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Teatopia is one of those games that feels absolutely peaceful and a bit like a slice of life game. The basic premise is that you inherited land from your grandfather, and you have to build your own farm up and integrate your life into the community at large. While the demo I played was a bit limited in content, I really enjoyed what I found and it made me want to see everything Teatopia has to offer.

The graphic art style is absolutely gorgeous. Quite frequently, Chinese-inspired slice-of-life games will go for a paint-and-brush art style that seeks to invoke calligraphy in the gamer’s mind. Teatopia instead uses vibrant colors that pop off of the screen with clearly defined art to bring its world to life — and I kept commenting on how beautiful everything was during my demo. The character models are 3D and the world itself is 2D, which helps to really make the NPCs stand out among everything else going on. Teatopia is truly a very cozy world to exist in.

Of course, gameplay is what makes or breaks a game. Thankfully, I was able to try out a handful of activities in Teatopia ranging from fishing, breaking rocks, and planting crops.  The gameplay mechanics for farming and clearing land thankfully aren’t out of the ordinary. I also was able to try out the fishing mechanics — and while they were a bit rough (it is a minigame experience!), I was pleased with that too. After GDC 2024, I popped over onto the official Teatopia account, and I saw there are other gameplay mechanics such as building a waterwheel connecting the local stream to your crops to help irrigate them. This game simply oozes creative potential for gameplay and exploration.

Teatopia, which has a Kickstarter that will eventually be launching, honestly has a lot of potential. During my demo, there was a lot of talk about being able to cook all sorts of dishes, raise animals, make tea, play gambling games like Cee-lo, and more in the world. I checked out all of the videos the development team has put out, and I was more than a little impressed with how they are committed to making sure even tiny details like having the plants sway when you walk past them are included in Teatopia. We unfortunately do not have an officially confirmed date for the Kickstarter to go up. However, just from my brief time with the game? I think it is something worth keeping an eye on as it heads ultimately towards release.

Are you excited to make tea and raise animals? What about gamble and fish?

Let us know in the comments below what you want to see in Teatopia!

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When I played a demo of Arzette: The Jewel of Faramore at PAX East 2024, the biggest impression I walked away with was that Seedy Eye Software had done the impossible: they created a game that invoked the heart and soul of the CD-i console platform and made it into a quality gaming product for 2024. Set in the land of Faramore, Arzette: The Jewel of Faramore has the titular hero go out on a quest to stop the evil Daimur.

The creator behind the game, Seth Fulkerson, has repeatedly stated that Arzette: The Jewel of Faramore is inspired by The Legend of Zelda CD-i games, and I certainly believe that. The gameplay is a 2D adventure where you jump and slash your way through enemies towards the end of the level. The gameplay itself fits well in 2024, and I was happy to find out that the enemy hitboxes were on point, and the platforming controls worked well. Even as I killed enemies and fought a boss at the end of the demo, I found myself becoming thoroughly engrossed by the gameplay itself. The game bills itself as Arzette being able to unlock more abilities as it progresses, and I am personally curious to see what all she can do when she is fully unleashed. During my demo, I was able to try out the bombs, and I ended up using them to great effect to help destroy the stage-end boss.

Of course, the hallmark of the CD-i was the animated cutscenes, and Arzette: The Jewel of Faramore does not disappoint. The distinct, low quality art style of the CD-i games has been lovingly recreated for Arzette: The Jewel of Faramore. The voice acting is over the top, and the cutscenes pop up to tell the story more frequently than what you would expect. The world levels themselves are beautifully done, and you can tell that a lot of care went into them. The more I kept playing, the more it reminded me of Working Designs’ Popful Mail in terms of gameplay quality and charm.

There is one other important note to mention: I tried the game with both the 2024 controller option and the remade CD-i controller option that was released through Limited Run Games. Unfortunately, that CD-i controller is awful, and I found it difficult to control Arzette with it. Using that controller really made me appreciate joysticks and other video game innovations in the past 20-plus years.

Ultimately, the PAX East 2024 demo I played of Arzette: The Jewel of Faramore takes inspiration and heart from a long-dead, barely remembered home console, while simultaneously transcending it into a final product that is far better than its inspiration. The final product was released back in February, and I think it is well-worth trying it out if the demo is any indication of the final game…and thankfully, it is out now!

Did you ever play any CD-i titles? Are you planning on picking up Arzette: The Jewel of Faramore?

Let us know in the comments below!

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Renaine is a Kickstarter-originated title that bills itself as “a game about overcoming failure.” The protagonist, Aine, is able to come back to life an infinite number of times, but also has to defeat a Dragon as an act of revenge while traveling across the Kingdom of Lineria. You jump, roll, and attack with your sword in order to move across the 2D map in an action-adventure, platforming, adventure with very busy pixelated graphics.

I am going to just open with my favorite two parts of my Renaine demo: the writing and the music. The NPC dialogue is frequently snarky and fantastic, and I kept wanting to laugh while playing. For example, when you enter the dojo at the start of the demo to learn how to play the game, one of the NPCs gives the cliché statement that how anyone can become a pro with enough hard work and determination. Immediately to the right, another NPC states a more realistic answer of how SOME can become a pro with enough hard work and determination. After training and learning basic combat, a different NPC explains that advanced lessons are for the full game, and you’ll even run into an NPC with an upside-down head who talks about it and tries to get you to relate to him. This style of snarky and fourth-wall break humor was peppered throughout the demo without wearing out its welcome. The music, which is a very jazzy set of tunes, is incredible as well and is a fairly unique aspect for a platforming title. I actually found myself wanting to buy a copy of Renaine’s soundtrack to just put on in the background while I am living my day-to-day life. If you listen to the above linked trailer, you’ll see what I mean!

Of course, Renaine is more than just music and humor, and thankfully it also delivers in gameplay. The platforming and combat controls were pretty tight, and I felt like I could accurately judge where Aine was going to land when he jumped, and that if I was fast enough, I could hit what I was aiming at with my weapon. The real surprise though was that there is a fairly unique powerup gameplay loop. Whenever you kill enemies, you get money to collect. And fairly frequently, you run across an NPC shop that gives you different weapons or abilities to buy for a price — and you could get one at a time. You’re making choices between a fire rod that shoots flames, bombs that walk around, and so much more. There are even more surreal items such as different mushroom powerups that…well…turn you into an actual mushroom. All of this actually incentivized me to kill all the enemies I could find in order to get more money to keep trying out new powers as I would come across them. In the second half of the demo, I actually was partnered up with another, much larger, NPC, who helped me to fight enemies all throughout a sand area and I loved how it mixed up the gameplay.

Overall, Renaine was a blast to play and to experience. I was not expecting such sharp humor and writing while demoing it, but that, along with the constant powerups gameplay loop, really drew me into wanting to see more and more of the kingdom of Lineria and its inhabitants when it eventually releases for PC and for Nintendo Switch.

Are you excited for Renaine? What powerups are you hoping to find and use in the game?

Let us know below!

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The longer I kept playing The World of Kungfu: Dragon and Eagle, the more I kept thinking “this is so cool!” and the more I wanted to keep playing and wanting to get it when it is released. The World of Kungfu: Dragon and Eagle bills itself as “an old-school wuxia turn-based RPG set in the chaotic times of ancient China,” and it has you start off as a no-named individual who has to learn martial arts as you shape the fate of Wulin.

While the game’s website claims it is a turn-based RPG, the demo I played at GDC 2024 was more like a grid-based tactical RPG game with up to five combatants on your side at once instead. During battle, you can move your characters a certain number of squares around, and you can also attack only within a certain number of highlighted squares too. This isn’t a knock against The World of Kungfu: Dragon and Eagle whatsoever, but I do think it is important to be clear what this game is and is not.

What sets The World of Kungfu: Dragon and Eagle apart from any other RPG of its genre is the combat move pool itself. Every attack is drawn from a pool of over 200 styles of martial arts, and so you will get to experience a lot of different moves. As you use moves over and over again, they will get stronger and level up over time. In other words: you’re literally practicing martial arts in the game and getting stronger and better for it. You can also learn new moves through manuals you collect throughout the world. I hardcore geeked out over all the ingenuity in combat, as I practice kendo in my spare time and it honestly reminded me of walking along the Avenue of the Stars by the Victoria Harbour waterfront in Tsim Sha Tsui, Hong Kong.

The enemy AI felt fairly fleshed out and intelligent, and I was impressed that I had to use tactical thinking in order to win my fights (bouts?). While I did not get to experience much of the storyline, as I had to skip a lot of the dialogue to fit the whole demo into my timeslot, I was entertained by what I saw of the wuxia and historically-based atmosphere. Finally, the graphics are detailed pixel-art with vibrant colors. While I was playing my demo, the developer told me that The World of Kungfu: Dragon and Eagle is supposed to be 30-plus hours and it has multiple storylines for you to complete. I am honestly excited for when this game comes out, as I want to play it, and I think you should consider picking it up too if you like the demo/early access that is currently out on Steam.

What martial arts style do you hope makes it into The World of Kungfu: Dragon and Eagle?

Do you plan on picking the game up?

Let us know in the comments below!

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Bread & Fred is deceptively simple: two people, each controlling a penguin, have to work together to climb higher and higher in the snowy mountain environment until you reach the top and finish the game. Oh, and you’re tied to each other by a rope. However, Bread & Fred is anything but simple in practice. During my hands-on demo during PAX East 2024 with one of the developers as my co-penguin, I found a brutally difficult — yet incredibly fun — game that required us to count in unison to time jumps, swings, and wall grabs.

The pixel art is beautiful, and I loved how the colors popped off of the screen. The controls were also incredibly fair, and every time we fell down, it was absolutely deserved. The gameplay though? Brutal. A lot of the jumps and rope swings have almost no room for error, and everything has to be perfectly timed in order to climb further upwards. If you and your partner do not have excellent communication and a willingness to plot the next several jumps ahead of time, then you won’t get far in Bread & Fred. This game is incredibly challenging in gameplay execution versus mechanics, and I think that really works to show off Bread & Fred’s strengths to force people to cooperate to succeed. As you climb higher and higher, the terrain can get more and more difficult with environmental hazards, such as the blowing wind, that can derail even the most calculated of jumps.

As a side note, I did not try the single player mode — Bread & Fred is clearly meant to be a co-op experience.

During my PAX East 2024 Bread & Fred demo, I also was able to try out the new race content. In this, you and your partner penguins are competing against a polar bear in a closed map environment to see who can get to the end first. During the race I tried out, it felt like it was more complicated than the gameplay environment I was previously in, and it was less forgiving with how far you ‘drop’ if you miss a jump. The polar bear also repeatedly fell, surprisingly, and so it did not make me feel like the race was over the moment I or my partner miscued a jump or swing from platform to platform. Ultimately, I think it is a nice little add-on to Bread & Fred.

New content for Bread & Fred includes competitive races on new maps!
They are harder than they look. (Images courtesy of Apogee Entertainment.)

So, I’ll be honest: I loved Bread & Fred and the new race content, but it definitely isn’t for those who cannot communicate with their partner penguin well. It took me and one of the developers (who made the game!) time to connect well enough to get our penguins partway up the mountain and to try to (but fail at) crushing the polar bear during the race. Bread & Fred’s already out now, so definitely give it a try!

What do you think of difficult co-op games? Have you tried out Bread & Fred?

Let us know in the comments below!

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One of the most exciting things for me to try out at PAX East 2024 was an early hands-on build of Turbo Overkill on PlayStation 5. Developed by Trigger Happy Interactive and inspired by classics such as Doom, Quake, and Duke Nukem 3D, Turbo Overkill has you play as Johnny Turbo as he returns to his hometown and finds everyone possessed by a rogue AI and its associated army.

The biggest difference between the PC version and the upcoming console build is just how slick everything feels, and how it is clear Trigger Happy Interactive really wanted to plus all the gameplay by making this the best possible version of the Turbo Overkill. The original PC build was designed to have you go as fast as you can through each area while solving combat puzzles and killing enemies, and they have tweaked the PlayStation 5 build to remove any potential slowdown spots in the game. I slid around a lot on my chainsaw leg (it is a weapon too!) and I ended up relying on that ability to repeatedly kill as many enemies as possible in areas where I had to kill everyone to proceed. Combat flowed so incredibly well, whether I was shooting or attacking through movement, and I had the biggest silly grin on my face during the entire demo.

As I alluded to, Turbo Overkill is a game designed to have you move fast, and that was perfectly showcased on the PlayStation 5. I was throwing myself from ledge to ledge, rooftop to the ground, and through tunnels and everywhere you could imagine as I tried to go as fast as I could while slaughtering anything that got in my way. It felt a lot like a 2024 version of Mirror’s Edge at times with how fluid and satisfying it felt to platform and move my way around the level while running and gunning.

Something that not every PC-to-console port does well is setting up converting a PC/mouse control scheme over to a controller without sacrificing any of the gameplay quality in the process. Thankfully, there was no such issue here for Turbo Overkill. The controller controls felt incredibly natural, and I would have been hard-pressed to tell you that this was not a game designed from the ground-up for the PlayStation 5 by the time I was done with my demo.

Did you play Turbo Overkill on PC? Are you excited for the upcoming console release?

Let us know in the comments below!

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Publisher(s): Toge Productions
Platform(s): PC
Release Date: January 17, 2024

Steam Link

TEST TEST TEST is probably one of the wildest, most unique and thought provoking games I played throughout all of my time at PAX East 2024. The concept is simple: you are an office employee who has to finish different tasks within 15 minutes or be executed and have your day start over again. The art style is hand-drawn pixel-art that I think is meant to invoke the 32-bit era, and it frankly looks gorgeous.

Where TTT really shines though is the puzzle solving. As you go through more and more time loops, carrying over real life-knowledge of what you’re experiencing, you will start to get quicker and quicker at doing things that lead up to where you inevitably failed (and you will repeatedly fail) during the prior time loop. Each time I did a time loop, I felt myself uncovering more and more of the story — and the Alternate Reality Game (“ARG”) elements kept surprising me in more and more ways.

You will have to think incredibly creatively in order to beat TTT and make it through to the end. I am being purposefully vague about the ARG elements, as I do not want to rob any player from figuring it out and experiencing it for themselves. I promise you there will be multiple moments when it will all click together in your head of what you need to do next, as TTT does a brilliant job giving you just enough to figure out what to do if you think about it while not being purposefully obtuse like 2007’s Zack & Wiki: Quest for Barbaros’ Treasure. Fascinatingly, the game also peels back the underlying storyline during each loop you play through — and you will want to figure out what the heck is going on.

If you’ve got several hours to set aside to play a game, and you want to really work your brain in a great way, TEST TEST TEST is the perfect game for you. I will say that I got pretty far in it with my hands-on demo (with some help from the developer sitting next to me!), and I loved how well-crafted this game is. It was released back in January of this year, and I think it is worth picking up — especially because it is free on Steam.

What do you think of ARG games?

Are you going to give TEST TEST TEST a try?

Let us know in the comments below!

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Shantae Advance: Risky Revolution has been billed by WayForward as the ‘lost chapter of the Shantae saga’ that went into development for the Game Boy Advance in the early 2000s, but was shelved indefinitely until now. Set between the original Shantae game and Shantae: Risky’s Revenge, Shantae Advance: Risky Revolution has the half-genie Shantae protecting Sequin Land from another evil plot by Risky Boots, and I found myself loving a retro – yet incredibly modern-styled game – that fit right in with 2024.

I grew up playing Game Boy Advance games, and so I was extremely happy to be able to go hands-on with Shantae Advance: Risky Revolution on an authentic Game Boy Advance console before shifting to a modern-era handheld replica device. Even though the GBA uses a D-Pad, I was surprised at how well Shantae’s controls worked, and it did not feel like a step backwards from Shantae And The Seven Sirens with the quality of gameplay. Fighting with the hair whip, jumping and dodging, and even the dive mechanics all are beautifully done – and most crucially, when I died, I knew that it was clearly my fault and not the game or the console’s fault. The enemies were also challenging, and while I did die on the one boss fight I had available in the demo, it was absolutely a blast to figure out the combat pattern and then absolutely obliterate it. There are even gravity-based mechanics in this game for diving into the water in order to get deep enough to glide to the next area through a water-filled tunnel.

The graphics are also gorgeous. The Shantae team clearly pushed the Game Boy Advance hardware to its limits to make Sequin Land pop off of the screen as much as possible. During the demo, I was able to check out one of the towns, and I was impressed with how active the character models were and how detailed even minor NPCs were. The game’s colors are also incredibly vibrant, and I was just impressed with how much attention went even into the background graphics of each area.

The detailed background art is incredibly necessary to have, thanks to the gimmick for Shantae Advance: Risky Revolution. In this adventure, Shantae can go through portals and jump between the background or foreground of each area ala Virtual Boy Wario Land. Jumping between the background and foreground effectively doubles the amount to explore in each area and makes you think about how to get to your goal. It also meant that sometimes I would see something in the distance on the other layer, and I wanted to get to it. I unfortunately did not get to experience the full potential of how this would play out in a variety of levels, but I loved what potential I could imagine for it. The other gimmick that Shantae Advance: Risky Revolution has, where Risky Boots can flip the gameplay world upside down, was unfortunately not something I was able to see during my demo.

Ultimately, would modern-day Shantae fans be pleased with Shantae Advance: Risky Revolution? I think the answer is absolutely ‘Yes.’ While this does feel like a throwback game, it controlled neatly and precisely like a modern-day title. It also had that fun gameplay the Shantae series is known for. While preorders through Limited Run Games are closed for the Game Boy Advance version, this game will still make its launch on Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4 and 5, and on Steam later this year.

Are you excited for Shantae Advance: Risky Revolution? Did you pre-order the Limited Run Games version in time?

Let us know in the comments below!

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During my hands-off showcase of Flint – Treasure of Oblivion, the part that stuck with me the most was how unique the Savage Level development team tells the game’s story of searching for a legendary treasure that promises freedom and fortune for Captain Flint, his second-in-command Billy Bones, and his crew. Inspired by Robert Louis Stevenson’s classic novel Treasure Island and set during the golden age of piracy, Flint – Treasure of Oblivion tells its story through comic book panels that will pop on and off the screen in the Franco-Belgian bande dessinée style. These comic book panels help to bring life and attitude to the different characters in a way that mere pixels on the screen cannot, and they are used for everything from opening a treasure chest to major story beats. If there is one thing that separates Flint – Treasure of Oblivion from every other tactical RPG game on the market, it is that story telling mechanic because it truly is that stunning.

The gameplay for Flint – Treasure of Oblivion was fun to watch as well. You can have up to 15-on-15 pirate battles, and there are over 50 different weapons that all have different effects on the battle and have their own durability. The battle system itself reminded me a lot of Dungeons & Dragons. When you take an action in battle, you spend points. When you attack, you will then roll in-game dice that determine the amount of damage you can do – and it can be influenced by weapon effects and other things. Additionally, you can have multiple weapon attacks to use at once – meaning you don’t fall into the ‘one weapon’ archetype, but instead can make each of your pirates more flexible for combat. Additionally, each pirate has their own attribute cards that allow them to affect combat and gain an advantage over opponents. If all of that complexity already wasn’t enough, there are environmental factors such as being able to roll a barrel across the ground to damage whatever is in your pirate’s way. All of these elements, including the sheer number of potential fighters, really makes the gameplay more than just a one-tone effort with a high degree of customization.

I know that I’ve talked about the story telling mechanics already, but what I glimpsed of the story was enjoyable. During my demo, the story was set up that I needed to build my own pirate crew and there were multiple goals gradually set for me to accomplish it. The writing was both enjoyable and witty – especially with the accompanying comic panels. From what I saw, I was drawn into the world of Flint – Treasure of Oblivion, and I wanted to see where this story was going to go over the 15 to 20 hour gameplay time.

It says something about an off-hands presentation of a video game that it makes me want to pick it up and try it for myself as soon as the developer was finished. And with Flint – Treasure of Oblivion, that is absolutely true. I wanted to build out the pirate crew, and I wanted to try out a variety of weapons and try out the isometric battle mechanics itself. Personally, I cannot wait until Flint – Treasure of Oblivion is released later on this year.

Are you excited for Flint- Treasure of Oblivion?

What kind of pirates would you want on your crew?

Let us know in the comments below!

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Rose & Camellia Collection, and the five games contained within it, was probably one of the craziest and funniest games I played at PAX East 2024, and it presented a surprising amount of actual gameplay depth for you to figure out that I can see people loving. The gameplay is simple enough to grasp: get hit enough — or hit your opponent enough — and they will lose hit points that are symbolized by icons beneath their names. Whoever loses all their points first is the bout’s loser.

In my hands-on demo, I played story content from the never-before-seen Rose & Camellia 4 and Rose & Camellia vs. La-Mulana. The voice acting and writing is absurdist and frequently over-the-top, but not in a way that descends into awfulness. Instead, the story for both games kept building up in a way that takes itself (somewhat) seriously and I found myself both quite amused and wondering what was going to come out of these characters’ mouths next. The story is also told in what reminds me a bit of a visual novel — with character cutouts changing expressions and poses as new text appears on the screen, but it isn’t nearly as wordy or complicated as that genre usually is. If you are a fan of La-Mulana, you will see plenty of returning series’ characters, and you will enjoy the story content for it too.

Where Rose & Camellia Collection truly shines though is the gameplay, complete with Joy-Con controls. And the controls are fairly simple: You press A and move the Joy-Con to slap, and you press R1 and move the Joy-Con back to dodge the return hit. Where the complexity comes from is knowing how — and when — to dodge. Each opponent you face has one or more ‘tells’ of when they are about to attack, and you have to figure out that secret and then be quick enough on the reflexes to avoid the hit. If you manage to dodge, you can then counter and get a surprise hit in while your opponent’s guard is down. Sometimes, you can even manage to daze your opponent enough to then grab them and make multiple slaps (done by swinging the Joy-Con back and forth wildly) to drain as much health as possible. In a lot of ways, the motion controls and the combat style remind me — in the best possible way — of Punch-Out!! on the Nintendo Wii.

Even though the game and the slapping combat style seems absurdist and isn’t something to take seriously, the combat itself is not a joke. The fights in each game start out fairly easy, but quickly get harder and harder. I found myself starting to lose multiple slap fights until I could figure out my opponent’s tell and then react quickly enough to dodge. And even then, I still lost sometimes — but each loss felt incredibly fair, and I never felt like I wanted to blame anything other than myself for not being quick enough. This incredibly fair combat system also resulted in me feeling a great deal of satisfaction when I WAS able to win that incredibly hard fight, and I was able to move on in the storyline.

So, is Rose & Camellia Collection worth picking up? Just from my brief PAX East demo — unequivocally ‘yes’. If you think this is just a silly slap game, then you are wrong because the gameplay mechanics have so much more depth than what you’d expect just looking at the story from first glance. And with a two-player mode, Rose & Camellia Collection sounds like a great way to solve any disagreements on where to go out to eat in the future!

Are you a fan of motion control games?

Which game in the Rose & Camellia Collection are you most excited to play through?

Let us know in the comments below!

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PC Demo

SunnySide has a special charm to it that is honestly hard to describe, despite me having an opportunity to go hands-on with it at GDC 2024, but I found myself wanting to spend more and more time in this world. The plot setup is straight forward: you purchase a plot of land in the Japanese countryside, and you have to build your own life in it. You can use technology to build up a farm, you can participate in local community life by falling in love, buying from businesses, and meeting people in the world around you.

During my hands-on time with the game, my biggest surprise was that I didn’t feel ‘pressured’ to go do anything. Sure, I had goals set up for me to do, but if I wanted to not bother doing all that and instead run off into the SunnySide countryside to see what I could find, then I felt like it was perfectly okay to do so. The graphic style is fairly unique here, too. Your fully customizable character exists in a 3D world that really pops with color, and it had a solid anime feel to it, too. A lot of the more well-known farming sim games rely upon throwback pixel graphics, and it was nice to see that SunnySide took a different approach to it. The music was also very relaxing and charming, and I was surprised to find out that you can access the playlist on your in-game phone to play what you want.

As for the farming itself? Planting takes place on a grid. You select the spot you want to plant, you dig, and then you plant. It is surprisingly simple to do, and it didn’t require me to select the type of soil I wanted to use, or to water the plant, or do anything else if I did not want to — though I assume it is certainly an option if you want. Additionally, setting up structures also took place in the grid system and you can shape it however you want it to look. To assist with your own master farm layout, SunnySide has a drone feature available that you can activate through your phone in order to see your plot of land overhead. It was a surprisingly helpful tool, and it was a clever way to naturally integrate an overhead viewpoint when you need to have a ‘big picture’ view of the world.

During my demo, I unfortunately did not get the in-game combat or visit the nearby big city. However, I was told that the combat is a turn-based, card-based combat system and that there is a lot to do in the cities. I was also told there are around five years of in-game story content to complete, that there are 28 days in a season, and there are 20 real-life minutes in a day.

So what does all this say about SunnySide? Even though I was only able to play it for a brief time, SunnySide is clearly meant to be a cozy, gentle, farming simulator title that wants you to just lose yourself in that world. I’m curious to see what SunnySide looks like when the full game is available on May 24 for PC and for Xbox Series X|S and PlayStation 5 on June 10. If you cannot wait until then, there is a PC-only demo currently available for download, and I would recommend you check it out!

Are you excited for SunnySide? What would you want to grow in your garden?

Let us know in the comments below!

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Steam Wishlist

Empire of the Ants, based upon a novel written by Bernard Werber, is a photorealistic real-time-strategy game where you play the role of a general in your own personal army of ants as you direct them over a battlefield comprised of leaves, fallen branches, water, and more. Empire of the Ants also has one of the most satisfying RTS gameplay loops I have encountered yet, and I honestly struggled to believe that was not a finished product being presented to me at GDC instead of an early version of the game. My demo was a PC build played via a regular home console controller.

Instead of a top-down god-eye view of the entire environment, you are in the thick of the effort as an ant who can jump, run, and cling to any and all surfaces on the environment as you run around. Interestingly, you can only direct your troops around to where you can see it in your area. This ended up making me constantly run around to check on all the different war efforts I had going on in order to make sure the different efforts were going well.

I started off with a single ant hill to summon from, and I ended up summoning regular warrior ants. As I marched to war against other ant hills and directed my ants to subsequently conquer them, I would summon additional worker ants that I would send off to collect materials to supplement my war effort. As I conquered more and more ant hills, slowly spreading my Empire of the Ants (the name makes sense!) across the map, I gradually summoned aphids to help heal up my units and even ants that would shoot from a distance! And all the while, the worker ants became the backbone of my war effort by helping me summon additional units faster and faster through their material gathering. This all felt extremely intuitive to figure out, and I did not really need the (extremely kind!) development team to hold my hand in figuring out how to build up my forces appropriately. Ultimately, I took on the final boss in the area, termites, and I CRUSHED them using all the attacking forces, defensive forces, and assisting forces that I had built up in my demo playthrough. If anything, it made me hunger for more, larger, and harder foes to defeat.

I used a controller to play my Empire of the Ants demo, and I was surprised at how well the game worked with it once I got the hang of it. I am used to using a mouse for RTS games, and so I was curious how it all would work. You can split and combine different units into two (or more, presumably) larger battalions with a couple button presses, and then direct each battalion off to do a different task — as long as that end goal is within eyesight of the ant you control. The wedged circle design of selecting each unit was slightly clumsy, as I found myself wishing I had a way to ‘snap’ between wedges more easily than what I had. With Empire of the Ants coming to the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S later this year, it is honestly important that these controls work for more than just PC — and honestly? I like how Tower Five made it work.

If I had only one kind-of complaint, it would be that this game is sometimes too photorealistic. More than once at the beginning of the demo, a cutscene would end and I would just be…standing around…because I was not aware the cutscene had ended, since graphics looked just that good and the game transitioned that seamlessly from the story back to the gameplay. More than once, the development team would have to gently tell me that I could start playing again. I will also say that if you have Entomophobia – fear of insects — then Empire of the Ants would not be a good game for you, because the graphics are just that real in Unreal Engine 5. There is also a day/night cycle, but I unfortunately did not get to see it in my demo.

So, what’s the verdict on my GDC demo of Empire of the Ants? One of the biggest keys to making an RTS game fun to play is figuring out how to balance encouraging players to build troops and gather resources while also making sure players can figure out how to expend those resources in a way that keeps the gameplay going instead of being just a resource building sim. And frankly, Empire of the Ants absolutely succeeds in that. I genuinely want to play this game when it is released later in 2024, and you should too.

Are you excited for Empire of the Ants? What kind of natural creatures would you want to fight with your own ant army?

Let us know in the comments below!

The post GDC Preview: Empire of the Ants is a Crazy Fun RTS Title appeared first on oprainfall.

In this installment of A Retrospective Look, I will be looking back at BABYLON’S FALL: the good and the bad, through a 2024 lens. This game was originally released on March 4, 2022, and end of service was less than a year later on February 27, 2023. While not a lot of time has passed since the servers were officially shut down, more than enough time has passed to look back at this game and talk about what worked – and what didn’t.

I am one of the few video game industry journalists who can really write about BABYLON’S FALL: I completed the main story and both substories, I carried new players through story content, I had actually competed in Duels (which I will talk about), and I ultimately Platinumed the game on PlayStation 5. I came onboard towards the end of service after the sunset date for the game was announced, but I had enough time to do everything possible. As a result, I saw all of the ins and outs of Neo Babylon and about the curse of having a Gideon Coffin.

Finally, all of the photos taken herein were done by me. I took photos throughout BABYLON’S FALL as I was playing the game, as I knew that I would want to write about this game someday.

So, without further ado…Let’s take a trip back into the defunct world of Neo Babylon.

Worldbuilding And Storytelling In A Cursed World

The world of BABYLON’S FALL was one of its two greatest strengths, with the other being the combat system (more on that later). The worldbuilding was intriguing conceptually: you were a Sentinel prisoner who had a Gideon Coffin integrated into your body and were forced under the threat of torture to climb a ziggurat structure in a fantasy world of different environments until you reached the top. Once at the top, you used your Gideon Coffin to put out the Blue Sun and end the plague murdering the people of Neo Babylon. As you reached the top of the ziggurat while losing friends and gaining new allies, you eventually discovered this fantasy realm exists beneath a dystopian-esque sci-fi society that actually created the Blue Sun and artificial sky Neo Babylon exists beneath.

The two substories, The Resurgence and The Tale of Two Ziggurats, built upon the ending of the first storyline and revealed what happened to Gallagher after he disappeared early on in the main game and turned into a Gallu (think gameplay enemies), introduced a war between different fractions of entities who were all once part of the Empire that controls Neo Babylon, and introduced people from yet another part of the world at large as they dealt with their own sun-infested sicknesses.

And that’s when time travel and teleportation were introduced.

BABYLON’S FALL worldbuilding was absolutely bonkers and really cool in concept, even in 2024. I am a major fan of the clash between fantasy and science fiction, especially when there is a realistically sound reason for both existing side by side. The city of Neo Babylon often felt like it truly existed, and while a bit small, was a place I genuinely enjoyed spending time in. Even the different environments as you climbed the Tower to reach the Blue Sun and find out that everything you know was simply more complicated than you could ever understand really drew me in and made me want to see what is next.

All of this makes the game’s biggest problem, the story’s execution, that much more frustrating. There is an old storytelling adage: “Show, don’t tell”, and BABYLON’S FALL often ended up doing a lot of talking with little actual showing.

One of the most egregious examples was in The Tale of Two Ziggurats, when there was a lot of talk about teleporting between Neo Babylon and the city of Waseto and about the dangers of getting stuck in a wall. In the next cutscene, we find out things did indeed go wrong with teleporting from one Ziggurat city to another! Clearly, all of this exposition was about to pay off. Instead…we didn’t see any of that. Frustratingly, we were told it all turned out okay because everyone simply walked the rest of the distance in a bit of exposition and the game carried on like nothing happened.

There is also a real problem with how the characters were depicted. Gallagher, who was one of your ‘Sentinel trio’ at the beginning of the game, overused his Giddeon Coffin and became a Gallu early on in the main story. He was a fairly disagreeable character personality-wise who then disappeared for the entirety of the first game, only to return as one of the antagonists of the two substories. Sylvi, who was the other member of your ‘trio,’ keeps talking about Gallagher throughout the remainder of the main story and tried to use him as an emotional focal point of the story that…just did not work because of his awful personality was and how little of the story he was ultimately present for. The most interesting character out of the entire cast through all three stories was Sophia, who lead the Sentinel force and was the daughter of the emperor of Neo Babylon. However, her turn from torturous and forceful imperial dog to stalwart ally and believer in the Sentinels came out of almost nowhere during the main game, and it didn’t feel truly earned beyond something we were told happened.

All that said, one of my favorite story beat moments of BABYLON’S FALL came at the end of The Tale of Two Ziggurat when two characters actually listened to each other, and a conversation solved everything.

Gallagher had the key (a literal key!) needed to stop the sun over Waseto from killing its people with disease. He and Sophia, who tortured him when he was still a Sentinel early on in the main story, stop and talk. Galagher talks about the Sentinels and how they should end, and he talked about his friends called ‘The Creatures’ that managed to keep their minds intact despite the Gideon Coffins taking them over. Sophia listens and tells him the Sentinel program will be ended. Gallagher was then willing to give up the key in exchange for a fight with the main character, no matter who wins, because Sophia was willing to end the Sentinels for good.

It is rare in video games when you have two people who resolve their issues and the central plot conflict by listening to what the other has to say. This peaceful story resolution and the ensuing fight between my character and Gallagher felt more like a demonstration match than anything that had the fate of the world hanging in the balance. And honestly? Whether in 2023 or in 2024, I loved that. I just wish that brilliant bit of BABYLON’S FALL’s storytelling wasn’t wrapped in such frustratingly awful writing in so many other places.

How Many Buttons Can You Mash At Once, And For How Long Can You Do It?

I have gone on and on about the story of BABYLON’S FALL, and now it is time to turn to the other major aspect of this action-adventure game: combat. You could equip four weapons at once: A light attack weapon that uses the Square button, a heavy attack button that uses the Triangle button, and two additional weapons tied to the L2 and R2 triggers that also utilized a special meter at the top left of the screen that constantly refilled. One of PlatinumGames’ signature game design skills is to create a unique combat system, and they absolutely did that here as it was fun to see four weapons flying around and attacking everything on the screen all at once.

BABYLON’S FALL’s level system seemed to almost be a carbon copy of the Light system from the first Destiny game: your character level did not matter so much as your average equipment level did. The higher average equipment level your character had, the better you’d do in dungeons. This was especially relevant as each stage had a recommended gear level, and your character would honestly struggle if you weren’t at or above it. Every chest your character encountered, and a lot of Gallu or bosses you fought, dropped randomized gear around the same level as your character.

This constant gear loot system, coupled with the ‘suggested’ gear levels for each stage, had the amazing effect of forcing me to try out every single weapon in the game. I wanted to initially only use ranged bows and magic to fight with, but I kept getting swords and heavy axes, and so I would have to switch up my combat style constantly in order to ensure I was continually creeping my power level upwards as I marched upwards through the ziggurat. You couldn’t simply just equip your ideal weapons and mindlessly go through BABYLON’S FALL, because you would absolutely fail if you tried to do so. There was a lot of real strategy in figuring out how each weapon worked in battle and how to have them all work together in a way to kill off enemies as fast as possible.

In additional to getting drops after each dungeon, you could also craft higher level weapons and gear by melding weapons/gear together. As you got into higher and higher gear levels, this proved to be essential in order to complete the game.

And yet, once you got to the recommended gear level or even just a level or two above it, every fight turned into a button mashfest as I was constantly just pressing Square and Triangle and L2 and R2 as fast as possible to slaughter all the enemies in my way. Even when I was engaging in a boss fight, with the sole exception of the first and third substory final bosses (Nergal and Ereshkigal), I did not have to learn any battle mechanics or boss patterns in order to survive. Instead, I would find myself simply slaughtering the boss’s HP down to nearly zero just by walking up to them and spamming button presses as quickly as possible. And unfortunately, the end of mission fights often repeated the same boss fights over and over and over again, with the only difference being they were now stronger than before.

This repetitive gameplay was very anticlimactic, and the glee of combat wore off as my hands started to ache from the nonstop quick and mindless mashing. Ultimately, I took dayslong breaks from BABYLON’S FALL not because I wanted to, but because my hands were hurting enough that I felt like I had to. This kind of button-mashing gameplay doesn’t really have a place in 2022 or 2024, unfortunately, and it is a shame that such an intricate weapon and gear system was reduced to such mindless gameplay.

Cutscenes As European-Style Oil Paintings

One of BABYLON’S FALL‘s game directors, Kenji Saito, participated in a SQUARE ENIX-hosted interview published on May 18, 2022, and talked about the game’s development and what players could expect in Season 2 (which turned out to be the last season) of the game. Among other things, he dove into the art style of BABYLON’S FALL: they “debated lots of options and ultimately decided to go with quite a distinctive visual style” of “very high fantasy, so we set out in a fairly old-school ‘classic fantasy art’ direction with an European oil painting aesthetic” that “employs a palette of strong hues with deep contrasts to create painting like graphics that convey a sense of weight, presence, and colour.”

Triple-A video games have, since the days of the Sega Saturn, Nintendo 64, and PlayStation One, pushed for more and more realistic graphics in cutscenes and the gameplay world and you don’t have to look much further than SQUARE ENIX’s own FINAL FANTASY XVI to see how true this is. Alternatively, there has also been an 8-bit and 16-bit renaissance of pixelated graphics emerging as well.  This constant pushing of more polygons and more realistic graphics (or reversion to age-old graphics) makes PlantinumGames’s BABYLON’S FALL all the more unique, and I genuinely think they succeeded.

BABYLON’S FALL stands out among video games as having, whether you love it or hate it, a striking and distinctive graphical design that doesn’t fit in in 2024 in all the best ways.  When you see an image from BABYLON’S FALL, you KNOW it is from BABYLON’S FALL. The European oil painting aesthetic, as they put it, is absolutely gorgeous and one of the things that I could not get enough of.

There was also that one time when Ishum told the history of the world through drawings.

That said, I wish PlatinumGames would have picked a cutscene mechanic and stuck with it. I talked earlier about showing and not telling, and how that is an important story mechanic. When so much of the storyline is told through still images that the game shifts between, no matter how absolutely beautiful they are, it has the effect of dragging BABYLON’S FALL into visual novel territory (and I do love visual novels). And ultimately, that would be fine, if the game had used it uniformly throughout. Yet, for so much of the game as well, BABYLON’S FALL used traditional cutscenes with in-game graphics to tell the story, too. And it wasn’t even that one cutscene method was relegated for important scenes over another – both would be used interchangeably for everything, and it proved to be distracting as I would often wonder why they picked one method over another instead of just enjoying the game ‘in the moment.’

Ultimately, despite the gorgeous graphical style, the inability to pick a consistent cutscene storytelling method hurt BABYLON’S FALL more it than it helped.

Skirmishes, Duels, And The Art Of Having Optional Content

If you weren’t completing the main story content for BABYLON’S FALL, then could complete option side content that really fell into two groups: Skirmishes and Duels.

Skirmishes were optional side content that really existed only to obtain incredibly rare items for crafting. While said rare items were often available also through story missions, they had a much, much rarer drop rate than in Skirmishes. Thus, there was a real incentive to play that content. Unfortunately, Skirmishes were just waves of enemies being thrown against you that you had to kill over and over again. Just like enemies in the main storylines, this turned Skirmishes into a button-mashing spamfest more than anything else since the Skirmishes just repeated themselves over and over again in content – and once you found one that you liked, you had no real reason to do any other for drops.

While Skirmishes weren’t well developed, Duels were the complete opposite, and it was absolutely the best content BABYLON’S FALL had to offer. In a Duel, you took a boss fight you had previously just button-mashed through and it turned the fight up to 11. You now had to learn the boss mechanics, learn when to fight and when to dodge, and how to equip yourself for the strongest chance of winning. And if you won? Amazing drops that would make your character even stronger.

Duels were what I wanted all of the boss fights in BABYLON’S FALL to be, instead of the mindless fights they turned out to be if you just spent some time increasing your gear and weapon levels beforehand. They really showcased the handcrafted care and love that PlatinumGames put into BABYLON’S FALL, and I couldn’t get enough of it.

While Skirmishes were not exactly riveting content in 2022 or in 2024, Duels felt fresh and new, and I still crave content like that in 2024.

Playing Well With Others

BABYLON’S FALL‘s greatest strength was the fact it was intended to be a multiplayer game where people would work together to complete everything outside of Duels. If you had someone to play with, storyline dungeons went quicker, Skirmishes were won faster, and you could even interact with people in Neo Babylon with emotes!

I was lucky enough to play story content with a handful of other players a few times, and that hooked me hard. While, yes, the battles were still mindless button-mashing, you could also see other people with different weapon and skill setups fighting alongside you. I completed part of my initial storyline run with another player who kindly shepherded me through some of the content early on until I understood how the weapon and gear level system worked and could manage on my own. Towards the end of service, I found myself frequently helping new players trying to achieve that Platinum in getting through storyline content by shepherding myself.

Unfortunately, I was never able to party with more than one person at a time – and with the low player base, that wasn’t really a surprise. BABYLON’S FALL would have really shined if more people could have been enticed to play the game – though I don’t really know how that would have been accomplished other than to make it free-to-play. Good multiplayer experiences are timeless and makes it incredibly poignant as a gameplay mechanic in 2024.

And there you have it!

While BABYLON’S FALL had elements that are still fresh and incredibly relevant in 2024, there are a number of development and storytelling elements that held it back despite its incredibly recent 2022 release. Unfortunately, with BABYLON’S FALL now being permanently offline, gamers will no longer be able to experience the good – and the bad – of this SQUARE ENIX and PlatinumGames title. And there really was plenty of both in this game.

If BABYLON’S FALL was released today, I unfortunately think it would still suffer the same reception. The storytelling methodology and the combat needed more work, and that wouldn’t change whether it was 2022 or 2024. That said, when BABYLON’S FALL got something right, it landed hard and all of that – be it the atmosphere, weapon leveling, or Duels – would still work in 2024. Ultimately? BABYLON’S FALL is, as I stated at the very start, not a bad game. It just is not a good game either, but it could have been with more players and more time to really develop Neo Babylon and the world within it.

Next time, I turn my attention to what is seen as a classic: The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker as we approach its 21st birthday later this month. Please be sure to check in then to see my thoughts about this entry in the storied The Legend of Zelda franchise!

What are your thoughts on BABYLON’S FALL?

Do you wish we could have gotten more stories set in the world of Neo Babylon?

Let me know in the comments below!

The post A Retrospective Look: BABYLON’S FALL in 2024 appeared first on oprainfall.

You can find out more about the upcoming Pokémon GO Tour: Sinnoh – Global Event, taking place February 24-25, 2024, here.

“I’m so happy here. I love this so much.”

I heard those words midway through Pokémon GO Tour: Sinnoh – Los Angeles from a teenager to her mother on Saturday, and that really sums up my thoughts about this event. Pokémon GO Tour: Sinnoh – Los Angeles was the smoothest, most fun, Pokémon GO event that I have been to yet, and I found myself with so much to do that I nearly could not finish it all during the event. If you do not read anything beyond this paragraph, then just know that I am extremely excited to see what Niantic, Inc., pulls out of their trainer caps for the yet unannounced- but absolutely inevitable- Pokémon GO Fest later this year.

Pokémon GO Tour: Sinnoh – Los Angeles took place at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California. The play area stretched from inside the Rose Bowl itself, around the stadium, across a bridge, and all the way down the connecting golf course. It was a very long, but narrow, play area, and I definitely got my steps in for the day just running all over to do everything in each of the areas. The ground was fairly level, and I didn’t find any real chokepoints to getting across the area other than potentially the large bridge that connected the golf course to the stadium area.

Pokémon GO Tour: Sinnoh – Los Angeles was the debut of both Origin Forme Dialga and Origin Forme Palkia. The appearance criteria for these two Pokémon were quite interesting: for the first half hour of each hour, the normal versions of Dialga and Palkia would appear. For the last 30 minutes of each hour, the raids would switch out for the new Origin Forme versions. This ensured that everyone could get both forms of the Pokémon. I also really, really liked this half-hour switch off. This ‘break’ from Origin Forme made me not feel guilty for not raiding nonstop, as I could go do other things every other half-hour until the Origin Forme popped up again.

The new Adventure Effects from the two Origin Formes- Spacial Rend (allowing a large encounter area for wild Pokemon) and Roar of Time (pauses most item timers for six minutes to extend their duration)- turned out to be nearly game breaking in the best possible way. I found myself frequently using Spacial Rend in order to see what additional Pokemon were around me, and I stacked multiple Roar of Time uses when I was doing multiple raids back-to-back with a Lucky Egg. When I first heard about these skills, I honestly didn’t think that I would use them all that much. Yet, they both turned out to be incredibly situationally helpful at Pokémon GO Tour: Sinnoh – Los Angeles and I figure they will help out occasionally during raid hour or during future Community Days.

Of course, another draw of Pokémon GO Tour: Sinnoh – Los Angeles are the rare Pokémon available to catch! The region-locked Pokémon (Pachirisu, Mime Jr., Chatot, Carnivine) were hidden inside eggs, and I found myself frequently getting them whenever I cracked eggs. I did pay for the Egg-thusiast ticket add-on to hatch eggs in one-fourth the distance, and I know that made a real difference for me. While none of them turned out to be shiny, I was still happy that I got enough of them to trade with friends in real life.

There was an exclusive research and a lot of rare Pokémon to catch at the event! (Photos by author.)

The three Lake Pokémon (Uxie, Mesprit, and Azelf) were also available to catch at Pokémon GO Tour: Sinnoh – Los Angeles. Interestingly, they all appear as random spawns on the overworld map. When I encountered them, I found that I only had time to use one item and Pokéball combo before they ran. I didn’t overly focus on trying to catch them during this event, as I had previously gotten them all in shiny form during a prior worldwide event thanks to me organizing a few international raid groups. That said, they were absolutely a welcome addition to the event.

Finally, there is the Unown spawns. At both Pokémon GO Fest events in Seattle and New York City that I had attended, all the Pokémon would turn into Unown for the last two minutes of every hour. At Pokémon GO Tour: Sinnoh – Los Angeles, Niantic, Inc., dropped that mechanic and instead made Unown appear as incense spawns. This was admittedly nice, as I could focus on getting Unown if I wanted to instead of being forced to just catch them (and ultimately only shiny check) at the end of every hour.

The exclusive event special research was not that difficult to complete, other than having to fight Team Rocket GO during the final step. I liked that it made me visit all the different themed areas, and so I had to cross the entire area in order to finish it. That said, the Rotom research did not go quite as planned. I tried to AR scan a physical TV set that was placed in the play area, but nothing happened. I instead was told what to do by an event support staff employee next to it and that the AR scanning would not work. This was somewhat disappointing, but I ended up getting the Rotom research done regardless.

There were two meet and greets at Pokémon GO Tour: Sinnoh – Los Angeles: meet the Pokémon GO artists and meet Notable Trainers (think internet-famous Pokémon GO players!). While I skipped out on meeting the Notable Trainers, I absolutely took my time meeting the Niantic, Inc., artists. When their lines were short, the artists absolutely took their time to talk about the game, their art, and what it was like creating different art pieces for Pokémon GO. The artists made me feel like they were genuinely grateful that I played Pokémon GO, and they even autographed a Pokémon GO card for me! There were multiple time slots for both meet and greets, and I did not feel like it was a blink-and-you-will-miss it feature of the event, but one that Niantic, Inc., took pains to make sure was available to anyone who wanted to do either meet and greet.

Inside the Rose Bowl itself, there were two photo opportunities: at one end, you could take photos with giant inflated Palkia and Dialga Pokémon, and at the other side, you could get a photograph with Eevee! I was happy with both of these photo opportunities, but I was shocked that Pokémon GO Battle League didn’t have a battle arena set-up between the two photo opportunities in the middle of the Rose Bowl itself. I was really hoping that I could take on other Trainers inside of the gridiron, and it was something of a disappointment that I couldn’t.

There were photo opportunities inside of the Rose Bowl itself. (Photos by author).

The biggest new activity to do was the party challenges. It is no secret that Niantic, Inc., wants trainers to interact and work together to achieve things. I ended up approaching multiple people to join up in parties at the event to complete different party challenges ranging from catching six steel Pokémon to using 25 berries while catching Pokémon. These challenges were simple, but onerous enough that we all ended up actually participating in completing all of them. The rewards- being able to guarantee catch Regice, Registeel, Regirock, and Regigigas- were well worth the incentive of talking to strangers to get the party challenges done.

There were also activity tents scattered throughout the area. At these tents, there was a lot of Pokémon trinket giveaways, trivia contests, and opportunities to create signs for what Pokémon you needed or had available to trade. This was also where a lot of people congregated for trading and socializing purposes. These areas were fun, but I didn’t spend too much time in them because I had a lot to try to complete during my playtime. There were also small other things to do like fight Team Rocket GO members, spin Pokéstops, try to find Spiritomb Pokéstops, and post on Campfire, at the event. All of those were fun, but fairly standard fare.

The highlight for me, though? I finally found someone willing to trade me a ‘?’ Unown. I had been hunting for a reasonable trade for that Pokemon since my first in-person Pokémon GO Fest, and I was able to finally make it happen. That particular Unown was only available for Pokémon GO Fest 2018: Chicago for two days, and it has not appeared since. Niantic, Inc.: Please bring back the ‘?’ Unown for people to get in the future!

Not everything was perfect, though. Despite the debut of White-Striped Basculin in Routes during Pokémon GO Tour: Sinnoh – Los Angeles, there were surprisingly no Routes available inside the Rose Bowl event itself. I actually ended up not getting one at all during this event because of it. There was (as I mentioned earlier) no Pokémon GO PVP events at Pokémon GO Tour: Sinnoh – Los Angeles. This was very surprising, as we are in the middle of Pokémon GO: Timeless Travels Battle League as we head towards Pokémon World Championships 2024 in Hawai’i later this year. These PVP events are a major part of Pokémon GO, and so it was more than a little surprising that it had zero representation at Pokémon GO Tour: Sinnoh – Los Angeles.

More photos from the event! There was so much to do and see. (Photos by author).

Another thing I noticed was that the various ‘areas’ of the event all blended together at the golf course part of the event, and I only knew that I had changed areas when there were different Pokémon spawning. While this was surprising, I am not surprised because golf courses are often quite persnickety with how you utilize the course for events, and they may not have been allowed to fully dress up the areas like they did previously at Pokémon GO Fest 2022: Seattle.

Finally, there was no merchandise tent at Pokémon GO Tour: Sinnoh – Los Angeles. In fact, the only merchandise sold at the event was the event t-shirt that you could pre-order when you bought your ticket. The event t-shirts that they had for sale on-site almost immediately ran out of everything but small and medium t-shirts within the first half-hour. Every time I’ve attended a Pokémon GO Fest, the merchandise line has always been wrapped around the building and down the block. People love their Pokémon plush, and it was surprising that they weren’t available for the sale.

Despite all of that, Pokémon GO Tour: Sinnoh – Los Angeles was absolutely an amazing event to attend. My issues, other than the inexplicable lack of Routes at the event itself, were fairly minor and did not truly take away from my overall enjoyment of the Tour event from 9 a.m. until 5 p.m. on Saturday. If anything, it makes me wonder how Niantic, Inc., will be able to fit everything into the shorter time blocks that Pokémon GO Fest normally run in, as they usually run two Park sessions a day during that event. I’ve said it before, and I will say it again: If you play Pokémon GO and you’re at all obsessed with it, you need to attend the in-person events. The teenager that I quoted at the top of my article was right about how happy playing Pokémon GO at an in-person event was, and I left with a giant smile on my face.

If you can come to Pokémon GO in-person, then you won’t regret it. You will absolutely catch some new Pokémon that you would never be able to get otherwise, and I wouldn’t be surprised if you also make some new friends too.

Have you attended an in-person Pokémon GO event before?

What is your favorite Pokémon? Are you planning on participating in the upcoming Global event?

Let us know in the comments below!

The post Pokémon GO Tour: Sinnoh – Los Angeles Was a Fantastic, Fan-Oriented, Event appeared first on oprainfall.

This series will take a look back at video games that have hit a significant milestone in time – be it release date, end of service date, and more – and talk about what works and what doesn’t work in the game through a modern 2024 viewpoint. While this column will not be nearly as regularly published as Cooking Eorzea (my FINAL FANTASY XIV Online-themed cooking column), I will try to do new installments decently often.

First up? Lightning Returns: FINAL FANTASY XIII.

Lightning Returns: FINAL FANTASY XIII was the capstone action-RPG to the FINAL FANTASY XIII trilogy that first kicked off on North American shores in March 2010. With this final entry released on Feb 11, 2014 – 10 years ago this week – in North America, I wanted to take a look back to this oft-forgotten sequel SQUARE ENIX game and talk about what worked and what didn’t work with it through my modern-day eyes.

To put my experience with Lightning Returns: FINAL FANTASY XIII out there: I started the game back in early Nov 2015, and I finished it up in the latter part of Feb 2016. I completed all the side quests that I could on a single playthrough, defeated the ultimate enemy fight, and completed the main storyline. Since that time, I have been obsessed with the OST, and I listen to it quite often in my day-to-day life. In writing this column, I re-watched a lot of cutscenes for the game, reviewed the official player’s guide, and thought back at conversations that I’ve had with friends as I was originally exploring this title.

Finally: all opinions are, obviously, my own.

So, with all that said, let’s start off with…

The Schemata System
(AKA Lightning Returns: FINAL FANTASY XIII’s Class System)

Lightning Returns: FINAL FANTASY XIII’s biggest strength, both at launch and now in 2024, is the Schemata class system. While only Lightning is playable in this game, the player was allowed to set three different Schemata classes for her at a time and flip between them with a press of the L1/LB and R1/RB buttons. What made the Schemata system so cool though was that almost all of the classes were able to be bought from NPC stores scattered throughout the game, and they all played differently and slotted into different gameplay roles. You could further customize each Schema by equipping one weapon, one shield, two accessories, one adornment, and up to four abilities!

This turned each Schema into pretty much whatever you wanted it to be, and there was no real top-tier end-all-be-all layout but instead you could adapt the different jobs to fit in the roles that you needed them to be. If you wanted to be a ‘tank’ class that can handle magic, then so be it. If you want to be a healer who can also deal serious damage, then have at it!

This element of Lightning Returns: FINAL FANTASY XIII is something that I’ve honestly wanted to see replicated in other FINAL FANTASY games, but to no avail. More customization is always a good thing, and I loved being able to set up my party however I wish with the Schemata system. It is a very fresh system, even in today’s video game landscape.

Lightning’s Return: FINAL FANTASY XIII’s Story Set-Up (Even If The Plot Didn’t Quite Land)

I love the story setup for Lightning’s Return: FINAL FANTASY XIII.

Lightning, blaming herself for Serah dying at the end of FINAL FANTASY XIII-2, puts herself in an endless sleep she describes ‘as dark as death’ as she dreams of a day where she can bring her beloved sibling back. Lightning is awoken by God, and she is told that the world will end in 13 days. God bestows upon her the title of Savior and tells her that she has to save as many souls as she can in the time that remains before Chaos consumes all. Lightning strikes a deal: If she plays the role of Savior and keeps the world going for 13 more days, then her reward is a ‘Miracle.’

That ‘Miracle’? Serah will get to live again.

To carry out Lightning’s mission, God reverted Hope back to the child form he had in FINAL FANTASY XIII and placed him in command of the Ark- Cocoon’s remnants.  Hope turns out to be the one who told Lightning about God’s plan to build a brand-new world and about God’s offer to bring Serah back. They both acknowledge what a cruel bargain it is by God to make. And if all this wasn’t enough, both Lightning and Hope realize they no longer have the ability to feel emotions anymore.

Hope then reveals that 500 years have passed since Chaos was unleashed to consume the world, and it nearly succeeded in drowning the planet. What is left of the world is now called Nova Chrysalia. With all that destruction also came another kind of horror: immortality. No one, not even children, can grow older, and there is no more new life born. Instead, everyone waits around for violence, accidents, and sickness to eventually claim them. One. By. One.

As we play through Lighting Returns: FINAL FANTASY XIII, we see everyone else’s story get setup.

Vanille, awaking a few years before Lightning does, believes that God is punishing her and she is willing to sacrifice herself to save the dead from suffering further in Chaos. Fang has lost Vanille to the Order of Salvation cult and now lives outside of what passes for ‘modern society.’ Sazh spends his time trying to find his son’s soul in a desperate search that has destroyed his upbeat personality. And Noel? He has become a murderous vigilante who believes he has to kill Lightning. Finally, there is Snow. Unable to get past his grief from Serah’s death, he presides over a never-ending party in a brilliantly glowing city called Yusnaan. He has held this role for centuries, and he now wishes to simply die.

Lightning Returns: FINAL FANTASY XIII is a bright, colorful, beautiful game that is also absolutely depressing to play in the most wonderful way possible. Each of the characters are wrapped up in a deep ocean of sadness, and all of their stories intersect repeatedly as those 13 days left pass. So many RPGs always present a world of happiness and hope at the start of the game, and Lightning Returns: FINAL FANTASY XIII does not give you that. Instead, the stakes are clear: Thirteen days, and the world ends. Thirteen days, and you might get what you want and bring Serah back to life. Thirteen days to undo centuries of unhappiness that shackle everyone of Nova Chrysalia.

I was immediately hooked by all of this, as I haven’t played a FINAL FANTASY game that felt this hopeless since FINAL FANTASY XIV Online 1.0 when you knew that Dalamud was going to come down from the sky with the end of the Seventh Umbral Era.

Unfortunately, the story’s execution did not quite live up to the set up for each of the characters – and for Nova Chrysalia – at the game’s start. I don’t want to spoil that for anyone who might want to pick up this game after reading this, after all. The plot fell kind of flat for me in the third act, and I found myself not really caring about some of the main plot threads that led up to that. I unfortunately blame the writing more than anything for this, but I am still in love with the game overall. It isn’t a bad game by any means storywise – just didn’t feel as satisfying as I would hope it to be.

But the world’s setting, and the awful deal that Lightning strikes to save Serah? is insanely memorable and it is a perfect way to start off the conclusion to the FINAL FANTASY XIII trilogy. And the story concepts still work, even now in 2024.

The Amazing, Powerful, Almost-Perfect Soundtrack

Lightning Returns: FINAL FANTASY XIII does not have a theme song like pretty much every other modern FINAL FANTASY game does. Instead, the three composers for the game (Masashi Hamauzu, Naoshi Mizuta, and Mitsuto Suzuki) used Blinded by Light as a reoccurring theme throughout the game. The original soundtrack (‘OST’) was released across four discs, and it runs for just a bit more than five hours. The only track I did not care for on the OST is the very, very jarring Fang’s Theme ~A False Leader~, which sounds like a steel mill singalong – complete with swinging hammers on anvils – before switching over to a soft bridge and then back to the hammers on anvils again. It simply isn’t great.

For me, the standout piece is Lightning’s Theme- A Distant Glimmer by Masashi Hamauzu. It starts with just a piano, and then it just continually builds up from a simple, sad theme into an overlapping strings and piano composition with a lot of joy in it. Music can communicate so much about a character, and Lightning’s Theme- A Distant Glimmer truly paints Lightning as a character who starts with no hope and happiness before she begins to find herself again throughout Lighting Returns: FINAL FANTASY XIII.

I truly believe that Lightning’s Theme- A Distant Glimmer would be perfect for a video game concert such as A New World: intimate music from FINAL FANTASY, and I will never fail to suggest its inclusion among other series greats like Aerith’s Theme and Sarutabaruta. This soundtrack still is an amazing listen, even in 2024, and should not be slept on.

Chronostatis, Eradia, and the Divisiveness of Those
Gameplay Mechanics

The in-game time management system – Chronostatis and Eradia – are probably what people think about the most whenever they talk about Lightning Returns: FINAL FANTASY XIII, and with good reason as it is the single most divisive element of the game.

To set up the lore: God will awake after 13 days. When that happens, this world will be done for and he will make a new world to replace it. There is nothing that can prevent this from happening on a set timetable. That is, other than Lighting offering up her life force in bits and pieces to push that deadline back by stopping time. Hope calls this life energy Eradia – but it is tracked as Energy Points (or ‘EP’) in the game.

Each in-game day lasts for one real life hour. That means that an in-game hour lasts for two-and-a-half minutes, and that a minute on Nova Chrsyalis lasts only two-and-a-half real-life seconds. In other words, time moves very, very fast in Lightning Returns: FINAL FANTASY XIII. You can stop it by spending a single EP to pause time for 30 in-game minutes, which equates to a minute and 15 real-life seconds.

You can replenish EP most easily by killing enemies in the world. Unfortunately, there are only a finite number of enemies out in the world, and so you cannot just kill indiscriminately, as you’ll end up using up the best way to replenish EP during each in-game day. So, you have to balance how quickly and often you kill enemies in the game.

Finally, certain NPCs and quests are locked behind certain times of the day. If you miss the time window for an event, then you can’t do it for that day.

What all of this means is that Chronostatis and tracking the in-game passage of time takes over everything else if you want to complete the game in a single 13-day cycle. I actually used the schedule laid out in the official player’s guide – alongside the internet – in order to make it happen, and I was constantly obsessing over time and making sure I hit areas when I needed to in order to get all of the story beats (which you have to absolutely do in a single run-in order to properly finish the game) and all of the side quests done in one go.

The completionist in me disliked it then, and I dislike it even more now as it is one of the most stressful gameplay experiences I’ve ever had. Even when I was deep into the game and it was clear I was going to finish Lighting Returns: FINAL FANTASY XIII in one go, I was still stressing about making my ‘appointments.’ If you want to play video games to just relax and have fun, then Chronostatis will really damper that for you. If you are a completionist like I am, then Chronostatis will drive you insane.

Tick, tick, tick. Time is constantly slipping away, and it feels like I can never do enough at all. And yes, I know that if I don’t manage to save everyone and complete all the story beats in a timely manner, then I will get a second chance in a sorta ‘new game plus’ that carries all my stuff over. But I really just want to do it all in one go, anyway.

I really think do that Chronostatis was innovative, but it simply is too divisive to be a series mainstay – especially in 2024 – and it is what will turn people off to the game.

And there you have it!

These are my thoughts on Lightning Returns: FINAL FANTASY XIII, and what worked – and what didn’t – while looking at it through the eyes of someone a decade post-North American release. Ultimately, Lightning Returns: FINAL FANTASY XIII is a game that still brings a lot of enjoyable value in 2024, if you can get past the Chronostatis and Eradia/EP gameplay system.

When A Retrospective Look returns next, I will be talking at what worked-and-didn’t-work for BABYLON’S FALL. (Yep, I played this game before end-of-service.)

Please look forward to it!

Did you play Lightning Returns: FINAL FANTASY XIII?

What do you think about Lightning’s final adventure? Did you love the music like I did, and does it all hold up well in a 2024 perspective?

Let me know in the comments below!

The post A Retrospective Look- Lightning Returns: FINAL FANTASY XIII In 2024 appeared first on oprainfall.

With only a month and change left to go before FINAL FANTASY VII REBIRTH is released exclusively for the PlayStation 5 on Leap Day 2024, SQUARE ENIX has managed to keep almost all of the game’s play and content tightly under wraps. With so many mysteries swirling around, I put together a list of five things that I want to see happen in FINAL FANTASY VII REBIRTH. 

WARNING: There will be heavy FINAL FANTASY VII REMAKE and CRISIS CORE spoilers throughout the remainder of this article. You have been warned.

1) Tie CRISIS CORE -FINAL FANTASY VII- REUNION’s Ending and FINAL FANTASY VII REMAKE: Traces of Two Pasts Into FINAL FANTASY VII REBIRTH’s Plot

One of the biggest questions, for me at least, is that the ending of CRISIS CORE -FINAL FANTASY VII- REUNION mirrors that of its original PSP release: Zack dies at the end of the game while fighting against endless Shin-Ra enemies. In one of the most surprising moments of FINAL FANTASY VII REMAKE however, Zack actually survives that fateful encounter after defeating everyone thrown against him. These are two seemingly-canon continuities with two extremely different (and seemingly incompatible!) endings, and hopefully it is something that FINAL FANTASY VII REBIRTH will address during the game.

Furthermore, I also want the game to build upon the backstories of Aerith and Tifa that were told in the canon novel FINAL FANTASY VII REMAKE: Traces of Two Pasts, when they open up about their respective pasts. If you read both stories, you see deep into both character’s backstories in a way that FINAL FANTASY VII REMAKE doesn’t address. I would love for FINAL FANTASY VII REBIRTH to build upon those stories in at least some referential way so we can see how their backgrounds shape both themselves, and each other, as the story progresses.

2) Make The Minigames in Gold Saucer Fun

While FINAL FANTASY VII on the original PlayStation is a game that stands the test of time as a whole, not all of the elements of the game are quite as replayable in 2024. Case in point: the minigames in the Gold Saucer. While perhaps groundbreaking for a 32-bit console in 1997, the minigames, such as Super Dunk where you shoot basketballs, or the claw game Wonder Catcher, have clunky controls with a play-and-forget quality to them.

Unfortunately, FINAL FANTASY VII REMAKE’s minigames were somewhat hit or miss for me. While I loved darts and the dancing minigames and thought they were well done, I found that the squats and pull-up minigames were both tedious and frustrating to play, and I immediately swore off of them both once I got the rewards.

While FINAL FANTASY VII REBIRTH director Naoki Hamaguchi HAS said in a September 2023 interview with PlayStation.Blog that there will be new minigames and harder unlockable difficulty modes, it all doesn’t matter if the minigame gameplay doesn’t also improve to match the new content. After all, decent gameplay controls do matter when it comes to playing a video game since gamers hate to lose when poor game mechanics are at fault.

Fingers are crossed that this time around, all of the Gold Saucer games will be fun to play and they will make me want to go back to experience them again and again.

3) The Party Starts Using Red XIII’s Real Name After Cosmo Canyon

This is a fairly straight forward gameplay desire for me.

When Red XIII first joins your party in FINAL FANTASY VII on the original PlayStation, his default name is Red XIII. In Cosmo Canyon, Red XIII discovers his true identity and undergoes character growth, and it drove me crazy that the game would not automatically give me the option to rename him at that point. During my various replays of FINAL FANTASY VII, I would always rename Red XIII to Nanaki when he first joins my party as a poor attempt to fix that.

In an October 2023 interview with Screen Rant, FINAL FANTASY VII REBIRTH director Naoki Hamaguchi confirmed that all the quests in the game have both a Red XIII version and a Nanaki version to reflect the metamorphosis that Red XIII goes through after he visits Cosmo Canyon. However, there is no mention that the party will actually address Red XIII by his true name or not once they visit Cosmo Canyon and complete the story content there. Even the trailers shown so far only refer to him as Red XIII.

Hopefully, even though this will obviously require more audio lines to be recorded in the booth, Red XIII’s name switch will be something that will be hopefully done in FINAL FANTASY VII REBIRTH.

4) Queen’s Blood Should Be Fun And Not Mandatory To Play

One of my favorite parts of FINAL FANTASY VII REMAKE DLC, Episode INTERmission, was the Fort Condor minigame. Early on in the DLC, you get to play a tower defense tabletop game where the objective is to take down the opponent’s headquarters with the optimal use of unit pieces. It is a game that is fairly quick to learn, but becomes incredibly challenging as you start to fight tougher opponents. The key aspect is that while you have to play one tutorial match, the DLC does not force you to play the minigame again if you do not wish to.

At Tokyo Game Show 2023, we got our first glimpse of FINAL FANTASY VII REBIRTH‘s card game, Queen’s Blood. While SQUARE ENIX hasn’t quite told us how to play the game yet, or how important it is to the overall storyline, we have seen how SQUARE ENIX has approached card games in the past with Tetra Master in both FINAL FANTASY IX on one side, and the FINAL FANTASY XIV Online version on the other side.

In FINAL FANTASY IX, Tetra Master is a card game that requires the player to not just learn hexadecimal in order to play, but also forces the player to play in a Tetra Master tournament in Treno. In a wonderful game with memorable characters and amazing music, the card tourney is an absolutely confusing and unfun slog that I guessed my way through to move the plot forward. Comparatively in FINAL FANTASY XIV Online, Tetra Master is a simple “highest number” wins game that is easy to grasp and absolutely is not required for gameplay progression.

Here is hoping that SQUARE ENIX borrows from the FINAL FANTASY XIV Online and Episode INTERmission Fort Condor routes of gameplay and doesn’t make Queen’s Blood hard to understand, while making the player suffer through multiple required matches to proceed the storyline.

5) 23 Tiny Wishes and 89 Sent Letters

If you played CRISIS CORE: FINAL FANTASY VII on the PlayStation Portable or CRISIS CORE -FINAL FANTASY VII- REUNION, then there are two quotes that sum up Aerith’s relationship with Zack:

“I have twenty-three tiny wishes. But, you probably won’t remember them all. So, I’ve put them all into one: I’d like to spend more time with you.”

“How are you? I wish I knew where you were. It’s already been four years now. This is the eighty-ninth letter that I’ve sent to you, but I don’t even know where to send them anymore. I really hope…that this final letter that I’m writing gets to you.”

Twenty-three tiny wishes and eighty-nine letters sent. In fact, it was that eighty-ninth letter that sent Zack to try to fight a doomed battle on his way back to Midgar to try to reunite with Aerith.

Zack’s ultimate survival in FINAL FANTASY VII REMAKE was the first time that I full-on cried during a video game in years because I realized that him living means that he and Aerith can meet up again and see what, if anything, of their budding relationship is still there. While I love the reunion of Zack and Aerith in the Lifestream in FINAL FANTASY VII: Advent Children, and I think it is an absolutely fantastic film, selfishly, I desperately WANT them to have an opportunity to have that happy ending and relationship that was so cruelly denied to them in CRISIS CORE, in a way that doesn’t require them to meet again in death. It is a moment in gaming that hits harder than listening to Taylor Swift’s song “You’re Losing Me” when she sings about how she wouldn’t marry herself – a pathological people pleaser who only wanted him to see her- towards the end of the song.

It is the one thing that I honestly want more than anything else in FINAL FANTASY VII REBIRTH, since it is what I’ve dreamed about since I first played through CRISIS CORE: FINAL FANTASY VII in 2008, and I would gladly give up the rest of everything else I want in my list to make that single thing come true.

What are you hoping will be included in FINAL FANTASY VII REBIRTH?

Do you want to see Aerith and Zack reunite?

Let us know in the comments below!

The post 5 Things I Want to See in FINAL FANTASY VII REBIRTH appeared first on oprainfall.

While watching Naoki Yoshida (“Yoshi-P”) present the Keynote at FINAL FANTASY XIV FANFEST 2023 London, my favorite part of it all was the announced raid series for the upcoming Dawntrail expansion titled ECHOES OF VANA’DIEL. Drawing upon FINAL FANTASY XI Online, this upcoming alliance raid series instantly caught my attention and my heart, as I played and raided in FINAL FANTASY XI Online for almost two decades now. In fact, I wrote a lengthy essay about my love for FINAL FANTASY XI Online as part of my ongoing FINAL FANTASY XIV Online cooking series titled Cooking Eorzea.

As a result, I immediately started writing up a list of 11 enemies from FINAL FANTASY XI Online that need to be part of the ECHOES OF VANA’DIEL raid series in FINAL FANTASY XIV: Dawntrail. This list is comprised of a mixture of storyline fights and endgame fights that only the very best raid groups could successfully take on.

I sincerely hope that SQUARE ENIX takes this alliance series seriously and implements fights that are at least a faithful homage to their original FFXI forms. All that said, I cannot wait to dive into these new raids when Dawntrail launches in Summer 2024.

Warning: There WILL BE story spoilers for FINAL FANTASY XI Online in this list. You have been warned.

So, without further ado…

1) Shadow Lord

(FINAL FANTASY XI Online)

No list of potential FINAL FANTASY XI Online-inspired raid bosses could possibly start with anyone other than the main antagonist of the base FINAL FANTASY XI Online game through Mission 5-2, as the Shadow Lord truly is what kicks off the sequence of events that impacts multiple future expansions with the Crystal War that concludes 20 years before the start of this MMORPG.

Deep within the Throne Room inside of Castle Zvahl in Xarcabard, Shadow Lord will constantly switch between either magic or physical attack immunity during the fight in his first form and then constantly cast Implosion, a major AoE magic damage attack non-stop until he is beaten down in his second form. While this seems incredibly simple, the sheer amount of damage that Shadow Lord can do at the original level cap of 50 made this an incredibly hard battle to win.

With Shadow Lord as the capstone to the opening chapters of FINAL FANTASY XI Online before you set out all over the world to fight more enemies, see more places, and save the world too many times to count, this fight is a no-brainer to be included in ECHOES OF VANA’DIEL. This fight’s inclusion would also mean that Warriors of Light will have to have a mixture of physical attackers and magic attackers in order to win and be able to drive down Shadow Lord’s HP before he can kill them first.

2) Kam’lanaut

(Rise of the Zilart)

Kam’lanaut is the Archduke of the Grand Duchy of Jeuno, and Eald’narche is his ‘younger’ (though technically older story wise!) brother. Both of them are members of the Zilart race who plot to open the Gate of the Gods and bring about the destruction of Vana’diel throughout a fair bit of the early FINAL FANTASY XI Online storyline – and they will use Kam’lanaut’s position as the head of the most powerful city-state in Vana’diel to make it happen.

This fight is a lot of fun and it requires adventurers to pay attention to what is happening at all times. Kam’lanaut’s signature fight skill is that he casts an elemental en-spell onto his weapon that will cause him to do particular elemental damage to the alliance…while also being healed by magic cast upon him of that same magic. For instance, if he has fire en-spell cast upon his weapon, then fire spells cast upon him will actually heal him. He also has an attack, Great Wheel, that will reset hate and does AoE damage.

This, plus the fact that he can cast dispel, silence, and slow enmasse makes him a worthy and challenging fight that Warriors of Lights cannot just mindlessly defeat and move on into the next room.

3) Domina Shantotto and Shantotto 

(A Shantotto Ascension – The Legend Torn, Her Empire Born)

Four words: Hilariously written, non-stop rhyming.

In one of the three digital-only add-on mini content expansions, the ultimate fight of A Shantotto Ascension – The Legend Torn, Her Empire Reborn is to prevent the Shantottofication curse from being cast across Vana’diel where everyone will be turned into Shantotto, and so you end up fighting two versions of Shantotto in this fight at the same time. (Just go with it, trust me.)

Domina Shantotto is equipped with a scythe that can use an AoE attack called Salvation Scythe that inflicts various status ailments and a lot of damage. When she isn’t swinging her scythe around, she is capable of casting every spell in the game. Unfortunately, you don’t have just Domina Shantotto to deal with. You also have regular Shantotto too. She utilizes a staff, uses a variety of black magic, and she will cast Meteor below 10%. She also has a powerful AoE attack called Divine Malison that inflicts a variety of status effects on players.

And if THAT wasn’t enough to deal with, both of them will enter a ‘rage’ mode when either of their HP drops to various percentages. During this time, their defense is massively boosted, their HP auto-regens, and they will use level 3 skillchains with each other to seriously damage adventurers and cause status effects.

If it isn’t obvious, double Shantotto is double trouble, and this fight to save Vana’diel is not a fight that you can just sleep on, but instead requires careful planning and attacking in order to survive and would make a great fight for FINAL FANTASY XIV Online to include.

4) Gessho

(Treasures of Aht Urghan)

Gessho is a beastman tribe member who has been excommunicated from the Yagudo theocracy after being branded a heretic, and he turns out to be one of your strongest allies throughout the Treasures of Aht Urghan expansion. He is incredibly well-written, and he gave a real humanity to the Yagudo that has not been present in the story up until that point.

In Mission 35: Legacy of the Lost, you end up fighting Gessho while he is a fully equipped ninja. He uses Ninjutsu spells, including Utsusemi that allows him to take zero damage from attacks, ranged weapon skills, and summon clones of himself to the field to attack alongside him. And if that isn’t enough, him and his clones can all use Mijin Gakure – the Ninja one-hour ability that causes significant non-elemental magic-based damage to everyone around them. And unlike the one-hour ability being used by adventurers using the Ninja class, it will not K.O. Gessho or his clones.

In other words, Gessho is a ninja that can explode repeatedly while also not taking any damage and would be a significant challenge for any Warrior of Light to overcome in battle.

5) Lilith Ascendant

(Wings of the Goddess)

Lilith Ascendant is the enemy born from when Lilisette is absorbed by Lady Lilith- who is also Lilisette, but from another timeline where the Crystal War never ended, the Shadow Lord was never defeated, and she where she forged a pact with Odin- at the end of Wings of the Goddess. I promise, it does make sense in the storyline.

This ultimate fight of the Wings of the Goddess expansion is primarily about causing status effects in players. For example: her Dark Burst ability resets job ability timers, her Dark Sun ability causes AoE Death, Dark Freeze does conical ice magic damage and terrorizes, and Dark Quake causes earth magic damage, amnesia, and bind. The most terrifying attack of all though is her Dark Moon skill: that causes AoE light damage and will place adventurers in a weakened state – like if they had just been raised.

If that wasn’t enough, Elemental Gyves will also spawn in the battlefield whenever Lilith Ascendant does a special attack. These are different elemental, non-moving targets that can be killed or despawned that create status effects in players and will also cause a state decrease. For example, the Water Elemental Gyve will cause drown and will give anyone within the range of effect Magic Defense Down.

This turns any fight into one where one where not only player positioning is vital to staying alive but requires healers to be on top of their skill sets in order to remove debuffs and status effects as quickly as possible while the tanks and melee are in a weakened state. Lilith Ascendant also looks like a classic FINAL FANTASY ultimate enemy, and fights like one too. This enemy – especially with the fairly unique focus upon status effects – would make a great raid enemy in FINAL FANTASY XIV Online.

6) Pandemonium Warden

(Treasures of Aht Urghan)

This was an end-game raid from the Treasures of Aht Urghan expansion, and arguably one of the hardest raids in all of FINAL FANTASY XI Online. A Tier V Zeni Notorious Monster, it is spawned deep in Aydeewa Subterrane after trading a Pandemonium Key to a ??? spawn spot.

Pandemonium Warden has 11 total forms that it changes into one after another, and all 11 must be defeated in order to win the fight. Each form has a massive AoE attack and moves reminiscent of the original enemy- including a unique skill for each form. With each form spawn of Pandemonium Warden, eight Pandemonium Lamps also appear. They must be dealt with separately away from the main tanking group as they also have a powerful AoE attack, and they must be killed quickly as they will be nearly impossible to pull off of the main Pandemonium Warden tank after a few minutes thanks to shared hate.

When you reach Pandemonium Warden’ s final form as a Dvergr, then you still have to deal with Astral Flow every 25% that will wipe out everyone within a large area if you don’t move out of range quickly enough. Each use of Astral Flow also will respawn all of the Pandemonium Lamps that were already killed, meaning that they have to be quickly dealt with all over again. You also cannot go too far away from the fight, as Pandemonium Warden also has drawn in, and it will pull everyone into the center of the battle arena together.

This is a small overview of a chaotic, difficult, and crazily fun fight that is absolutely unlike anything else you will experience in Vana’diel. It is also a perfect fit for a FINAL FANTASY XIV Online raid, and one that will give any raid group a challenge as it will force different alliances to handle different aspects of the fight all at the same time.

7) Nidhogg

(Rise of the Zilart)

For many years, Nidhogg had a chance to spawn within a 30-second window every half hour for three hours every 21 hours after it was last killed as the HQ chance spawn of Fafnir. The spawn chance of Nidhogg also went up for every day that Fafnir spawned instead of Nidhogg. If it sounds confusing, then just imagine being up at 3:20 AM, bleary-eyed, and desperately hoping that the Nidhogg would spawn after 10 days of only Fafnir.

This fight takes place deep within Dragon Aery inside of The Boyahda Tree. Positioning in this fight is fairly unique, as all players have to stand on either of his front feet in order to avoid the frontal AoE Dragon Breath ability that does a lot of damage. Among Nidhogg’s abilities are the ability to single target terror, dispel a single buff with Horrid Roar, and to cause both blindness and AoE damage with Hurricane Wing.

There are two things that makes this fight worthy of a FINAL FANTASY XI Online-inspired raid. First, adventurers could not use AoE attacks while fighting Nidhogg. Dragon’s Aery is a very small area, and there are 11 Darters (dragonfly enemies) that spawn around him that are both higher level than the then-level cap of 75, and that will aggro if they are attacked first. Oh, and they will also all link up together to attack if one is attacked. This means that instead of just fighting one Dragon, you now are dealing with potentially 11 other highly-leveled add-ons at the same time. Needless to say, it can be EXTREMELY chaotic, and this would force Warriors of Light to be unable to spam their regular move rotation.

Second, there is Spike Flail. If you attack Nidhogg from behind, he will use his tail to cause massive AoE damage that will kill everyone in the area. Wipes to Spike Flail were not common, but they would absolutely change the game when they happened, as you can see below during one such fight that I was a part of.

For context in the below pictures: SA stands for ‘Sneak Attack”, which is a Thief job specialty move that generates hate, and it is used behind the enemy for the critical hit damage. Usually, you pair it with Trick Attack to transfer enemy to correct player (aka ‘SATA’). When it doesn’t go off perfectly, you wind up with enmity being given to the Thief…who was behind Nidhogg in the below screen caps. Finally, all of these players below are equipped with the best gear possible in FINAL FANTASY XI Online at the time:

(Photos by author).

Causing Warriors of Light to care a lot about positioning, worrying about add on mobs, and not being able to use their default rotation makes this a fight that would be a real stand out in ECHOES OF VANA’DIEL, and Nidhogg would be a better gameplay shakeup than almost anything else in FINAL FANTASY XI Online.

8) Schah

(Rhapsodies of Vana’diel)

Located in Reisenjima, Schah is the hardest Notorious Monster introduced in the Rhapsodies of Vana’diel expansion and most likely the hardest fight in the entire MMORPG. Also: if you want an Aeonic Weapon, you will have to eventually fight it.

Whereas Pandemonium Warden focuses on managing eleven different forms and the battle mechanics for each form with the adds somewhat secondary, Schah is the opposite. Schah spawns fourteen additional enemies that have to be all killed before you can do any damage to the main enemy: seven Bhata (Pawns), two Ashva (Knights), two Gaja (Bishops), two Ratha (Castle/Rooks), and one Mantri (Queen). These adds start spawning 30 seconds after the fight starts and will keep spawning 48 seconds after each rank dies, with the Mantri first appearing three minutes into the fight. Also: if a Bhata is not killed within two minutes after spawning, then it will turn into a Mantri. These adds all have various abilities, cast high level magic, and will do incredible damage if not properly managed. And on top of all that: Mantri will use Enthrall to AoE charm everyone.

As I said at the start: until those additional enemies are dealt with, adventurers cannot damage Schah. Schah is no pushover over, as it can also use every spell that the different adds can use, can use Royal Decree (which is AoE damage and resets all ability timers), and can use Banneret Charge. Banneret Charge is an AoE attack that resets both hate and affected players’ HP to 1. And if that wasn’t all enough, Schah also has heavy resistance to attacks and to all magic but Dark.

It is a very hard fight that is very, very fun and it would require a high level of coordination among Warriors of Light to conquer.

9) Garazu-Horeizu

(The Voracious Resurgence)

In the latest expansion for FINAL FANTASY XI Online, Garazu-Horeizu is the ultimate villain who is determined to resurrect Chaos. Like Shadow Lord, Garazu-Noreizu is more notable for his role within the expansion’s storyline than anything else, but that doesn’t mean that he is a pushover.

These skills include casting Tier 2 Ancient Magic, Comet, Meteor, and spamming Silencega instantly over and over again. And if that wasn’t enough, he can use Tartarus Tocsin, which is an AoE damage and sleep skill. Additionally, he can also absorb some of the player’s stats and cast dispel…And it is all AoE. When his HP starts to drop, he will summon multiple cloned allies of YOUR allies, the Destiny Destroyers, to help him. This quickly devolves into, like the Shadow Lord, a damage race to kill Garazu-Horeizu before he and his allies can kill you.

I ultimately chose Garazu-Horeizu over the final boss, Chaos, because I did not want all the raid fights to be ‘gods’ or ‘god equivalents’, but to be characters who also had a major role in FINAL FANTASY XI Online. While this would undoubtedly be a mid-run ECHOES OF VANA’DIEL raid boss, I know that there would be a place for him in the content.

10) Promathia

(Chains of Promathia)

Promathia is the God of Twilight and the namesake of the Chains of Promathia expansion. There is a lot to be said about Promathia, what the chains that bind him are, and what it means for the Vana’diel of yesterday, today, and tomorrow. I am being purposefully vague here, since Chains of Promathia is probably my favorite FINAL FANTASY storyline of all time (narrowly beating out Lighting Returns: FINAL FANTASY XIII) with a plot that just drops mind-stunning revelation after revelation upon you as you play through it and you just need to experience it for yourself.

In this fight, you are partnered with Prishe and Selh’teus (two major expansion story NPCs) alongside your own party of adventurers. There are two stages of the fight. In the first stage, Promathia has different AoE and cone attacks that inflict dispel, plague, curse, and various amounts of damage. He can also cast the magic attack Comet. What really sets this stage apart is that he has five different ‘Chains’ attacks, and each one only affects one of the five playable Vana’diel races (but is negated by a story item collected previously in The Garden of Ru’Hmet).

The second stage has Promathia hitting incredibly hard, and he now also uses AoE abilities such as Mute and Amnesia, and he will cast Meteor once a minute. If that was not enough, he will also switch between magic and physical attack damage invincibility.

This is a hard, and difficult fight in a battle arena that is my absolute favorite in all of FINAL FANTASY XI Online. It is truly an epic battle, with incredible stakes, and there is nothing like fighting alongside Prishe and Selh’teus. In addition, due to ‘plot reasons’, the Chains attacks would have to land on the various inhabitants of Eorzea- unless, of course, SQUARE ENIX includes a way to negate them as well in the raid dungeons. Promathia is simply an amazing, iconic fight, and both the God of Twilight and his battle arena would be perfect for ECHOES OF VANA’DIEL.

11) Maat

(FINAL FANTASY XI Online)

Like there could be anyone else in this final, 11th, slot from FINAL FANTASY XI Online for the ECHOES FROM VANA’DIEL raid series in FINAL FANTASY XIV: Dawntrail expansion.

When you first hit level 50, and every five levels after that point, you have to seek out Maat to increase your level cap inside Ru’Lude Gardens in the Grand Duchy of Jeuno. While he appears to be just an old man, Maat is a master of all 15 jobs that were created before the Chains of Promathia expansion was released. In order to break your ‘limits’ (level cap) and unlock the then-final level increase from 70 to 75, you had to test your might against Maat himself as you both fight each other on the same job.

And he WILL test you. He is incredibly powerful, incredibly strong, and any player who played FINAL FANTASY XI Online knows just how hard taking him on can be. He is an obstacle that everyone faced who wanted to get to the level cap, and he takes no mercy on anyone. You can have all the best buffs, eat the best food, and wear the best gear…And still easily lose against him.

While this fight is undoubtedly the one that would require the most change, I would personally love Maat to shift between all of the FINAL FANTASY XI Online jobs to fight Warriors of Light with and make an alliance prove their worth in a raid by besting him in battle. It would be a true fight of strength and a way to test FINAL FANTASY XI Online jobs against FINAL FANTASY XIV Online jobs in a way that would make sense in-universe.

Conclusion

And there you have it! Eleven enemies that would be perfect for any Warrior of Light to test their might and mettle against.

I will admit that I had a very hard time narrowing down my list to just 11, and I ended up regrettingly leaving out Hades from the Seekers of Adoulin expansion and the Ark Angels from Rise of Zilart expansion- they would have been my 12th and 13th choices if I could have permitted myself to have two.

Regardless, I know that SQUARE ENIX and the team behind FINAL FANTASY XIV Online will do a wonderful job implementing and honoring the history and story of FINAL FANTASY XI Online in ECHOES OF VANA’DIEL and I just cannot wait to explore it all!

Who did I miss and who have you fought during your own adventures in Vana’diel?

Let us know in the comments below!

The post 11 Enemies from FINAL FANTASY XI Online that NEED to be in FFXIV’s ECHOES OF VANA’DIEL appeared first on oprainfall.

Nintendo Live Official Website

Ordinarily, I put out my thoughts on a fan-event fairly quickly -within the week- of the event itself. Nintendo Live 2023: Seattle has been the one exception. Not for a bad reason, but simply because there is so much potential that I kept talking with other people connected to oprainfall and to my own social group about what Nintendo could do with it. If you want to take away one thing from this column, then let it be this: Nintendo Live 2023: Seattle felt like an incredibly successful dry run for a potential future standalone Nintendo two-day convention.

Before we get to why I feel that way, let’s talk about the event itself. Hosted adjacent to PAX West (and sharing a building with part of the event, in fact), Nintendo Live 2023: Seattle was a separately ticketed event that did not require PAX West 2023 admission to attend but instead held a free lottery system for people to potentially gain admittance for a few months beforehand for one particular day. Nintendo also distributed a handful of tickets at PAX West itself. What this means is that Nintendo was able to spread the attendance out over the full four days of PAX and that, most crucially, Nintendo knew exactly how many people were going to be attending each day and it helped to make Nintendo Live 2023: Seattle feel like an event that was both at capacity yet not overwhelmingly overpacked.

Inside Nintendo Live 2023: Seattle itself, the different activities fell into four categories: demos (including for the yet-to-be-released Super Mario Bros. Wonder), photo opportunities with characters and items, live events to sit and watch that ranged from competitions to musical performances, and merchandise shopping. I will be taking each of these up in turn.

First and foremost: the demos. Nintendo had several video game demo available – as well as some of their partner’s titles like Just Dance 2023 and Disney Illusion Island – across the entire show floor. While all but Super Mario Bros. Wonder have already been released, it was a great opportunity for people to pick up a console, play a demo in a staging area themed after the various game, and try it out. For example, Pikmin 4 was in a full-on Pikmin­-themed area that took you right into the game. Nintendo even cleverly enticed people to play retro titles that are available on Nintendo Online, such as the NES classic Ice Hockey, but turning it into a competition. The wait to try out the demos were not very long, and even for Super Mario Bros. Wonder, I only spent around 20 minutes waiting to pick it up and run through it. Some of the competition slots ran longer, but nothing was too bad.

If you are already a major Nintendo fanatic, then chances are you have probably owned or demoed everything that was there but Super Mario Bros. Wonder. To help keep those Nintendo fans busy, there were a ton of photo opportunities. Did you see the billion-dollar-making The Super Mario Bros. Movie? Nintendo hauled in the Mario Bros. van for you to take a picture with. What about if you’re a fan of Super Smash Bros. Ultimate? The life-size replica props were available for you to take pictures with. Kirby, LEGO Bowser, Tears of the Kingdom Link, Ink Squid, the three Pokémon Scarlet/Violet starters, and more were all on hand for you to get up and close to take pictures with. Nintendo also smartly rotated out the non-statue photo opportunities fairly frequently, and so there was always someone new to get a picture with just around the corner.

All of these lines seemed fairly quick to get through, with one exception: K.K. Slider from Animal Crossing: New Horizons. Every single time I passed by that line, it was capped, and it seemed to be around 50 minutes to an hour long. Not because K.K. Slider was doing some really long photo shoots, but just because he was that popular.

My personal favorite was the re-imagined room from the 1980s. This photo line, while not as busy as K.K. Slider’s, was always busy as well. And when I was able to get in, I was surprised to find that it was a fully-realized and built living room. I flipped through the albums, checked out the NES and R.O.B. at the TV, and even the vacuum cleaner and the couch. It is a cool idea that I really hope Nintendo will expand upon for the future. I would love to see, for example, a 1980’s Japanese living room with a Famicom in it!

Next, there are the various live events to sit through and watch. The big marquee event for Day 4 of Nintendo Live 2023: Seattle was the Splatoon 3 Championships 2023. This event took place on a giant stage in the back of the event hall, and it had excellent on-site commentary for people who weren’t fans (at least until then!) of competitive Splatoon 3 gameplay. There were also two concerts being held per day with a full-on live band: one for The Legend of Zelda and one for Super Mario Bros. There was also something called Mario Dojo for people to compete in, but I only saw it start right before I had to leave for other media appointments. I don’t know if that was just poor timing on my part or if Mario Dojo (seemingly no relation to the DSiWare Photo Dojo) was just put on that infrequently.

The biggest surprise was that for all of these live events, I had no trouble showing up at the last moment and getting a fairly awesome viewing spot. Now, it may have been a bit further back or it might have been standing-room-only, but at no point did I feel like I was being walled off from enjoying a part of the Nintendo Live 2023: Seattle experience. Even the Super Mario Bros. concert that I attended, which had given out ‘Warp Pass’ tickets a while ago for seats up close, had a ton of standby seating and stand-by watching areas for people if you really wanted to watch it. My biggest fear, going into Nintendo Live 2023, was that the concert was going to be performed in a walled-off room and I was going to miss it entirely. Thankfully, that wasn’t the case at all. Even when I dipped in and out of the Splatoon 3 Championships, I was able to find a spot to watch the tournament happen live on stage.

If there was one somewhat dark spot though, it had to be the merchandise line. The Nintendo Live 2023: Seattle merchandise sold out through the online My Nintendo Store fairly quickly on both occasions it was put up, and so many attendees had to buy it in person if they wanted the event-exclusive T-shirts, the event-themed Switch case, or more. The line ended up taking people around one-and-a-half to two hours to get through, and it wound through the outside courtyard, back inside, and then through an inside queue system.

When you got close to the front of the line, a store employee would mark your order down on a wipeable sheet and hand it off to the stockers, so that they could assemble the order and have it ready for you to buy when you got to the front of the line. It was, in theory, a great system. However, there were simply not enough cashiers on hand to help move the line as quickly as it needed to go in order to process people through in a timely manner. I found myself ultimately wishing that there was some way for people to scan a geo-locked QR code, place an order through a secret website, and then have Nintendo ship out the goods after the event. Instead, there were ever-capped merchandise lines instead of people being out on the event floor.

All of Nintendo Live 2023: Seattle, with the except of the merchandising, was a master class on how to put together a fan-based event. There were plenty of demos, tons of photo ops, live performances and events to attend, and it all happened in lines where you were never waiting truly long.  In fact, the whole event kept things moving so quickly that I could see that everyone not in the merchandise line was having a wonderful time.

And that brings me to the point I made at the top of this column, about this event feeling like a ‘dry run.’ The only thing missing from Nintendo Live 2023: Seattle from making it a full-on fan convention like FINAL FANTASY XIV FAN FESTIVAL 2023-2024 or BlizzCon was the lack of a Keynote Speech ala a live Nintendo Direct.

As I was taking pictures and watching performances and playing games, my mind kept being flooding with possibilities about how this event could be expanded in a future year to be the launch event for a Nintendo console. I could easily see the executives from the various Nintendo branches presenting a live Nintendo Direct to show off a new console and new games on Day One, and to conclude with the words “and you can demo those games on our new console for yourself today on the show floor, you can take pictures with Mario and our other new friends, and you can even see a live performance of a couple secret tracks from one of the new games later in the afternoon.” It would take what Nintendo did with the unveiling of the Nintendo 3DS at E3 2010 (complete with hands-on fan demos) and crank it up into a Nintendo-only event where they wouldn’t have to share the viral social media attention.

All of that may, of course, just be ‘blue sky’ dreaming on my part.

But Nintendo Live 2023: Seattle seemed to be so successful that it is hard believe that it wasn’t a test run for a more substantial Nintendo event of some sort in the future. Personally, I plan on the next Nintendo Live event, no matter where in the country it is held. And honestly? You should too, if you can.

Did you attend Nintendo Live 2023: Seattle? If so, what did you think?

Where would you like Nintendo to host their next Nintendo Live event?

Let us know in the comments below!

The post Nintendo Live 2023: Seattle’s An Amazing Event for Gaming Fans appeared first on oprainfall.

You can find out more about Dragon Con on their official website, on Twitter, on Facebook, on Instagram, on Pinterest, and on Discord. 

You can also buy a membership for next year’s Dragon Con here.

One of the biggest mantras about attending DragonCon is that you will never, ever, get to see and do everything because there is so much going on all the time, every day, from Thursday through Monday over Labor Day weekend. There are also so many inside jokes and references at DragonCon that you will never be able to keep track of them all, no matter how many years you go.

The fact that there is so much to do is why it took me 10 years (but only been covering it for oprainfall since 2015!) to finally put on an inflatable Carpetsaurus Rex costume and march in the Saturday morning DragonCon Parade as part of the Marriott Carpet group. Yes, there is a lot to unpack in that sentence, so let’s start with exactly WHAT the Marriott Carpet is, and what the DragonCon Parade is.

For a long time, whenever you would walk into the Atlanta Marriott Marquis hotel, one of five host hotels for DragonCon the event takes place in, a crazy carpet pattern of reds and blues and yellows would be there to welcome you. The Marriott Carpet pattern (anyone who goes to DragonCon will instantly know which pattern you’re talking about) is an incredibly loud, colorful, and complex pattern. That was, until 2015 when the carpet was unceremoniously ripped out and replaced. People who loved the design started a group, the “Cult of Marriott Carpet”, and started to put that design onto everything from flasks and dresses to reskinning cosplay in the Marriott Carpet theme. And against all odds, the fandom for this carpet pattern has only grown since then and they now have a regular spot of pride in the yearly DragonCon Parade.

The yearly DragonCon Parade is a full on, honest-to-goodness Parade that takes place over 1.5 miles through the heart of Atlanta on the Saturday of DragonCon. Hundreds of people participate in everything from the various elements of the Periodic Table to driving geeked-out vehicles to – you guessed it – the Cult of the Marriott Carpet.

I have seen the parade several times while I have attended DragonCon, but I have never actually participated in it…and I was not planning on doing so until I saw a Facebook post in October 2022 asking who wants to be in on a new round of Carpetsaurus Rex inflatable costumes. A Carpetsaurus Rex is a regular Tyrannosaurus Rex, but with the famed Marriott carpet pattern for skin. I immediately bought into it without a second thought and registered to march with the Cult of the Marriott Carpet in the Parade.

Several months later, it is September 2023, and I have shown up at the 8:30 a.m. Saturday pre-parade meeting. There are more Carpetsaurus Rex people like me, there are cheerleaders who will lead people on either side of the parade route in Marriott Carpet chants, and there are cosplayers who have adapted their cosplay to show off the Marriott Carpet pattern. There were, in other words, quite a few people who showed up to express their love for a carpet pattern that has been gone for eight years now. We shuffle onto the transport bus to the staging area, and I am immediately greeted by a full-on marching band playing as soon as I get off the bus.

We go to our designated area, and the first thing we do is sign the back of the Cult of the Marriott Carpet group banner. Each year, that year’s DragonCon Parade group signs the back of the group banner that we take turns carrying down the street, and it was really cool to see everyone that has gone before us. Soon afterwards though, it is time to suit up in our Carpetsaurus Rex costumes, and we find out that we will be going on after the Deadpool cosplayers group head out. They also have a Carpetsaurus Rex, but it has been doubly re-themed to be Deadpool as well!

When I’m in the inflatable costume, I find myself extremely thankful for the water bottles that the Boy Scouts of America had previously handed us, my cooling towel, and my internal fan that was helping keep the costume inflated. I walk carefully – but confidently – down the street, and I can see THOUSANDS of people just lining the road and cheering us on amid chants of “MARRIOTT” and “CARPET” being led by the cheerleaders.

I bask in it all, and I do my best to help cheer and pump up the crowd by shimmying, by waving my arms, and even giving the best Carpetsaurus high fives that I can! I was sweaty, yes, but I was having the best time of my life.

The mile-and-a-half distance feels like almost nothing, unfortunately, and it is over too soon as we head inside at the end of the parade route into, fittingly for our group, the Atlanta Marriott Marquis. Inside, I unzip my costume by the Walk of Fame and I drink down the rest of my water before we have a professional group photo taken to memorialize this year’s Cult of the Marriott Carpet group.

This Parade experience only took me 10 years to get around doing at DragonCon. And you know what? It is just one of many, many stories of what you can do.

Some people will sleep all day long and hit up all the dance parties at night until the very early hours of the morning. Other people will try to get as many ribbons to attach to their DragonCon badge as they can so they can participate in a contest to see who has the longest DragonCon ribbon chain at the end of the convention. And others will be sure to hit up every chance they can to see the Atlanta Radio Theatre Company perform live segments from their daily show Mercury: A Broadcast of Hope or, for the first time in 22 years, a live adaptation of Terry Pratchett’s Guards! Guards!

DragonCon is a convention like none other that takes place every single Labor Day weekend, and it is my favorite event to attend every year. Every fandom, from Firefly (complete with a drinking songs filk panel!) to amateur wrestling, to even obscure 1970’s anime will be celebrated there, and you will find someone who will recognize your cosplay no matter what it is and ask to take a picture.

ESPECIALLY if you theme it after the Marriott Carpet.

Did you go to DragonCon this year?

What do you think of the Marriott Carpet pattern?

Let us know in the comments below!

The post DragonCon 2023: I was a Carpetsaurus Rex in the Parade appeared first on oprainfall.

Pokémon GO has the best fan-community, bar none other.

I went to Randall’s Island Park in New York City for Pokémon GO Fest 2023 this past weekend, and that was my biggest take away from that event. No matter where I went during my Saturday morning timeslot inside the Park, there were strangers talking about Pokémon GO, trading battle tips, doing group raids, and trading anything and everything to anyone. It felt like a real, breathing, fan community of people who just wanted to enjoy this amazing mobile game together.

Nothing exemplified this more than my experience trying to trade for Pokémon that I did not have. At various spots throughout the event, Niantic passed out signs that you could fill in with what kind of Pokémon you were looking for in trade. I put up regional-exclusive Pokémon (and Flabébé!) because I figured “why not? Maybe I can negotiate for something that is region locked elsewhere in the world…”, since there are exactly zero plans in my near future to travel to France or New Zealand or any of a dozen other places in the world to get a Pokémon that spawned only in that particular country or countries on the far-flung side of the globe.

And every time I put a new Pokémon on my small sign, whether it be for Klefki (France-only), Relicanth (New Zealand-only), or Sawk (Europe, Asia, Australia-only), there was someone who would inevitably come up to me and say “I’ve got you, give me whatever in return” when I said that I was just trying to complete my Pokédex. No extortion, no hard trading for some super rare Pokémon. Instead, it was just one Pokémon Trainer trying to help another Pokémon Trainer to fulfill the 25-year-old-plus motto of “Gotta catch ‘em all!”

There is some real magic in the absolute kindness of a fan community like that.

This column cannot be just about how great the fan community is when a bunch of strangers get together, though, so let’s talk about the rest of Pokémon GO Fest 2023. If you attended last year’s Pokémon GO Fest in Seattle, then you have the basics down: there are several GPS-tagged areas in the park area that each have exclusive spawns and a collection list to complete for a medal; there are various activities such as meeting fan-famous Pokémon Trainers, meeting illustrators, and even getting your picture taken with Pikachu or Eevee; there are large tent-like areas for players to hang out with others from their team; you can battle in a battle arena; there are plenty of Pokéstops to spin and raids to do; and there is an over-arching exclusive research quest with the Professor for you to do.

Honestly? It’s a lot to do in a four-hour period.

Despite there being some slight mud from the day prior, each of the Pokémon GO Fest 2023’s four areas had an amazing-themed structure placed prominently in the area. While I am not knocking on the Pokémon GO Fest that I attended last year in Seattle, it was definitely a real improvement to see a giant volcano or a huge sand castle with a large crystal that you could get your picture taken in, a large swamp cave, or even a huge monument that changed whenever a new Pokémon GO Team took control (like Mystic repeatedly did!). It felt like there was a real effort by Niantic to make sure that people could have something significant to take pictures of and enjoy in each of the four areas. The Pokémon in each area were also completely different – with the exception of the Egypt/Greece region-locked Sigilyph that was available in each biome.

In what was probably the smartest decision Niantic made, they split the entire event into two areas: the Athletic Field and Poison Swamp on one side of the park, and the Prehistoric Volcano and Cursed Treasures areas on the other side of the park.

Inside of the Athletic Field/Poison Swamp area (first area, just for convenience), there was the Pokémon Center Store. The fact that the only side attraction in this area was the Pokémon Center Store proved to be a really good idea, as the line to get inside to shop for merchandise was insanely long. I was given the opportunity to look inside to take photographs of the merchandise for this column, and there were so many types of Pokémon apparel and Pokémon plush available for purchase, including a dark gray t-shirt that was exclusive to Pokémon GO Fest 2023. My only real complaint about the merchandise was that they had sold out of several sizes on Day One of the event, and it didn’t look like they held back any stock for Days Two or Three. That was really surprising, as it meant those people who had the Sunday afternoon Park Experience were going to be picking through bare leftovers to find what they could wear.

In the second area, there was a lot of additional content for people to enjoy if they wanted to take a break from catching Pokémon. While the lines were too unfortunately long (and I had too many Pokémon to catch and trade for!), I saw a lot of people were thrilled to meet Trainers that they only see on TikTok or YouTube or on Twitter and get pictures taken with them. It really didn’t surprise me that a lot of famous Trainers had large followings at these events and that the lines were always full. Additionally, there were photo opportunities and character meet-and-greets to participate in that were fun (and packed with lines!) too.

My favorite part of the whole Pokémon GO Fest, honestly, was each of the Team tents. I am Team Mystic, and so I wandered into my tent midway through the event and found that they were doing a Pokémon trivia game with a crowd of people surrounding the stage. The person on stage would ask a Pokémon trivia question, which ranged from “what Pokédex number is Pikachu” to “name this Kalos normal-type Pokémon that I am thinking of” and “who here has the lightest-weighing Pichu?” No matter the question, a TON of hands would immediately go up, and she would select a person to answer. If they got it correct, they would win a pin.

Gentle readers, I thought I knew Pokémon. But after being unable to answer a lot of the tougher questions, I definitely don’t know Pokémon.

My chance at a Pokémon GO Fest 2023 themed-pin seemed bleak…Until, at the very end of that particular quiz session, she asked for volunteers for a dance off. Before she could finish the word “volunteer” and before she could tell us what we would be doing, my hand shot up and I knew that I was in to win. Ultimately, there were five of us of different ages up at the front of the stage, and we were told to dance.

I cannot dance, for I have no rhythm and I certainly cannot keep a beat.

But you better believe I danced my butt off until they called time with every 80’s dance move and every dance lesson that Sinbad taught me in First Kid that I could think of. Ultimately, the Niantic person gave us all an event pin, and I definitely felt like I earned it.

The exclusive Pokémon GO Fest 2023 quest, where you can get Diancie/Mega Diancie, had a major quality of life improvement over last year’s Pokémon GO Fest event. In both years, you had to visit each of the different areas and complete a certain set of tasks in each one in order to complete that step of the research quest. Last year’s event was the fourth step, and I found myself having to rush hard to get to it and complete it during my event time window. This year, it was the second task to complete (after a fairly easy first one), and it served to incentivize me to visit each of the four areas early on. I thought it was a smart way to move people around the whole park area and to get them to see all the event has in store instead of just raiding and catching as many Sigilyph as possible.

The raids themselves were great. I finally caught a shiny Xerneas and a shiny Yveltal! The raids filled up extremely quickly, and I loved how close in location they were to each other. There were raids going on and refreshing nonstop, and I kept spamming Xerneas until I finally got my shiny. The shiny rate was also boosted for this event (as confirmed in my interview), and that was a relief as I wound up with zero shiny Pokémon at last year’s event. This year, I got a shiny Hitmontop, a shiny Throh, and a shiny Zangoose! It was nice getting those shiny Pokémon as I was just going around and catching whatever caught my eye.

When time began to wind down to the last hour of the event, I ended up frantically running around to all four areas to try to finish up the medals and to try to finish up the Dancie quest. Four hours honestly isn’t enough time to do everything, see everything, and complete everything. If there is one big takeaway issue that I have with the Park Experience, it is that it was too short. I hope Niantic will expand it next year to a fifth hour for each section. I really did feel a bit rushed at the end, and I honestly didn’t want it to end when it did.

Afterwards, I wondered into New York City and I did the City Experience portion. Even though I was in East Harlem (which was right across the river from where Randall’s Island Park is), I found a lot of Pokémon there to catch and raids to complete. The City Experience this year was measurably better than Seattle’s experience due to one thing: the Campfire App. I was able to find raids in the area, both local and remote, and participate in them. I ended up clearing several Mega Rayqueza raids in the East Harlem area and at the LaGuardia airport before my early evening flight thanks to that handy app. While it is obviously not as much fun as the Park Experience, the City Experience was fun too and I did ultimately catch a Rayquaza (even if it wasn’t shiny!).

There are a few more points of interest that I want to highlight that I can’t really put in anywhere else. First, there were plenty of food trucks in the second area for people to eat at so they didn’t have to leave the Park Experience. While I did not partake myself, the people I saw eating seemed to enjoy it. Second, the Battle Arena was okay, but it felt like an in-person version of what I was already doing online. I wish that Niantic adapted a “show six, choose three” format or something for Pokémon GO Fest 2023, as I figure that the in-person events are the best way to test-drive new PVP content in a real-world setting where there aren’t Cup points on the line. Next, Niantic smartly picked a location with a lot of options for people to get to the event in, even though the bus drop off points weren’t labeled with a sign or something. Finally, I was annoyed that the New York region-exclusive Pokémon, Bouffalant, was not part of this event and you could not catch one if you had the event ticket because of that. While I was able to get one the day before, this meant that if you flew in on Saturday morning to do the event and then flew back out that same night, you wouldn’t be able to get it. All of these things are minor issues that I had with Pokémon GO Fest 2023, to be honest.

The moment that I loved the most about the entire thing was my experience in the Team Mystic tent, because it showed me what Niantic intended Pokémon GO Fest 2023 to be: a lot of silly, family-friendly, fun that is for everyone from Pokémon GO beginners to Pokémon GO experts.

If you can go to next year’s Pokémon GO Fest, then you should. I think you’ll love it just as much as I did.

Did you attend this year’s Pokémon GO Fest? 

Where do you hope next year’s Pokémon GO Fest will be?

Let us know in the comments below!

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