Hey, you come gather around the campfire and welcome to the party.

This is Party Chat, a JRPG podcast where we talk about everything that we love in the world of JRPGS and other Eastern titles.

I am one of your hosts, Cameron Hawkins, and with me, as always, is my party partner, Kevin Kenson.

Kevin, how you doing?

I'm doing well.

Yeah, I, I want to, I want to take the beginning of this episode to say that's weird to talk about video games right now.

Yeah, I think that, you know, as y'all can listeners can know or tell like we are from the US and shit's bad here.

Shit's really bad here and you know, I, I really do try to divorce like political talk from the podcast because I know that a lot of people listen to podcasts they because they want it to be an escape, right?

They they want it to be an distraction.

But I think what is going on in the US right now, you know, I understand wanting distractions, but don't let yourself be distracted from what is happening in Minnesota right now.

What's being what's happening?

Like all around our country, there's other things that are happening similar to related stories that just aren't being picked up by major media that this is happening like in several major countries or countries, cities around the country.

And, you know, we're, we're literally seeing people be executed on the streets by a masked secret police like, you know, enforcement.

And it's, it's one of those things where I don't know how you could go through school here in America, learn about both our country's history when it comes to like Civil Rights Act, Jim Crow, like, you know, Rodney King beatings and as well as world history of like World War 2, Holocaust like type shit.

And not think that those are not the bad guys.

Like I, I, I just don't, I don't see a, whatever reality you're in.

It's not the real world.

Like if, if, if, if you're someone listening to this podcast that that feels that way, like you're, you are living in a fantasy.

And I don't want, you know, if, if there's a rare case where that you are one of those people listening to this podcast, we don't want you here.

We don't want you here.

Go go listen to a different podcast.

I don't think anyone listening to this podcast feels that way.

But I just need to be clear that where we stand on this issue and, you know, really disgusting, vile things are happening to U.S.

citizens who are exercising their First and Second Amendment rights in this country.

And it's, yeah, I, I, I felt a responsibility regardless of like, how we, like, want this podcast to be, you know, like, again, an escape to talk about this stuff really quickly.

And, you know, I hope we, you understand.

We hope you understand we're going to have a link to donate to the Minnesota Immigrant Rights Action Committee for anyone that wants to throw any bucks that way.

We'd really appreciate it.

But again, this is happening all around the country.

So, yeah, I just, I just wanted to take some time to recognize that because it's incredibly important.

And I, you know, I, I can't sit by.

I can't I, I, you know, we have a platform.

We got to do some, you know, we got to do something with it.

I'm not going to be, what's the word I'm looking for starts with AC, but I can't think of it right now.

But I'm not going to, I'm not going to sit by yes.

I'm not going to be complicit.

I'm not going to be complicit with what's complacent with what's going on in America right now.

So there's that.

That being said, and I had a pretty good weekend.

I went down to Lai, got to go see twice at the Forum.

That was that was crazy.

Like that was like the, you know, I've gone to a lot of concerts, K pop concerts specifically, most of them not in as big as arenas or stadiums.

I've only seen one other stadium show, 1 stadium show, which was twice at Sofi a few years ago and then I saw Etsy at the Forum as well a couple of years ago.

Everywhere else I've gone has been like somewhere around the size of like a theater or an auditorium.

And so like that was the best produced like K pop concert I've ever seen.

Like the production value was off the charts, very, very cool.

Really, really great time.

And then got to see you for like, literally 30 seconds.

Yeah.

Did a quick?

Did a quick card hand off?

Yeah, I did a quick card hand off but got to see you for a second, which was cool.

And then I got invited by Atlas.

Thank you, Atlas, to go to the Persona Live Awakening concert at the Dolby Theatre.

That was very, very, very cool.

Got to hear most of the notable Persona 3 Reload and Persona 5 Royal songs live.

They also did some Persona 5X, which was surprising.

Not super surprising, but like, you know.

Yeah, it's like, I get, I get it, but it's also like, that's not why most of us are here.

Yeah, exactly.

We're not.

We're not looking to celebrate the subway slammer right now.

Like we're not play the hits.

What are we doing?

Yeah, they they they played the hits.

The only song from Persona 5, Persona 5 Royal that I feel like I was like surprised that they didn't perform or Lynn didn't perform was whims of Fate, the casino palace theme.

Yeah, no whims of fate, which was wild.

And then no strikers recognition whatsoever.

Like not not even like not even showing characters from strikers.

It's like, damn it, I want what you wish for.

It's funny when you think about it too, because from like a not that this actually matters in any kind of real way, but Strikers is the more canonical game between it and and Royal.

Like if you're going to go with like what 1 is official timeline or whatever it it's.

I mean, all this is made-up but funny stuff.

How long was the total runtime for the show?

It was like just, I would say, like it was just that two hours or a little over 2 hours.

Yeah, OK.

And it went by fast for two hours, I would say.

But yeah, it was cool.

They had like like dancers that came out dressed as the characters.

Yeah, I saw something about I guess doing a cartwheel or a flip.

OK so so there's a single song for each game where it's just the dancers and then like a hall like not like a hologram, but like a projection, A projection Tron of Joker.

And I guess like those were the 2 characters.

So like, I guess was just like doing the same choreography as the dancers, I guess.

And then, yeah, at some point, I guess does a backflip, I guess.

Yeah, it was a it was a really good time.

I got this shirt, which is cool.

They had some other neat merch that I did not have the money to afford.

I actually bought the Morgana and Koramaru pin where they're like sitting on an airplane and there's like a flag.

This is Los Angeles, I think.

I immediately lost it.

I don't know where it is.

I don't know where it is.

Like, I'm so sad.

Yeah, I know.

I'm like, I don't know where it is.

I thought it was in my pocket.

I was like, I don't know.

But yeah, it was a fun trip.

And so yeah.

Oh, I have a question for you.

This is this is where it goes on the weird tangent here.

OK.

I, I, I felt like I was being gas lit the other night and and don't, don't, don't don't worry.

I told this person that I'm going to talk shit about them on the podcast.

They know what's happening.

So I was staying with my friend George Yang.

He was a, you know, he is like freelance extraordinaire, like he has bylines everywhere.

I don't know how he does it.

And we went to get ramen before the concert.

And, you know, I am a big purveyor of ramen and we eat at this place and I'm like, and I'm, you know, like we get our ramen, I start eating it and I realize that I'm not a big fan of it.

OK, that.

Right.

Yeah, yeah.

And so I, I, I stopped eating it like probably halfway through and and George and George was like, why aren't you eating your food?

And he's like, you know, his voice was carrying a bit.

And I was just like, I was like, I don't, I'm not a big fan of it.

And he's just like, what what do you mean?

And I was like, I'm not a big fan of it.

And, and the place was really nice.

I'm not going to say the name of the place, but like, sure.

Setting wise, gorgeous, loved it.

Great environment, atmosphere, all that stuff for those that care about that stuff.

But the food, I was just like, and so once we like pay and go outside, I explained to him I was like, yeah, I wasn't, I did not like that ramen very much.

And he's just like, he literally says all ramen tastes the same.

Dude.

No, I was like, I was like, what do you.

I was like, what do you mean?

He's like, dude, all tastes the same.

It's like all tastes the same.

It's like, because, you know, like when I ask when, when I say like, hey, let's go get food.

I'm like, hey, can we get ramen?

You know?

You know, you react in a way where it's just like, Oh yeah, Cameron likes ramen.

Like, you know, it's fine.

George, on the other hand, like reacts in a way of like, why do you want ramen all the time?

If that makes sense?

And and, and and learning this information from him, I'm like, this makes so much sense now.

It makes so much sense.

Why you why you get upset when I want ramen all the time because you think it tastes the same.

And I'm like, dog, I could take you to my favorite spot in Reno.

It tastes nothing like that because I always get the same.

I like get spicy tenkatsu.

That's like my, my, my thing.

Night and day difference.

Like, you know what?

I.

Mean and and I mean also just like I feel like I need more clarification from him on what he means by all ramen tastes the same because it's like.

Like, if you had tinkatsu?

Yeah.

Like if you had like tinkatsu at different restaurants, you'd think it all would taste the same.

I mean, like, certainly similar because they're using the same base, but like, yeah, there's different toppings, different, like, and people make broths differently.

So like, even if you're getting like, you know, Tonkotsu at multiple places, like, it's going to taste a little different.

Like it might be generally creamy, savory, but like, yeah, I don't know.

Yeah.

It was my.

It was mind boggling to me.

Yeah, I mean, there's some people that are definitely dismissive of because I remember I, I worked with a guy who was very much just like, I'm not paying, which he's not entirely wrong here, but he's like, I'm not going to go somewhere to pay $18.00 for soup.

And I'm like, it's not, it's not just soup like, like it is, but that's not.

But yeah, there is this like dismissive air sometimes to like, yeah, like it's this thing, it's going to taste like this.

And it's like, no, there, there's differences and there's variety.

And like absolutely different places can make different quality levels.

So it's interesting because my, because my roommate, I told my roommate about it, who he like, he is a trained cook.

He doesn't like do it for a living, but he can cook.

He's, he's like, oh, he's one of those eats to live type people where like, 'cause he said, 'cause he says that like 'cause he downed his ramen and he said that like, oh, I would need like at least one more bowl, probably 2 to be completely full.

And I was just like, I'm six, you know, guys, I'm 6 foot four, £250 like 1 bowl of ramen is like perfectly good for me.

Well, you know what I mean?

Like and so like and and George, George is like an average height on the somewhat shorter end of average height individual, like slim individual.

I'm like, how the fuck you eating?

How you scarfing that down, dude?

But yeah, it was a very, I was like, you were crazy for this.

Yeah.

I mean, like they used to live things definitely like a viewpoint where it's, you know, you just don't care about that as much.

And if anything, like I think when you have that viewpoint, it's almost more so like that also explains the almost like, why are you not eating your food?

Because in that mind, it's like you paid money for this.

Like get your calories.

Like, what are you doing?

Like who cares if you don't like it as much, like eat your food, what are you doing?

So I can understand like especially coming from that viewpoint, why having that reaction.

But yeah, I mean, it's, it's a different way of being wired, man.

I just, I don't.

Think that is that is the level of wiring that I just cannot understand like even remotely that you know, we we've talked about like our how our brain is wired for like whether it be like with Magic, how you don't care about foil cards or like yeah or or like in video games, certain JRPG things that you care about that I'm just like or that you like that I'm like my brain's not wired like that.

This is a whole nother level, but anyway, we're going to get into some housekeeping for this week.

If you've been enjoying the show, please go to your podcast service of choice, give us a five star review as well as go to youtube.com, slash at party chat, JRPG pod, hit the subscribe button over there.

We do have both YouTube membership and Patreon subscriptions for $5.

You get the episode a day early, bonus monthly episode, as well as our Campfire Catalog, which is our book club podcast.

Lastly, go to youtube.com/kevin Kenson, hit the subscribe button over there, and now we're going to get into the news for this week.

Quite a bit of.

A lot of news this week.

Lot of news, some.

We can like kind of speed through, but there's there's been a lot of stuff dropping the last like really just the last 48 hours I feel.

Yeah, Yep, a lot.

First and foremost, we're going to go back from our story a couple of weeks ago about the developer direct that happened.

We got an more in depth look at Beasts of Reincarnation from Gamefreak.

We have learned that it's going to launch on PS-5, Xbox Series consoles, Xbox Game Pass and Steam this summer.

There is a like some new details that were just like written up from Xbox Wire that I want to share.

It's a little bit of text so bear with me here.

The protagonist of the story, Emma, and Ku meet in a land to the east.

Emma was born afflicted by Blight, which was granted by granted her the power to manipulate plants.

Void of both memory and emotion, Emma is shunned and feared by those around her, living in a life of total isolation.

Ku, on the other hand, is what's known as a male fact.

A male fact, a creature that poses A dire threat to this world.

Emma bears the burden of a sealer, a role that requires her to hunt these male facts and absorb their blight into her own body.

Though their existences should be fundamentally incompatible, the wheels of fate begin to turn when Emma and Coup cross paths.

Eventually, their journey takes them to the far West where they must confront the Beast of Reincarnation, the source of all Blight in this world.

The influence of blight can be can cause the environment to shift abruptly, transforming the landscape into a dense, overgrown forest.

These blighted forests are generated by the giant male facts known as Nushi.

Emma and Ku must fight their way through these forests and the male facts to take down the Nushi.

The to ultimately defeat the Beast of Reincarnation, Emma and Ku have to absorb the Nushi's immense power and acquire the respective skills.

Beast of Reincarnation is a one person one dog action RPG that is like what they are.

Yeah, they're branding it.

As that is the that's what they're branding it as.

The gameplay blends 2 styles.

The protagonist Emma fights using fat, fast-paced Cortana action, while Coup supports her with powerful skills triggered via command base system.

Similar to a turn based RPG, in this game you don't have to rely on raw action skills alone to survive.

By performing a parry against enemy attacks with Emma, you earn points that can be used to unleash Coup's abilities.

You can open Ku's command menu at any time, and KU possesses a wide range of skills designed to handle a variety of combat situations.

Whenever you're in a pinch, KU was always there for you.

While you were selecting Ku's skill from the menu, combat slows down.

This gives you the breathing room to to assess the battlefield and strategize your comeback.

We placed a high priority on the sense of tempo.

Rather than forcing players to rely solely on split second reflexes in high pressure situations.

We wanted to create moments where you can pause, think carefully, and fight with the tactical mindset of a command based RPG.

Further, the game features 3 difficulty settings.

In addition to the standard normal mode, we have included a highly challenging hard mode as well as the story mode.

In Story mode, the parry timing is more forgiving and enemy damage is reduced.

To add even more depth to combat, you can equip items called Spirit Stones.

These stones grant various effects based on your actions during battle.

You can also find new katanas for Emma and charms for Coup through exploration, each providing unique, specialized bonuses.

By combining these elements, players can build and customize their own unique combat style.

When it comes to story stuff, it says both Emma and Coup carry a heavy secret throughout the game.

They will cross paths with allies who offer their support, who are also bound by their great secrets.

These mysteries intertwine with Emma and Ku's journey, adding color and depth to the multi layered story.

There's all.

There's still so much more we want to show you, but there is one thing in particular I want everyone to remember.

It is a vital rule concerning this world.

Never look up at the sky.

An ancient legend of this world warns that something is floating up there.

But please, for your own sake, do not try to see it for yourselves.

First thing I'm doing when I boot the game up.

Yeah, I was.

Looking up hit me with that, game over.

So yeah, we got a good look at this game a few days ago.

Kevin, what are your thoughts?

Yeah, I mean, I I certainly am more interested than I was before, primarily just because like the first time they revealed it, we didn't really get a great sense of what type of game it was going to be yet.

Like we knew it was going to be action, but like that can mean so many things.

I saw some people wondering if it was going to be, you know, kind of Monster Hunter ish, if it was going to be like a souls like, if it was going to be, you know, insert whatever popular style of action game here.

Lots of questions and what we've ended up getting is something that, you know, somewhat unique.

I, I would say visually it gives me kind of vibes of the action elements alone are somewhat like stellar blade or near where there's like a little bit of that soul's influence, you know, you got your parries and such, but it's not really like leaning into that style of play.

It's faster, you know, not as breakneck as like a character action game like Devil May Cry, but like you're splitting that difference more.

And then I think the really interesting thing to a lot of people write is the coup special abilities, which kind of feels like Final Fantasy 7 Remake Rebirth where you know, you have a gauge that gives you abilities you can use.

And that break brings in that kind of turn based vibe where I'm going to slow the action down for a minute and pick my move.

And the moves are more than just like, you know, great, you did a lot of damage.

Congratulations.

There are things like status effects, like one of the ones they show it off is using a coup ability that like rooted enemies in place.

So, you know, very kind of interesting mix of like, yes, you have these action elements, but then you do have these special powers that are going to break up the combat a bit.

And it's not just raw act, character, action, focus.

Yeah, I I really loved the mixture of gameplay.

It just feels, you know, obviously it has the inspiration from the remake games, but it's just some it it still feels like refreshing in a way that we for sure like haven't gotten in a while.

And I just, you know, I just want to play it at this point.

It's just it's just like I've seen enough.

Give me it.

Yep, Just release it, make it happen.

Honestly, I I know they aren't really well within the purview of what we want to focus on in the show, but like, I thought overall all four games they showed off like solid stuff.

You know, there's always that difference between like what we see ahead of time versus what final product actually looks and feels like to play.

But I thought that the slices we saw of everything was like real solid at that show.

Yeah, you know, everything was interesting.

Forza Horizon was Forza Fable like I still like.

Obviously I'm going to play it because I love Fable, but I'm cautious on some things and I think that that is just AI need to play the game.

To to really at the end of the day.

Yeah, feel how I'm going to feel on that.

And then yeah, I Beasts of Reincarnation is something that I'm definitely a lot more excited about.

I'm definitely like going to hopefully get to play that day one.

Hopefully we get a review it and and see what happens there.

But yeah, very excited about Beasts of Reincarnation.

I I will say the one thing that was funny to you is how many times they mentioned Pokémon during that presentation, mostly in the sense of like, hey, we swear we do other stuff.

Like, yes, we are that team that makes mainline Pokémon games, but also we do this.

But then they also have lines where it's like, yeah, because we've done Pokémon for so long, you know, we've best with this idea, but now we want to do this.

It's just a lot of like, yes, yes, yes, for that Pokémon team.

Anyways, look please other things.

Kevin that's fine.

It seems like it's finally happening.

Resident Evil Code Veronica is getting a remake, and it's seemingly going to be coming out this year.

Sooner than later.

Or at least our first look.

At least to reveal this year, I think is what the the rumor is, yeah.

Yeah, so a notable Resident Evil leaker, Dusk Golem, shared online that no, there's not a Resident Evil 5 remake that's going to be announced this year.

Instead, later this year RE remake that starts with C and ends with Ode Veronica is going to be announced, I promise you.

I hope so man.

Yeah, I feel like this is the one that people have wanted for a long time.

It's definitely a big one because so Code Veronica was kind of the last one that was still the older style gameplay before they made the transition into the over the shoulder that we got with four.

And so there's a lot of people who love Code Veronica, like a lot of people would push that it's like the best one of that era, even though of course there's a lot of fans of like 2 back in the day and such.

But excellent game that, you know, especially after seeing the remake treatment that we got for two and three.

It's like cool, like now you're going to do Code Veronica, right?

And then we got 4 Remake, which like great game, I don't know if it needed a remake, but it was a great game and you know, that's how it worked.

We just thought they would it would go in order.

Sure.

Or, you know, if that was a sign that they just weren't going to at all, right?

Like, are we just, are we just not acknowledging that game at this point?

Are we just, you know, marching down the numbers?

I think this also gives hope to some people that are maybe hoping maybe like 0 could get a similar treatment at some point.

I know some people want one to get remade again because, you know, one did get remade, but it still kept the fixed camera angle style from back in the day.

So it certainly opens that door of like, hey, they're not just marching in number order like there are other games they're messing with maybe.

So we'll see what else they they touch on.

But I love the original cover Veronica.

I'm very excited that it's getting this treatment finally.

If this is true, obviously this is not an official thing.

It's a rumor, a leak, whatever, but Mando, I want it to be real.

I I want that for you.

I want it for.

You.

Yeah, yeah, no, I want it for you.

So hopefully it happens over the weekend.

There was AI guess.

I mean, it's technically called a direct on the Super Mario Galaxy movie where we got a new trailer that debuted Yoshi for the first time.

Kevin, after watching the trailer temperature recheck it, has it changed at all?

Are you more excited?

Are you less excited or?

I mean, I would say no adjustment for me, but that's because I'm coming from a standpoint of like I didn't care that much about the first one and I'm not particularly I'm like, look, I'm going to see it.

I'm going to check it out at some point.

I hope it's good.

I hope I like it more.

I just, I didn't really care for the direction or design of the first one.

And outside of maybe having a little more time with certain characters in this one, like I love Miyoshi, it looks like Luigi's going to have more screen time.

I'm down to see more.

I will say it was interesting to see some of the how wide the references were in this trailer.

And I know that's something that I've even seen some people be a little like unsure about because it's called Mario Galaxy.

But this news trailer really didn't show much Galaxy stuff.

It showed Odyssey stuff, it showed Super Mario Brothers 3 stuff or two stuff.

We saw a little bit of three as well.

They had the frog suit.

Like, like there's all these references to other Mario stuff and like, not really much Galaxy, which at the end of the day, you know, I prefer when trailers don't show me everything.

So it could just be that we just have a lot of other references knocked out in the first 20-30 minutes and then it's Galaxy from then on.

But it is interesting how many different games that this like 1 trailer tapped on.

Yeah, my, my big thing is that like from everything that we saw in that last trailer, doesn't really feel like that they're in space, right?

Doesn't doesn't really feel like a Galaxy setting.

Yeah, but that's even what I'm saying, right?

Like I feel like that could just be not shown yet, like.

Yeah, but like, I don't know, I just felt like that we saw a lot of different scenes in that trailer that didn't show us any.

I'm like, how, how, how often are we in this space, right.

Like how how often in this movie that you're titling Galaxy, are we actually going to be there?

That's like something that I'm curious about.

One thing that I know a lot of people are talking about too, is the voice of Yoshi.

Like it sounded different than normal.

And people are wondering if it's like the same voice actor or if they like actually got someone like Hollywood related to voice him.

But I feel like if that was the case, we would have known about it.

Like they we would have learned that then.

Yeah, it could be.

I mean, it could be that they're making it a surprise of like who they're featuring as the voice of him.

It could either they didn't tap the shoulder of whoever traditionally do does it, but did tap maybe the shoulder of a, you know, fairly traditional voice actor.

I mean, who God?

Who's the one voice actor that does literally every animal noise in everything?

Oh, I know.

Dee Bradley Baker.

Yeah, Dee Bradley Baker, like, for all we know, they tapped his shoulder.

Like, it could be any number of things, right?

Like.

That Hey Dee Bradley Baker, you want to you want a Moise Yoshi?

Why not?

Is it that out of the realm for him?

Yeah.

But like, I do get it though, that it doesn't sound the same.

It could be just different recording, different style, you know, voice direction, whatever.

Like there's all kinds of possibilities for that.

It is interesting that we don't know the casting at all though for sure.

Yeah.

Also worth noting, they moved the release date up a couple of days.

It was going to release on April 3rd and is now releasing on April 1st.

Which is hilarious.

Yep.

So we'll see.

Which, yeah, I'm curious as to why that is.

April 1st is a Wednesday.

It's not a holiday weekend.

Very interesting choice.

Maybe they just really want to go big because I mean, the first movie is like the 5th best selling film of all time or something like that.

Like, yeah, it's it.

Yeah, it's.

It made its money and yeah, I've no clue why they would have done that change.

Maybe they just liked the the numbering of being able to say it's on the first couldn't tell you.

Makes it nice and easy like a dragon.

Executive producer Yokoyama says that he treats each new entry like it could be its last.

This was in an article with Automaton Media where he says quote as an example.

I haven't thought about what happens to Ichiban Kazuka in the future yet after the events of Like a Dragon, Infinite Wealth, and Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii and Quote.

Boy, does this make sense.

Boy, look, I I will say Yokoiama says a lot of stuff that bothers the hell out of me.

I, I have my opinions about his tenure of leadership.

I will say this particular 1, I don't find that egregious because I think this is kind of always been a little true.

Every Yakuza game is kind of its own thing.

And there's never really been a sense of like, oh, they're setting up continuity where this is going to matter two games later.

Or like maybe we're like, no, this shit has always been they kind of make it up with each game and end it the way they're going to end it.

Which is also why so often the openings of these games are like weird soft resets where they're like, by the way, we're going to explain why this person left.

This person's no longer around.

We don't even talk about this guy.

We it's just it's own thing this time around.

And like in retrospect, it has formed an overarching story, kind of, but there's never really been that much forward planning with these games.

OK, I agree with you, but I also feel like a lot of the things that you mentioned, while they do suck, I just don't think that they're like at the end of the day, for lack of better phrase, it matters in a way where like because Kiryu is just like such a he's such a like he's a character in such a way where like you don't really need to have this ongoing particular arc with him throughout all these different games where you can just kind of like do like these kind of check insurance scenarios with him.

And it's just like, oh, he's just chilling being Kiryu because he's just, you know, he's pretty unproblematic and he probably he very much kind of keeps to himself a lot of the time.

And then it like creates a scenario where like, you know, and then they begin a scenario for him, right.

With Ichiban, I just feel like that there's like that they're trying to kind of not.

They're trying to go a different route with Ichiban.

I mean, I feel like the route they're going with Ichiban is they're trying to make him not as important anymore so we can get back to the curio show like.

No, that that was like the that's the and that's one of the criticisms, right.

It's just like is that Ichiban like felt like is like this character that would have like this more overarching story throughout multiple games and this honestly, like sure, they're specifically mentioning mentioning Ichiban here.

I don't believe that they know what they're what they were doing in general after infinite wealth.

Yeah.

I mean, I will say that the one thing that is frustrating about using this line within the context of like how Yakuza has been lately is that the fact that like seemingly there are more seeds being planted for future hintings that we traditionally didn't have in past games.

The ending of, you know, pirate Yaquaza was very heavily ham fisting.

Like this is kind of where we're going to go next game, maybe infinite wealth.

Similarly with, you know, there was kind of the the baiting of what's going to happen with Kiryu.

And then we see how that ends.

And again, they're not letting this man sleep anytime soon.

There could be doing it as long as Kuroda's around to do it at this rate.

This is basically Hugh Jackman as Wolverine.

Like we're just until he's 102, they're going to drag him out so we can be able to make another thing featuring this character.

But it is odd to have this concept of like, you know, we don't really plan where this is going to go in the future.

And yet we're seeing more active attempts in these more recent games to like lay seeds for things.

And it's like, well, if why are you laying seeds for things if you don't actually even know what you're laying seeds for?

Yeah, and it's so interesting too, because like everything else that they do is so good, like the characters, especially in like like a Dragon and Infinite Wealth, so good.

And but then like the just like the overarching stuff like that.

Like what what?

What I'm particularly showing up for in a Yakuza game, especially like for Infinite Wealth, right where they very much pitched like this is Kiryu's kind of last game.

And then it, you know, it's like it's not.

It goes the direction it does, yeah.

Yeah, it goes in the direction is it goes and we're it's probably not it's just like, I don't know dog like I I want a little bit of vision here on where you're wanting to go with this because like it yeah, it's just it felt like such a curtain call for Curry you and.

Yeah.

But then it's not.

Yeah, Look, I have so many rants I can go on about the general direction of the series right now.

I think the simplest, I forget if I've brought up this point before, but it's one of my long standing beliefs about the riding style of Yokiyama is that I think Yokiyama has very specific scene ideas that he wants to have and they're generally good.

Like I think he has some really great specific climactic scenes in mind.

But then outside of that, the man is just finding his best way to stumble through and copy and paste whatever he can together to get those scenes together.

Because like again, there are some individual moments in in infinite wealth that are incredible near end moments of a man who raised his name fantastic.

But boys, a lot of surrounding structure and other payouts and other things dealing with that.

Not good.

And it's just it's it's headache inducing and we'll see what happens with, you know, Kiwi 3 being a remake.

We'll probably end up seeing some either changes or new plot being added with whatever they're doing.

And then whatever the next game ends up being within like a dragon at least.

Like we know Stranger Than Heaven's coming out as well.

And we have no idea if that's going to tie in any kind of meaningful way other than same general setting in a different year.

But yeah, man, I don't know, I I, I joined this franchise right at the position change and I did all this catch up playing the older stuff.

And it's not nostalgia because I wasn't playing it when it was originally releasing.

There absolutely is like a difference between kind of the pre and post negoti eras.

And I don't.

I don't know if I like where post has been going but.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I don't know.

I think it is too.

I do in benefit of the doubt, I think it is too early to tell because like with man who erased his name, the outside of the ending, like that game was about what I expected it to be like, you know, as like this kind of prologue to infinite wealth and then infinite wealth, like admittedly very high expectations that were mainly not met, but like it's only been that one game like Empire accused.

I just feel like such an anomaly, right.

It's like it's really only been that one game, at least just speaking for myself that I feel like I can truly judge everything by that.

Like I think that the next like proper like new story entry is going to be very telling.

That is going to be like the key factor for me or it's just like, OK, like I worried for nothing.

You know, infinite wealth was just a stumble and and we're getting back on track.

Or like, Nope, this is just how it is now and that sucks.

Yeah, I mean, I also have a lot of opinions based on what was in Pirate Yakuza and how that was all handled.

But I agree infinite wealth is the largest one to look towards as far as like what another main like be like.

But I do think there are trends we're seeing across some of these later releases, how they're being handled and.

Again, like, yeah, benefit of the doubt.

I would love for it to get better.

I love this franchise.

I do think it's very, very funny to think about what the landscape is going to look like within the next like 3 to 4 years where we get maybe two or three more releases under their belt because they're trying to do yearly and thinking of drag and drops.

And it's like, what is that kind of comparison and vibe?

Because Gang of Dragon is obviously not going for the exact same vibe.

It's it's definitely a more brutal looking game.

From the looks of it.

We got a lot more just straight up on screen death.

And people have no qualms about using guns in a more realistic way because you could use guns in some of Yakuza games, but they don't really matter for the most part.

It's just spam and you do some damage.

We see a guy get shot in the head in the Gang of Dragon trailer.

So I'm very curious how having IP side by side at some point is going to feel.

Yeah, that's fair.

That's fair.

Tomodachi Life Living the Dream is getting a exclusive direct on January 29th, so the day that this this episode drops publicly, it'll already be out.

So that that is not, we don't play there so.

I'm gonna watch it.

I mean, I, I'm keeping up with stuff and my, my wife was really into Tomodachi life.

The closest I've really done is it's not the same series, but I think it's at least somewhat similar.

In vain is Utopia.

I did play some of the Utopia stuff, but I know Tomodachi life is different and I've seen other people play it and I know stuff about it.

I'm, I'm curious to see.

I'm, I'm excited for the Tomodachi Sickos that they're getting a brand new game and hopefully we see some cool stuff on Thursday.

I hope the best for you all.

We'll we'll, we'll talk about it.

You will report back to us next week.

We'll.

Talk next week.

The rest is quickies for the week.

Super Mario Bros Wonder Nintendo Switch 2 Edition and Meet Up at Bella Bell Park is releasing on March 26th and there are three Amiibos coming out.

Alongside it we have Elephant, Mario Poplin and Princess Florian and Captain Toad and Talking Flower.

They're going to sell for 2499 each.

And then there is also the Talking Flower figure or like is, is that what you want to call it?

That is coming out on March 12th and that is going to sell for I believe 3499 if I remember correctly.

I am very curious how Amiibo prices are going to maintain and fluctuate because we've already seen a few sales happen for ridiculously cheaper that aren't permanent price drops, you know?

But still, how often are we going to see those kind of numbers happen?

Because I, I partially get why they've made them as expensive as they have.

I think they're trying to outweigh costs that have grown elsewhere, but man is it getting harder and harder I think for some people to justify picking up an Amiibo when we're looking at, you know, 25 as a starting price in a lot of cases and going higher for specialty collaboration type stuff.

Yeah.

One thing that's worth mentioning for those specifically is that those are apparently bigger than regular sized amiibos, your average size Amiibo.

So there's that's something, right.

Like that's something there.

Yeah, there's more plastic, yeah.

Yeah.

So that's the thing, you know, I, I'm not like a hardcore Amiibo head like at this point.

I, I, I do really want to like collect all the Metroid ones.

My main issue is just that the Samish return 1 is just like, because they did reprint the Metroid 1.

So that, and that's huge.

That's huge because that's like a 2200 plus dollar Amiibo that's now regular price.

But the other one from Samus returns, which is arguably the most boring one, but still is, you know, just not available.

And so it's like again, 200 plus dollars.

And it's like, OK, well, I, you know, so I, I kind of am in this mindset where like I'm probably going to wait for the Metroid Prime 4 ones to just get like dirt cheap and then scoop them then.

And then like outside of that, it's really just like Fire Emblem and Xenoblade and Fire Emblem Xenoblade amiibos drop.

Like got them because I have all the Xenoblade ones.

I have all the Fire Emblem ones.

So yeah, that that is not going to change.

Fire Emblem is definitely the main one I'm trying to keep up with.

I was up to date on Zelda for a while but I didn't pick up the newest set of ones that came with.

Like you know when the switch to whatever the last drop was where they added a bunch of the Champions, I didn't grab one of those ones, but I have all the other ones otherwise.

And then Fire Emblem up to date as well.

Xenoblade.

I have some I don't have.

I don't have Shulk, I've got Pyra and Mithra.

I do you have Mio and Noah.

Noah and Mio.

No, I.

Don't think so.

OK yeah, cuz I have my collection's a little weird.

So what?

So yeah, I have all the Fire Emblem, all the Xenoblade and then I have like some miscellaneous ones, right?

Like some miscellaneous smash ones.

So I have like Cloud Sephiroth, I have a banjo and I've never played Banjo Kazooie, but I'm just like that is it's one of those things like if an Amiibo looks cool enough, I will buy it.

Sure.

Like so Banjo Kazooie is like the jiggy piece on the Amiibo show up and take my money.

The joker one, which is might be the best Amiibo just from a design like it's just really good.

Of course I have like I have like three Sora amebos.

I'm so mad dude.

I tell you the story.

So I pre-ordered three of them.

Yes, I do recall this.

And I bought 1 to open one for preservation.

Yep, and a third one just in case.

You never know.

You never know what happens, right?

And they all came in a box and they were all fucking smooshed.

And I've and I've never had an issue with amiibos before.

Was this through Amazon?

It was through Best Buy.

Oh, that surprises me.

I've generally had pretty good experiences with, yeah, Amazon's where I've gotten screwed on stuff like that, which I don't care.

I never like buy stuff for like keep in box like whatever but I find.

No, I open all my amiibos but like the one instance where I actually care about one staying in good condition, right?

Destroyed.

So yeah, so I need to like find like find a time I've actually seen some Sora like just displayed at my at some of my local shops.

And so next time I see one I'm probably going to just like nab it as long as it's like in perfect conditions, but like cool, this is it.

But yeah.

And then I have, I do actually have a number of Zelda ones, mainly because again, I just like the design.

Like I really like how they just decided, hey, we're going to have like 1 Link for each of the games.

Yeah, I thought that was really cool.

So I was like, yeah.

During the anniversary.

Yeah, and they did a reprint, so I was like, cool, I'm going to scoop all these up.

So I have like all of the like 30th or 25th anniversary Zelda ones.

I need to get the Lynx Awakening 1 and I think I need to get like the Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom Link.

And then that's basically it.

And then I I think I'm good.

But yeah, I I definitely have a bunch of amiibos.

I just need to just be in my place, be in my space where I can actually display them again and stuff, Right.

But yeah, so cool.

I I might, I might get the elephant Mario.

I might get the elephant Mario.

I did pre-order the Galaxy Mario one that comes out in April.

Yeah, that's cool.

That is cool to come on.

I also love Captain Toad, so might, might, might scoop that other quickies for this week, Don Kong Country Returns has a free update including Dixie Kong, which is kind of like easy mode.

Like there's certain like you can like jump higher because of her hair and things like that.

Turbo mode, where you basically can go through things faster and then switch to features including enhanced visuals, facial load times, and gameshare.

Kirby Air Riders version 1.3 Point O update is out, gives Gameshare new game mode called Grand Prix, a new rule set, sub in series and balance adjustments and bug fixes.

Mario Kart World also has a new update.

It's added team races to Knockout Tour when playing in a room during online play and wireless play.

The game now supports the Polish language for any Poles out there.

And then it fixed some.

Like other like very specific issues.

Splatoon 3 is getting a substantial update on January 29th.

It's getting Flow Aura, a new mechanic that activates when defeating multiple opponents in a row.

Provides boost to run speed, swim speed, ink resistance and Intensify action health bars on the on enemies, which I think is interesting though that is a that is a big change.

That's a big change and I'm curious to see how that how that turns out.

Hit detection adjustments and then stealth jump gear, which allows players to jump to their teammates without the opposing team necessarily seen where they will land.

Very interesting seeing them add like some more competitive elements to the game.

Yeah, a Walmart ad has shown Metroid Prime 2 Echoes and Pikmin 2 on a Nintendo Switch Online ad.

So Yep, seems like we're not getting that Metroid Prime 2 remaster, sadly, yeah.

Yeah.

And that raises questions to me, I think more than anything like, OK, so that's weird.

Does that mean that we never get OG Prime on NSO because they want to keep that to the remaster?

Does that also mean like what are we doing for three?

Are we waiting for we NSO at this point for that one or is that going to get like a dedicated remaster rerelease first?

Like that's such a bizarre.

Fucking frustrating.

I would be so mad at that if they.

Didn't I mean The thing is there are quite a few games that are like we're getting on GameCube, NSO and they have direct sequels on Wii.

So it's like, when is that happening?

Because you know, they just dropped a path of radiance for Fire Emblem.

When is Radiant Dawn going to be available to play on mountain platforms?

Same with, as we just said, metric Prime.

It's like, cool, we're apparently getting 2 here.

How are we going to play 3 anytime in the near future?

You know, hey, still cool that there's going to be a way to play it.

I think the biggest frustrating thing is just the consistency, right?

Like, but especially someone who likes to be able to, like, buy and own games.

NSO is always frustrating because it's like, cool, I have a way to play this.

I would like to also just have it like, like a way that is mine to hold onto and not be beholden to when a service stops being available or whatever.

I just wish they'd let you buy these games individually, even if it was like something stupid like, you know, 15 bucks a pop.

Like just give me the option, yeah?

Yep, Yep, On the semi bright side, like not bright side, but like alternative side is that like GameCube is one of the few like older systems where I really want to build a library for.

So it's like, OK, like if it's not going to be on like a physical release on switch or like an like a remastered release, I'll just buy a copy of two for GameCube and probably play it that way.

Or like, you know, just just so I know I have a physical copy when the Switch version is no longer available.

So, but yeah, it's cool that it's coming in in some form.

I just wish it was in the remastered form.

Yeah, pretty much.

Hyrule Warriors Age of Imprisonment has officially sold 1,000,000 copies.

Virtual Boy NSO launch lineup has been announced.

We're getting Galactic Pinball, 3D Tetris, Telero, Boxer, Virtual Boy, Wario Land, The Mansion of In's Mouth, Golf, and Red Alarm, with confirm coming later being Mario Clash, Mario Tennis, Jack Bros, Space Invaders, Virtual Collection, Virtual Bowling, Virtual Force V, Tetris, and then 0 Racers and D Hopper are also coming out later this year.

Yeah, which 0 racers is crazy because that's I don't think that ever came out.

Like that's AF0 Virtual Boy game that just like never actually released because Virtual Boy went down in flames and they're making that available to play here now, which is a really cool argument for like why to have the Virtual Boy NSO thing?

Cuz it's like, Oh yeah, we're getting stuff we wouldn't have done otherwise.

You know, it's like when they added Star Fox 2 to the Nintendo, the Super Nintendo classic.

And then eventually I think about swing NSO as well.

I think that's really cool though.

That's actually happening.

I know there's a lot of people who are kind of not so hot on Virtual Boy, NSO being a thing.

They would have rather seen another platform happen sooner or just had more games released on the ones we already have.

But I think this is super freaking cool.

It's happening.

I'm grabbing the peripherals.

I'm planning on talking about these more.

But yeah, cool stuff.

Yeah, I mean, like I want to get the Virtual Boy attachment like eventually, like I, I think it's, you know, it's obviously niche, but it's cool and like.

Yeah, I just want it's definitely a niche because it's still in stock like all the other times they've been like, hey, here's this controller, here's this controller gone immediately.

GameCube is The only exception because I think they keep restocking it and they actually have done like a larger push for it.

But yeah, some of the other ones were like instantly gone.

And Virtual Boy was like, hey, it's up for pre-order.

Crickets.

I pre-ordered one but yeah, it's it's still up there if you want to grab one.

Dynasty Warriors Three Complete Edition Remastered has been delayed to an unannounced state, Code Vein 2 character creator demo is out now, and Streets of Fury EX is getting a free update titled Come Back in 10 Years.

It's going to include tag battle mode, new playable characters, and new challenges.

And if I saw it correctly, it's supposed to release is out now or is it out in the future?

They don't say.

Yeah, it looks like it's out now.

It looks like it's out now.

So yeah, update is live.

It is out now.

So it's on Steam specifically.

And this was developed by the Streets of Rage for an Absalom, Absalom, Absalom, Absalom.

I'm not sure anymore because of the Dick, said Absalom.

And then in game they say Absalom.

So it's very weird.

OK, it might be an accent thing maybe.

Yeah, it might be an accent thing I think.

Did guard crush work on epsilon though, Cuz I know epsilon was cuz Dottie MU is like the overall like producer for everything yeah, but guard crush I know guard crush worked on.

Oh no OK, so guard crush was epsilon as well.

Yeah Streets of year is a weird 1.

I don't know if you've actually looked at gameplay in this one.

It's where you actually play as like people like yeah, that sounds dumb.

It's like actual rotoscoped in like people like you're, it's not like a character that's drawn or anything.

It's like, here's a motion capture of this person and they're the person you're playing as running around and hitting things.

It's it's definitely a sillier looking title that a lot of the other stuff they've worked on now.

We're going to get into what we've been playing for this week.

I have returned to Xenoblade Chronicles Axe.

I'm in a headspace like I'm in a headspace now where I'm like, I'm just real.

I feel like now is the time to do it like.

If you don't do it now, you'll never go back kind of thing, yeah.

It's just one of those things like I think that Xenoblade Chronicles, you kind of you, you kind of have to commit to it because it's just such a big game and there's like so much stuff.

Especially X, which is like a different vibe from yeah.

And so I returned to that and I'm really enjoying that.

I, I'm, I'm, I'm basically using my time, the time that I can to play games right now.

I'm trying to use that.

And then I'm, we're finally going back to Legend of Dragoon.

It's happening, it's happening.

We're doing it.

We have the, we have the time right now because, you know, we're not like reviewing shit right now, which is great.

So those are like my two games right now.

I haven't gotten back to legend of Dragoon, but like, that's kind of my headset.

Just like my mind says like if I if I have the time at night, I'm going to put like and I'm at home, I'm going to play Legend of Dragoon.

And if I'm like out driving and have the time, I'm going to like waiting for like deliveries or whatever.

I'm playing Xenoblade and I'm just like trying to knock, knock that out.

Speaking of Speaking of this, I don't know if you saw my post about this.

Oh, you mean about how you stress tested your freaking power?

A protective case.

I, I meant to do, I meant to do a reply that was just Cameron.

I'm.

So sorry, I'm so sorry.

It was no, it was totally on accident because like you know when I go.

Out.

I would hope it was an accident.

I don't want to go out for the day.

I'm just like, OK, like I, I have a, a thing of tea with me.

I have like I, I take a couple of soda, like soda cans with me.

I try and stock up so I don't have, so I don't spend money while I'm out driving.

And so I had my, you know, I had my switch and I put my switch on top of the car while I was like loading in the drinks and stuff like that.

Yep.

And then I, and then I just get in the car and I start driving and I live on the and I live on a hill, right?

Thank God it happened before I hit an actual Main Street.

Could you imagine if it happened when I was on the Main Street?

So I'm going down a hill and there's, you know, like a little bit of curve, right?

And then just out of nowhere, I just like see in my peripherals something Gray, just like fly off the top of my car.

And I was just like, oh shit, that was my switch.

And so I stopped the car immediately, like in a very inconvenient place.

Thankfully, there's no cars coming up or down the hill at the time.

And I had to walk back.

I had to walk up the hill across the street.

It flew across the street and it barely got any damage on the case and the switch to was perfectly fine.

And I'm like, you know what?

I got a shout out power ray for this.

I got I got to make a post and and shout out power ray and they did respond this morning.

They were just like you did what they were like what happened?

But yes, that was a very funny bit and.

Yeah, my switch to is OK, guys, no harm, no foul, no harm, no foul.

Now we're going to get on top of the show and you know, we've we've done this podcast for over a year now and we've gotten, you know, more and more listeners and through just general discussion, of course, I think that we've people have kind of grasp that the things that we look for in a JRPG.

But I kind of wanted to like reopen the floor, our first like revisit topic where I just like, hey, like, what do you look for in a JRPG?

What are the things that you really like?

What are the things that you dislike those kind of things and just kind of have like an open discussion, maybe talk about like, oh, where do you stand on this?

Where do you stand on that and, and go from there.

So, Kevin, the floor is yours.

Yeah, I mean, like, man, it's really funny because you say, you know, we we did this topic a year ago.

This was what like our not our first video, but like our second or third.

Podcast.

It was it was it was the first episode, yeah.

It wasn't like it wasn't the the the quote UN quote topic, but it was like cuz we were like what is a JRP?

G and then we kind of like we divulged into that.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And it's interesting cuz I, I don't fully remember what specifics I brought up back then, so I can only go to how I feel now.

And it's almost like, I wonder if, you know, play side by side, if there's an adjustment, if there's a change yeah, I mean like, look, there's a couple I think main things I go back to very often.

I think 1 immediate shorthand for a lot of folks when it comes to RPGs is not always the same kind of, but usually story is important to a large degree more so than a lot of other games, right?

Like I'm willing to forgive like like I could play an action game that has terrific combat and terrible story and that's a OK with me.

RPG is usually a bit the opposite where it's like, I could put up a bad gameplay, but just make sure the story is good, you know, And that's often times essentially because you also spend so much more time in these worlds.

Often times, I mean, you know, even at their shortest, you're, you're talking about a 20 to 25 hour investment.

Party is always a huge focus, which I think you and I sometimes come to different things we're looking for out of the party.

But that is, I think, another central concept in a lot of RPGs.

Really, let's dive into this because I don't know if I agree with you on this.

So I'm just I'm.

Kind of that we have differences or that the party's important.

We both agree that the party's important for sure, like the difference is as to like what we look for in a party.

Sure.

Well, I just look back at times where we've had disagreements either on like how we felt about certain party members or just general like vibes of a story.

I think EX is definitely one of the big examples of where we've split up and that has to do with story choices as well.

Well, like I, I just think that we, OK, you know, we, we both emphasize similar things, but we've come out differently in terms of what stuff we're like, oh, that was a good example.

And you're like, I don't.

Was that a good example?

Oh, OK, interesting.

OK, I, I, I mean, I, I don't remember.

So I'm just like, OK, sure.

Cuz yeah, I, I think that like we both agree that party is like super important and there's definitely instances where there may be a character that you really like.

And there's one I was like, yeah, you know, it's fine.

Like, but I was, I was thinking more of a like a, you made it sound like a more of a general way where like there'd be like a game where like, oh, this party I don't like as a whole, like I don't really vibe with.

And you're like, oh, I love this party.

Like that type of that kind of mentality.

We talked about it, I think a little bit in Chrono Trigger.

I think that like Chrono Trigger, when we're talking about it on Campfire Catalog, you really love Frog and like, to a certain extent I get it, but to another extent I'm just like, yeah, but you know, there's Robo and there's mail and like, and I feel like a lot of people don't really like from what we talked about on that Campfire Catalog, like a lot of people aren't crazy about male like that.

And I'm like, I'm not saying I'm crazy about male, but like, I do think she's one of the stronger party members.

Right, you got some Expedition 33 leaking into your brain a little bit right now.

Or what?

Oh, what's her name?

What is her name?

What is her name?

Marley.

Marley Marley.

Or moral or moral?

Yeah, I called her moral.

I call.

I think I called her moral.

Yeah.

Male.

Cuz the Japanese pronunciation I think is Maru.

So a lot of people interpret it as moral, but that's one of those things where it's like we've never had a visual voice acting.

So people are just kind of like, I think this is how I'm supposed to say this.

Yeah, yeah, no.

And that's the character that yeah.

And that is definitely difference of like which characters resonate like more or less.

Absolutely.

Yeah.

And so I just like, I think that we there's definitely can be like these really nice diverse casts where certain characters stand out for other people, like for different reasons.

And I actually think that that is a great showing of a like great cast, of a good cast of a good cast.

Different people have different feelings about different stuff.

So, yeah, OK, continue.

Yeah, so we were talking about party members, characters, story.

I would say for me, you know, I definitely prefer or look for games that I think when it comes to the mechanics can do something a little different or a little weird.

I don't mind like a well produced type execution of like classic formulas, but I definitely like seeing like weird ideas or weirder activity with things.

I'm a sucker for a class system.

It's not always the right answer, but I'm always gets my ears perked up a little bit.

That's the DND in you.

Yeah, a little bit.

It would also just character like, I like the idea of it isn't always the right move depending on how your cast is set up, but the idea of like customizing or, you know, being able to choose roles for characters to inhabit in a way.

And sometimes it's a great thing and sometimes it's kind of weird.

Yeah, your turn Cam.

What are what are things you're looking for or what are things that?

Yeah, I mean, like, I, I, I do agree with what you're what you were saying about how you see like JRPGS with like the story and gameplay relationship.

Like obviously like the gameplay of JRPGS are my favorite, but I also think that like though JRPGS are like the ones that I'm more lenient on in the sense of if the gameplay isn't great, I like can normally push through if the if the story is good enough.

As long as I'm actively upsetting and like painful to go through.

Just like.

Yeah, cuz I, I really do see RPGs in general as like, OK, like I want a good story out of this.

That is what I want out of this.

And I think that while there's other games that are outside that genre where it's just like, oh, I'm probably like playing this for the gameplay and then if I get a good story out of it on top of that, awesome, right.

And that's why like I, that's like one of the things that like I get frustrated with where like certain people like, like when people just like say certain games like, oh, this is like the best story like ever.

And it's just like you like, like I'm not saying that there can't be like great, fantastic short stories, but it's just like, I just I like JRPGS because you get to spend so much time with those characters where I feel like with like these with other games, it's just like, I feel like I hardly actually got to spend time with this character and get to know this character that it just didn't like really hit the same way.

And yeah, so I think that I think like story, like story is like what I love most about JRPG.

They also just like changes like my it has affected my expectations with like stories outside of the genre too, which is a little unfair because again, like they're much shorter games, but it's also just like this is still an option, you know what I mean?

You're comparing the character development of a three season show with hour long episodes against a duology of movies that have 4 hours of runtime across all of them.

And it's like they're, you know, you paste things differently and there's ways to pull these off better.

But especially if you're caring about character relationships or time with people, yeah, obviously you're going to have a bit of an advantage with the thing that takes longer.

Yeah, exactly.

And yeah, you know, obviously, like we said before, party is party is super important.

Like if you're not enjoying like the characters that you're playing with, like then you're, I mean, or not even like in the sense of just like their character writing, right?

Like you can like think a character is like, you don't like a character personally, but you think that they're a well written character.

Like, you know, that that can definitely exist.

And yeah.

And again, like one of the things that I I've talked about before is just like I and, and you know, this doesn't always apply to some of my favorite JRPGS, but I do think it is a, like a thing that I really like look for is that I want to care about the world I'm saving, right?

I want there to be like reasons for me to care about this world outside of like general morality of like, oh, these people are going to die.

But you know I.

Don't want the Dark Lord to destroy everything.

Yeah, exactly.

Like give me, give me some reason in world reasons give you.

Connections to.

It yeah, as to why I care about this world and why I want to actually save it again, one one of the games I really, really love that doesn't really do that for me, but I still love it is Final Fantasy 13 don't really care about that world like in a real way and and sense of saving it, but I love that game so much.

And so like the the you know, there are outliers to that and yeah, I'm trying to think like those are definitely like the the main things.

And again, just like a sense of adventure, like make it like feel like, you know, when I finish a game, thinking back about like everything that I just experienced to me, like, wow, what a what a journey I just went on.

Yeah.

So like, those are like the big things for sure.

Yeah, I, I will say for me, I think some of the things that tend to come up, I always really enjoy a sense of.

And this goes back a little bit to the concept of like carrying about the world, but I think it's the the thing that always gets exciting to me is the idea of the sense of exploration that can come with discovering a world.

And I don't necessarily mean this in terms of like the video game pillar of exploration.

Like I'm not necessarily talking about, oh, are there good mechanics for traversal and, you know, feeling a sense of reward for finding things as much as it is like, you know, take me to interesting places that are different than something I've seen anywhere else, right.

Whether that's and the way they've handled the architectural inspiration, the way that particular world's like depiction of not necessarily the government, but like how a place is ran and just like the vibes of that given town or place.

That's always like a really a really big thing for me is like the idea that I'm going somewhere that I haven't really fully seen elsewhere before.

You know, it's not just like, here's the old starter town.

Show me things in places that are interesting.

Yeah, and I think like part of that is the context of the world, right?

Because I mean, there's certain things that are a lot more fantastical, you know, or sci-fi or something like that.

But then there's like Pokémon, right?

We're like, we're in Pokémon.

It's like, yeah, you're going to all these different towns that are like basically the same thing.

But it's like the it's more so the events that take place in the town that make those things memorable.

Yeah, although I think Pokémon does have room for it does it's not experimented with often and it's certainly not every town you're in.

But I do think there's an interesting way to play with, you know, if Pokémon are a real thing that exists, how does that shape the way that your locale or place is toned or depicted?

Whether that's, you know, going all in and like, oh, lavender town, heavy focus on ghost stuff.

Literally, there's a large graveyard, and so we have a heavy focus of ghost Pokémon, and there's this kind of just general spooky vibe that comes with that concept.

Or, you know, in some of the later games, they've begun to experiment a little bit more with the idea of like, hey, literally Pokémon are just like involved in like helping construction or just doing things in the world.

And it's not just they're not just here for your children.

Dogfights, like they do, exist elsewhere in the space.

Yeah, there's like a there's a harmony between the people and the Pokémon.

Yeah, I'm trying to think of what, well, I mean, like some of the things that I talked about like that I dislike previously, some are like have nothing to do with JRPGS in general.

It's just like respecting time.

Like that's definitely a big thing for me there.

There was this one other thing that I know that that really irks me, but I can't think of a problem I had right now.

Kevin, what are some of the things that you like don't like in a JRPG?

Oh geez, don't like one thing that always lightly irks me and like I, I get over it, but it does irk me a little bit.

I I've never enjoyed the idea of doing things like unwinnable battles.

It's like just just do that in the story.

Just like just give me a cutscene where I get my ass handed to me and we call it a day.

I understand there's this idea of like trying to give the sense of like you as the player.

This actually came up with something that you and I both played recently where, yeah, there's times where it's just like, yeah, I know narratively I'm supposed to just lose this thing.

Why are we wasting time with, like, loading into battle and having me actually think for a moment and go, oh, wait, there's no point to this, OK, let's just get it over with.

It's interesting when it's like the ones that are balanced, where you actually can, like, win to an extent.

You know, you get those occasional ones where there's like a reward for pulling it off just enough.

F of Eight's a great example of this where there's this like immortal spider tank thing that you can kill after your first fight with it.

Like the first fight you just have to run away like as a script thing, but you can beat it on like a later encounter and you get some cool stuff for doing that.

Like that stuff.

I like I like when it's like an optional thing and it's like a test, a challenge for you to overcome.

But when it's just like narratively we need you to lose here.

Like cool, just narratively have me lose here.

Yeah, in the older Trails games.

I'm actually curious if they're going to implement them in in the remake because I'm pretty sure in 2nd chapter at least it happens a few times.

There are fights that are like either unwinnable or like they're, they're purposefully extremely difficult, but they are winnable.

And if and if you win like the the cutscene will be different.

Right.

It like acknowledges the fact that you just like held your own in whatever situation.

Yeah, it's like nothing that that is like it feels like ultimate timeline or anything like that type type revealer scene.

But it does like recognize like, oh, you did this.

So no, I always respect when you have plot be aware of that.

Like I think a really great example actually of one that I enjoyed was, and this ends up playing a little bit into special hidden stuff to unlock in this game.

But in Triangle Strategy, there's a battle where you're playing a kind of defensive pitch battle and it's meant to be you're a little overwhelmed.

It's one of the harder fights like just default difficulty wise.

And one of the things you can do is basically burn your own houses down as part of like a trap to take out a lot of enemy units or at least deal a ton of damage.

And it's cool and all, but it's like narratively you are burning down houses in the town you live in.

And if you get through that fight without doing that, if you're able to like hold your own and you don't activate the fire traps, it's like acknowledged narratively where they're just like, I don't know, like these dudes just fought really fucking hard.

We don't know how like they held off like, like we don't know how they held us off this well without resorting to any kind of trickery.

And it's like, yes, cool, awesome, because I'm just that bad ass right now.

And I like that it respects that like like acknowledging it's always done when there's like a you're supposed to do this trick or whatever.

And then if you don't, the game just assumes you still did it narratively.

And it's nice to see that reflected.

I like, I feel like most of my hang ups to GRPG's tend to come down to mechanical choices.

Like, I don't know, I hate no bench XP if there's no other way to balance it out, right?

Like like I love being able to use my whole party and if you're not giving away for like the people I'm not actively using to keep up in some fashion.

And like some games walk this balance well.

Like sweet good in for instance, because it's such a gigantic freaking cast.

It always does relative XP.

So like if you have someone you haven't been leveling at all and you bring them into a late game fight, they're gonna gain like 8 levels instantly because they just get a huge disproportional amount until they catch up.

But like Amesworth's like, yeah, I'm not using these party members right now and now I have to use them for some stretch or there's a reason I want to try using them out for a bit and it's like, cool, they are 20 levels under leveled.

That's that's great timing.

Actually, I have a friend who got minor spoilers to guess in the sense that this does happen.

A friend of mine stopped playing FF6 for that very reason because there's basically a stretch where you have to use certain characters and they were like none of the characters he leveled.

So it's like cool, I'm just like in this part of the game with like a severely under leveled party and I don't I'm just not having a good time man.

Like what am I supposed to do?

How do I grind if I can't even like live?

That's super funny.

Yeah.

One of the things that we've talked, we talked about like a a bit last episode, we talked about with Brandon that I just do not, I just do not care about at all in JRPGS.

It's just like the gamifying of the genre where it's like you're trying to break the game or you're trying to make these like super powerful builds to, you know, that type of thing.

It's just like, I don't, I don't care about that.

Like it just does not interest me.

It's not why I'm playing a JRPG.

Is it cool that it exists?

That's an option?

Absolutely.

You know, like I'm not trying to yuck anyone's Yum, but it's definitely something that I just do not care about and I just and it's just not what I'm what I'm there for sure.

So like, you know, and I'm not, I'm not trying to pick on Brandon.

So Brandon feels like I'm not trying to pick on you.

It's just an example.

Yeah, what I think what to what to also like frame it as right is is where that kind of mentality is necessary for progress, right?

Like you want a game where you you know, those options exist and there's ways to break things that are silly.

But if that breaking is necessary to just even finish the game, it's like.

Cool, why I don't want to spend time doing this.

I'm actually very curious for if you if when you eventually play through Eva Lease Chronicles.

Cuz Final Fantasy Tactics is very much a game about making broken units to do silly things and there's a handful of fights where if you don't have that, enjoy.

I think there's something different.

I think there's a difference between realizing that something is like very good and very like abusable, then like specifically going out of your way to to gamify like and be like this super ultra powerful, like being at a point in the game where you're like really not supposed to be or like that type of thing.

That is where I take more issue with like, you know, like just knowing that like, again, Brandon, like Brandon like has played through Three houses like several times in the way that he like said that he like abused the system.

So I'm like, I do not get fun out of that.

I just feel, you know, like, that's not, that's not what I go to a JRPG for.

And, and yeah, I I just like just not my thing.

Just not my thing.

Yeah, it's somewhat of a non issue for me.

I have fun when like that is a part of the play style or the thing and there's certainly are some games where I begin to mess with that more.

Like Expedition 33 was a big example of this last year.

Yeah, I get like some fall Passy tactics.

That's a big part of tactics is like making some broken ass character builds.

But it's not a thing I'm looking for.

But I'm not opposed to it when it comes up.

It's more of I'm just like, OK, cool.

Like this is this kind of game like this is that this is the situation.

I'm going to lean into it.

I would say it's not really a deterrent or a bonus for me.

It's just different.

Yeah.

I mean, like, it's not like if it's something that I recognize, like it is a thing that I have to that I don't have to deal with.

It's not a deterrent.

It's just more, it's just more just saying like, Hey, my, my brain is not wired like that.

And if it is a thing that like, because I think in Exhibition 33, it's a bit more direct and in your face about it, sure, versus like other games, but it is still something there's like where people are like, Oh yeah, I did this build and I did all this damage and I'm just like, I just want to be this boss dog.

I'm just trying to win.

Like I'm not, I'm trying to like progress in the story.

Like that's, that's that's where I'm at.

Like obviously like, do I like it when I see like something very effective happened?

Like again, like one of like the most satisfying things is in Zenoblay Chronicles 2 where you have all the orbs around and then you break all the orbs and then you just deal a shit ton of damage.

I'm like, that was awesome, but I also didn't need to abuse the system to make that happen.

And that's you're.

Engaging the system.

Yes, exactly you're.

Using it as intended.

Yes.

And that's like that's when it feels really good.

But yeah, so like that's something that again, like if it's not, if it's something that I know that can I can do or can be done, but I don't have to engage with it.

Yeah, for for, for you sickos.

I love that shit.

Have fun.

I, I feel like we're veering into like what things GRPGS do in general that like we like or dislike.

And so there's a couple of these similar concepts I kind of want to cover real quick.

And these can be, it's still like things you, you know, look for in a GRPG or not, but it's things that some of them do.

And I'm, I'm curious your, your feelings on some of them.

So let's go with multiple endings.

Multiple.

Endings.

Yeah.

Is that, is that a bonus for you?

Is that a deterrent?

Is that that?

Does it matter how it's like executed?

I'm trying to think about it.

It depends.

It really depends.

Like again, for example, like let's talk about it again, firearm on three houses.

Like I know that you don't have to do every route to get like the story of like what's going on, but when I learned like, oh, there's only you can only do this route through Black Eagles, even though it is like it, it's because of Edelgard's character.

That is, it is it is much like more grounded than that for me mentally.

It's just like, I don't care what I don't care about that.

If it is an exclusive route that is only through this character, to me that is like oh that is the route I need to do.

Which is so funny, you know, in the context of what, why that route is different.

Like it.

We've had this talk before and I really do find this particular example so silly personally that.

Like I know that I know this is how my brain well, like here's the thing, like once I like, you know, that is like my immediate thought like going into the game because.

Because I always forget, like, do you actually know?

Like do you actually, have you been spoiled what the things are or are you just?

I know the I know the general aspect of it.

Sure, yes, yes.

And so like, I don't know, it just like it kind of feels like the the revelations from like Fates where it's just like.

Oh, it's definitely not.

Well, I mean, I don't, I, I don't know because I haven't played.

I haven't gotten to that point in Three Houses.

Yeah, because Revelations is like a here's everything coming together and this is definitely the true route, which is not a thing I think you can say about any of the three houses and.

Things that's just OK, like that's even more frustrating to me, like.

What is true?

Not having like a Canon intended route.

Oh I love not having a Canon route.

Oh yeah, I don't.

I don't.

Give it like, that's part of my, that's part of my beef with Revelations is that it's like the worst version of everything works out and everyone comes together except 1 character dies because we decided they should for this route specifically for reasons like that.

I I oh God I hate Revelations so much.

I know that.

Revelations dodged that.

I know that revelations like, I mean, it's I, I it's hard to compare these two 'cause they're 2 completely different concepts, right?

Yeah, it's different approaches to the idea of different endings.

And stories, Revelations, like, I think in general, like saying what you're saying about Revelations, like Revelations would have been good if Revelations was a good game, like if the story was good, if it came together right.

I think it's doomed to not be good because of that choice, is my argument.

I mean, I haven't played Revelations, so I can't say that, but I just like fundamentally disagree with that idea.

And so like I, because The thing is like just knowing like Corn's character and all that stuff, like I think the, it makes sense that like, yeah, like I'm not going to go either way because I have problems with both sides or whatever.

Sure.

I, I think a large part of it for me is that if you're going to introduce the concept of choice, give me a choice with actual interesting consequences and divergent and not just simply, oh, but then there's also the best version.

You can just do the best of all.

Things.

Let me, let me explain it this way because I think you're going to better understand where my mentality is at with choices.

Sure, if we're talking like a Mass Effect or a Balder's Gate where you're consistently making choices, you're consistently shaping your own story.

100% OK with with non canonical endings, totally OK with that.

When it is literally like just like you know these three routes that you start in the beginning of the game that will lead to a specific ending that will be different depending on which house you choose that I take more issue with.

Yeah, and I vastly prefer it.

Yeah, if you're gonna have choices.

If you're gonna have choices, yeah, We're just on different sides of the spectrum here.

Yeah, don't get me wrong, I love a game that just has a specific story it wants to tell, and it does that start to finish.

Just don't give me a choice then, if that's what you wanna do.

Here's actually there's the thing I hate in games.

I hate fake yes or no choices.

This is for sure like like I hate when a game's just like you know, oh, if you pick the no option, they just re ask you the question and they're going to keep re asking you until you pick yes, you know, or you make the choice and then it immediately re collapses after 5 seconds of dialogue that throws away whatever you just chose.

That should infuriate me.

I absolutely love that if a game is going to give me choices, give me like different shit.

Like I and so like to use the fire album example, right, of like 3 Houses versus Fates.

Like Fates to me is dumb is that you introduce, you know, 2 interestingly different stories, but both of them are incomplete.

And then you sell me a third DLC that is the true route that answers questions and brings everyone together in some kind of happy way.

Whereas 3 Houses is just like, look, here's these three kind of four different routes you can take.

Each one is its own different way that things play out based on a decision you made early on.

And they are each their own complete canonical story.

It is just which way you ended up going.

That, to me is far more interesting and rewarding.

I think I would be more OK with it if I actually had some context, real context to the choice I was making in the beginning.

If it's literally just, hey, pick these three houses.

You're basing this all on this one character in front of you that you don't know anything about outside of their personality.

That's not a good choice.

That's not a good choice to start with.

That is not that is not what I should rely my entire 80 hour run.

It it is not.

660 OK, like 60 hours.

That's still a long time.

For fire MO three houses.

People talking about how long that game is.

I'm looking this up real quick.

That game is not 60 hours.

Really.

That would be that's surprising me.

OK, 50, which still feels longer than I remember it being.

But is that not including Cyquest?

Is that not including Cyquest?

OK here they're saying side quest 70 but this must be like not turning off combat animations and doing everything the slowest way possible because that game did not take me that long.

Second playthroughs take like 25 hours.

Yeah, that's, I'm sorry.

It's I just, that just does not work for me.

It just doesn't.

I just, I, you know, because initially, like again, initially when what happened was I chose Golden Deer as one should, and then I wish and then I find out like, Oh yeah, Black Lions has an exclusive route.

What exclusive route?

Is a very weird way to word it 'cause it's not like it's a choice, but it's not like an exclusive special version of things like.

I know, but it's it's, it's an exclusive route that you only get if you choose if you happen to have chosen that route.

You would not have no deer Sending is also an exclusive route that only happens if you choose Golden deer like that doesn't use hear what you're saying right now.

Like it's not as if all the other routes are the identical same events and then Black Eagles gets the special extra 10 hours of gameplay or something.

I I get what you're saying, but it still irks me.

It's still.

It's still.

Irks me.

It's just such a funny one to me.

Like it just.

Yeah.

No, it's still, it still irks me.

Like I understand that it's not like a Canon intended ending, but it still irks me that that is.

And I again, I know it's connected to Ellegard's character, that's fine.

But like, it's just, it's just my brain doesn't like it.

My brain doesn't like it, Kevin, but no so choice.

But yeah, outside of Three Houses, because God damn, when it comes to choices, like like, I'm OK with it.

I think most GRP GS like don't do choices super well.

Or, you know, I, I more look for that in my Western RP GS.

And there are some instances where I'm actually curious how well is that implemented in Triangle Strategy?

Because that was like one of the big for me.

That was kind of one of the big sellers on Triangle Strategy.

Sure.

So Triangle Strategy is interesting.

I'm gonna give minor structural spoilers, sure, because there's not really a way to talk about this otherwise, but I won't go into specifics.

So Triangle Strategy does have a happy ending route.

There are there's one good ending and there are three value based endings.

You can think of it as each ending is focused on one of the game's three values.

And then there was a golden route.

That is, you balanced all the values perfectly.

And normally, as I mentioned earlier, I don't care for that kind of result.

I like how it's handled in three in a triangle strategy because it is extremely difficult to do the golden one on your first playthrough.

In fact, it is pretty much implied that you're doing this on New Game Plus.

I already hate that.

Yeah, both in a sense of how it's well, cuz the idea is that it's difficult to walk a path balancing all these different virtues and values and you see the flaws into leaning into only one at a time.

And then it's like, here's the golden path where like, you know, you truly are like walking all the values well and doing things right.

It also requires you to make very specific decisions throughout the whole game.

It's absolutely a like second, third playthrough type deal.

You're never going to stumble on it on your verse go.

And even with a guide, it's pretty hard to like you would need to have a guide that goes through every single choices, which I don't think really exists out there for it, but yeah.

So that's how it handles it.

A lot of the other choices are very immediate re collapses, but some of them are important for unlocking that golden path eventually.

And there are some choices that will impact how, like some later things play out a little bit, but a lot of it is like, which of these ultimate endings are you building towards?

Yeah.

I mean, I don't like how there's a again, like a golden route that that, that whole aspect that you just mentioned, Not not a fan of that.

I like it in Triangle Strategy.

I don't like it in Fire Emblem the way it's done, but I like how it's done.

Triangle Strategy.

Yeah, I also don't really like how it's done, like those things are done in Persona either.

Like I just just just let me do the golden path.

Like not in the sense that it's not available to you, but there's so little actual role-playing until you, it's just like, hey, you get to this kind of spot and you got to make this decision.

And it either like goes down the royal, like, you know, goes down the royal path, or it goes down the normal path.

Or down the bad path.

Well, and and Royal's weird because that's the situation where it's like, hey, do you want to play vanilla story or do you want like the royal exclusive stuff?

It's a it's a bizarre way of handling the fact that this is a re release and not like a complete brand new game.

Yeah.

And it's, yeah, I'm not, it is an anomaly with the Persona games, but it's still.

Specifically the re releases when you get into stuff like that and four golden.

Yeah, in general, like choices for JRPGS, I've had like more bad experiences than good.

I'm not against it completely, but I'm also like, admittedly it's like a stickler.

Like it needs to be done the right way for me to be like.

Man, there, there are some because I know we've talked about like retro stuff you haven't played yet or other ones.

There's a couple, especially during the PS1 era, there are some games that are going to absolutely piss you off if you actually take the time to play that because a lot of them are built around the concept of like, hey, we're selling games where like we realize you're not getting a game every month.

Like we want to give you play time.

So we're going to have like esoteric, hard as hell, weird ways of getting true endings.

And you're kind of meant to do figure this out on like, you know, your second, third or fourth go around and you would never figured out new dog that's a YouTube.

Video at that point.

Like I will tell you right now up front, you will never get the true ending of Valkyrie Profile accidentally.

You're going to have to find a guide if you want to get the true ending of that game because it requires you doing things you would never naturally do, like as a player.

That's fine.

Like esoteric specific stuff.

Yeah, that's fine.

Telling me I need to play through a game multiple times and then fight specifically like that's.

Cuz that would have been the, that would have been the method back in the day though, right?

Because you didn't have like easy access to guides or like outside of buying an official one.

Like the goal was that you play it once, get the OK ending and go well what do I need to do to get the better?

One.

Yeah.

And admittedly, even when I was younger, I was never a fan of that.

Like, it's not like just because I've gotten older and I have less time that I'm not.

I've never was a fan of that.

Yeah, I get why they did it.

Nope.

I feel like we're talking about all the things that I I've been hating.

Kevin, you got to hate some more things.

Hate, hate some more things with me.

Yeah, I mean, like, well, I mean, like I can talk about my feelings about like these different concepts.

I guess it's just like I look, here's the thing.

I don't have a lot of hater energy, if I'm being honest.

There's just a lot of stuff where I'm like, cool, that's the way they chose to go this route.

I mean, there's stuff that'll bother me like in the short term, but it there's not many things where I'm just like, oh, like if a game has this like mechanic or this way of doing things dropped, like I just don't, I don't have that.

Like there's like I don't I don't to be clear, like I I say I hate these things.

I'm not against like playing them still, but it's just definitely something or just like Yep, don't like this, don't like that, like you know, I know, I know my taste, if that if that makes sense and sure.

Yeah.

And it's like, I mean, I have my taste, my preferences, but I think I'm also, I don't know, I'm very open to like pursuing each game on its own terms of like what it's trying to do or wants to be.

Yeah, for sure.

And because of that, but I, I think I, but I think as a result, I like wipe away my, like I almost wipe away my personal interest.

Then in terms of like, oh, I don't like when games do this or this.

It's like I'm really trying to just do this on its terms if that makes sense.

Yeah, I know.

I mean like I again, I would I I take the game when I play it for what it is, right.

And then something may come up where it's just like, boy, I like, you know, I don't like that or I don't like this like one game that.

And I think it's a great, a great game in general, but in this is more of a personal thing for me, One game that kind of like I got burnt out on to the point where I just like never finished is Unicorn Overlord.

Like I was just like, I'm really like, I'm digging this.

I'm vibing with it.

And then it's just like, boy, this is the entire game, huh?

And I'm doing kind of like the same things over and over again in a way that I just like what it wasn't real.

I just didn't feel like real progression, I guess in a in a real way.

Yeah, you're doing these big, long, fairly long engagements and you're doing those over and over again.

And there is plot that happens, but sometimes it's after quite a few of those battles where nothing has happened plot wise other than this person joined you.

Yeah.

And so like, and then I it's like, Yep, here's another person that's is going to be.

Like in one of my back units and like, I, I don't know, I just use something that like I, I got to a point where I was just like, I think I have gotten the most I'm going to get out of this game.

And even though I like like the game and I think the game has like some interesting systems, I just didn't think the story just really wasn't going anywhere.

And the, you know, the like the sense of like a party didn't really exist in a, in a traditional way.

Sure that I was just like, I think I'm, I think I'm good.

Like I might come back to this and revisit it later, but like I just didn't feel the need to continue.

Yeah, and that's fair of Unicorn Overlord.

I think that game really demands that you care about like its core combat system, which was.

Cool and unique for.

Sure, yeah.

But you have to that has like the joy of doing that needs to be enough.

Not to say that there isn't plot and other stuff that happens in the game that's like good and solid, but it heavily takes a backseat to you're going to do a lot of battles over and over and over again.

And if if that isn't enough, if if the if the act of play is not enough joy, you're not going to stick with it for that particular example.

Yeah.

I mean, like when I think about things that I guess like, bother me more, I mean, like I mentioned, I don't really care for like Revelations Fire album specifically.

I I think one thing that, you know, rubs me the wrong way sometimes is, and this has more to do with storytelling than any kind of particular game choice.

I want to feel interesting, real stakes and like good writing.

There are games where I'm just bothered by like, Yep.

And then everything worked out fine and everyone's a OK and happy.

I mean, this has been a large argument I've had.

We we've brought it before with like some of the Persona games where like a big shift after three for me.

Was that like 3, you know, upped certainly like the the visual novel vibes and you know, with the music choices and that that began the direction that Persona is now in.

But I also feel like 3 still kept some of the darker depressing.

Some TV vibes.

Yeah, and, and there's absolutely some like it is a Pyrrhic victory game like it is.

It is not a thing where everyone ends up fighting and then four and five are both just like, and then, Yep, all the main characters are good.

We all like, everyone gets together, we all have a fun time, Everything's great.

I'm like, what the fuck?

Give me something, make me hurt a little.

Like like I don't need everything to be pop.

Like make me make me feel things.

I would say I would say 5 at the very least.

Does that a little bit in my opinion.

But five straight up hints that the one character that might actually be dead is just OK.

Like, come on.

Like OK.

Hold on, hold on.

You don't think that they're I, I, I think you're being a little bit absolutist here.

Like the because like you don't think like the tragedy of like Maruki isn't like enough or you know what I mean?

Like, or does it have to be specific with the party, right?

Like if, because if that, if, if it's just the party, then like, sure, I I'll give you that because like in Persona 3, like definitely there's like things that affect the.

Party no, I'm not saying there's no tragedy or no drama in the games and everything is happy go lucky at all given moments.

I mean, dear Lord, the first palace in Persona 5 is a great example of how that is not the case.

Yeah, but I'm I'm primarily talking in terms of resolution.

Like I don't I don't find it interesting when resolution is everything 100% works out and thumbs up.

Like it just isn't a thing that I find interesting.

Yes, I, you know, sure.

And again, this is ultimately a plot preference, not really anything about like RPG specifically, but.

This actually makes so much sense.

Why you why why you're a Xenoblade 2 hater?

Because Xenoblade 2 is like the opposite of that.

It's like so like optimism filled and like so like.

It's a God, man, it's a God damn shonen and I've seen plenty of shonen in my life, no.

It's.

Not it's a shonen like it's beat their beat.

It's the immeasurable force of will and power of a 14 year old boy with multiple women that want him.

Like what are you talking about?

If that's if that's how you're going to dumb it down to, sure.

I've look, I'm not saying it doesn't have other elements.

There absolutely are like well written parts of two and they're things it does, but it just loses so much juice for me because it ultimately still boils down to a lot of those tropes and choices.

That's just how my reaction to it was, yeah.

That that's that's.

Wild Rex is genuinely awful.

I'm sorry, I don't.

I think I think he would be better if he had a better voice actor.

But.

I look, I, and here's the thing, you know, I don't necessarily mind a a wildly optimistic character who's going to get by like, you know, off of his power of friendship and belief.

I mean I absolutely love Ichiban, but I also love Ichiban because that man gets kicked in the stomach multiple times and still stands by stands by his beliefs and choices like things don't work out for him.

You don't think that happens to Rex?

I think Rex Rex ends up with a harem.

Rex dies in the first couple hours.

Yeah, and then he ends up with a harem living happily ever after.

Like what do?

You.

Not without sacrifice, not without not.

You know what I mean?

What?

What does he sacrifice other than getting plot armor Not.

Him, not him experiencing sacrifice like, experience like, Van Damme like.

Yeah, I yeah, there's other characters that have things they go through.

And you don't think that affects Rex?

I think Rex has development, but I just don't think his ending is interesting whatsoever.

It doesn't.

OK, I'm not saying that the end of resume, like Chronicles 2 is interesting, but I do think it is like I, I, I love it.

I think it's a beautiful ending.

I think it's a touching ending.

Yeah, sure, it tugs emotional heartstrings.

Yeah, sure, that doesn't make it good.

Oh my.

Getting misty eyed doesn't make a.

Game.

Oh my God, you got to.

You got to stop.

Like, hey, I got a lot of stuff that gives me emotional reactions that I like, but I can't just be like, oh man, like this thing that tugs at heartstrings immediately is good writing.

Like, that's not.

Those aren't the same thing.

If I get an emotional reaction out of something.

See, and here's the difference, right?

I feel everything all the time and you're emotionally constipated.

That's that's part of the problem.

That actually might be a a part of the.

Problem that actually.

That actually might be the part of the problem, but.

I feel things too much.

I, I, I, I feel sad when someone next to me is sad.

Like I just immediately.

I feel everything all of the time.

Yeah, I thought so easy.

Yeah.

Oh, I I wish.

I wish, but no.

I mean, see, now you threw me off.

Now I'm just like well maybe, maybe fuck me, right?

Maybe.

I'm, well, no, it's not.

It's not, but it's just different.

Here's the thing.

At the end of the day, we're different people, Cam.

We like to respond to things differently.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Damn.

I love the direction this all ended up taking.

I really really this is rarely dead.

I really I really got a Stew in that though.

I really got to think about that off off podcast because yeah, dude, like, I don't know, like I, I don't know, I, I thought I, I loved the ending of Xenoblade Chronicles too, so.

Yeah, I and I think it's a fine game.

I I don't feel the way some people do that too.

I mean, you're in the majority, I would say.

Yeah, I mean and look and and I I shit on Rex, I do actually enjoy a lot of things about Xenoblade too.

Like I do like it.

It's just my least favorite and there are specific choices it makes that I really don't like, and so I like to harp on those particular things, but I'm not just like as.

Does the Internet?

Because there are some people who are like, oh, I'll never play too because it has boobs.

And it's like, OK, calm the calm down, calm down.

A thing can do things you don't like and still have other things that are good about it.

And I do overall like Zenoblade Chronicles too.

It's just not my favorite of that set.

And part of it does have to do with some of those choices and tropes it decides to lean into because to me it undercuts and undermines a lot of the other work it's doing.

That is good.

But yeah, to walk it back a little bit, I do like to you just you give the 14 year old this harem and I roll my eyes like I just it's it's an impossible reaction.

I mean like you're not like I get what you're saying.

You're not wrong with the with like the harem shit.

It's just like obviously I guess I'm just able to look past it.

Sure, like Pyra and Mithra.

Pyra is a tragic character.

Yeah, tragic character.

Yeah.

And I can't remember his name right now, but like, the main villain that is, you know, you end up being sympathetic with.

Yeah, Jin, Jin, his whole arc is fantastic.

Yeah.

And this is part of why, even though I dislike the way they pace it, I really enjoy Torna a lot because Torna feels like it downplays a lot of those, a lot of the shown in aspects of two while being in the same setting and has a lot of the setup and introduces more of like, Jin's back story.

And like, I ended up loving Torna a lot more than I love mainline too, for other reasons too.

I like the combat more.

I think it streamlines itself better not having the blade system or in the sense where you're getting random blades and equip them and that kind of thing.

But yeah, that's definitely a large part.

I yeah, like, I like Torna a lot too.

And I think that like, Torna helped re like, you know, it very much gave the back story of Mithra that I needed because the first, first time I played Xenoblade Chronicles was like, fuck Mithra, fuck this bitch, right?

And then I played Torna and I'm like, oh, OK.

Well yeah, and also the fact that Pyra is literally a trauma response and only exists because of.

Yes, which is literally a creation of Mithra's trauma, which is a crazy yes, but cool.

That was our Xenoblade Chronicles 2 tangent.

What next?

But yeah, so that's the thing I dislike is shonen.

I don't know.

Yeah, yeah, I mean, that's fair.

I mean, that's fine.

Like I get it.

I just like I was just able to look past it was like yeah, OK.

Titties and like and like girls like, you know, falling for Rex, like that's fine.

Yeah, I just.

I think what happens for me in those is that I'm cool with those things existing as well.

I would just rather than be in a thing where that's the goal, you know what I mean?

Like if you want a BTN, A/B, TNA, cool.

Yeah, like don't, don't try to also tell me like, oh, but then this is also this epic heartstring story with this going on.

It's like guys like, pick one, pick, pick a path.

What are we doing?

Here I really don't even like.

Even then though, I don't think they look really like push that narrative until like especially going much later in the game.

Yeah, no, yeah.

It, it, it's a thing where you're like, they're not going to do that.

They're not going to do, oh, they're doing that.

Yeah, I really need to play Feature redeemed.

I need to.

I really need to play.

I want to know more.

I like.

I don't think we learn more about the whole Poly polyamory.

Polycool.

Yeah, Polycool, but that is and like I don't think Monolasoft has commented on that at all since.

I remember.

So I mean, I guess this is spoilers that we're talking about that that's a thing.

But I remember when that initially leaked like the the photo people.

Didn't think it was real, they.

Were I thought, yeah, I thought it was someone's fan art or something like that's really, that's really stupid.

And then when I thought it was real later.

I like, I like 3 so much but three is the one that like canonizes that shit like even beyond what 2 did and it's so funny.

Yeah, what was the director's name again for?

Of Xenoblade like in general?

Of Xenoblade, yeah.

Saga, it's I'm blind.

But anyway, director was just like direct.

Takahashi.

Takahashi.

Yeah, Takahashi, it's just like we either don't let like any of like there's.

We don't give an answer or we give it to everyone.

Yeah.

Yeah, it's like either we canonize everyone or we canonize no one.

And they decided to go the everyone route, which, like, OK, listen, like, I don't, I'm not, you know, no judgement here.

Like they're living the lives they want to live.

Oh.

Yeah, none of this has to do with me having a problem with like polyamorism.

No, yeah, it's just.

I have a problem with hair I'm writing.

Like, oh, I mean, yeah, I guess for me, it's just like, oh, they, they, they did this.

Which, especially being in a Japanese role-playing game, a Nintendo game, it's like.

A Nintendo IP, yeah.

Yeah, A.

Nintendo IP, it's like, wow, OK.

Hey man, love is love, even if it's between a technologically advanced blade being divided into two people and a 14 year old boy.

I don't, I don't know, man.

And NIA, it's weird.

Well, Nia's also so yeah.

I thought you meant Pyro mythos specifically, but anyway.

All of it.

All of it, but we got to move on to another thing that bothers us.

No, I get what you're I get what you're you're saying though, because like again, like I I I really want to do want to get to this part out of the way.

Obviously, you know, I'm love trails and I think that trails does do some wild fan service as well sometimes.

But like there is some like I don't want to go as far to say as it's like a harem, but there is like, oh, here's this MC, Here's all these women that like the MC like sure type.

Deal well and isn't it like starting with Cold Steel, there's like an actual light romance aspect where you can like kind of like have your pick of like who the main character gets with or something I think I've heard.

That before so in Cross Bell it's Lloyd and like like canonically like it's pretty heavily handed that it's Lloyd and Ellie, but also people like to ship Lloyd with Risha.

It's very popular cuz she's just a very popular series character.

Yeah, but that's because the game doesn't go out of its way to like, canonize.

Like hey, this is officially a couple in universe.

Yeah, but like in general, even in the crossbow games, like it very much pushes like Lloyd and Ellie sure.

Like it's not like to the point where we see still in Joshua, but yeah.

And then in Cold Steel, it's like Reen.

And you know what, in general before like, well, let me finish this off.

And then in general, we need to talk about this.

OK.

You know, you can there's like a few of the the girls that you can date.

But again, the game very much pushes Alyssa.

And then like Van is a bit different and a bit weirder in my opinion, because Van you have on yes, who is a minor that obviously like has feelings for Van.

And then there's Elaine, who is his childhood friend, lifelong friend they used to date.

She still has feelings for him and like there's like this kind of like divide there, but like, but like Van is like just again, based off of the game, it's very much either like he may end up back up with Elaine or he's probably going to end up with nobody and stay by and stay single.

But kind of like what Max said on the episode last week is that Falcon has gotten to this weird point now where they don't want to.

Step on ships.

Yeah, step on ships, which is stupid.

I'm sorry it's stupid.

Like you can live in y'all fantasies.

Like let let let Canon like relationships be canonized.

That being said, how do you feel about romance in JRPGS?

As in, like how romance?

Like mechanics are executed.

The mechanics of romance, I mean, it's extraordinarily shallow 95% of the time, yes, right.

Like it's usually just like which character do you like?

And you do like 4 conversations and pick the obvious yes choice and then congratulations, you have heart symbols around this character.

Like, I mean, don't get me wrong, there's like that bass ID instinct that's just like, I like this character so I'm going to romance them and like cool.

I think most of the time, especially in JRPGS, like Western RPGs really aren't any better about it.

I think they put like a little more effort, but it's still not good.

But most GRP GS that have it as a mechanic, like I, I like romance as like a plot element.

I mean, we talked about this during to to plug more campfire catalogs.

That was a large part of Lunar, right?

Like the first Lunar is such love is such a central theme of that game.

I mean, the party is made of couples, and I think that's something really great about it.

And so romance is a concept.

I'm yeah, awesome.

Love it.

The idea of mechanically representing your character, picking their love interest, it doesn't really do much for me.

And I don't think it's ever really, like again.

I understand the kind of base impulse fun of it where you go.

I pick the one I like and like, Cool.

I, I don't think it adds anything to the overall structure of the game or, and it's not a reason why I'm like, oh, I'm going to pick this up.

That's actually a really big thing about Fire Emblem and the way they've developed the support system, because the support system has been around for a long time.

Originally it was just like a passive thing where, yeah, these two characters plot wise are related or in a relationship and so they get bonuses for being near each other.

Eventually they turn that into a mechanic where it's like, hey, you can build supports between people and initially it was specific pairings.

It's like this character can support one of these four or five people and they have their own little plot arc for why that is, either because they get romantically involved or because they're a long lost siblings, or they have similar backgrounds.

They're able to commiserate over whatever and then eventually they start trying to do things like let everyone support everyone.

And that's where you start getting supports that are like, I like the cut of your jib C rank achieved.

And it's like all right.

And you start getting into and then it hits.

I think it's peak of annoying me where you get into Awakening on where you get your avatar character and it's like, Hey, you now get to romance the character you want and have kids with them in some of these games.

And it's like, cool.

I didn't mind when there was romance that made sense for specific characters and it was written specifically for them.

I do mind when it's just like I'm going to play matchmaker and pick the character I want to have be my waifu and it's like, all right, cool.

Yeah, in general, like, I think that there's like should be like a minimum when it comes to like if you're going to implement romance, like it needs to do at least these things mechanically.

Like I think Persona and Fire Emblem are like the best examples of like this is the floor here.

Like this is like, yeah, this is the minimum.

And even then I would go like a step higher where like, hey, you have like the support or, you know, these support scenes, right?

And you get bonuses for for gameplay when you do it.

But on top of that, like I need that shit to matter in the plot somewhere.

Sure.

Like I need that shit to matter somewhere in the plot, even if it's like a small thing and like a very penultimate moment or whatever.

Like I need this to feel like this actually meant something outside of like getting the bonuses for this character for like a battle or something.

Have you played I forget if I forget what you have and how not played to this franchise?

Have you played Symphonia yet?

Tales of Symphonia, Yeah, long time ago, but yes.

Yeah, I mean, that's a good example of something where, like they add a relationship system and that it actually does come up at a certain point in the story.

That's like, this only plays out this way because you were in this relationship and like, that's cool.

Like you, you acknowledge it in some way beyond just like a bonus scene at the ending or an extra line of dialogue.

Yeah, and I like Fire Emblem is OK to me because like that doesn't go that far because at least at least in Awakening, it's because you they have kids, right?

It's like, oh, this is your reward for is that you have kids and then you gonna have like these dialogues with your parent to kid and like all that stuff that I think is really, really cool.

I really, really appreciate that.

But yeah, like certain instances like like again, I don't think Trails does the romance stuff in Cold Steel.

Well, like, I think it's like really pointless and it thankfully it only happens in the Cold Steel games.

They rework things.

So it's just like general connection stuff in in the Daybreak games.

But yeah, it's like, and again, like Exhibition 33, like terrible.

Like why, why?

Why have that in the game?

You know what I mean?

Like it was well.

I agree.

That was that was a I'll formed.

There's a few things about EX33 where I love the base of it and there's a lot of attached systems where I'm like, you didn't need to add this.

Yeah, like you could have just focused on the other things you already had going.

Exactly.

And it doesn't affect the story in any way based off the choices that you make at the end with Verso.

And it's just like what?

Like, yeah, OK.

Yeah, I do agree that was very poorly.

Like, it depends a little bit too.

And like what you even think they're trying to like, get out of doing that edition, other than just being like, which of these two female characters do you want to see this guy get with?

But it's just.

Yeah.

And then that happens off screen and then it's never like mentioned ever again.

I think some dialogue is slightly different in there, like support combos, but not in like the actual like like plot line, yeah.

Well, if you do CL, CL's romance happens earlier.

Yeah, Luna's is at the very end.

Right.

Yeah.

So with CL, sure, yeah.

That's but but Luna I think the triggers for activating like even though the result isn't till later, I think the triggers are earlier and some conversations between do play a little differently.

Cuz it's not it's not a choice you make in her final convo.

There's a choice you make like on the 3rd or 4th one that'll be the actual like flag.

I don't remember that I remember.

It doesn't.

It doesn't signal it at all.

Like I only found it out in retrospect, yeah.

Cuz yeah, I thought it was just like, oh, you have to do her loyalty mission type thing and then and then she actually trusts you enough that like.

Nope.

There's specific dialogue choices you have to make in earlier conversations for it to actually flag.

OK, sure.

It's just, it's just not good.

It's just not good.

Yeah, No, I I agree.

It was not executed well.

I I like that game and that's one thing that I think it did not do well at all.

I agree.

I like the game too, just not as much as you.

Yeah, I like it more than you do.

Yeah, but going back to trails, I no genuinely, genuinely Kevin.

And I know that like this puts a lot of expectations and I know that those expectations have only like scared you away from trails because you want because you're scared of your expectations are not going to be met.

I mean that in the sort of runtime investment, but yeah.

That's you, that's you, that's you.

I genuinely am curious as to like how you were going to feel about JRPGS as a genre after you play like the first two Trails games like in the.

Sense of like.

In the sense of like, you know, for me, I'm in the mindset of just like, why does like, why does this game not do this like trails?

Like because because The thing is like it does a lot of the normal JRPG things like, but it just does it to a degree where it's just like, how can this small team this, you know, this team of 65 people able to consistently make these really in depth JRPGS?

But then like these bigger studios, regardless of like the type of JRPG that they're really making, as long as it's like, you know, not a tactics game, but if it's like, you know, you're more traditional JRPG, like, why can't they do this here?

If that makes sense?

Like my expectation for JRPG is fundamentally went up after playing through Trails because it's just like this, these guys can do it.

Let's have everyone else do it too.

And that's like, and you know, I would say like a portion of that is like it's stuff that only Trails can do or like only like because Trails is trying to achieve a specific thing.

But in general, just like the quality of the side quests, the quality of the world building, the quality of like all of these things that I just like, never experienced in a JRPG before until I play Trails because it was, you know, and like how it's just like, you know, it, it's, it's, it's a little bit unfair, but it's just like, it's hard not to compare other JRPGS to Trails nowadays because it's just like they can do this.

Like this is normal stuff.

This is like normal things.

Why can't you do it?

And so I'm very curious as to like once you at the very least finished second chapter, how you kind of like if you're like kind of in expectations or like you know what, like you, you know, you think that are the kind of bottom line of like what you think X like JRPGS should achieve.

Right.

Has shifted.

That's what I'm curious about.

All right, I mean, I can't yeah, I have no follow up for this because it requires me to play a pair of 50 hour games.

But like, yes.

Yeah, no, once you no, at the end of the year we're we're gonna have like a topic of the show where we're just talking about like yeah, hey.

That is the new, so the new.

How we feeling?

I did fail this last year, I copped to it entirely but the fail last year was I did not finish first chapter before 1st chapter remake happened.

I did play it, didn't finish it.

The new goal is I'm gonna finish first chapter remake before 2nd chapter drops and I'm gonna play through that as well, like ASAP this year.

Yeah, unless that month gets absolutely wrecked, but we'll see how that goes.

Yeah, I mean, like, now's the perfect time, right?

Well, I gotta finish Legend Dragoon first.

Yeah, there's that too.

There's.

We have obligations.

We do have other obligations and Omori, but Omori's like 20 hour game should be pretty quick.

That's easy, yeah.

But yeah, you know, I think we talked about a lot of different things that we want or don't want in JRPGS or what we like and don't like.

So we have a bit a bit of a better understanding of our of our tastes and things like that.

You're gonna say something.

I just had a quick thought and this is a whole other subject within that that who knows how much longer this episode will be if I do this, if I open the store, depending on how we want to talk about it just in general with like the direction JRPG has been going with combat options, right?

Whether that's like how are we still feeling on when we see a turn based game, when we see a mono character action game calling itself a JRPG still when you have party based real time action games, games that walk that line a bit, which I absolutely hate, like Xenoblade.

I like Xenoblade.

I don't like the half and half combat of, you know, tab target, cool down, focus, whatever.

You don't like the MMO?

Yeah, I would rather just straight up turn based or straight up action.

I don't love when something's like no, like it's still kind of turn based because you have cool downs and you hit the thing when it lights up and positioning still matters and it's like cool, just make it an action game or make it a turn based game.

I don't this does nothing for.

Me could not disagree with you more like.

I don't.

Single blade combat, I don't know what they put in that outside of outside of 1, I don't know what they put in that.

Shit, yeah, no one is definitely not a good example.

Yeah, no, but like Xenoblade 2 and Xenoblade 3, like and XI, don't know what they put in that shit, but I love it.

I, I don't like outright hate it like I play it and like I get feel like whatever I can play it.

It's not grueling or anything.

It's just if I have my choice, I would absolutely take a pure turn based or pure action game over that.

It is my least ideal situation.

I'm, I'm a little conflicted with how GRP GS have been evolving because like I do think a certain there's, there's a few factors.

One like we got a lot of big companies saying like, oh, we're switching to action hybrid because turn based isn't like engaging enough and things like that.

And I just like just fundamentally disagree with that.

And on top of that, it's, it's tough, right?

Because I just don't know like the right way to kind of dive into the topic of the, because because accessibility isn't purely difficulty, right?

Like accessibility is like there's multiple factors to that.

But I think for like general, the general aspects of accessibility for like people that aren't directly like part of the disabled community or anything like that, it is kind of like this ways to like make the game easier.

And I think that we've like over over the years, we've also seen a shift there where like I, I do like the push and pull of like JRPG combat and like how it, you know, you do have to like strategize, you have to work for your wins a lot, not a lot of the time.

But like, you know, every now and then, even outside of boss fights, that just has started to kind of fade into oblivion, sadly.

You know, we, we do have some instances where that is still present, like the Urduch trilogy, Octopath, which is which is great.

But when it comes to like these more mainstream titles, we're not really seeing that anymore.

And that is a trend that I do not like even in Trails.

You know, one of the things I didn't mention in our Horizon review is that like once you understand the systems of like the action hybrid, those fights go super fast.

Like, and maybe that is by design and I get that.

But like when you're when the gate, when the cycle of a combat is you hit enough enemies to stun someone, you press square to release shards, boost to EX, chain one enemy, and then you go into your S craft to wipe everyone out.

And that is like what you do verbatim almost every, you know, encounter you do that isn't a boss fight.

That's you know, it's it's satisfying because it's like a well made system, but it's also like there's no real tension, which I wish that there was a bit more of.

That was the things that I actually really liked in sky cuz like in sky cuz in general, from sky down to like Daybreak, I think the games have just naturally gotten easier.

Sure.

And sky remake really brought back a bit more of that difficulty.

Like I remember when I played the demo and I was fighting Josette, Josette like was an actual like push and pull bit more of a challenge than some other bosses that you fight in like the more recent games where it's just like, you know, you have like the mindset that you kind of have in an extended fight in Daybreak through like fight when you're fighting like normal ads.

You will probably find an equal amount of success in these boss fights where you know you're trying to get their stunt up.

EX chain S craft.

Like really the only instances where I had any sort of struggle was when they when like this boss specifically, a lot of their moves afflicted a specific status ailment that like I didn't have the gear that made myself immune to that or it prevented that for a large amount.

And that's when I'm like, OK, I just got to like basically die reset and then pick the right gear and then do it again or just use the items to like to cheer myself of that and then see if I can, you know, hold out.

And like that to me isn't like the Super engaging combat that I fell in love with the trail series on.

And so like it's, you know, it's, it's tough.

I, I, you know, I can understand like from a business standpoint, why those decisions are being made.

And there's some instances where like it did bring up like one of my favorite combat systems being in the remake trilogy, right?

Like the the remake combat system is fantastic.

But there, you know, and there are other instances where it's just like, yeah, you know, I just like not really vibing with this.

I wish it was a little bit more challenging.

I wish that there was a little bit more push and pull to the to the combat.

And yeah, that's kind of where I stand on it.

Yeah.

I mean, difficulty in general is such an awkward line to walk sometimes, especially because I think we have entered a time where, as you mentioned earlier, I think a lot of stuff often times gets framed as accessibility.

And sometimes it actually is like thoughtful incorporation in that.

And a lot of times it's, oh, we make it more accessible by making it easier.

These are not the same thing.

Yeah, you know, those are not the same thing.

But a lot of times that's the result we end up getting, which I I agree is not great.

I'm all for options.

Like if you want a game to have a story mode where you just do story mode and everyone has infinite health and you never have to worry about anything, more power to you.

It does not bother me, but it is absolutely important to me that like a game's normal, like default, assume difficulty is something that has a difficulty to it.

You know, if I want a game to be easy, I'll pick easy, I'll pick story, whatever.

But if you're giving me those options, then I want that option to be meaningful.

And some of this comes down to different people's, what they're used to.

And sure, I might have an easier time with something someone else has difficulty with, but there's absolutely a general shift away from friction that I don't really agree with.

I think friction is a great thing.

I think friction is one of the things that can really make victories feel a lot more meaningful and interesting in a game.

And there are a lot of games where, like you don't really get that anymore.

And I think some of the major franchises walk the line well enough.

Like there was still might be easier than I prefer, but they're not just like a total cakewalk.

There's exceptions.

And Final Fantasy, the remakes I think are a really good example of 1 where, yeah, they're trying something different.

The goal is to have that action element.

The goal is to be more engaging, whatever that means to the person saying it.

But I think it does walk that line in the way that I personally do find interesting still.

And like, there are solutions to problems that make things easier, but you can also tough it out if you want.

There are things that can simplify certain encounters, but it's not always going to be a one time solution.

There are interesting choices to which characters you're using and how that impacts the flow of battle.

Like there's a lot that that game that those games are balancing right now that I think is excellent.

And we're not really seeing in a lot of other stuff, especially the ones that are making the pivot to action.

I mean, even within Square Enix itself, I, I've talked about this before.

I don't care about 16's combat.

Like, I think 16's action combat is not great.

You have a wash win 3 peak combo, you equip your load out of special moves that you activate on cool down.

And then once an enemy is broken, you do the other set of moves to do as much damage as you can.

And it's like, cool, that was fun, I guess.

And yeah, so like I, I, I'm not like, I know there are some people who are very much like, you know, Final Fantasy specifically is the example that goes back to a lot where they're like, make it turn based again.

Turn based is the like the, the true way.

And I'm like, I don't there's good action games and there's good ways to incorporate action.

Combat and action elements have been around as long as like the GRPG genre, at least going back to like SNES era.

I mean we got stuff like Star Ocean and the older Tales games.

Action RPGs have existed for quite a while.

It's not something that just happened with like the 3D shift and AAA budgets.

So I don't have that immediate ick of like, oh, like turn based is a true GRPG.

But I do understand why people kind of want that to come back sometimes and have good examples of doing it better, which we do still have some games doing.

Like, you know, there's this whole idea about how we've talked about this a few times where people act like turn based RPGs have been dead.

And it's like Persona games still come out, SMT games still come out, Octopath Traveler, even Square Enix has their franchises they're supporting that are focused on turn base.

It's just so happens that their biggest name, one that people harken back to, isn't has not.

And that's like, I think leaves a sour taste in some people's mouths.

And so I agree with you, like, I, I guess my main point is that when it comes to just the general direction of things, I, I think there is a way to, I don't know if chasing trend is the right term, but like there's a way to embrace the concepts of like, oh, we do think, you know, action combat is a viable route.

I think you can still make an engaging, good, interesting game that's tactical with that choice.

It's just not the way that all of them end up.

And I do think that turn based games are still extremely relevant.

Ultimately, the bigger problem is whether or not you incorporate any degree of friction or not to make those combat systems interesting and worth investing time in and mastering, as well as just what steps you take to add a little variety.

Because yeah, like there are certainly turn based games that are just like, it's my term.

I do my high damage move, call it a day, maybe heal if I need to.

And then there's other ones where you do get that push and pull interesting feeling, whether that's by introducing some kind of brake system, some kind of boost system, some way of just adding a little bit of extra thought into the moment to moment gameplay beyond just simply what's the move that's going to do the most hurt right now.

Yeah, I, yeah, I mean, I, I agree with you.

I just think that we we're in a weird we're kind of in a weird space right now just because like a lot of the major JRPGS are kind of like being created.

So I'm very curious as to like what a Final Fantasy 18 looks like what a you know, what changes or like kind of shifts Persona 6 will have?

Sure, cuz I would even argue that Persona 5 is like notably easier than Persona 3 and four Yeah and yeah.

And I think that Reload did follow like 5 trends.

Like I'm talking about like the original 3P3P, like Persona 4 Golden, like those those had like a sense of friction that 5 did not have.

And like, part of that I think was a design choice to make, you know, cuz that game was all about style, right?

And they wanted you to feel cool as the phantom Thieves that they're like, hey, we're going to implement these things to make combat easier and make it have more flair and, and stylish while still being engaging.

But you know that I, I cannot, I can't deny that when I play Persona 5, it's just like, boy, I'm just kind of doing the same thing over again.

And it's not like, you know, once you kind of like know what this new enemies weaknesses, it's just like, all right, rinse and repeat, rinse and repeat.

Yeah.

And to a certain extent it was like that in Persona 3 and 4.

But again, there was still there was enough where there was enough tension going on that I just didn't really think about it as much.

Yeah, I mean older Persona games are definitely a little more swingier and punishing if you end up having a bad turn and enemies hit the right weakness.

I think a large part of it too is that 5.

Royal specifically and then three reload by extension, they add more easy methods of being able to like get the element you need because like in three, it's like you have your party members and you have your main character who's the wild card.

You're not swapping people in, you're not like tag, whatever.

Like it's just it's your turn.

Do the thing you can do and hopefully you have something that affects the enemy you're currently fighting.

Whereas like 3 reload and five royal.

These are mechanics that are very fun and they feel very like satisfying, but they also absolutely annihilate the difficulty where it's like, I forget what they call it right now, but like the but Tom pass.

But Tom Pass such a great feeling to deal tons of damage with it.

But you can also do it so, so consistently.

And three-year old is the same thing where they don't call baton pass anymore, but it's like the you signal this person to act next so you can use them.

To I forgot what it's called.

Weakness, yeah, But there's just so many more ways of, like, guaranteeing your next turn.

You have the thing, the tool you need to, like, hit a weakness.

And that really impacts the momentum in those games that you can consistently hit weaknesses more often instead of being stuck with like what you brought into combat.

It's called shift.

That's.

All it's called.

Yeah, yeah, I agree.

And so I'm very curious as to that was like the thing that actually was kind of refreshing about metaphors, that metaphor.

Like I felt a little bit more of that difficulty come back when you do go into the turn based stuff.

Like if you did do like the squad attack, then yeah, probably not as much like that's kind of like the point of it.

But when you did have like some of these more proper fights, it's like, oh, OK, like this is like, you know, there's it's not like you're going to defeat these enemies in a single turn.

You you know, there's going to be a bit more depth to it.

So great.

No, I'm glad you brought that up, Kevin, because that's definitely something to talk about.

And I'm, I am curious about where the where, where the future holds with that.

But yeah, I, you know, as I said before, like some of my favorite, most of my favorite combat systems in GRP GS are like real time based, yo, Kingdom Hearts 2, like Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth, like, but in general, I prefer turn based.

Like I, you know, I do like that more and it's more consistent for that for me.

Sure.

And so, all righty, Kevin, do you have anything for the people before we dip out?

Yeah, four more topics.

I think we need to do a tackle real quick.

No, we're good.

We're good.

This already.

It's really funny.

I always love when this happens in some episodes where I'll look at the timer and I'm like, yeah, we're getting, we got through news pretty quick.

We didn't really have what we've been playing.

We're already on the topic of the show.

This is going to be like an hour and a half and then the right keyword activates one of us.

Suddenly it's like, oh, never mind, this is now a 2 1/2 hour episode.

So it goes.

Yeah, no, it's fun.

We haven't had like a lengthy discussion in a minute, so.

Yeah, this year's most have been shorter episodes.

So this was this was a little catch up on that.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

All right, everybody, you can follow me on socials at Camp Final Mix and you can follow Kevin on socials at Kevin Kenson.

Thank you, everybody, for listening to this week's episode.

And until next time, we'll catch you later.

Later.