Samantha Lienhard's Blog, page 66

PlayStation Showcase Highlights (KotOR Remake, God of War, and More!)

Yesterday was the PlayStation Showcase, and we have a lot of great things to talk about!

I went into it hoping for God of War and maybe an update on Final Fantasy XVI (although I thought that was unlikely), but I came away with a lot more.

So here are my favorite highlights from the showcase!

They started with a Star Wars game, and I was intrigued. Then I saw what it was. Yes, it’s really happening… a Knights of the Old Republic Remake!

The teaser didn’t show much, but it’s a Knights of the Old Republic remake! I love the original game so much, and so now I will live in mixed excitement and dread. The announcement post says they’ll stay true to the story, so I hope they mean that.

Moving on, the next game was an action game I first heard about last year and thought seemed interesting, Project EVE, and it looks great! It might be a lot of fun (and maybe fill the stylish action void while we wait for Bayonetta 3).

I knew it was sci-fi, but it also looks like it’s got some creepy enemy designs, so I’m on board with that!

Meanwhile, Square Enix was there with a new Forspoken trailer.

I know Forspoken has gotten some grief for its isekai setup of a character from our world being transported into a fantasy world and becoming its hero, but I think it has potential.

However, the trailer involves a cat. Comments have rightfully pointed out that the cat does not appear to go with her to the fantasy world. I demand happiness for the cat, Square Enix!

Alan Wake Remastered got an October 5 release date, and I’m mainly excited about this because it brings us one step closer to getting an Alan Wake 2. Yes, I know I still need to play Control. I’ll do that soon.

One of the biggest surprises of the show for me was getting to see Ghostwire: Tokyo again. I was interested in Ghostwire: Tokyo from the time it was announced, but my excitement did diminish slightly after last year’s showcase, where we saw it would be more action and less horror.

But… it looks really cool and like it might still have a pretty creepy atmosphere at times!

It’ll be out in Spring 2022.

There’s a cute open world adventure game called Tchia, but of course the next major highlight for me was the game that closed out the show, our first real look at God of War: Ragnarok.

I was hoping for a release date, but even though we didn’t get one, I’m sure it will be out sometime next year. It looks great! Sure, some people are complaining that it looks graphically like the previous game, but I don’t care! I loved God of War 2018, and I’m so excited to see that story continue.

One thing that has me a little worried is that they made some comments afterwards that sounded like the Norse saga would wrap up in this game. I thought it would be a trilogy at least, since it feels like there’s a lot of stuff to pack into a single game to end the Norse storyline here.

However, what the director specifically said was that “You can’t call the game God of War: Ragnarok and not have Ragnarok happen in the game. So you know, it’s gonna happen, we’re gonna cap off the Norse series with it.”

While that does sound like this game will conclude the Norse saga, I think there’s a chance that it will build up to Ragnarok occurring at the end and lead into another game that deals with Ragnarok. We’ll see.

Either way, I can’t wait!

There were a lot of other things in the showcase that we didn’t talk about here that I know fans are excited for, like the new Spider-Man game, but these are the ones that stood out to me personally. What were your favorite highlights from yesterday’s PlayStation Showcase?

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NIS Classics Volume 2 Contains Makai Kingdom and ZHP

Among all the other games coming out this year, Prinny Presents NIS Classics Volume 1 was recently released, a collection containing Phantom Brave and Soul Nomad.

I’d never played either of those before, and I’m interested in trying them someday.

(In fact, I probably would have picked them up at launch if this wasn’t the year in which every game I want comes out at once.)

The “Volume 1” in the title was a pretty good indication that there would eventually be another collection, and today they officially announced Prinny Presents NIS Classics Volume 2.

Volume 2 contains Makai Kingdom: Reclaimed and Rebound and ZHP: Unlosing Ranger vs. Darkdeath Evilman. According to comments I’ve seen online, this includes the new content of the previously Japan-exclusive Makai Kingdom PSP port.

I’m not too familiar with either of these games, but I’ll be sure to look into them. NIS Classics Volume 2 will be out for PC and Switch sometime in Spring 2022.

Meanwhile, we’ve got a lot of other great games coming out as well, with Tales of Arise right around the corner. Have you played any of the NIS Classics titles so far? Which are you hoping will be added to theoretical future volumes?

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Lost Judgment DLC Details

One mystery that has surrounded Lost Judgment ever since it became available for pre-order was that the Digital Deluxe and Digital Ultimate editions included some sort of DLC, but no one knew what.

Well, the DLC has now officially been revealed.

Everything is listed out here by Gematsu. All pre-orders include the Quick-Start Support Pack, basically some bonus items as a preorder bonus.

Then there are three main pieces of DLC: the Detective Essentials Pack, the School Stories Expansion Pack, and the Kaito Files Story Expansion.

The Detective Essentials Pack includes new colors for your dog, four new Master System games, a “Super Shin Amon” fight, and three additional girlfriend options, along with some other items and bonuses. This feels substantial for day-one DLC, and I’m not crazy about extra side content being available at launch as DLC.

(The Japanese website appears to list Tsukino as one of the three extra girlfriends, which makes me hope the twins are returning outside of DLC as well.)

On October 26, the School Stories Expansion Pack will be released with a lot of little extras, like new dance moves and motorcycle parts, and more notably a fourth combat style that lets you use the boxing mini-game’s moves in actual combat.

Making a combat style DLC doesn’t sit well with a lot of fans, and to me it feels strange to release content that would appear throughout the game a month after it comes out.

And finally, the big Kaito Files Story Expansion DLC will be out in Spring 2022, and it’s a side story starring Kaito as a playable character. According to the official details, it will be about 10 hours long.

Since all of these things are described only as being pre-order bonuses with the Digital Deluxe/Digital Ultimate, I got a little concerned that you might not be able to buy them on their own, but RGG Studio confirmed that the Lost Judgment DLC will be available to purchase separately.

I have mixed feelings about the DLC. The story DLC is fine; I’m completely okay with buying DLC for a good side story expansion. And I never care much about cosmetic DLC and minor things like that. But including small pieces of side content, mini-games, and a combat style as DLC feels like a step in the wrong direction.

How do you feel about Lost Judgment’s DLC? Will you be getting it?

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Impostor Factory Has a Release Date!

Our wait for Impostor Factory, the third game in the To the Moon series, is almost over!

Today, Freebird Games announced that Impostor Factory will be out on September 30.

(Right on top of everything else, of course.)

A new comic is supposed to come out around the same time, with more information about that coming soon.

We still don’t know a lot about Impostor Factory, but To the Moon is one of my favorites and I also loved Finding Paradise, so I’m sure this game will be great. I also can’t wait to see if and how it advances the overarching series storyline. It is officially described on Steam as “bonkers time-loop tragicomedy murder mystery thriller,” so that should be interesting.

So the September 30 release date puts it just a few days after Lost Judgment, which is two weeks after Tales of Arise, which is less than two weeks away as I contend with The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles, NEO: The World Ends With You, and Psychonauts 2. All the games I want to play keep coming out at once!

At this rate, I half-expect PlatinumGames to just shadow-drop Bayonetta 3 at the next Nintendo Direct. …Not that I would complain at all if that happened. But if the universe is listening, that would be right in line with the rest…

Anyway, are you looking forward to Impostor Factory? What do you think it will be like?

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More Music-Based Hints of a Possible New Xenoblade

Not too long ago, rumors of a Xenoblade Chronicles 3 circulated due to Jenna Coleman (who plays Melia) saying in an interview that she thought a third Xenoblade was in development.

Maybe yes, maybe no – it didn’t sound to me like she necessarily knew for sure.

Something that definitely makes me hopeful we might see a new Xenoblade soon, though, is the recent work of composer Yasunori Mitsuda.

Mitsuda has worked on a lot of games, not just Xenoblade, but the more details come out, the more hopeful it seems. Several months ago, there were tweets that suggested Mitsuda might be working on a project with ACE, a group that also worked on Xenoblade Chronicles and Xenoblade Chronicles 2, although it wasn’t clear.

A couple of months later, the Bratislava Symphony Orchestra posted about recording music for a Japanese video game, to which Mitsuda replied saying it was a great recording session. The Bratislava Symphony Orchestra previously worked with him on Xenoblade Chronicles 2.

And now, Mitsuda is remotely recording with someone from Ireland. Another group that contributed to Xenoblade Chronicles 2’s music is the Irish choral group Anúna. When asked if they’re the ones he’s recording with now, they just replied “Aha…”

Is this related to Xenoblade Chronicles? Who knows? It’s certainly not confirmed. However, a composer who worked on Xenoblade in the past seems to be doing several collaborations with groups that also worked on Xenoblade… so it’s starting to feel likely.

(I still hope we see a Xenoblade Chronicles X sequel someday, though.)

Do you think we’ll see a Xenoblade Chronicles 3 announcement soon?

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Tales of Luminaria Has an All-New Cast and Story

When the new Tales game announced at Gamescom turned out to be a mobile game, I was a bit disappointed.

Not that I expected a whole new mainline title to be announced before Arise is even out, but I was hoping they’d remaster some of the other titles.

Instead, they announced Tales of Luminaria for iOS and Android, the latest in a long line of mobile Tales games that haven’t had much longevity in the west. The most recent was Tales of Crestoria, which I’d like to play for its story once I get a newer tablet (so I really hope this isn’t a sign that Crestoria will be shut down like the others).

However, Tales of Luminaria is not a crossover game.

According to the recent developer messages posted by Bandai Namco, “none of the previous series characters will appear in this title, so you will have the experience of following the encounters and growth of an all-new cast of characters.”

They also said it will have “a volume of content that surpasses that of previous original titles.” Its official themes are “possibilities and discoveries.”

Back when Tales of Crestoria was first announced, that’s what it sounded like it would be, until they revealed the crossover element. It’s interesting to hear that Tales of Luminaria is completely original. The way they describe Luminaria makes it sound like a normal Tales game, just built for mobile devices.

Is it too much to hope that means it won’t have gacha? I’m not crazy about mobile games, but I’ll be interested in learning more about this one and what they have planned. What do you think of Tales of Luminaria?

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Gamescom 2021 Opening Night Highlights

Gamescom 2021 is in progress now, and this afternoon was the Gamescom Opening Night live stream.

I went into it with more curiosity than ever about the whole Blue Box/Abandoned conspiracy theory, because after following it out of amusement for a while, the latest phone antics made me wonder if there’s really something to it.

But in general, I just hoped to see some good games, preferably some surprises.

So let’s go through the highlights (highlights for me, that is, since some big-name games don’t interest me).

There was a short pre-show ahead of the main show, and it included some jokes that actually made me laugh, like the instruction to criticize any streamer who doesn’t talk over the boring parts.

House of Ashes and Dolmen both look nice and creepy. Dolmen in particular has had my attention for a while since it’s supposed to be cosmic horror.

DrinkBox’s new game, Nobody Saves the World, looks like it could be fun. A mysterious new game called Dream Cycle was also announced from the creator of the original Tomb Raider games, and even though they barely showed anything from it, I’m interested in learning more. (Update: It’s inspired by H.P. Lovecraft’s Dream Cycle, but apparently it’s a sandbox game.)

Halo Infinite got a new trailer for its multiplayer, as well as a December 8 release date.

Then there was a game that looks both very cute and very dark called Cult of the Lamb.

A new character for Super Monkey Ball: Banana Mania had been teased, and it turned out to be Morgana from Persona 5, who will be available as DLC.

They showed a new trailer for The Outlast Trials, although it was delayed to 2022, and a game called DokeV that looked pretty cute and entertaining, but it’s an open world MMO, so I doubt I’ll play it.

Now, I’m usually not thrilled when there’s a musical performance during one of these events, but this time it was Lindsey Stirling performing music from Tales of Arise (dressed as Shionne, no less), so I enjoyed that. And then they said Arise wasn’t the only Tales news they had and announced a new…… Tales mobile game.

Tales of Luminaria will be the newest Tales mobile game, and I have to admit I was disappointed since I keep hoping they’ll port/remaster some of the older games. Lost Judgment also got highlighted briefly.

Finally, it closed with a new trailer for Death Stranding: Director’s Cut. I never got around to getting Death Stranding, so I’ll probably pick up the Director’s Cut eventually. (And it was just a Death Stranding trailer, so people are searching for connections while I’m firmly back on Team Confused.)

Those were the highlights for me from Gamescom’s opening night show! What games stood out the most to you?

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The Great Ace Attorney: Adventures Sets the Stage for Its Sequel

Over the weekend, I finished the first half of The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles, the game now officially titled The Great Ace Attorney: Adventures.

The more I played it, the more I wondered if I should think of Chronicles not as a collection of two games, but as one big Ace Attorney game.

Before we get into that, it’s a beautiful game and I love how expressive the 3D sprites are. Some of the animations are simply fantastic when it comes to how much more they can show now. The music is great, too.

Ryunosuke is a good protagonist, and he doesn’t just feel like a copy of Phoenix but a new character in his own right. I like him and the rest of the main cast, with the standout character being Herlock Sholmes (Sherlock Holmes).

I don’t know why they decided to make Sholmes such a wacky character, but I love it. He has a tendency to make elaborate deductions based on clues, but overlook certain necessary details, leading to a new gameplay mechanic called the Dance of Deduction where you find the evidence to steer his wild conclusion back onto the right track. Beyond that, he also sometimes just shows up in the background during investigations, always doing something odd that contributes to this… eccentric portrayal of the great detective.

The new prosecutor, Barok van Zieks, is also interesting. He’s sort of a racist jerk toward Ryunosuke, but he also seems much less corrupt than a lot of the prosecutors we’ve dealt with in the past. He’s fairly dramatic, although not as over-the-top as you might expect from a guy who tosses wine bottles around and occasionally slams the desk with his foot.

Moving on to gameplay, you can investigate most areas for entertaining dialogue once again, and the trials involve both multiple witnesses like in Professor Layton vs. Phoenix Wright, as well as a jury system.

The jury comes across almost as another set of witnesses, with moments in the case where you need to hear their reasoning and find contradictions in order to change their minds. It’s a bit contrived that you always end up with a jury with information relevant to the case, but in general I found it to be an entertaining feature.

Overall, I really enjoyed The Great Ace Attorney: Adventures… except that, once again, I don’t feel like I finished an Ace Attorney game so much as played half of an extra-long one.

The pacing in this game is strange. The first three cases all feel like tutorials to some degree, and none of the cases have multiple days of investigation. Some of this comes from it really shaking up the Ace Attorney formula a bit, which I liked, but it gives the game a strange feeling. The final case does feel like a typical climactic resolution, but the overarching plot leaves many unanswered questions.

I liked the game a lot, but I wonder how I would feel if we did get the game back when it first came out on its own, instead of being bundled with its sequel. If the second half of this story wasn’t waiting for me, I might not have nearly as positive an impression.

Nevertheless, we didn’t get it alone but as part of The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles, so I’ll save my final thoughts for once I conclude the story! I’m taking a break first to play NEO: The World Ends With You, but after that I’ll move on to The Great Ace Attorney 2: Resolve.

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Tales of Arise Demo Impressions

Wednesday was not only the day of Pokémon Presents, but also the day the Tales of Arise demo became available.

I downloaded it, and while I didn’t dig into it as much as some fans have, I played through it and enjoyed it quite a bit.

First of all, Tales of Arise is beautiful. I’ve seen debates about Tales switching away from an anime art style to a realistic style, but that’s not really how I’d describe Arise. It strikes me more like a painting, but whatever the art style is called, I love the way the world looks.

The camera is pulled in a little too close for my taste, but I got used to that as I played.

Exploration was one of the high points of the demo for me. There’s nothing I love more than running around a beautiful environment grabbing items, so the vegetables to collect at gathering spots for cooking made me happy. Being able to jump into the water and swim to new spots was great, too.

There’s a lot going on in the combat, and I didn’t quite get the knack for it yet. However, I’m sure that’ll be easier in the full game, when elements are introduced more gradually.

Then there are camps. At camps, you can rest and cook a meal to provide the party with benefits. Cooking as Alphen also gave me one of the funniest skits in the demo.

Skits are told in the comic-like style we discussed previously, and I enjoyed them, although it still feels odd to me. Not being able to see all of the characters’ faces/reactions when a pane focuses on a specific character might be why it doesn’t feel right.

Still, they were fun enough. More importantly, they gave me an idea of the character dynamics, and we could have some pretty entertaining interactions with this cast.

(Characters trying to interpret Dohalim’s way of speaking stood out to me the most. Also, it seems Hootle doesn’t talk, so he could be a non-annoying mascot after all!)

The demo provides very little story context (and for people criticizing the unvoiced “cutscenes,” I’m almost certain those exist only for the demo), but I don’t mind that, since that lets the demo give you a full party without risking spoilers. Overall, I enjoyed the Tales of Arise demo and it left me even more excited for the full release!

Did you play the demo for Tales of Arise? What did you think of it?

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(Most Of) Our Pokémon Questions Answered in Today’s Pokémon Presents

Today was the Pokémon Presents presentation, which I had certain hopes for going into it.

To start with, no, there was no Detective Pikachu news. The additional games shown beyond the two being highlighted were Pokémon Unite’s mobile release and the relaunch of Pokémon Café Mix as Pokémon Café Remix.

But let’s get into the main features, starting with Pokémon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl.

There’s still no sign of the Pokémon Platinum storyline returning in Pokémon BDSP; some ominous lines in the trailer could hint at that but are also part of Cyrus’s Diamond/Pearl plans. However, I was also worried that they might cut the Underground mini-games from the remakes… but the Underground content is in!

These remakes actually look great to me (and I didn’t even mind the trailer’s zoom-ins on the dialogue).

The Underground’s mining mini-game is one of my favorite Pokémon mini-games, so I’m thrilled to see it return. It looks like there’s even more to do in the new “Grand Underground” now, too. Secret Bases are also back, which is great.

They also showed off Super Contest Shows, using Stickers for special Poké Ball visual effects, character customization, and Pokémon walking behind you. Overall, this trailer made me pretty excited for Brilliant Diamond/Shining Pearl.

Then they moved on to Pokémon Legends: Arceus. Combat is turn-based, but with some new twists. Your speed stat determines how often you can attack, so it sounds like it’s more of an ATB system. You also have two different combat styles to switch between.

As for it being open world, it looks as though you’ll unlock new regions as you progress through the game and then enter a region to explore it. I think. Some people still think it’s a full open world.

You’ll accept missions at Jubilife Village, a hub area where you work as part of the Galaxy Expedition Team. Okay, the connections to Team Galactic speculated about shortly after the announcement trailer are definitely not a coincidence. Commander Kamado is confirmed to be an ancestor of Professor Rowan, so it feels like a safe bet that Captain Cyllene is Cyrus’s ancestor (although that seems weird to me considering what we know of Cyrus’s backstory, so maybe not).

Interestingly, catching a Pokémon isn’t enough to complete its Pokédex entry. Completing the Pokédex is a major goal, and you need to study the Pokémon through additional research tasks to complete its entry. Catching Pokémon also seems to have more of a puzzle element, since you approach Pokémon on the field, and large Pokémon appear capable of attacking the player directly, too.

Legends: Arceus sounds like it could be a lot of fun, so I’m definitely interested in seeing more.

What are your thoughts on the new details shown about Pokémon Brilliant Diamond & Shining Pearl and Pokémon Legends: Arceus?

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