KILL la KILL – IF: The anime piqued my interest back in the days, but let’s be honest: I’m not an anime aficionado, and I’ll probably never watch it. On the other hand, I can get the next best thing: a brawler featuring the KlaK crew and a piece of story! And since that particular brawler boasts some particularly stellar physics and gorgeous graphics, I’d be crazy not to indulge in it.
I am Setsuna: I’m a complete and total sucker for wintry & snowy settings and atmosphere — so of course, I had to have a complete and total crush on Setsuna. The fighting system ain’t half- bad either, and the crawling is promising — really, no complaints at all here.
Kowloon High-School Chronicles: I expected a Point&click with strong VN elements, taking place in a modern Korean setting. What I got instead was a first-person dungeon crawler with a strong emphasis on puzzles — and a much unexpected Egyptian temple setting. I was too disoriented by that mighty plot twist to sort out my immediate feelings about KHSC; but I’ll be damned if I don’t give every FPDC that crosses my path its fair chance to shine.
Moero Crystal H: It’s more of the same delightfully bonkers and risqué Genkai Toki fare — only better than in Moe Chronicles. We have smoother roaming in better-looking dungeons with a more balanced encounter rate, faster and more efficient fighting — and maybe flashier character designs? We’ll see — because that game is here to stay!
Okami HD: A PS2 and Wii cult classic that’s been ported to new machines over time — yet somehow never managed to be a commercial hit despite garnering critical acclaim. I’ve wanted to try that game for years; yet now that the deed is done, I’m a bit underwhelmed. Is it the weird, stiff camera angles? Is it the ever-so-slightly clunky controls? Is it the fact that we’re dealing with a 6th generation game that maybe didn’t age gracefully? Or is Okami just a half-baked game, all style and no substance, that somehow managed to fool reviewers into granting it their eternal blessing? I don’t know, and I certainly won’t start a debate here. What I know is that Okami left no imprint in my gamer’s soul, and that I don’t feel the slightest desire to touch it again.
Diablo III – Eternal Collection: I had to try the king, the boss, the granddaddy of Hack’n’slashes sooner or later; and heck, Diablo III didn’t disappoint at all. Super-addictive combat, pitch-perfect physics, gorgeous graphics, atmosphere in spades — I’m yours, game!
Trials of Mana: Oh heck no. Trials of Mana is another one of these Seiken Densetsu remakes that completely squandered the original’s appeal in the process. No RPG series is defined and identified by its art style as much as Seiken Densetsu; remove that signature art style, and you obtain a game that is not quite an SD game. And even if I turned a blind eye to the butchering of the SD charm, I couldn’t turn another blind eye to the poor pacing, the lifeless environments and the overabundance of cutscenes.
Collection of Mana: Now we’re talking, Squeenix. I never played Mystic Quest or Secret of Mana, and that collection is the perfect opportunity to do! As for Seiken Densetsu 3… look, I booted the game; and I just cannot describe the wave of sheer, intense nostalgia that crashed over me upon hearing the music and seeing the character selection screen. I know I wrote a slightly critical post about it 8 years ago, but man… If the first screen alone can elicit such powerful feels, maybe I’ll play it again after all. Actually, I didn’t say I would never replay it back in 2014, did I?
Rune Factory 4 Special: I have a long and convoluted history with this game. Rewind all the way to 2014, when we learnt that Europe wouldn’t be granted a physical release of RF4. I didn’t buy digital games at the time; yet I wanted to play that one, badly. That desire prompted me to cross the Rubicon and have a second-hand North-American 3DS and a physical copy of RF4 cross the friggin’ Atlantic Ocean, right into my greedy paws. Having gone to such lengths to secure a single game, you would think I’d play it right away, wouldn’t you? Heck, no! I left it untouched for the next 8 years, until I finally decided to get rid of it in favour of the Switch version. The ultimate irony would have been to hate RF4 right from the first second of play; but fortunately, I was actually hooked, and eager to play more.
Dragon Quest XI – Echoes of an Elusive
Age: Let’s be honest, I was sold upon seeing
the first frames of the retro mode. Full-force gaming fernweh for the win!
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