Kamiko

I can't really put my finger on it, but it looks familiar

As being a fan of the Fairune series on the 3DS for its short adventure/puzzle gameplay I couldn't resist picking this up for the Switch as it is made by the same developers. And for a short puzzle/adventure it satisfied me enough. You choose one of three possible characters that differs in ways of attack. The blue one in the picture uses a sword, a green one uses a bow and another one uses some hybrid weapon. The differences in weapons create different game styles as the blue one you must attack constantly and keep up combos while avoiding getting your swings caught on a wall. You go around solving some easier puzzles, where the most trouble is actually carry some "keys" while avoiding taking damage and dropping the "key"and have to restart the procedure. And it pretty much looks the same as Fairune, both enemies and settings are pretty much recycled. Gotta say Fairune is more in my taste, but that is also because this game emphasis repeating the game over and over again to get a better score and I might do it for a while, but I'm more for a story and even if it wasn't much of it in Fairune it was way more than this. Doesn't help that compared to Fairune's integrated whole world, Kamiko is built up by stages. The music is good, but I rather started expect if from these people. Maybe would get more out of it if I hadn't so many other games to play.

Dragon Quest VIII: Journey of the Cursed King 3DS

It's finally here!

I already gone through what I thought of the story back in 2012 when I played the PS2 original. Reading through the cliff notes I wrote back then I still feel the same 5 years later. The story is cliched, but it is so well executed. Without problem I spent upwards 100 hours on this game... again. I even enjoyed the grinding for tokens, gold and exp which are the time sinks, but I found the improvements in this game made it even more fun. A difference from the original is that you actually sees the monster on the maps and therefor really can make the grinds more effective. Hunting gold? Travel to Neos and run after the gold golems and don't bother with any other monster. Exp? First grinding spot is the ruined abbey for metal slimes, than Trodain Castle for Liquid Metal Slimes and lastly Dragon Graveyard for the Metal King Slimes. The tokens is still a grind of save when winning, reset when losing, but it felt faster... maybe due to them allowing one to speed up that segment. No joke, I grinded my character so high that they went above level 80 before beating the final boss for the first time, then rolling over the extra bosses I didn't stand a chance against back in 2012 so I even got the special ending.

Everones here... even those who weren't in the original

So what's new beside non-random encounters? Well, as the picture show you got 2 "new" characters, the lady smuggler Red who is an old friend of Yangus and Morrie, the owner of the MONSTROUS PIT... I mean Monster Arena. And it's not until you get them that I realised they gotta have made new voiced dialogue since I couldn't tell until then since I thought it was the same voice cast which is true, except for Jessica and I can't hear that unless I play the clips side by side. There is certain changes in the story as well. One I noticed on my own which is the cutscene where David is forced by his master to eat dog-food. They cut that and instead makes the dog intimidate him. The other I couldn't recall and found when researching on the differences and that is Marcello stabbing himself when the staff of Trodain tried to possess him. In this version he uses magic as the final act. Then they added things like a short scene with Medea meeting the main character and Dhoulmagus killing master Rhylus and an extra dungeon where you fight a boss battle with... Othello as it says on the screen. I actually have problem seeing what's new and whats old. They also made it possible to marry Jessica at the end, I don't know how and I feel that the story is so nice toward the main pairing I have a hard time changing that. Although Jessica is the better looking one, and as King Clavius says, she got the Va-Va-Voom.

I really gotta get Dragon Quest Heroes

I know some people complained on the small censuring on certain costumes and so, but I stumbled upon mentioning that it could be due to changes in what the rating allowed if it's gonna keep the same as last time. I don't really care about it. Other changes was a change in colours as it's more brighter and not as detailed, but it doesn't look as washed out in the screenshots I've watched. Then we have the alchemy recipes. Someone else mentioned what I suspected, they changed what the recipes are. The original did force you to guess certain ingredients based on a little in hint while here it states every single ingredient. I don't know if I like it or not. Overall it's still the best Dragon Quest game and playing it again I couldn't stop and the further I played the more I couldn't stop thinking about it. This might be one of those games I just have to play again and again due to being one of the easiest to grasp as well as the most player friendly. Really, knowing which skills is necessary after 2 playthroughs made it much easier when grinding. For example spears trumps swords even though sword usually are the hero's weapon (due to have a critical hit attack that you really need against metal king slimes so maybe it would be a good low-level run to not use spears, but swords?).

I can't stop loving the accent!

What isn't that great? First of the camera controls doesn't work that well. It's probably due to the New 3DS plastic pin feeling rather wonky. Then there was some glitches like liquid slimes clipping through the floor at one part of Trodain Castle. Also, even when I can see how many skill points unlock which ability, there's no description showing why "Zoom" is a must for a newcomer, being the series teleport spell. Also, the voice acting of Angelo still grates on me when he almost whispers his line, but when he actually puts emotion behind his words I can feel it. I also think I become more used to it since it's the same voice as Alvis from Xenoblade Chronicles. I think I heard Dixons voice character as well. Also two points in the story really confused me over the direction I was supposed to go. One was the Pirate cave which I knew I was supposed to find and it gave me a memory from when I played the game the first time. They never tell you there's a cave there? Or is Red supposed to tell you since she ends up there as well? But why would I go look for Red? Then it was hunting down the flying Leopold. I didn't recall anywhere where to find the dark leaf to find him? I wondered around the Lord High Priest place for a while until I remember that I picked it up by accident since I don't think anyone actually told you about it and the only reason I ended up there was gaining the power of flight and being able to go to this isolated town. Mostly nitpicks and still an enjoyable game. So lets see what I have in my backlog... boy, still a lot of RPG:s to go. Better get grinding.

I Am Setsuna

More like "I am Yuna"

So I picked this up at launch for Switch since it was an RPG and I'm a sucker for these... and it's published by SquareEnix, how can I not try it out? And after playing it and reading up on things around it I just felt empty. People compared it to Chrono Trigger and I've already written down what I thought about that game... twice! I can see it, but at the same time I actually don't see it. It's an JRPG, you can walk around with your characters on the screen like Chrono and it has a time travel plot... but  in reality this is a reworking of different Final Fantasy-plots in a different setting. Don't believe me? The girl Setsuna in the title is a sacrifice that you were sent out to assassinate but ended up protecting to the end. You know, like Yuna from Final Fantasy X, but there it was a twist in the story. Here it's told from the start. Oh yeah, you play as Endir, a member of a clan of mercenaries. And for some reason I would like to say Cecil from Final Fantasy IV in his dark knight phase. But with Squall's behaviour. And I can get behind that I'm escorting someone I'm supposed to kill, but the game doesn't tell a great character story to really show it. First of they give you the possibility to choose certain actions, the problem is that they are either morale high ground or low ground. And the answers doesn't actually effect anything. So I tried answer like a tough mercenary in the beginning and thought that the story would make it so Endir would change his way by actions of the others around him or he himself had to do, especially concerning Setsuna which is what I assumed the name of the game showed. But I switched pretty much to goody-two-shoes since the alternative answer was just dark.

It might just be me, but I think he even looks like Cecil

So as per usual you collect several characters during this journey to the Last Lands in order to sacrifice Setsuna. First of is the magician Aetema who serves as Setsuna's bodyguard. Nidr who is pretty much Auron from Final Fantasy X, I mean, a former bodyguard of a sacrifice and the scars over the eyes, and he looks like a ronin/samurai. Kir, some half-human/half-beast magical wonder child which let me think of Eiko from Final Fantasy IX. Julienne, a dragoon princess that gets possessed all the time, like Kain from Final Fantasy IV. Oh and then there is the "hidden" character that admittedly feels more like Chrono Trigger and that is the Reaper character you fought at several points and can join you and uses a scythe. So he's Magus basically. So that's your cast. There is certain interesting facts about them, but as usual it only is given one quest or town and we never learn anything new about the characters.

I gotta say, I really like the artwork

So you have the sacrificial journey that is as stock as ever, the only interesting bit is that Nidr is actually Setsuna's father and the sacrifice he failed to protect was Setsuna's aunt that caused her mother to be the next sacrifice. We never go anywhere with this after resolving Nidr's remorse with a boss battle. Kir is trying to be like his brother by unlocking his magical ability that will shorten his life, but prefers that to go out like a shining flame trying to solve this. His brother that he also wanted to find actually did the same choice, but died before the journey and Kir tried to find him and that would be a nice side-quest... if it wasn't resolved in the town we picked up Kir as we left it. Julienne pretty much the same problem as she is possessed by monster blood, but that is pretty much the next story segment to continue the game. And the reaper kid joins at the end have some things going for him. He is controlled by his master that created him and have a psychic link with him, but he has no emotions since he is a clone. Like Aetema that is a clone of the Time Judge that guards over the great evil sealed away and uses the sacrifices as a power boost to keep the evil at bay. Time Judge is basically Yunalesca, but actually realises that the downward spiral needs to break and reveals the last twist of the game, Setsuna have arrived several times before, but made the choice to sacrifice herself instead of fighting the evil. But each time the seal breaks and the world is doomed so the Time Judge winds back time 10 years to see if Setsuna choose differently. So she is pretty much insane. But small things changes each time and this time is Endir who never shown up before. And Endir was contracted by Cornelius that is Julienne's second in command while she was influenced by monster blood which gives the great evil power over them? I think. Anyway, yadda-yadda, you confront the evil and the truth is that he is an experiment by the destroyed kingdom to regain their magical abilities, but the power went out of control so they confined him and he grew resentful. You beat him and he flees back in time, Endir and Setsuna are the only ones that can follow him through the save ring which in-game is explained as the memories of the former journeys (neat idea, but fails on the premise that Endir only appeared once). They end back at the beginning of the game and confront a more human-like shadow kid. I think one-hit kills him, but I thought it would be like the paladin battle of Final Fantasy IV, just wait and take pity on him. Instead I have to kill him and his soul enters Setsuna that now ask you to kill her, like the first time you met. Why? I don't know, is she afraid she wouldn't be able to sooth his anger? So I agree, the camera pans up, she says thank you and credits roll. Post-credits Endir walks past a lone tree and disappears and Setsuna appears from nowhere, which is the cover of the game.

See, the game is already spoiled for you.

Gameplay wise the game have certain interesting things going for it. It have Active Time Battle like Chrono Trigger and Final Fantasy IV and here is some more Chrono Trigger comparisons like the different attacks were the enemies and players are roaming the screen and depending on when and how you attack you can inflict damage on surround enemies or bonuses on players. You equip which abilities or bonus your characters have which you need to synthesis from materials you get from defeating enemies and compared to every other RPG you don't need to pray to the RNG gods, not all the time at least. Defeating enemies certain ways seems to guarantee a certain drop. Use fire or ice attacks, de-buffed or get "exact" kills or overkills. And everything is recorded in a bestiary. Sadly it feels like there is to few different enemies. I think there's like 4-5 different versions of each monster and that is like 10 of them? And the dungeon settings are repeated at least once. Aka 2 mountains to climb, two high-tech dungeons, two ice-caves and so on. All in all a bit short. I think it misses a quarter of the game, defeating the Dark Samara and sending him back in time should unlock the world so you can travel back and get the necessary powers to open the time travel which should be a dungeon where you fight a manifestation of time that sends Endir and Setsuna to  the end of the game. The dungeon should explore the different versions of Setsuna's journey to see the differences and the impact you as Endir have made. But maybe I couldn't have taken the extra dungeon, especially when the second monster of the game is a self-exploding seal that must explode upon defeat giving me Earthbound flashbacks and don't get me started on the meteo throwing T-rexes at the end. Really, the deja vu moments should have been from the start where fatal outcomes in confrontations should have been avoided. Like that Nicolas Cage movie which I never seen beside the trailers. Or the answers you gave continually evolved the way to either good or non-caring. The music is at least good!

Metal Slug: or how to get multiplayer on the Switch

Action Hero: The Game

As mentioned in my Switch overview I pretty much got Metal Slug as quickly I could when it entered the e-shop. I already mentioned I played it before, baked together with the other 4 I played on my Wii Virtual Console. But maybe I should go through them one by one to what I see as the progressions in story and gameplay? Well, what better way than start from the beginning.

First stage and the blood just flows

So after reading up on the backstory which isn't in the game at as all as far as I can say (if it isn't is in some wait for the intro at the start) it basically is that a general Morden have staged coups of all the worlds governments and plans to get hold of the Metal Slug, the only ones standing in his way is the Peregrin Falcon Strike Force and it's to officers Cpt. Marco Rossi and Lt. Tarma Roving. Would have been fun with some flavour text on why I am where I am at the start of each level. I get the final level since it's basically storming the generals base, but the others. Why am I in some swamp like jungle at the first stage followed by a town, snowy mountain and so on? That would have been more fun to know, like in Steel Empire where each mission explained why it was important to destroy the boss or liberate the area or just pass through it in the players goal to stop Saurlon. Here I just continues until the end credits which is rather boring.

What isn't boring is running and gunning killing each and every enemy as you avoid the bulletstorms around you. Living through to the end on one life is pretty much impossible... lucky I can heighten my extra lives to 99 as well as continues. Now, playing the game a bunch I can actually manage pretty well. The Wii Virtual Console didn't have this amount of lives and I actually got through without starting over. Not so in the beginning where every life and continue was used to go though take after stage. At the moment I haven't figured out if that's even possible on the Switch version.

So being one of the few multiplayer games at the moment for the Switch (that I own) I tried to play co-op with my sister and I did what I thought I was supposed to do. I split the controller and then attached the wrist-strap extension and then tried to play. Didn't react. So we sit there for a couple of minutes until I look it up on the net since there is no instructions. And basically I constantly have to pair the controllers going between multi- and single-player by entering the controller option on the home screen (except on Shovel Knight which I bought for the 3ed time were at the start screen just push (-) to get the option). I get why, but for some reason I thought I just needed to separate them and that would be it. Cause if there is one problem I feel I gave with this whole console generation is that there is no manuals at all. Zelda have none (if you don't count the mini guide you could get with the Nintendo reward program), Metal Slug have none, at the moment no game have a manual. I miss looking through manuals with artwork and trying to piece together what might happen in the game and which people I might meet. I miss the old days in that regard.

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild

Breathtaking

As mentioned in the Switch post from last week I pretty much have only played Zelda on it from day 1 and one month later and around 100 hours put in I finished the game. A bit of difference from Skyward Sword I could play for 2 weeks from start to finish... twice and on hard mode as well. Doesn't help that my brother-in-law sends me questions on the game as he had some parental leave taking care of their new born child while I sat at a work meeting. Working sucks in that regard, but at least it pays for all these games. So story is Link awakes in a chamber of resurrection after 100 years sleeping recovering from the wounds in a confrontation with Ganon. Zelda put him there after the battle and ended up confining Ganon until his return. But as usual something gotta have gone wrong since I don't think the legendary hero tried to fight Ganon with 3 heart and no clothes... and amnesia. Great, you know what that means? Running around Hyrule to gather weapons, armours, memories and spirits orbs from shrines to power up either heart or stamina. And I gotta say, this is a really enjoyable game. After the starting area you have bombs, magnet power, stasis power and freezing powers which you can manipulate your surrounding (there is a camera power later on, but it isn't necessary for the core experience of the game). And those are what can be called the only left-overs of the Zelda formula of items to clear puzzles. After getting those you get a paraglider and can leave the area and the rest of the world is open to you.

See this? This is the starting area...

... and this is the whole world

There are certain quest markers you can follow to get the core story so to speak, but my method was finding shrines and towers first. Both act as fast-travel points, but as mentioned the shrines contains puzzles, battles or just gives you a spirit orbs to power up Link or even find interesting equipments or weapons in chests. The tower unlocks map portions and are great survey points to see if you can find shrines or other interesting things. Then climbing to the top of every hill and peak since they often contains korok seeds, an item you can exchange for more inventory space regarding melee weapons, bows and shields. And there is 900 of them and as of the end of the game I had found 306... 1/3. I will probably not get them all. I got the 120 shrines though, but when I reached 111 I pretty much gave up and looked through a guide to find the last ones since getting them unlocked the games own classic Link clothing (you could get different outfits from previous games with amibos, but I haven't even got a single one and doesn't intend to get one either). Another reason I caved was that up to that point I could guess fairly easy where a shrine would supposedly be since it was in areas without shrines, but the last ones pretty much all of them was fairly close to other more accessible shrines and more often than not didn't trigger the sheikah sensor that could tell you when you got close to them which is the best thing ever since if you got pictures on certain items, monsters, herbs or whatever you can set the sensor to search for them and therefor cut down on grinding time. Especially when you need to upgrade armours at the great fairy fountains you can find.

Kiss of upgrade... and this isn't even the final upgrade stage

So most of the game is upgrading your stuff by finding better things or get items and drops from monsters or chests. But if you care about the story the main objective is to travel to the corners of the world and finding the four divine beast, calm them down after they were taken over by Ganon, climb inside, solve the puzzles to take control of them and fight a portion of Ganon to release the spirit of the champion that fell 100 years ago. After that you have to infiltrate Hyrule Castle to reach the top and confront Calamity Ganon as he is called here. And I tried it 3 times until a fourth and successful run. First time I ran through at the main gate, but after several confrontations with guardians and two lynels (the lion-centaures) I fled the second lynel fight and flew out of there since pretty much all my shields and melee weapon was destroyed. Second time was pretty much gathering resources until I stumbled upon the library and later Zelda's tower to get the final memory so I fled to finish of those side-quests.  The third time I found one of the last shrines and found a back-door into the library so I escaped and knew which my next point of entry was when I cooked up enough rations and gotten enough arrows. And this fourth time I ran up the steps, jumping to every window I could find and swim up every single waterfall. I entered the final chamber and the divine beast blasted half of Ganons life away. The struggle was just bash him until he started some invincibility crap. I guessed I had to master the dodge and reflect abilities that I never got a hang of (and I pretty much checked it up before continuing just in case). So now or never and I succeed. And of course he goes for a second form and Zelda gives me the light bow and my horse is waiting for me (and thank god the AI choose my best horse instead of the others).

What is it with Nintendo bosses looking like Resident Evil-bosses?

So, is there something wrong with the game? The weapon durability is annoying how much you go through since I assume there is a hidden stat on how much it can take, mostly because there sometimes a stat boost for durability that doesn't affect the number displayed on it. Also the rain always feel like at the most inconvenient moment. The fact you can only have one main save per player without having to create another one if I would replay the game again. And also the damn Yiga clan that respawns without a blood moon (an event that resets all killed monsters and gives an in-game explanation to it) that messed up my dragon farming spot so I had to change it. Lastly, the music... is not bad, but it very seldom feels epic. The only time is when the divine beast are put up against Hyrule castle and then again as they fire. That is the only original song I felt was epic. I missed musical tracks like the Koloktos fight from Skyward Sword that just got more intense during the battle. Why couldn't  certain mini-bosses have that theme instead of the same one for all of them (not bad theme either, but not as epic) and most other songs is a bit on the silent end. But I like the Rito and Zora return as well as Kakiriko and Ranch theme. I don't think the Goron theme was the same. Also, while I get that the divine beasts acted as dungeons together with Hyrule Castle, I really missed the multi-level dungeons. Of course I probably solved more puzzles in this game than any other, but I would really have liked a bit more and bigger divine beasts. Other than this a great game. Especially since I played most of it blind (except the small thing I mentioned). It's not many games where I can feel awe-inspired just wandering around and stumbling upon an event. Most mini-bosses in the beginning you just see a giant lying in the woods sleeping and you just decide to avoid it for the moment. One particular moment was when I was in the jungle area. I was stuck at the source of a waterfall seeing some strange things in the water while the rain poured down with lightning strikes (meaning I can't carry any metal weapons at all) making it impossible to reach the top. Suddenly the wind intensifies and the music changes to some haunting string instrument... and a dragon raises from the water just in front of me. I just hurriedly takes a pictures and wonder if I have to fight dragons in the air as well? Then balls of lighting flies toward me and I have to run away. And that was pure chance since the conditions was just right otherwise he wouldn't have shown up.

You know, the monks looks like the mummy from Tintin and the Seven Crystall Balls...

Or is that just me?

And to cap it of some tips, short on rupees? Hunt in the snow-clad mountains. Elks, wolfs, foxes and some kind of rhino. Gather gourmet raw meat and cook five at a time and sell for around 500 rupees. For rations to actually consume, radishies. One single cooked small radish restores all life and gives 3 extra hearts. Which at maximum means a total of 30 hearts (which is the maximum with 3 whole stamina wheels). And finally, the adventure isn't actually finished since there is some extra DLC on the way (which I already payed for) with both hard mode, multi-level trail dungeon and an extra quest.