Late to the Party: Assassins Creed Origins

Late to the Party: Assassins Creed Origins

Posted by Lana Meeren on March 01, 2020 in Assassins Creed, Assassins Creed Odyssey, Assassins Creed Origins, Late to the Party, PlayStation 4, review, video games,

Late to the Party is a series of games reviews for games that released a significant time ago that I still feel the urge to write about. A lot of them have only become available to me this last year and continue to offer me new abilities to explore gaming and different aspects of it. The added benefit is that the games I get to explore are usually completely patched and free of their release day bugs and with most of the DLC already released and even included in the purchase. So please enjoy a fresh perspective on a not so fresh game.

Assassins Creed Origins is the overall 20^th entry in the series and the 10^th main game. It was published on October 27,2017 by Ubisoft and developed by Ubisoft Montreal in Canada. The game was to overhaul the Assassins Creed formula which had fallen out of favour. It’s predecessor Syndicate launched under the bad memories of Assassins Creed Unity. It would receive lots of praise but be ultimately over and over criticised for the repetitive gameplay that had been with the series since the first game in 2007 and thus did not up selling to Ubisoft’s satisfaction. This led to Assassins Creed Origins being developed for more than 4 years, in an attempt to change up the stale formula, leading to a break in the recent yearly releases. 

Assassins Creed Origins was a game I got for my birthday last year and I originally started the game sometime in summer after I finished Odyssey. The setting intrigued me even though I felt wary of too much desert (which I perceive as depressing) and the fact that it came before the game I had just finished and very much enjoyed. I knew there’d likely be some changes and I wasn’t sure if they would work for me.

I was also on a high enjoying the female protagonist I had craved for forever in an Assassins Creed game. So, despite not knowing the character yet I wasn’t as excited for Bayek as I had been for Kassandra when I started Odyssey. 

I played the first third of the game then, mostly alone unlike Odyssey, which my partner and I played together for all of the story. Then I put it down because I had bought Horizon Zero Dawn and was much more intrigued by that. 

On Valentine's day we decided to opt for a cosy day in bed, gaming and ordering pizza. When the time came to choose what to play my partner asked me to get them up to speed with the story and if we wanted to finish Origins together.

Thankfully the game is not all desert and uses the lush Nile delta to full capacity

The story starts out in a flashback to Siwa, the protagonist’s hometown/region. The city is busy preparing for the visit of Ptolemy the Pharaoh and we briefly get to see Bayek in his role as the Medjay. When Bayek spots some masked figures behind Ptolemys back his expression becomes angry.
The flashback cuts to a scene currently taking place in the bent pyramid, Bayek is killing Rudjek aka “The Heron” the first of the people in masks he was able to track down. He then battles his bodyguard and returns to Siwa

Through more flashbacks it is soon revealed that Bayek son Khemu was killed in an incident in Siwa, where a masked man forced a knife in Bayek hands through his chest while the others watched on. The people in the masks call themselves the Order of Ancients and Bayek has sworn to kill them all to put his son’s soul to rest.

On his quest to achieve this he travels through vast parts of Egypt, finding the Order of Ancients poisoning the land wherever they established themselves in power. They are backed by the usurper Pharaoh Ptolemy who stole his sister Cleopatras throne and Bayek and Aya align themselves with her to right the wrongs and install her as the rightful ruler.

For most of the story we follow Bayek, but every now and then we also get to experience the ancient world through Ayas eyes. Her DNA was damaged (her sarcophagus fell in a trench and broke open) so we only get bits and pieces as she becomes an even closer ally to Cleopatra than Bayek and frequently takes on dangerous sea voyages for her queen.
Aya is out for revenge as well and while less in number, she as well is cutting her way through the Order of Ancients.

In the end all their efforts seem futile. Cleopatra wins the favour of Rome’s emperor Julius Cesar and quickly bans the two from the royal palace since the last Order member ranks high in Cesar’s court and is thus protected by them.
It is this betrayal that finally leads the pair to start the Creed, and they manage to get their vengeance. However, Aya feels this is not enough, that tyranny like the one that was allowed to grow along Cesar’s reign has to be prevented and so she takes on a new name and travels to Rome where she becomes the first to stab Cesar, a deed that earned her fame through the ages known under her new name: Amunet.

Screenshot from Assassins Creed II, showing Amunet who we came to know as Aya

Now I have to say the way the open world is designed and used in Origins and Odyssey is what made me excited to play Assassins Creed again.
I love free-climbing mechanics and find myself increasingly frustrated by open-world games not offering them. Especially when exploration is a big part of the game. Origins delivered on this making most surfaces climbable, with a few acceptable exceptions. 

The more role-play-oriented design, however, is what made me unable to put the controller down at certain points. I love the older games in the series, but they very clearly tell a story that you follow with little straying from the intended path. Origins is drastically different. It still tells its story very linear and there is the one ending that you’ll get if you finish the game, but how and when you get there can vary a lot. 

Synchronisation points remain in the game and improve Senus perception

In the end, the open world and wanting to explore it more remained my main motivation to complete the game. The world is built incredibly beautifully, and I loved moving around in it. Quick travel was we rarely used since there might be something cool to discover along the way.
I liked the overarching story but the subplots in between had a tendency to tire me out and I was almost glad when the main game was done because I wouldn’t have to go somewhere, talk to someone, do a sub-quest, realize who the Order member was and go assassinate them (most likely in a temple). 

There were a few boss fights that mixed things up, like “The Hyena” who fought by bow and arrow in a sandstorm or the fight against Flavius who uses an Apple of Eden, but overall a lot of the main quest was very similar.
The theme of child death is also used so frequently that it actually became tiring to me at a point where it is yet again brought up to make the stakes seem even higher. Needless to say, that a theme like child death should not be considered tiring and I consider its actuality in the world very cruel. As a plot point in Origins, the death of Khemu was cruel and more than enough motivation to wander Egypt until all those who had a part in it were dead. But then there a child in danger of dying here, unborn children being poisoned there, another child dying as a plot point and it just goes on and on. I got the fact that Bayek was a family man and this event was tearing him apart the first time. I got that he was generally loving kids the second time. The third time I just thought “again?”. 

For me, it just didn’t contain the shock value that the writers might have intended. 

I also felt like I saw Bayeks whole story arch coming from very far away. He would avenge his son because that was the goal the player was given to achieve. He would most likely found the Assassins because that is literally in the name of the game. And his marriage would not last and I’m glad it didn’t, it would have felt like cheating a broken relationship fixed. The last point was obvious to me seeing how he and Aya we’re mostly united by anger but had just gone a year without contact no problem. I was unsure for a bit after they united happily in Alexandria but Aya just never seemed as Bayek when they went their own ways again. 

All through his journey, Bayek can find stone monuments

The monuments unlock memories with Khemu as well as star signs in the sky

All that said I still really liked the story. Side Quests brought me more enjoyment since they never had to play into the endgame and could do some cool unexpected stuff. There’s a repetition here as well with how you’ll go about one but the idea behind varies. I loved the quest where Bayek must go and find out why the Natron mines seem haunted ever since he killed the Heron nearby, the residents fully blaming him for murdering in a sacred place. Because in a pious society like ancient Egypt murdering someone in a place dedicated to a god was a sacrilege. 

Exploring the Pyramids and graves strewn through Egypt was a special treat. It’s like a childhood dream come through since I always wondered what it would be like to wander those monuments and the game made it somewhat experienceable. Although it was a bit funny to run through rooms filled with gold to the brim and collect 10 coins as loot.

Now there is as always, a modern-day story. I have never been big on those and most people I know aren't either. Layla is an okay protagonist but I’m most happy when I can be done with her. 

In the game there is a series of hidden ancient mechanisms, which when activated spit out messages directly addressed to her. Those mechanisms are never ever referred to as important or a quest objective, instead you might stumble across them or maybe miss them all for the one that is in the main story mission. 

I guess Ubisoft knows by now that we all are over the modern time stuff and they leave it as optional for people who are deeply invested in the lore (for which you also must read all the comics and books).

The game plays very smooth for the most part but occasionally the boats took to the sky 

Something Origins did very well is the number of weapons to choose from. Loot with stats is something that motivates me a lot in games and I enjoyed the variety. There are swords, sickle swords, spears, axes and blunt weapons like maces and hammers. While my partner favoured a mace at the start, they later found a flaming sword they took to. I varied between spears and sickle swords the whole time and when I had to decide what to level stayed with the sickled swords since I loved the ability to break through shields and the fast and sleek movement especially when the overpowered mode was triggered.

The bows are nearly as varied as the melee weapons, which is one of the things I’m most sad about that they were lost in Odyssey. I took to the predator bows a lot, which are basically sniper bows, but I also enjoyed the warrior bows that fire a spread of five arrows at once, especially helpful against multiple opponents or to take riders off their mounts. 

My partner used the predator bows a lot as well but tended to go with hunting bows, which allow relatively quick and precise shooting while having a larger quiver. The quiver really was the only drawback of the whole bow gameplay, fitting only nine predator arrows we tended to run out very quickly even if we tried to reclaim all the arrows the game would allow us. Once we were out, we rarely went to a vendor if we were exploring in the middle of an area right now, relying on either finding some as loot or our melee weapons.

The gameplay is overall very enjoyable, unlike Odyssey there is not a plethora of healing mechanics, instead the game rewards somewhat traditional assassin playstyles. While Bayek can use his tools and eagle to aid that he can also hold himself in an all-out fight, especially when the blocking mechanic is properly utilized. But the chances of dying are much higher that way especially when faced with more than one enemy at once. Unlike the protagonist of Odyssey who can just stride into a fort and take down the majority of people with a plethora of godlike abilities.

I loved playing both of those styles, but I see the fair point people make when they say that the Assassins style should be OP in Assassins Creed. It’s in the name and all.

However even without shockwaves and healing options, Origins skill tree is impressive.  It has all kinds of cool treats for the player, a good thing in my book because I’m a big fan of unlocking new skills in games.
The tree is split into three distinct parts: hunter, warrior and seeker abilities. Hunter abilities improve Bayeks skill with the bow and allow for such cool things as guided sniper shots, leaving you in control of the arrow even after you fired it. It's also the part of the skill tree where you can improve your assassin abilities, gaining experience for the kills and automatically looting enemies sparing you to check every pile of hay once you’ve cleared an area.
The warrior abilities revolve around melee fighting, for instance allowing to extend your attack combos or to charge enemies with your shield, and if all that didn’t help to pummel them with overpowered attacks.
Seeker abilities are more divers, for one this branch includes the use of tools, allowing Bayek to vanish in a smokescreen and poison his foes, but there’s also a lot of utility here. For instance, the ability to hold the breath longer and thus explore underwater areas more effectively or to buy certain crafting materials from vendors and get generally better prices from them.

It was also interesting to see what changed in comparison with the Odyssey as the later entry. Bayek can send a wave centred on himself that’ll mark loot and secrets like doors or interactable objects. The same skill is in Odyssey, though it must be acquired from the skill tree in that game and upgraded to have wider range. On the other hand, the character in Odyssey automatically earns experience for killing by any kind of means while the experience from assassinations and kills with the overpower attacks have to be bought from Origins skill tree.

The skill tree at the start of the game 

Something I knew from the follow-up game but love nevertheless is that we have an actual eagle companion. Senu is useful for all kinds of scouting and lands on Bayeks arm for some pets when he starts his idle animation. Being a sucker for animal companions I hope this is something the franchise carries forward, maybe with a raven or something similar thematically fitting in the rumored viking installation. 

Additionally to Senu you get a mount, usually a camel or horse...or even a Chocobo?

What I came dearly to miss was my awesome boat from ancient Greek. Origins offers some ship combat, but it felt clunky and old in comparison to the sleek navigation of the Adrestia, and I had a lot of o fun investing tons of resources to level my boat alongside my character. While similar resources have their use in Origins to update overall armour rating and health (not tied to the outfit Bayek wears) and damage output in all aspects (hidden blade, melee and bows) it became an extreme grind towards the end of the game to gather enough for an update. I never went specifically on a long grind for them but tried to gather them on my way to different locations instead. Still having a boat and a crew to put these resources into felt more rewarding to me.

At a certain point it became evident to me that gathering the resources was supposed to be a boring grind, especially since you could buy them via the in-game shop.

This shop is another first in Origins and it had a few interesting effects. For one money was kept very limited to the player, causing you to actually pick and choose what gear you wanted to level or if buying something was worth it. Since I played with my partner and we both liked a different weapon and bow it got annoying, but also surprisingly motivating not to use the shop, but to properly keep track of expenses. We also started to enjoy the grind as a challenge. The main material that is scarce are Carbon crystals, those can be bought from an NPC vendor, but they are beyond expensive which is again a motivation to use the shop. 

The trick here is that technically you never buy resources for real money, you just buy the game money. In the end, the game was properly playable even with an unfinished set of upgradeable stats though so while it left a certain aftertaste it was easy enough to ignore.

I have not yet played the DLC because I got the game as a gift and I also got burned a bit by Odysseys DLC. Until there is a sale I will wait to pick that up, but after reading the description I’m intrigued and hope said sale will come soon.

Playing the series with my partner is a special treat and makes them even more dear to me, but even for the parts I played alone Origins entertained me and sucked me right into ancient Egypt, even if it had a few difficulties to get going.

In the end I came to love Origins. Not as much as I love Odyssey, for a lot of reasons the game has no influence over, but it’s definitely one of my favourite Assassins Creed games. There is a ton of stuff I’m happy was improved in the follow up, and a lot that I will from now on dearly miss in Odyssey (my sweet predator bow). 

For anyone who has not yet picked the game up but loves games in historical settings that feature exploration and some gory combat I would recommend giving the game a go to get a feeling if the new ways of Assassins Creed might be for you.

Continue Reading

About delays and Animal Crossing

About delays and Animal Crossing

Posted by Lana Meeren on February 21, 2020 in Animal Crossing New Horizons, Blood Sweat and Pixels, crunch, Cyberpunk 2077, delays, FF/ Remake, Nintendo, video games, videogame industry,

A new Animal Crossing render and a picture of the sweetest stray cat ever

Around 4 weeks ago I wanted to talk about delays. The FF7 remake and Cyberpunk had just been delayed, being the latest followers of the trend that seemed to go around since the end of last year.

Then my partner informed me that there was a small kitten outside that they frequently saw when out to smoke. It seemed tiny, was shivering and pestered the humans around it. 

So we gave it some tuna since that was the most appropriate cat food we had on hand and discussed if we should catch it. 

The tiny thing had returned multiple days and was clearly a stray. Its eyes were infected and it was very skittish. The nights outside were cold and we live in a region with lots of predators. 

So we caught the kitten, suffering quite a lot of scratches for it, and put in our bathroom. 

So, what now? 

There’s a tiny cat in the bathroom hiding away in the last corner beneath the heater. 

We improvised a litter box and fed it some more tuna and went out early the next morning to buy real cat food. We asked around if someone was missing a tiny cat, and got a friend to drive us to the vet the day after. 

The vet confirmed what we had suspected, we had caught a stray and probably saved her from death by either the hypothermia or starving. The eyes would be okay buy it would take time for them to heal. The kitten was also a lot older than we thought, about six months already, she had just stayed tiny due to the malnutrition.

So we kept the cat. We went and bought lots of supplies. A proper litter box, a scratching post and so on. The next morning we woke up to our bathroom covered in cat excrements and vomit. A visit of the emergency vet later we learned that her tiny stomach was probably overpowered by all the new food and lots of trash that she had been eating days ago. 

She got antibiotics and strictly one food for around a week. It was what he could do to help her, the vet explained, she had to get through the rest herself.

And she did. She recovered and began to grow like a weed once she was able to properly deal with the normality of food.

We still had tons of work left, we had to cat-proof our entire flat. Since we didn’t think we adopt a cat soon we kept stuff around, not considering a juvenile cat exploring.

It took us the better part of a week to get the tiny flat ready and a few more days to let her in new rooms and watch her explore, ready to jump up and clear any hazards that we might have overlooked or not even considered to be such.   

So far it has worked remarkably well. The cat is one piece and most of the furniture too, her worst habit is fighting herself in the mirror.

But between all that worry for the cat and some exams I had to take my time for writing fell short. 

I got to game and read a little since we had to get her used to our everyday activities, but I just didn’t find the time to sit down with anything but learning material for too long. 

When I wanted to write this originally my main topic was going to be game delays. It seems ironic but even more fitting now so I decided to keep it.

There have been plenty of those in the last months, starting with Animal Crossing which announced its delay last year at E3. By now most of the anticipated releases this year have been moved. Some like the Final Fantasy 7 Remake moved only a few weeks, others shifted to the end of the year.

In general, the feedback from fans across the different franchises was usually positive. While people sure are disappointed that they have to wait longer, most people who are into games know about the issues the industry has with crunch. And even if in general not bothered by the gruelling hours' developers have to work for months on end, people still want the best product.

 Sometimes even a few weeks more time can ensure a seriously less buggy game on release and a smaller day one patch as well. But with long delays, people mostly hope to spare the teams the crunch as much as possible.

And I’m sure in many cases, while not alleviating the issue completely it’s at least better. But the reality is the crunch will still take place. Some times for even longer periods than originally planned and in such making it worse. 

Something we were harshly reminded of by the statement issued by Adam Kicinski, the chief executive of CD Projekt Red, who openly talked about it in a call with the investors of the studio.

Now, this is the point where I originally planned to rant about crunch and how despicable I found that statement.

First and foremost because I think the people who dedicate their lives to make my hobby more awesome each year deserve the best working conditions possible and also because I believe a healthy work-life balance is something that literally will save you years of regret and keep your health intact.

Since then, however, I started reading Jason Schreier's “Blood, Sweat and Pixels: The Triumphant, Turbulent Stories Behind How Video Games Are Made”.

And even the first few chapters have already changed my view on the issue.

I still think crunch should be avoided as much as possible. But I can believe a bit more that people are getting so very passionate that they put this work in because they want to create the best game they can. 

The book also made me understand the circumstances under which developments take place better, and sometimes mechanics, story beats or design work just doesn’t work out the way they got planned. A lot of changes then have to take place in a short time span, which leads to crunch again. The problem has so many causes it’s hard to rule them all out.

I think it’s a good thing that the reaction to delays has changed with video game fans, at least in my personal bubble people seem so much more relaxed about it than they were years ago. But I think it’s important that people are still aware that crunch work will be involved in making their new favourite games even if the company takes more time.
Just the awareness will change how people react to the game and how the studio might try to avoid it.

Because I still think the industry should strive to eliminate crunch as much as they can.
The current system has established it as something that’s just necessary to finish video games, be it on schedule or delay. And while it may not always be avoidable, I think the original goal should always be no crunch at all and the least amount possible in cases where that doesn’t work out.

I don’t think that it’s a failure of leadership if crunch happens, but I think it’s one to accept it as given. The videogame industry is younger than most media industries we have grown up with and it has a lot of chances to do things better. Here’s to hoping that with time the industry can find better management and planning options and avoid crunch. I think both fans and developers can only profit off that in the long run.

But onto to happier shores, literally, if you so will.

Isabelle is finally here too! She'll be helping out with the resident services

Yesterday, Nintendo finally offered us a glass of water in the information drought that seems to be going on with them. About 25 glorious minutes of footage from the much-anticipated Animal Crossing game “New Horizons".

It seems the delay of the game seems to be worth every extra day we have to wait for it!

They repeated some of the info we already knew for a good part of the travel ad styled info trailer but also showed quite a bit that hadn’t been shown beforehand.

For instance, we will be able to travel to different mystery islands, being able to collect resources and treasures there. The islands will be chosen at random so there seems to be quite a selection of options.

The return of the Able Sisters (Label going by her original name again!), Nooks Cranny and the museum were also confirmed.
Of those the museum was definitely the one that took my socks off! It looks amazing and I’m already very dedicated to fill it to the brim to experience the full glory.
It’s like a real-world museum where it’d be nice to hang out and not the dusty boring thing it sometimes came across as in older games.

Our islands will offer more customization options than any town before. The path-making feature is just the start, you literally will be able to reshape the landscape and change the course of rivers and tear down cliff-sides.
All while planning exactly how your neighbourhood will look in the end.

The next 28 days will be quite the wait after this treat of a trailer.
I’m going to try and finish the Last of Us during that time. The contrast will probably make Animal Crossing New Horizons seem all the brighter.
My friends are excited to, the fruit trading business is about to get started in serious when we play online.

There will also be new content added to the Nintendo Switch app, like voice and text chat and the ability to scan old designs from New Leaf and Happy Home Designer to add them to the new game. How useful this will turn out remains to be seen. So far I don’t know anyone who’s a big fan of the app since there are simply better alternatives.

I can’t wait for the 20th of March. I will open the game as soon as the clock turns midnight. Hopefully cuddled up with the cat.

Continue Reading

Dice & prejudice - a story about being wrong

Dice & prejudice - a story about being wrong

Posted by Lana Meeren on January 18, 2020 in Critical Role, D&D, Lost Mines of Phandelver, Shadowrun, TTRPGs,

source

So around September of 2018 my partner started listening to a new Podcast whenever there was time.

 At first, I didn’t mind it much, but the continuous laughter drew me in more and more. Long story short I’m now at a point where I wait for the next episode of “that show”, which turned out to be Critical Role, weekly.

I’ve also just set up the next doodle for our D&D group to meet. You could probably say that D&D successfully got its fangs in me by now.

The funny thing about that is that up until I started following Critical Role, I held D&D up as one of those stepstones I wasn’t going to reach. 

I might be a nerd but at least I wasn’t that much a nerd that I played D&D, right?

What a fool I’ve been.

But why? I kept telling myself this aforementioned mantra even when I started playing tabletop RPGs in 2016. 

I might be a nerd, I might play tabletop role-playing games now, but at least I didn't play D&D.

The first game I tried was Shadowrun, a slightly less known franchise for people who aren’t really into role-playing games. Created in the 80’s it shines a dystopian view upon modern times. Big companies took over, wielding the power of independent nations while still only focused on profit. Magic came back as well, causing the birth of elven and dwarven children or causing grown people to outright mutate into orcs and trolls.
It’s a pretty grim fantasy and the characters aren’t painted as heroes. Instead, they are shadowrunners, criminals who work for hire, messing with the plans of a company, extracting or kidnapping key researchers or whatever other crime imaginable in a high-tech and magic world. 

Much like D&D, there's multiple editions and tons of rule and lore books. The game is played by rolling a number of d6 corresponding to the value you have in the skill. Five and six count as successes and 1 as a failure. Like in D&D you have to reach a certain threshold to manage a task.

I was introduced to it by my partner who made friends with someone who wanted to run a game. It was fun for a while and I enjoyed my character, but the GMs style and mine were not really compatible and I stopped going sometime last year after a session I particularly disliked. We’re still friends, just with the acknowledgement that I’m looking for a different style of gaming.

So, if I could dive headfirst into the world of Shadowrun, how did I manage to carry so much prejudice against D&D still? 

There are multiple factors to it I think. For one I didn't know about Shadowrun beforehand, it was a completely new thing I was able to approach much more open-minded. Maybe it was even cool. The second factor is the way D&D tends to be portrayed in the media. It was the very typical picture that the media keeps up, five nerds sitting around a pretty much dictator like acting Dungeon Master in a stingy dark backroom of a game store. An all-male affair with lots of sneering and rules-lawyering and way too seriously taken fantasy world. I never had contact with the game apart from seeing it portrayed like that and let's be honest, it's not an appealing portrait. Especially not if you're a female gamer with a tenacious authority problem. 

And that's where I have to thank the cast of Critical Role as well as my partner. 

Critical Role for showing me that this perception of mine couldn't be more wrong, that D&D is about fun and creativity, about being with your friends and telling stories. Ashley, Marisha and Laura especially for showing me that this was a game that other women enjoyed wholeheartedly, making me more confident about wanting to try it myself.

My partner found a way to make the rules seem less like something I would have to force myself to abide but something useful. Take children playing, one is a bank robber, the other a police officer. It might come to the point where the police officer declares to have shot the robber in the leg but the other kid fiercely declines and an argument ensues. 

At this point in D&D, the rules are there to have an easy way to determine whos right. The police officer shooting has to hit a number equal or higher to the robber's armour class...and also hope that the rogue isn't a monk who's gonna catch the damn projectile.

I still struggle with some rules but I can see the reason in them. Well most of them anyway.

But the understanding and different perspective opened me up to see the game as something else, something new, that might even be really cool to do myself.

So, when I got more into Critical Role, I stumbled upon their intro for Campaign 2. I think that’s what finally did it in the end. I listened to that and wanted to play. Really just desperately wanted to play. I wanted to roll some dice and see what was going to happen. 

A bunch of my friends were also interested in D&D, but most of us had never had a chance to play. And one day one of them jokingly proposed that we should play together online, and the idea took off. 

Later that day I found myself making puppy eyes at my partner, asking them if they didn’t feel like being the DM for a group of batshit crazy people who mostly knew each other from chatting online. They had some experience running one-shots in Shadowrun which was more than the rest of us could say. 

Weirdly enough they agreed. And so, we started making characters and reading the rules.
The next days were a struggle for me deciding if I wanted to play a cleric or a druid. 

In the end, cleric won out. But, what race? I was super into Tieflings and Firbolgs, but I decided against both because I wanted to move away from what I had seen on CR, so I choose the next weirdest race I could find and ended up creating a Tabaxi life domain cleric.
My partner sifted through official adventures and finally picked up something to start us of with.

Now, nearly a year later we’re usually trying to play at least once a week, with the usual breaks as all of us have Uni and jobs going on, and we left the starting adventure, The Lost Mines of Phandelver, way behind. Our characters are Level 5 and we’re very entangled in the homebrew campaign and all the intrigues that our DM has dreamed up for us. We are trying to save the world and every now and then it feels like we do take a step in the right direction.
I’ve grown a lot closer to the friends I’m gaming with and it feels great to chat with them regularly. Also, I managed to develop a terrible dice addiction and am only saved from the same fate regarding minis by the fact that we play online and don’t use them anyway.

Dungeons and Dragons acts as a creative outlet for me as well. It takes the kind of dread I feel for being responsible for a whole story, instead I create parts of the big whole along with the others. There are secrets to discover that we prepare for each other, our characters know each other for a few weeks now and I can’t wait for the big dramatic reveals regarding the backstories we thought of.

All in all, it’s a more social experience and something I’m excited for days ahead. 

I had discovered D&D a while I was still playing Shadowrun and was already drawn in, I think discovering what it felt like to play that, with a DM I had a much more trusting relationship with tore me away from it in the end. I like the rules of D&D a lot more, they are simple yet very effective. They set a clear outline and leave tons of freedom for players and DMs ideas to unfold around. Levelling and skilling is much easier than it is in Shadowrun and the D20 based dice system ensures that you don’t have to be super skilled into a task to have a shot of achieving it.

And to be honest, the world is friendlier, at least generally speaking.
Of course, there is a multitude of settings to play in and D&D can easily turn into a cyberpunk game as well, but the general fantasy settings like the Sword Coast are easier on me. I feel like there’s enough dystopia already happening around me, I don’t need more in my free time.

My past-self, priding herself on not being a D&D nerd could not have been more wrong. But what she perceived as D&D is also not my reality of playing the game. 

It’s not that I don’t respect the world our DM keeps creating for us, despite my authority problem, its quite the opposite, I am very invested in it. But the rules are enforced by someone I trust not to abuse them and someone who accepts criticism and lets us as players question their decisions because it's all of our game in the end. It's very civil and argument free as well. 

We’re also almost all girls, so far away from the typical portrayal of the game that I don't even connect the two. And we're blessed with a DM that knows the rules but lets us be creative and gives a lot of space for the “rule of cool” to make our ideas count. 

And I think that’s the important thing I took from Critical Role, D&D is about having fun with your friends and it’s a lot of different things for different groups, but rarely is it what the popular media has made it look like for years now. It’s creative and free.

By now I’m at a point where I seriously recommend everyone to try the game with some people they like. 

Just around Christmas I introduced my parents to the game and ran them through the same adventure that started it all for me, The Lost Mines of Phandelver. Acting as the DM is another fun dimension of Dungeons and Dragons, although it tends to give me the increased dread feeling of being responsible for larger parts of the story again. That might get better with practice, I will probably find out. 

My mother built a Tiefling ranger and my dad, true to his entire gaming history, build a dwarven cleric. Although my mother was a bit reluctant at first, they both enjoy stories and they both latched onto telling their parts of the story very quickly. We had a great time, with the added benefit that there was no loosing involved, but collaboration, so we all had fun the entire time. It made this Christmas special. 

And that's in general something D&D has given me, a lot of special moments with people I love. I'm very glad to say that I've been wrong and that I'm a total nerd, one who even plays D&D.

Continue Reading

Christmas gaming and what's to come in 2020

Christmas gaming and what's to come in 2020

Posted by Lana Meeren on January 10, 2020 in Concrete Genie, D&D, God of War, Horizon Zero Dawn, Lost Mines of Phandelver, Luigis Mansion 3, Planet Zoo, PlayStation 4, Pokémon Sword and Shield, The Last Guardian, Witcher 3, Witcher Show, Xbox,

A late happy new year to all of you! I sincerely hope you all had a better start to this than I did. 2019 ended with me being sick almost all December long and I started 2020 in the same way.
Some of the time around Christmas I got to use for gaming, but it was less than I had hoped, naps took prevalence in getting healthy. 

I got to start playing Planet Zoo, which is a game I’ve been near religiously watching Let’s Plays and streams of ever since it launched into open Beta. The game is lovely although still flawed and while I definitely will sink some more hours into it before I review it, it was definitely the video game I enjoyed most over the holidays.
Additionally, to that, I played some Luigi’s Mansion 3, which I got as a present for Christmas. I like the game so far but I’m only about an hour or so in, so I don’t feel like I can really say anything about the quality and enjoyment the game brings me.

Never before packed so many nerdy things for a family holiday

Travelling to my family, I brought along some games and lots of dice and a few games. I gifted my mum “God of War” and helped her get into it and lend her “Concrete Genie” because I knew she’d love the art style as well. We wanted to try “The Last Guardian” as well but it seems that might have to wait until next Christmas.
The reason for less video game time was that we also played some Dungeons and Dragons with my family, which was great fun. It was the first TTRPG for my mum and the first time my partner got to experience D&D in a group not being the DM. I ran the group through the “Lost Mines of Phandelver” adventure and it was absolutely great and fun. There’s already plans to continue the adventure on the next family holiday.
Dungeons and Dragons is a relatively new passion in my life, and I plan to blog more about that as well after all the dice is part of the name of the blog. I have a rough draft of how I came to play and love the franchise, and I hope to finish that in the coming days.

As another family activity over the holidays we watched the Witcher show (which is awesome) and it was a lot of fun, I haven’t played 3 yet, but it’s snug on my PlayStation and its time will come. My dad played the first two games and I used to be glued to screen next to him, while I didn’t technically play them myself, I definitely “experienced” them. From what I gather my mum is excited to play at least Witcher3 as well.

One of the good things about being sick in December is that it’s the month of endless “Best XY of the year” videos and, since it was the end of the decade the amount seemingly doubled. So, while I was indeed in bed most of the time I at least wasn’t missing out on entertainment even when I didn’t feel like reading or gaming.

For a while I ruminated if I should do a similarly themed blog post as well, but it proved hard for multiple reasons. The most relevant reason is that I spent most of the 2010s too poor to do lots of gaming. I’m still catching up on the entire life cycle of the PS4 and the only PS3 game I ever got to play was Assassins Creed 3 literally years ago. The only consistent gaming I had access to was DS and later 3DS games for most of the decade. I played some stuff on PC, but my laptop used to be slow as hell. It ran Skyrim though, which was nice. So, my gaming life really took up in the middle of 2018 again when I got a Switch. That kind of proved to be a catalyst for me missing my old hobby a lot and saving up for a PS4 which I bought around Easter last year. It was an awesome purchase which I’m still super happy about, especially since it led to my mum finally finding her way into gaming as well. My parents were kind enough to also provide me with a new Laptop for Christmas (well I paid half but I still couldn’t have made that leap without them) so now the Sims4 starts in 2 minutes, instead of the 26 minutes it used to take. Meaning I have 3 up to date systems to run games on and nothing but real life can stop me.

However, I have lots of great stuff from the last decade still to explore. Making a “games of the decade” list would have felt wrong since I missed so many titles and my selection is so limited. A game of the year would also be difficult because I played a lot of great games last year that released in other years and I loved many of them very much. Horizon Zero Dawn, God of War and Assassins Creed Odyssey would all have competed in the same year and to be very honest I cannot decide which of those I loved more, they were all incredible experiences.

Instead I hope I can give them all the time and effort they deserve in coming blog posts. I will blog about games that are older than a year and a half in a category I plan to dub “late to the party” (or something similar I’m not sold on the title yet).
There are already 3 pages of notes and rambles that I wrote down for Horizon Zero Dawn so I hope I can turn this into a coherent post soon.

One kind of a resolution I made to myself was to clean up my backlog of games, so I can feel less guilty about it. It’s probably as common a resolution with gamers as doing more sports and eating healthier is with all people, nevertheless, I want to try at least. I downloaded some of the games on Steam and I’ll try and only get a new game for every two I finish. Let’s see if I can keep to that.

Meanwhile new stuff will come out, there are several games I’m super excited about this year and I can’t wait for more to be announced. There’s “The Last of us 2” and the new Animal Crossing. My partner is positively bursting with excitement for the first part of the Final Fantasy remake and I can’t wait to play it with them.

Pokémon is also releasing a DLC for the first time in the franchise’s history and I’m very excited how it will turn out. Currently, opinions in forums and other online places are clashing again, but I don’t feel like judging this new thing without seeing it first.
The important part to me is that the DLC is not necessary to get all the newly added Pokémon, although it might be a bit harder to do it by trade.
I have a lot of hopes and feelings about the whole topic, but I think I’ll wait until the Pokémon Home direct is done until I gather them all in a full post, since that service will very much determine my opinion on some things, like Pokémon accessibility and fair pricing.

I probably won’t be able to play all these games on time and right to release, which would be the relevant time to blog about them traffic-wise, but that’s not my goal anyway. This blog is supposed to be a fun side project for me to write about my favourite hobby. I’m also trying to finish university right and now and am working on the side to keep eating, so my gaming time is naturally limited. My goal is to blog weekly, I’ll do my best to uphold that.
I know I’ll probably get Animal Crossing on release and might play the Pokémon DLC pretty soon after release. My partner probably also wants Final Fantasy early so those games will hopefully get their blog posts in a not too long after.

With all that said, I think 2020 will turn out to be an awesome year for gaming. There are a few very big releases coming our way and the year will end with a bang when the new PlayStation 5 and Xbox release for the holidays. One thing is for sure, I won’t run out of things to blog about.

Continue Reading

Concrete Genie

Concrete Genie

Posted by Lana Meeren on December 17, 2019 in bullying, child-friendly, Concrete Genie, Pixelopus, PlayStation, PlayStation 4, review, video games,

Black Friday sales are a serious temptation, especially when it comes to new games.  Thankfully my bank account reminded me sternly this time that buying new games for my pile of shame was not an option.
So, I set myself the limit of buying one game, and it couldn’t be more than 20€. I ended up buying two, but since one is the Christmas present it doesn’t quite count.

The other was Concrete Genie which conveniently was 19.99€. So, I argued internally for a moment and then the game magically manifested in my amazon cart. As such things sometimes tend to do.

There hadn’t been that much press around it, at least not in my media bubble. But I had spotted the game here and there previous to its release on October 8^th.
It’s a third-person action-adventure made by Pixelopus, one of Sony’s studios, so naturally it released exclusively for the PlayStation.

The game deals with the theme of bullying as well as shining a light on environmental issues and reclaiming a place that feels like home.

The incredible art style of the game was what made me consider getting it originally, I saw the drawings and I liked them quite a lot. I wasn’t immediately sure if the game was for me though, I’m everything but talented with any kind of drawing equipment.
Hell, I’m relieved if I can read my own handwriting two days after the fact.
It turns out I did not have to worry about that a lot.

The game offers a selection of designs, so instead of drawing everything yourself you pick and choose the different designs. This does not make the game lack in creativity since the option of placement, combination and even size and orientation of the drawings stays with the player, it’s unlikely that two people will create the same. It also made me feel able to accomplish some beautiful designs even though I lack the artistic talent to draw myself.

The controls are gently taught in the intro, our hero Ash is sitting on the docks of his former hometown Denska. The once vibrant fishing town has been plagued by a strange darkness that forced almost all the residents to leave. Ash and his parents among them, but he still returns here, obviously missing his home as it once was.

He’s idly doodling in his sketchbook before he gets disturbed by a local gang of bullies. They tear his beloved sketchbook apart and wrangle him into the cable cart to the lighthouse.

Little do they know that up in the lighthouse a breeze has brought along one of Ash’s drawings. Luna Ash’s first self-proclaimed masterpiece comes to life and gifts our hero a magical brush, asking him to paint Denska back to life and defy the darkness that claimed it.

While fulfilling this task Ash collects the pages of his sketchbook which the wind blew all through Denska, continually making more painting options available. He’s also able to bring along helpers, the genies, old childhood drawings he left all over town. Each time a genie is brought to life the player can decide what shape it’ll take.

This was one of my favourite parts of the game, the genies are really versatile, with new body shapes, horns, head shapes and accessories for them being among the pages Ash collects. They can be small, or tall, walk on two legs or four. The body shapes range from plant-like to fuzzy animal-like.
It’s a joy to design each new companion. Especially after just gathering up some new parts to design them with. They became dear to me quite fast, sometimes even saddening me when I left an area and they couldn’t follow. The genies have their own special kinds of magic, opening up previously blocked ways to Ash.

Still, every corner that is rounded bears the danger of the bullies waiting behind it, ready to throw Ash into a dumpster.
Now here is where the game really connects. As someone who has been bullied throughout their school years, I didn’t’ think of it much at first, but seeing Ash slouch more and moving more careful as soon as the voices become audible felt very, very real. I remember this feeling all too well. And while the things I’ve been bullied about were very different the violence seemed just as senseless.
There is no combat in this part of the game. The most Ash can accomplish is to push away and run if he has been caught by the group. Most vividly, all of the colourful paintings and sweet genies turn into white, unmoving paint as soon as the bullies draw near. Ash’s creativity and magic being muted by the presence of his violators.

As far as any visualization of bullying can be beautiful, I think this one is. In all of the game this is the strongest picture, showing the player how bullying affects a person to the core.

Drawing might be one of Ash’s escape mechanisms but even that is taken from him in these moments.
And so the only thing you can do is hide, clamber to the rooftops and sneak around those teenagers and lure them away with baiting calls if you need to get your genies past them. 

Yet they are not just portrayed as mindless villains and there are ways to see into their pasts and what let those kids behave the way they do.

I see what the game went for with this, it opens the players understanding and asks them to empathize with these teenagers. It keeps its villains human because they are.

Still, I will say, there will always be bullies who let of steam and frustration from what they experience at home, but even the most well-adjusted kids can bully if they lack the key empathy or enjoy cruelty. There will also always be kids who deal with the emotional turmoil life throws at them without lashing out at others. An unfortunate upbringing is not a reason nor an excuse to turn on others.  As a child of parents who split, and not in a friendly manner either, I feel a certain level of insult whenever this is used as an excuse for bullying others.
I know that is not the story the game wants to tell, the story most media wants to tell, but not every victim of this kind of abuse has to be forgiving in the end, sometimes it is just enough to leave it behind.

Ash leaves his colourful painting all over the city. The painting main mechanic is controlled either by motion control or with the right joystick. I tried myself with the motion control in the introduction and as soon as I was able, I switched to the joystick control which did not demand me trying weird movements while sitting in the bed.
I love the idea of controlling my paintings with movement, it works wonderfully in such games as Okami HD on the Switch, but the Switch offers a touchscreen to directly translate my movement and I don’t have to aimlessly wave the controller in the air, constantly resetting it to accomplish anything.
Since the controls work just fine with the joystick the game isn’t hindered much through this. I’m also strongly suspecting the motion controls might tie in a lot better if the game is played in VR. I do not own any kind of VR equipment to try this though.

Something else that takes Concrete Genie a step further from your normal game is the glaring absence of a combat system in most of the game. There is one later in the game, but even here the goal is not to deal a lethal strike to your foe. As soon as this part of the game is done, the combat UI vanishes, and the moves are no longer accessible. 

Violence is the most common language in video games and whenever a game manages to do without it, even if it's just mostly, it feels very refreshing.
To me, it shows that the creators put a lot of thought into the mechanics of the game and how they want conflicts to be resolved in the long run. A big shoutout to Pixelopus here, for building their game in such a peaceful way.
I’m very excited about what they’ll come up with in the future.

Through this it’s a game you can put into younger children’s hands without a second thought, it’s not scary, not violent and not too hard. It might actually be a nice experience to play along as a first game for a younger child.

The game is a sweet experience, but it isn’t too long, my playthrough took five hours for the main story. It came up to six and a half after I invested some time to explore the postgame. That mainly consists of completing trophies and finding all the remaining sketchbook pages. Personally, I don’t mind that, but I know a lot of players out there value the time they can put into a game a lot.
It comes at around 25€ to 28€, which is about half the standard price of new games releasing nowadays and it feels more than fair at that. 

I’d heartily recommend it as a feel-good game for a rainy weekend or over the upcoming holidays if you find yourself enjoying the art style.

Continue Reading

Pokémon Sword &Shield and the fumbled promotion of a great series entry

Pokémon Sword &Shield and the fumbled promotion of a great series entry

Posted by Lana Meeren on December 10, 2019 in Nintendo, Nintendo Switch, Pokémon, Pokémon Sword and Shield, review, video games,

I have played Pokémon ever since I can remember really. If there is any staple of what got me into gaming, what kept me there and made me return after small fallouts with the hobby the credit definitively goes to this one series of games.

So, what better thing to start a new blog about gaming off than a review of the newest instalments that released about a month ago?

The most important choice in the game! Source

Pokémon Sword and Shield had a rough time leading up to their release for sure. Ever since Junichi Masuda sheepishly announced that they would not in fact feature all the Pokémon a very vocal part of the fanbase was ready to burn them at the stakes.

Every little imperfection was from then on noted and put on display.

I’m not going to lie; I am one of the people who personally is super disappointed by the decision to cut the Pokedex (basically in half as we now know). I grow ridiculously attached to my Pokémon and so far, I transferred at least my main playthrough teams to all the newest games, so I feel pretty disappointed that I’m now supposed to blindly entrust them to a yet unreleased service in the future. Even with that though, the worst part up to release was the constant rumours which clearly had the malicious intent to turn people away from buying. Those made it into my not so carefully moderated social media bubbles and they actually made me really sad or sometimes even angry. At the people who spread them and at the company for constantly hiding behind vague statements.

So not only was my usual interest and anticipation marred by the fact that I already expected I would be unable to bring along my favourite Pokémon but also by the constant negativity I encountered whenever I went online. 

And picking the games up actually felt different. I was still stupidly excited, and the GameStop employee still tried to sell me a ton of stuff I will never need, but there was this little grain of doubt. Would I for the first time in my life regret buying a Pokémon game?

I did not regret it.

By now I have already spent way too much time with the games, around 100 hours to be precise as of the time I’m writing this. The new games are not perfect in any way, but they are also not deserving of the hate they got. In fact, I must chime into a long list of people who proclaimed them to be the most fun they had with the series in years.

I started my journey with the Sword version and all most of my prejudices were thrown out of the window by the time I faced the first gym leader. The graphics are gorgeous for the most part and right out of the gate there is a lot of new Pokémon to discover and catch. The routes are short and don’t offer many opportunities to explore, something that has been criticized by fans ever since the games got the 3D graphics overhaul with X&Y. They are still beautiful and every single one clearly features a theme and a carefully selected cast of Pokémon on them. Sadly, they fade into the background once the game has been cleared as there is little to no reason to revisit them, except for the rare case that a Pokémon cannot also be caught in the Wild Area.

My final team I beat Pokémon Sword with

The game allows to skip tutorials as well. which is an option the Pokémon games lacked for so long I never actually expected to see it.
There’s unprecedented freedom in just being dropped off at the Wild Area in the beginning of the game. Yes, you get told where to go to next, but in comparison to Sun and Moon where I could not walk for a minute on Melemele island without being stopped and forced into a cutscene, the Wild Area was a revelation.
It took me a few hours to return from my deep dive and continue on to the gym challenge. By that point, it actually felt like I went on a long camping trip with my newly caught partners. The actual threat of high-level Pokémon is refreshing as well. It adds to the narrative that it is dangerous to leave the house without Pokémon at your side.

That said the open world-esque part of the game is not flawless, the infamous trees that were so heavily criticized as lazy design work are found here and generally the game drops the gorgeous look it usually captivates its players with. All of this is probably done so the game runs as smooth as possible even if connected online, but in the end, the frame rate is still dropping left and right as soon as the functionality is activated through the new Y-Comm.

Ballonlea is by far my favourite town and really showcases how gorgeous the game looks. Source

The Y-Comm replaces the Festival Plaza and the PSS from previous games and must be one of the worst systems Sword and Shield presents. While you can see what your friends are doing by so-called stamps, there is no way to just click a friends avatar and start trading. Instead, you must enter a four-digit code and start searching for trades, hoping that you will pair up with the right person. In trying to trade with my friends we had to restart multiple times after we got paired up with random people who just happened to be using the same number. You also only see the name of your trade partner if you hover on the name of a box or a free box space in the PC making extra navigation necessary to confirm the trading partner.
All the other functionalities you might want to use exclusively with a friend work with the same system. After a certain time, it becomes quite tiring to enter the same four-digit code, again and again, to access or set up raids, trades or battles.
The game even obviously knows which players I have on my friends list as it shows a special symbol next to them, just the option to invite-only them is glaringly absent.

The next big new thing in the games is obviously Dynamaxing and the Max Raid Battles. Both of which you gain access to as soon as entering the Wild Area for the first time.
The Dyna-/Gigantamax option is the new battle gimmick introduced in the games. Other than Z-Moves and Mega evolution it is not available in every battle, only so-called power spots offer the ability to have your Pokémon take on enormous sizes. The gyms are built on such power spots for example and the raid dens in the Wild Area seem to be as well. The restriction in its usage actually made Dynamaxing feels special and exciting. It’s not a constant bother but rather a treat that the player gets to enjoy on special occasions. Even more special and rare is the opportunity to Gigantamax Pokémon, while the feature works everywhere where you can Dynamax it requires special Pokémon to function. This is a very two-sided mechanic. On one hand, it’s sad that the Pokémon you’ve been training all game will just never be able to achieve this form simply because they aren’t “special” enough. On the other hand, it is a lot of fun to hunt for the elusive Gigantamax forms in raids. I would have highly welcomed a mechanic that offered me to award some of my long-standing teammates with this ability, even if it were limited to the postgame and hidden behind a limited item. Especially since Game Freak kept making a point about how they want the Pokémon you travel with feel special when they explained how certain mechanics allow to change a Pokémons nature in a way.

Finally finding and beating a special Gigantamax form is pretty cool. And while setting up a raid with some friends still has its hiccups, as they sometimes just don’t seem to appear for the other person (meaning you must back out and enter the code anew) it is also immensely fun. The raid battles differ in how strong the opponents are by a star system and offer lots of items and a chance to catch the Pokémon in reward for winning them.  Raids can also be taken on alone, the player is then given a team of three NPCs and their Pokémon, the same pool of NPCs also fill raids that have two to three real participants so a raiding party will always feature four trainers.
While I love the mechanic of raids I can see how they can become very frustrating for players who lack a Nintendo Online subscription (which is needed to access these multiplayer features apart from local play).
Some of the raids are quite challenging and an NPCs bringing a Magikarp or even just a Pokémon with a type disadvantage can ruin that entire run very easily. It’s easy to be cynic and see this as the way people are incentivized to opt into buying the subscription after all, especially since trying to access some features apparently lead to an e-shop site where it can be directly purchased. I haven’t seen any of this myself since I own the subscription already and it’s nothing other games haven’t already shoved in our faces but with Game Freaks continuous marketing focused on kids it leaves a slightly bitter aftertaste.

Raids are shown in the overworld as giant beams of purple light

When I finally emerged after exploring the Wild Area one of my biggest concerns was that I had over levelled my Pokémon so much that I would actually need to skip trainer battles as best as possible if I did not want to one-shot every opponent in the first gym. Thankfully the game allows access to the PCs boxes on the go, so instead, I began swapping my team out frequently, filling the Pokedex along the way. The level curve is also rather nicely done and seems to account for players exploring and catching a lot. Since the new games do not allow the shared experience system to be turned off this implementation was extremely necessary but something players feared in advance would be missing.

A hard-learned truth of the Pokémon series is that once you have learned your type advantages the game is pretty easy to beat even if the Pokémon is slightly under levelled. The days where I mindlessly used my Swampert for just everything are done for me and of course, it’s become a lot easier since then to beat my rivals Sceptile.
 So personally I don’t mind the game showing me the effectiveness of moves. I know them anyway. It’s a very beginner-friendly feature that similarly to the experience share would be just a touch better if players could opt not to use it.
A difficulty setting from which the players can choose could have benefitted Sword and Shield greatly. Even if just operated by adjusting levels of opposing Pokémon and limit the ever-present healing by basically every special NPC you come by. This setting would have added the challenge that some players crave and try to create with custom rules. After the post-game, it would no longer have any real significance and thus players of both difficulties could play together without a problem.

This is just one of the what feels like 1000 curries in the game

The often-criticized constant healing is another feature that will probably only bother players who want the games to be more of a challenge, healing is a free commodity anyway. I am always slightly relieved when my team with nearly no moves left gets refreshed ahead of battle.
To treat your Pokémon’s injuries and taste buds on the go you can set up camp and quickly cook a curry with them. The mini-game is mostly button mashing but gets more fun if other players who must work in unison. Generally, this the camp is easily identified as the new gimmick that will probably be removed come whatever the next generation of Pokémon might be. It’s still fun and useful but nothing to get too attached to.

The biggest point in buying a new Pokémon game for me is usually the new featured critters. There were certainly less than I had hoped for, just around 80, probably driven by the fear of the ever-closer looming #1000.

I get why that number is intimidating and instead of investing in completely new designs we get more of the same in a new coat. I like the regional forms, it’s a nice idea to give overlooked or proven Pokémon a chance to shine in a different light. However, they don’t carry the game for me. That is what the new Pokémon need to do. For the biggest part, the selection of new Pokémon that is offered in the games is amazing. There is a lot of them that have a true potential to become new favourites of players new and old. Some designs might not work for some people (I never evolved my Sobble) but I think that has always been the case and as usual, we’ll see people starting to love the newcomers within a few months. I will just keep hoping that we might at some point get a Pokedex featuring more than just 80 new Pokémon. Maybe once the big bad 1000 is broken Game Freak won’t care so much anymore or maybe I will need to adjust to the fact that there will only be a few new critter lines added in upcoming games.

My Sobble never evovlved and likes to take naps after eating curry

The story of the game took me about 35 hours to complete, though my tendency to talk to everyone and catch every Pokémon on every route surely played into this. The narrative itself is not the games strongest point as it is largely just the very same, we played over 20 years ago. Some of the cast, however, bring a refreshing charm with them as we get to see glimpses of their journeys and struggles along the way. It’s charming but also made me realize that this game offers you one of the blandest Mary Sue plotlines in the series history. You show up and get a Pokémon and from then on you are the young prodigy trainer and everything kind of works out for you without too much of a hassle. Not only that but of course you are also the one enlightening everyone around you, including people who should definitely be more studied and knowledgeable.

This being a Pokémon game my expectations for the story weren’t sky-high, so I was not that bothered. However, I still long for a return of the narrative design that the Black and White collection offered. Hopefully Game Freak will strike a bolder note in a future instalment.

Other than the story the music really grabbed me. I think it might have influenced a lot of my feelings about certain story parts, especially the fights in the gyms and the league.
A peculiar choice was to hide the audio settings behind random NPC that technically you never have to talk to. Now audio settings in itself are a new feature for Pokémon games but for accessibility reasons alone they should be available from the start.

Sword and Shield did not revolutionize the Pokémon series as this first main series entry on the Switch. They are great Pokémon games but having seen what the creators of Zelda and Mario did with their debuts on the platform they leave this lingering feeling of how much more potential there could have been explored. Especially after these games were praised to be for the long time series fans back when Let’s Go came out. All that talk vanished quietly earlier in the year and ever since the games set sail in the seemingly never enduing pre-release shitstorm caused by the cut of Pokémon and other issues, the Pokémon Company and Game Freak seemed wise enough not to bring it up again.
Personally, I enjoyed less information about the games ahead of time instead of being completely spoiled but much of the other communication was and is lacking.
While I can see the logical necessity to cut the amount of Pokémon in an instalment it would be desirable to be offered clear information right away. Not only to offer reassurance but also to take the ground that might otherwise be claimed by people spreading negativity and hatred. Honest communication is one of the most powerful tools companies like these have at their disposal, yet they refused to use it for the benefit of their fans and themselves.
Pokémon will always sell well, or like in this case exceptionally well, but it would be sad to see those who’ve supported it for the 20 years of its existence being driven away by poorly handled PR. There is be a middle ground between revealing everything and staying completely silent and Game Freak and Nintendo should try to find it to assure long-time fans feel seen and valued.

In the end I love these new games and I will put many more hours into them. But I will also, remember the bad feelings that the whole release cycle made me go through which leaves a certain mark. And while I probably won’t remember much of the story for a long time, but I will remember setting up raid evenings with my friends and playing together with them I hope Sword and Shield will be used as a steppingstone that improves on the potential the Switch as a system and Pokémon as a series still have.

Continue Reading