Season of the Switch - March/April

            The Nintendo Switch is the first console I have ever bought at launch day. Typically I’d have to wait until a holiday season or a price drop to grab up new hardware, but the Nintendo Switch was just such a cool concept of a console I didn’t really care if it’d put a dent in my savings or whatever the software lineup is like. And thankfully, the console has not disappointed me in almost any way. While underwhelming on the surface, the Switch’s early library is filled with a good variety of games to play whenever, where ever you like!

The Negatives

            Let’s get the negatives out of the way. Buying a console early is never as smooth as you’d hope in the modern age and the Switch is no exception. Thankfully the console has been supported with regular patches to help fix these issues, but it did lead to some frustration. Apparently out of the box on launch the Nintendo Switch had issues connecting to a lot of people’s wifi which has had some of the issues such as not being able to find password protected connections patched out. Personally I still have issues getting the Switch to connect at times when everything else works fine, so connecting to the net is still a source of frustration for me, but thankfully it’s getting better. If you are looking for power you are not going to find it in the Switch, at least compared to the other home consoles. However, as a handheld it’s a powerhouse! The unfortunate part of the Switch’s marketing message as a console-on-the-go is that it’s more the exact opposite as a handheld with more options. And while I’m finding plenty of things to enjoy on Switch people looking for bigger games are probably gonna be underwhelmed with the library for quite some time. The controllers not having a real dpad is a real bummer as playing 2D platformers and fighting games without it is a bit of a pain, so I might just avoid those games until I have the money for a Pro controller. The battery life is also very low and no packed in power cord means I had to play with the Switch docked more than I wanted to until I bought a cord.

Versatility

            The main feature of the Nintendo Switch’s hardware is definitely the plethora of options you have in how and where you play. Of course you can play games as a regular console inside the dock and play it in your hands on the go, but you also have options to play games on a table top. You can lay the screen flat like a tablet, or set it upright on its kickstand. The options don’t even end there as the detachable Joycon controllers have their own list of options such as connected to the console as a handheld, detached and held free hand much like the Wii Remote before it, holding each Joycon sideways like a SNES controller for some 2 player action, or attached to the packed in Joycon grip accessory and played like regular controller. I was really skeptical of the Joycon grip, but it works perfectly fine as a controller. The only reason I ever see myself buying a pro controller is if I really want a true dpad, but for most uses the Joycon d buttons(?) work as a functional replacement. And of course none of this even gets into the additional accessories you can buy to further expand the play options of the console.

            Personally I really enjoy almost all the options available. During the Splatoon 2 testfire I kept changing up my controller set up every hour and found just about all of them work very well. The Joycon Grip makes for a good reliable controller, free hand is very comfortable, and handheld can be played anywhere within wifi range. None of them are a clear favorite as they all have their uses. Personally I find it a blast to play games on a console with enough options to fit my current needs. There are a lot of games I’ll just end up buying for a second time so I can have the option to play these games in bed, at the table, or wherever.

Game Library

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild

            What is obviously the major launch title for the Switch and last hurrah for the Wii U, chances are you have probably played or at least heard enough about Breath of the Wild, so I’ll be brief. I am not a big fan of the Zelda series, while I tend to be impressed with their overall consistent quality, but they just don’t do enough for me for me to say I even like them all that much. They are perfect fine, playable, mostly inoffensive video games. Though the standouts of the series to me are the original and Wind Waker which both capture the spirit of adventure the series is known for the strongest. Breath of the Wild to me joins those two in capturing the same spirit of adventure while reinventing the Zelda wheel. Breath of the Wild makes a great balance between keeping up with Zelda tradition to keep the series identity going and making massive changes to help modernize the series. Breath of the Wild plays a lot like other modern AAA open world games, but is still very much a Zelda game. The game does have its issues mostly being weapon durability being more of a hassle than a fun challenge to work around, lack of decent rewards for combat makes combat a bit of a waste of time, the various magic powers and puzzle items feel very underwhelming compared to previous titles, and the boss fights feel like a step down for the series.

Mario Kart 8 Deluxe

            Another game that probably doesn’t need much explanation, Mario Kart 8 Deluxe is an upgraded port of the popular Wii U entry of the Mario Kart series complete with all the DLC, an overhauled battle mode, new characters, vehicles, items, and a change to a two item system similar to Mario Kart Double Dash. Whether or not you feel Mario Kart 8 is worth another $60 will vary depending on your love of the series and how much you enjoy playing games on the system. Personally, having Mario Kart 8 in my hands has made me fall in love with the game all over again. There aren’t many major changes other than the two item system which both makes the game more chaotic, but also more defensive when you’re towards the front of the pack. If you are familiar with the original Mario Kart 8 or Mario Kart in general you probably know what you are getting into with Mario Kart 8 Deluxe as it is the definitive Mario Kart experience. Looking forward for more time trial grinding and online fun to come.

FAST RMX

            Similar to Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, FAST RMX is an enhanced port of the Wii U racing game FAST Racing Neo. While not a replacement for a new F-Zero, FAST RMX is a great alternative to scratch that high speed racing itch we’ve all been feeling since F-Zero GX blew us all away on the GameCube. If Mario Kart 8 Deluxe is too slow and gimmicky for you, FAST RMX is your hard high speed alternative (and at a much more affordable price too). Personally, my only major gripe is that I still don’t feel the two color system adds anything to the game other than a distracting gimmick.

Super Bomberman R

            Konami of all people decided to join in on the Switch launch with a new Bomberman title. As a longtime fan of the series I had to pick it up for my Switch and I wasn’t disappointed. Super Bomberman R brings the classic Bomberman action and chaos to the Switch. Unleash chaos in local and online multiplayer or play the short but sweet story mode complete with adorable cartoon-style cutscenes. While a bit bare bones and lacking in a whole lot of content (especially for its steep price) the game still oozes in style and fun. The game also continues to get regular updates and has some fun Konami cameo costumes lined up like Vic Viper and Pyramid Head of all things. It’s a blast, though whether or not it’s worth the pricetag will vary depending on your love for the series.

The Binding of Isaac: Afterbirth +

            This feels surreal to say, but the Binding of Isaac is one of the biggest launch window games for the Nintendo Switch. The latest version of the Team Meat cult classic indie hit, Binding Of Isaac feels right at home on the Nintendo Switch as it is so easy to just pull out the console for one more run. While the Newgrounds dead baby edgelord humor feels like an incredibly pathetic relic of your middle school years rouglikes are a very natural fit for the Nintendo Switch. I ended up dropping the Binding of Isaac around its Wrath of the Lamb expansion so there is so much new content to wrap my brain around. Honestly I do feel like the game feels way too random especially now. Still I find myself coming back to it every so often  just for one more run… I swear just one more.

Snake Pass

            From the developers of Sonic & Sega All-Stars Racing Transformed comes something… very unexpected. Snake Pass is a very fun Snake “platformer?” where you control a snake by slithering and coiling around multiple courses. Snake Pass is a very fun smaller title that I enjoyed learning the ropes of slithering and coiling around. The game can get a bit frustrating with its unique controls, but feels intuitive enough to still feel well designed. While not the meatiest game on the Switch, Snake Pass will still give you plenty of hours of fun challenges set to a great soundtrack by David Wise of Rare fame.

Splatoon 2: Testfire

            While obviously no longer active, the Splatoon 2 Testfire event was the most fun I’ve had with the Nintendo Switch to date. I had a ton of fun trying out the new weapons, maps, listening to the new music, and trying out all the new control options the Switch can provide. I was also… shockingly good at it? While I have probably more Splatoon experience than a lot of Switch newcomers, I never actually got that much into the original as getting to the game late and missing Splatfests turned me away from playing the game. I don’t really want to brag too much, but I took to Splatoon 2, especially the new Splatdualies, so naturally I placed the top scorer and typically the best K/D (kills to death ratio) on my team every match! I am really looking forward to Splatoon 2’s launch this summer as I feel it is definitely the best upcoming game for the Switch.

The Future

            While Switch news has slowed down as we anticipate future announcements at E3 the near future of the Nintendo Switch looks bright! Ultra Street Fighter II is releasing in May which will bring a new version of the fighting game classic to Nintendo Switch. ARMS is coming out in June which looks like a ton of fun that I am curiously optimistic about. I am a bit worried that it could just be a gimmicky multiplayer Punch-Out that no one will play seriously so we’ll see. Splatoon 2 is going to launch in June and likely be a must have for all Nintendo fans and my most anticipated multiplayer game of the year. Also over the far horizon is the stellar looking Mario Odyssey come holiday season, Sonic Mania and Forces are also coming to the Switch which you’ll be able to go fast on-the-go on the Nintendo Switch, Xenoblade Chronicles 2 which will add to the JRPGs of the Switch library which the console feels like the perfect fit for, there are also other JRPGs far over the horizon coming to the Switch like SquareEnix’s Octopath project as well as Dragon Quest XI (please come west), an unannounced Tales game, an untitle Shin Megami Tensei project, an unannounced Pokémon game which will be huge for the system. I definitely see myself enjoying a lot of games on this console for years to come.

NieR - Review B

I thought it felt really appropriate to come back to NieR with some more hindsight and a different perspective. I wrote a “review” for NieR a long time ago and… it is absolutely terrible. It’s a long incomprehensible series of word vomit paragraphs. It’s been something I’ve felt hanging over my head for a long time. I didn’t do NieR justice; instead I just screamed all my emotions at once into an essay and thought it was profound. I feel the need to apologize, but I suppose acknowledging your mistakes and working on improving on them is the path to becoming a better writer.

After watching a few other people play through the game and playing through all the endings, and even the sidequests this time around, I’ve learned that my original thoughts on NieR are questionable at best. It couldn’t be more appropriate that what has gotten me to appreciate NieR more is time for hindsight and seeing the game through different perspectives. I used to think Nier is a monster. The game lays on the guilt pretty heavy handed so it is easy to fall into the trap of thinking Nier is the real monster (an NPC in the late game even says this verbatim). I don’t think it is right to say Nier is totally innocent or the victim either. Instead I think it is important to consider that NieR is not interested in absolutes. NieR is a tragedy about two sides of struggling to survive in a cruel world and their coexistence being impossible.

“Ignore the sidequests” is very common advice to hear from people recommending you NieR. Its advice I followed on my first go of the game and at the time I felt it was the right way to go. There really isn’t any particularly useful rewards for completing sidequests, and the most you’d think you miss is some ultimately inconsequential dialogue. What could be written off as pointless busy work is actually a pretty important part of the game. You could argue that they should’ve made the rewards better or the quests more fun, but I think that misses the point. Nier’s bland adventures of doing pedestrian errands for the townsfolk for little to no reward other than the satisfaction of doing the good deeds themselves are appropriately designed as such. I’m not saying you need to do ALL of them, but it is important to go out of your way to do enough of them. The sidequests breathe life into the world and help humanize Nier.

NieR’s combat is also a pretty huge negative talking point, especially now that the smoother, prettier sequel by Platinum is out. While I won’t say that the original has the same depth, polish, variety, or smoothness of Automata I still feel like there is something to the original’s combat that I think people write off too easily. I’ve seen people go as far as telling people to avoid the game due to its rough combat which feels too far. Not only does the game have a lot to give outside of its combat, but the combat itself isn’t half as bad as people make it out to be. At the very least NieR’s combat shouldn’t be an outright deal breaker for anyone playing the game.

Behind the combat’s flaws is actually a really fun experimental action game attempting to marry the once thought distant worlds of hack and slash action RPGs and hectic shmups. It’s something that feels entirely unique and incredibly ambitious even if it doesn’t quite make the marks it aiming for. I’ve also gotta hand it to the late Cavia for making a combat system so versatile as they can shift the combat to play almost like entirely different games while changing very little about the core of the combat. Full 3D, 2D, Top Down, and shmup sequences all happening with this workhorse of a combat system. Bosses can even vary from Zeldaic puzzle fights, big set pieces, one-on-one humanoid fights, or just cover the screen with countless bullets. I am NOT saying the combat is perfect or not without faults, but I don’t think people should write the whole game off because of it.

This game is also the game that I feel Yoko Taro’s multiple ending structure works best. Playthrough B is definitely the high point of the game as replaying the game with hindsight and new dialogue giving you a new perspective on the game’s events is definitely one of the best experiences I’ve had playing a video game. While it’s easy to write it off as busy work I think it is critical that the game has you go back and meditate on your actions. I also really like how overpowered you are in this playthrough which just hammers home that Nier’s actions are not to be held as absolutely heroic however justified.

I’ve also came to appreciate Ending D more having yet another save file erased before my eyes. It’s a beautiful sacrifice and redemption for both Nier but also the player’s involvement in the tragedy. I’ve realized the multiple playthroughs and the tradition of collecting all the weapons are important elements both as pacing tools but also adding more weight into the final decision. It’s the ultimate undoing of all of the player’s work just to see the final ending.

NieR still remains my favorite modern JRPG. It is an absolutely beautiful tragedy that doesn’t quite fall all the way to grim, hopeless “sadporn”. NieR is a game where you can feel the crushing sadness of a conflict where both sides are the victim, but also laugh as Kaine and Emil talk about camping. It is a game that is filled with lovable characters, the best soundtrack in video games, amazing bosses, varied gameplay setpieces, and commentary on violence. Yet even being packed full of all this amazing stuff the game never really feels like a mess. It’s not a perfect game, but it is sad to see people pass this one up for the shiny, new sequel.

Moving on From Final Fantasy XV

            Well here it is! After many delays and much hyping up, I finally wrote this Final Fantasy XV piece. And appropriate for the game itself, it’s largely underwhelming and disappointing!

            Okay that opening is probably crueler than FFXV even deserves, though I can’t help but feel upset about it. I’ve spent the last few years lowering my expectations to the floor, but somehow FFXV came barely stumbling its way out of an unforeseen basement door. I saw the game’s troubled development and movement towards design decisions that I wasn’t too happy about. I thought I set myself impervious for disappointment, but somehow this game prevailed, or failed, depending on how you want to look at it. I was really worried about the build up towards that game because it’s big focus on its big open world and free form gameplay

At the very least, the openness of FFXV actually did feel pretty refreshing despite my preferences. I love my hallways! Nine times out of ten I’d rather have a totally linear directed experience than just be given a big map with a bunch of way points. FFXV actually manages to break this as it makes its open world traversal VERY enjoyable. FFXV’s roadtrip is when FFXV shines its brightest. The four characters are very enjoyable to watch bicker and bond with one another. The highway structure makes the game very easy to go from point A, get sidetracked by points C and D, and continue onwards to point B.  Even just riding in the car doing absolutely nothing for minutes at a time is amazing when watching the breathtaking world roll on by. Planning out daily routes to wrap up sidequest objectives as optimal as possible is honestly the most fun I had playing this game. I spent 40 hours before even progressing the plot as soon as the world opened up. Outside of some janky shit, I feel like those were hours well spent.

However, once I ran low on sidequests to wrap up and explored the majority of the world and decided to progress the FFXV story is when my FFXV experience began to fall apart. At first I recognized that FFXV was going for a much simpler, classic Final Fantasy story and I felt okay about it. There are plenty of games with little or zero depth or complexity to their stories that I loved a lot. What I feel ends up being crucial for me in these circumstances is if the characters, tone, world, or game systems are well enough to make up for its lack of narrative depth. FFXV unfortunately does not land this. The characters are enjoyable for the most part, but that quickly changes as the story progresses. Some characters just vanish into the background, some change into much less enjoyable super serious versions of these characters. Characters can and should change as the circumstances around them become direr, but it’s hard to swallow when the lighthearted banter between the main four turns into serious fighting between members of the group. It certainly doesn’t help that the pacing and tone just shifts way too fast, possibly due to cut content or content stuck in the character specific DLC chapters.

Honestly, the death of Lunafreya could be its own blog post. Luna’s death and the Leviathan boss sequence is where my opinion changed completely from mild disappointment to just pure shock in what was actually happening on my screen. Luna plays a similar role to a lot of past women in Final Fantasy games, love interest, spiritual healer, but apparently most importantly a corpse for Noctis to cry over. You could argue that is just FFVII’s Aerith/s all over again, but it is honestly worse since Luna isn’t a member of your party and you barely get any time to get to know her. The most you see Luna is in flashbacks where she’s either focused on her destiny as Oracle or her marriage to Noctis. She seemingly only exists in the story to suffer and die and raise the stakes for Noctis which is misogynist edgelord writing 101. And it ends up transcending an old tired problematic cliché to just pure schlock when this results in Noctis going Super Saiyan and fighting Leviathan in a horrible flying battle hilariously reminiscent of the final battle of Sonic Adventure 1. I was supposed to be moved to tears, but instead I couldn’t help myself to belting out “Open Up Your Heart” and laughing my ass off. Sadly the game doesn’t really improve from there, nor does it continue to have any sort of unintentionally hilarious schlock value. Just a pretty bland predictable Final Fantasy plot that is living so much in the shadows of FFVI and FFVII that it’s almost pathetic.

However, one aspect of this second half that is genuinely amazing it’s the way it builds up the impending doom of the darkness. The game runs on a day night cycle, but as you progress the story the night falls sooner and sooner, the game doesn’t even mention this is happening, but I started to notice when my later sidequest wrap ups had to take much more frequent rests. The linearity and shift in tone also reflects this too though sadly much less elegantly pulled off. It’s a very neat alternative to FFVI’s apocalypse where it’s a gradual shift you probably won’t notice until it’s too late which is a pretty refreshing take on a sinister power creeping its way to bringing the world to ruin. It works extremely well with having the earlier game’s openness and tone in hindsight. You can of course return to the open world, but it does require a resting point, which feels appropriate as if Noctis is dreaming of adventures with his friends he’d never have.

But good use of tone is just not enough for me when what is tying the whole game together is an awful combat system. I wasn’t expecting Platinum-esque levels of polish and depth in the combat, but this game isn’t even on the level Square’s own Kingdom Hearts. People giving this game’s combat a pass, but saying they won’t play the original NieR due to its combat feels like a crime! Final Fantasy games don’t all have amazing combat, but I just felt miserable mashing up against enemies for hours.

Final Fantasy XV being bad was my expectations, but the few strokes of brilliance really makes me upset. There’s a great entry to the Final Fantasy series somewhere in there, but it’s just unfortunately bogged down with so much trash. What makes this game getting mixed to positive reactions from a lot of people a real bummer is that FFXIII was truly so much better than this. The cult of Versus XIII is, appropriately, the outcry of a hardcore fanbase against the FFXIII installments. I’m not saying they have to like those games as much as I do, but I feel the games got an unfair reputation. FFXIII is blamed for such an absurd amount of things such as killing Final Fantasy, Square, JRPGs, even as far as the entire Japanese game industry, when none of that is remotely true. It’s a movement away from more linear, directed experiences to wanting a revival of the “glory days” of Final Fantasy with big open world maps and simple, awful stories.