sake, and in an attempt to create more for the player to do, the surroundings these tasks are situated in are dull, repetitive or both.

Having played a good number of hours of Horizon, and around 30 minutes of Breath of the Wild at the Switch event in London a few weeks ago, it does thankfully look like this trend in the industry is about to get a big fat slap in the face.

Let’s start with Zelda, given this is the game that releases around now in the UK (at the time of posting) and is the game I’ve spent less time with of the two. In just the short time I had with the game, it can’t be stated enough how refreshing the game felt, not just as a Zelda title, but within our beloved medium as a whole. Every corner I chose to explore had something waiting for me. While there were plenty of open grassland areas, looming forests and aged rock formations to create the vast stretches of this reimagined Hyrule, they were generously peppered with things of interest too.

The buried remains of an ancient Guardian sat in a cluster of moss and dirt, frozen in mid-animation. Lakes and rivers would cut through the terrain to add some visual variety and to add some complexity to navigating. Goblin camps would often be positioned along commonly used pathways and would be home to a whole host of enemies and loot, should you defeat them.

What’s more, these details within the greenery provided new ways to interact with the world around you. At one camp, I found some large boulders on a hilltop to the west. Pushing these boulders down the slopes meant I squashed two of the three enemies waiting for me, allowing for an easier victory and an even easier path to the wooden chest the blighters had been guarding. The world felt more alive than any iteration I had played before it, and this wasn’t just limited to the environment; characters and enemies feel more alive than ever too! While traversing a canyon during exploration, I found myself within a narrow bottleneck. Atop of solitary rock stood a goblin wielding a wooden torch. After knocking him to the ground with an arrow or two, his lit torch set the grass around us alight and we both scurried backwards away from the flames, waiting for them to die out, before we charged at each other once more ready to settle our little ember-filled spat. What made me fall in love with the game was how this clearly huge space before me felt like it had purpose. It felt lived in. It felt like it had a history. The things I saw felt like they were there for a reason, instead of just to fill a void.

It’s been a long time coming but I can tell you that I am incredibly excited to play what Zelda has waiting for me, and I honestly think you should be too.

On a more Sony oriented note, Horizon: Zero Dawn is also proving to be another highlight in the catalogue for Playstation 4. While the comparisons between Horizon and Zelda will undoubtedly surface, it’s important to keep in mind that while they do a few things similarly, they are two very different behemoths. While Breath of the Wild brings a much-needed freshness to an established series, Horizon aims to build a solid base for a completely new IP and, make no mistake, it succeeds.

Horizon is a game of two tales and it’s one that manages to provide a playground filled with things you’re already familiar with. Scaling a Tallneck reveals the expanse on your map as you’ve seen in many Ubisoft titles. You can traverse the map via your mount which you can summon to you, akin to the Witcher 3′s Roach, though perhaps not as comical as Geralt’s almighty steed. You’ve got heavy attacks, light attacks, special tools and a weapon wheel just as you’d expect. What the game does, it does incredibly well and with a great deal of polish. But on top of this all is a new universe to become complete infatuated with too.

The strange mashup of sci-fi robotics and engineering with more traditional tribal influences creates a kind of harmony in artistic direction you wouldn't expect to see with such juxtaposition. Locales are a cocktail of twisted metal and blossoming vegetation and everywhere you go has a reason to exist and a visual storytelling that ignites your imagination as you try to piece together your own logic for how or why this ruin is where it is.

While there is plenty of familiarity to keep you grounded in the world Horizon offers, there’s so much more depth in what it brings newly to the table. The open spaces are ones you’ll want to envelope yourself in and already, in the limited hours I have spent with the game so far, I have discovered locations and beauty in the environments that will stick with me forever in my gaming endeavours. This world isn’t just beautiful; it’s actually interesting and exciting too.

While there have been plenty of open worlds and empty spaces in videogames in recent memory, we are at a point in time where things are really changing and open worlds are coming into their own. They feel, as they should, more like established worlds than just open ones. With Horizon and Zelda, we are treated to some of the most brilliantly realised worlds we have ever seen in this medium and I think we can all agree that that’s a trend we hope continues.

#horizon #horizonzerodawn #zelda #breatheofthewild #legend of zelda #link #playstation #wiiu #switch #nintendo #gaming #videogames #games #openworld #triforce #ganon #aloy

[thephotopitmagazine]

Photo: JW Lee

I love finding a great band who is so in sync with their music, their presentation, and their performance. And when you get to know a band like that to find they are also genuine and appreciative of their fans, it makes meeting them that much better. So when I had the opportunity to interview a band I’ve known over the past two years, it was an absolute pleasure to help introduce them to more people. That band is GFM.

GFM is from Jacksonville, FL and consists of CJ Sanders English (guitar, vocals), Magdalene “Maggie” Rose English (bass, vocals), and Evie “LuLu” Louise English (drums, background vocals). But, the part that blew me away is when I learned how old they all were. Currently, CJ is 20, Maggie is 19, and Lulu is 15. Yet, if you’ve seen them perform, they sound like they’ve been doing this for years on stage. Their parents made them pick up an instrument to learn to play at a very young age and told them to stick with it and if they didn’t like it after a few years they could stop their lessons. CJ started to learn guitar, Lulu decided on drums, but Maggie was learning piano. When they decided to form the band, Maggie decided to pick up the bass, since it was the core instrument they were missing. And they’ve been playing together for over 10 years. “We started at a super young age,” CJ said, “and we’re really grateful our parents gave us that opportunity and that suggested that we do that because it has given us extra time, I guess, to make our name in the music industry.”

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And when you hear how mature they sound and see how well they perform together, it’s mind-blowing. “…being that young it just freaks people out that we can play as good as we have just because we’ve played for a long time.” GFM was playing at local bars and venues while they were still underage. And while most of the venues had no issues with the band being underage, there was always that one exception as GFM explained, “There was only one show where we weren’t allowed to sell merch in the venue. Everyone else was totally cool with it. Everyone had their eyes on us and we had the wristbands and Xs on our hands so everybody knew we were underage. But, there was only one venue that said ‘This is the rule we have you have to sell merch outside if you’re gonna sell merch. You can come in and play the show and after that you have to get out.'” Overall, GFM has always been treated with respect whenever they play.

GFM first released an EP known as Death of Giants in 2015. The immediately followed that with their first studio album titled Identity Crisis that was released in 2016. When I asked about their writing style for those albums Maggie said, “When we first started writing Identity Crisis we had a lot of help and we were depending on a lot of people for the input and their influence saying, ‘Hey you should write like this’, ‘You should write songs like this’, ‘Your music should sound like this’. So we were going in all these different directions and listening to all these people.” Then in 2019 the band released another EP titled Oh, The Horror!. When asked what was the difference from this recent EP and their other albums they said, “We’re more confident in who we are, more confident in writing, and so we knew what we wanted to sound like. We obviously were still looking to others to see what they had to say, we had cool writers, and we’re very collaborative and that sort of thing. But, we knew what we wanted to sound like. So, we were directing it more. Saying ‘Hey we want to write like this’, ‘This is the stuff we want to talk about’, ‘Let’s go in this direction’ instead of people telling us what direction to go in.” Working together for so long, the sisters work collaboratively well together bringing each other ideas on both music and lyrics. CJ added, “I feel like sometimes we’re scatterbrained a lot and it helps us with writing as we’re constantly throwing stuff out ‘Hey about this? How about this?’ So it’s important to have cool writers and we’ve used them before so they all make sure we’re on the same wavelength as us because we’ve been with others before and we just confused them.” We all had a good laugh over that.

Check out the video “Stuck in My Suicide” from Identity Crisis below:

  Producer Eric Varnell and Billy Decker who both worked on Oh, The Horror! really understood GFM‘s vision. “They completely got it right away. And Eric is completely the same as us. We had so many ideas we want on there and so many emotions we want to portray and he really does a great job at making sure we portray those in the right way and making sure we put those thoughts and those emotions to music and he knows exactly how to do that. And how to make us feel comfortable while doing that…He makes it a very relaxed situation.” They also went on to explain Eric always allowed them to take their time with the songs as they recorded and never chastised them for making mistakes.

Oh, The Horror! was also a very personal EP for GFM. They explained, “We were able to write about things we [had] overcome and the happiness we had found and we wanted to share that with people and share that story with others, so they could hopefully learn from it and be able to reach that same point in happiness, that same point of self-acceptance that we did.”

Check out the video “On The Inside” from the EP Oh, The Horror! below:

GFM is currently working on a new project and we’ve already got to see a taste of the new work. The band released a single titled “I Don’t Need Your Fantasy”. The single will appear on their upcoming new project and produced by Joey Sturgis. “We felt it’s such a strong point to lead from because it embodies what the new EP is about, what the new project is about, because we have dealt with heavy topics in the past. Just struggling with your identity, not knowing who you are, constantly comparing yourself to other people, but then at the end of that coming to a conclusion of you accept yourself now and you’re happy with who you are and learning to love yourself. This EP is just kind of embodying that whole thing where we’re confident in ourselves now. We’re here and we’re going to take over. And there’s no one who can get in our way. And no one who can stop us because we know what our goal is.” The song was written to tell people “you don’t need to listen to the stereotype that society has placed on us. You don’t have to live that cookie-cutter life. You can live the way you want to. You don’t have to live the perfect way. You don’t have to have the perfect social media status to be happy. In the end it doesn’t matter. It’s social media, it’s not real.” GFM says they feel the music compared to prior songs is more complex and they’re pushing themselves to be even better than before. You can check out their video of “I Don’t Need Your Fantasy” below.

  One thing I do love about this band directly relates to their full name of Gold Frankincense & Myrrh. Their faith. “We are all Christians. We’re a faith-based band. With our music we always want to create that positive outlook for people and that safe community for people to listen to let go of their problems and feel better about themselves after listening to our music. And we do deal with heavy topics like depression and suicide and mental health…but it always comes out in the end with a positive outlook like you can get help and it will be OK. It’s very important to us to let people know that there is hope, there is a way out, there is recovery.” And just because they’re a Christian band doesn’t mean they don’t know how to rock out, trust me they do. They don’t change their music based on the venue. “On stage, we say a small message on what we believe in, but we never want to force it down anybody’s throat. We never want to force our beliefs on anybody. We say our piece and then continue playing music.”

The ladies in GFM are very family-oriented and make time to go to dinner together, see movies, or even just go to the park. When they’re not on tour or working on new music they love playing video games. They are big XBox and Nintendo Switch fans. Lulu loves Apex Legends and Dead By Daylight. Maggie is a fan of Call of Duty and likes to let loose with a hail of bullets because “I have terrible aim” and is bound to hit something with more bullets than less. And CJ loves Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. All great selections!

GFM left us with these parting words:

Maggie – “I’m very excited about this new music and being able to put out new projects and new ideas. And kind of make those come to life with music videos and being able to talk to our fans about them. Cause I feel like once you put out music everyone listens to it for a little bit and then says ‘When’s the next one?’. So we’re excited about being able to give them another one so recently. Because we had gone a couple of years after releasing an album. It was like two or three years and then we put out the EP. And now it’s been a year and we’re going to put out another project. That’s what’s exciting for me.”

Lulu – “I’m excited for just the shows because playing shows is one of my favorite things of all time. And just getting that rush before we go on, hyping each other up, and coming off stage and talking to fans, and encouraging them, and seeing them smile and hugging them it’s really great. So I can’t wait to do that for weeks and weeks in a row.”

CJ – “Definitely seeing people and hearing people’s stories and getting that physical connection to actually see people and see people that are supporting you. That’s what I definitely love when touring.”

At the time of the interview, GFM was planning to go on tour. Unfortunately, those plans had to be postponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. I look forward to seeing GFM back out on the road again entertaining the fans. For those who’ve never seen them live, they bring an energy to the stage that is unparalleled to most live bands. Expect to be bouncing, jumping, and singing along because GFM loves to get the fans involved in their show.

Please check out all their social media links below to keep up with the band. And for those who support their Patreon you get to see sneak peeks of new music, videos, and behind the scenes! GFM is an amazing band with such wonderful and powerful music, so check them out. I hope you love them as much as I do!

www.instagram.com/thegfmband

www.facebook.com/thegfmband

www.twitter.com/thegfmband

www.youtube.com/thegfmband

www.patreon.com/thegfmband

www.bandsintown.com/gold,frankincense,andmyrrh

www.thegfmband.com

From The Pit To The Mic: Interview with GFM I love finding a great band who is so in sync with their music, their presentation, and their performance.

[extraquarterblog]

The Wii U was made for Pokemon

Nintendo Wii U + Pokemon = Match made in Heaven

Nintendo has always been known for its unique and different approach to the Gaming Field. If the industry went left, Nintendo would go right. Everyone went to CD, Nintendo gave us, N64 Carts. Nintendo out of the box thinking, gives its brilliance and occasional failures. Some of Nintendo best ideas come from this philosophy, The Nintendo Wii and the DS were both completely polar opposites compared to the rest of the industry, but despite their differences it's what made Nintendo massively successful last generation. 

The Wii U however, is a different breed for Nintendo. Coming off the success of the original Wii, Nintendo has this difficult situation. The Wii just isn't any console, its Nintendo best selling system ever, that was also known for its unique motion controls. How do you follow up to that? How do you reach out to the over 100 Million Wii owners? Nintendo again, being unique and seeing the market trends, decided to build off the Wii platform and introduced its most famous part, the Wii U Gamepad (aka the tablet thingy)

Sadly, despite the enormous success the Wii was, its successor is struggling. It's puzzling that the Wii U isn't selling more with its year lead and have released so many core titles like Super Smash, Mario Kart 8, Super Mario 3D, Wind Waker HD, Pikmin 3, Donkey Kong Country. I could go on and on, True, there's a large pool of 3rd party titles missing, but still. Nintendo first party games are typically power houses. Yet now, they can barely move any hardware units. So just why is that?

My personal belief is that it's all familiar, it's been done time and time again. Sure, Nintendo first party games are great, but to really win fans over, you need to pull out a trump card. Something so massive, only the wettest of wet dreams could compare. Tabooed from Fans every wishing for. A long lost dream that I swear, every time I look at the Wii U, I realize this entire system's existence was made just for one game.

Pokemon

As you know, if there's anything that could rival Mario in popularity and sales, it's Pokemon. Much as I love the favorite red Plumber, despite being featured in over 5 different titles. The Wii U still hasn't sold 10 million units yet. I think it's time for Mario to take a brief vacation, hang out with Peach, and let the good Professor Oak try, I mean, if there's one thing Pokemon is famous for, its reviving Nintendo.

Nintendo and Pokemon have a bit of a history of redemption and revival.

There's an old legend that's told around campfires, it goes like this: In the mid 90's, Nintendo was on the brink of disaster, the N64 was struggling and the Gameboy was falling off quicker than expected, while the Gameboy Color was in the works, it wouldn't be ready for release till years later. Putting Nintendo in between a rock and a hard place. With financial struggles, the unthinkable rumors of Nintendo closing began to circulate. Then, from the shadows of doom and despair, an underdog studio Game Freak, with barely any money left, released Pokemon Green and Red for the Gameboy. Saving the entire Nintendo company.

It's a cute story that has "some" truth to it. Despite all my attempts to find hard, concrete evidence of Nintendo being in such a terrible position and Pokemon saving the day remains unfounded. But that's not to say it's completely far-fetched. At the time the Sony PlayStation was hot, CD's were becoming all the rage and games were arguably cheaper to purchase compared to the N64 more expensive Carts, and towards the end of the Gameboy life had lost a lot of steam. It was one thing for Nintendo to go against Sega, but also competing with Sony caused a lot of stress. 

The company Game Freak was almost out of money too, the reality is, Pokemon almost never happened. To get the game off the ground and finally ship, they had to cut content out and allowed some half finished artwork to pass. It's why Pokemon Green never came State side when Pokemon Blue had far better artwork. Truth be told, Pokemon Gold and Silver could be considered the first true complete Pokemon Game, Game Freak intended it to be in its entirety.

But was the N64 really in that big of despair? I wouldn't doubt it had various money issues, but don't forget, it also had Mario 64, Zelda Ocarina of Time and Golden Eye. Just, you know, some of the most iconic games of all Time. I doubt Nintendo was losing a lot of sleep, but there's no denying that Pokemon had some serious impact for Nintendo.

So, wouldn't it be poetic, to see, that relation from the 90's, the struggling Nintendo and Pokemon tag team match up, appear again. But this time...for the Wii U?

In Nintendo treasure chest of things that they could do. None could top a full fledged Pokemon title debut on a console. We've seen multiple Pokemon Stadium games, Mystery Dungeons and other spin-off titles. But never the full experience. Nintendo has always reserved the full Pokemon titles on the handheld side, despite fans cry to capture them all on the big screen TV. 

Nintendo always had their reasons for not releasing a Pokemon game on console environment. Generally Nintendo kept such titles to push each Handheld system to boost sales and establish itself in the market. Well, the 3DS is doing plenty fine and there's already Pokemon X & Y for it. Its the Wii U that's needing a boost, and what better system to do justice for the Pokemon franchise.

When you look at the Nintendo Wii U hardware and controller, it's a match made in heaven for a Pokemon game. If you've played any of the recent Mario games, you can test to just how gorgeous and simple the visuals look. Nintendo really aims for the Pixar look of games. Imaging that, but for the world of Pokemon.

The Gamepad would be the bread n butter for this Pokemon game. Generally, when you play an older Pokemon Game, you'll always find yourself in a constant battle of sharing your screen with other windows. Like your item pack, list of Pokemon, the display Map, phone call list, ect ect. When the Nintendo DS had its big Pokemon release of Diamond and Pearl, it received tons of praise of having used the second display. The same prinicble could also be used here. A Pokemon game for the Wii U could possibly be the best use of the Gamepad in its history.

Now if you ever played Nintendo Land on the Wii U, then you know this game makes great use of the Gamepad. It's more than just a controller, it really brings a whole new experience. When I was playing the Zelda themed game, where you hold the Gamepad to aim and shot your bow n arrow. I was thinking, man, wouldn't this be so cool, to try to capture a Pokemon like this. Instead of shooting an arrow, I'm throwing poke balls towards a Pokemon. All the sudden, effects like sleep, paralysis would play a huge part. Trying to capture an Abara as it runs around the room, only giving you seconds before it teleports would simply be, insane. It would be raising the bar on what it meant to truly capture a Pokemon.

However, while it's all fun to play with our imagination and let our creative juices run wild on what a Pokemon game could be for the Wii U, the reality is, it needs to be a solid investment. That it has the potential to move so many units and gain mountains of cash that the risk involved would be well worth it. Sure, I've listed off a few reasons, but would a new Pokemon game using the Gamepad and having better visuals really make the Wii U a huge seller? Would it really make the Wii U a must have?

However, I still have one more trump card I personally saved for last, would make it so damn appealing, even Nintendo mouth would start to water. Imagine, the next Pokemon game, started using...

Amiibo

If there's one thing Fans and Scalpers have been going crazy for, its Amiibo figures. And the Smash Bros shows just how demanding fans can be for it. Can you imagine, the insanity for Amiibo Pokemon figures would be like? Super Smash Bros has over 48 characters. A Pokemon game could have over +250. You could be printing off Amiibo figures for years, with no end in sight to the demand. Not to mention Nintendo could intentionally do limited runs for some figures, causing pre-orders to explode. Fans would be lining up at the door with cash in hand to get their paws on one. Well, at least the scalpers would, they seem have nothing better to do these days...

Thoughts again raced through my head, Imagine, you could have your own Safari Park that gave you the chance to catch rare Pokemon through the use of Amiibo you've purchased. No longer would you have to own two versions of the game, or spend days trying to trade. You simply purchased the Pokemon Amiibo you were needing. Scan and few, and Bam. You're off on your Safari hunt. I could even see Nintendo having a selection of Pokemon only available through the use of Amiibo. 

But why stop there, when Amiibo could even open up to items, and when I mean items, I mean the keys to finally capture those elusive Legendaries. 

In almost every Pokemon Game, there's always 1 to 3 Pokemon that you can only capture via special events. More specifically, you are given an item. Typically a Ticket, that grants you special trip to a previously impossible location. Now, you no longer have to wait, cause now, you got yourself a S.S. Golden Ticket Amiibo. Legendary, Brace yourself, you got a trainer coming towards ya. 

The list goes on and on. I could write a Novel on this, but ultimately. Would Nintendo explore such an opportunity? Could we awake to a new era of Pokemon games? Much as my heart says yes. My mind, impossibly stubborn, cruel and cold, says No.

Nintendo has continued to shoot down any possibilities of this ever happening and no matter how slow sales for the Wii U may be. Nintendo still has enough cash in the bank to weather several storms. But, It is one thing to survive an unpopular device, it's entirely different to win back fans. If Nintendo is serious about winning back its core, It will take more than a few Triforce pieces and a couple of red mushrooms. 

#Nintendo #Pokemon #Wii U