[Game Journal] I used to be an adventurer like you until I took an arrow to the knee.

Setting up my own Game Journal (finally, only been meaning to do this for months!) to keep track of everything so we can all look back and laugh at how badly I manage my time and money, haha. Will update this weekly (hopefully) or when I have something worth talking about.

Expect this to get more organised as and when I have the time =P


2021 Goals
- Complete at least 50 games. Preferably new games, but replays inevitably sneak into my schedule at points when I feel l like doing something.

Currently Playing


To play this year (hopefully)


Dropped


Purchased


Completed - 1/50


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So. I've been away pretty much since the start of this year, owing to...complications. Unpleasantness. General inability to cope. All leading to an overwhelming desire to be isolated generally...because I tend to bring down the mood, get very short-tempered, and can't trust people which is probably no different from normal me. It's no wonder I don't have any friends, haha.

But. I have been busy. VERY busy. I have completed 19 games since I started this blog, and whilst a fair few of them have been short, that's still quite a lot for me this early in the year. When I'm stressed I tend to lose myself in video games, and I've been...weirdly in the mood for games lately. I tend to stumble about a lot between games until I settle on the next thing I want to play - comes from having a terrifyingly huge backlog you will never clear I suppose - but I've had almost laser-like focus recently. Probably because I haven't wanted to waste time on anything, because time is something I don't feel like I have much of at the moment. In a general sense. I don't feel any impending death approaching...I hope.

So I have a lot to cover. But to save time - and my sanity - I'll just write a short recap of what I've played between now and my first post here. If you're interested in more detailed thoughts on each game, I point you in the direction of my blog, which I have been keeping since the start of last year and have somehow miraculously managed to keep up to date. That has a record of my 2020 gaming progress as well if you're bored and want to read more. xD

Oh! I also got this. After a morning of misery in which I was trying to work, praying nobody would call me on teams whilst I watched my queue time stay stuck at 22 minutes for 10 minutes longer than it should have. Then getting website crashes which refused to let me see my cart. Then finding out I had TWO in my cart when I finally got there. All with a 30 minute timer before I got booted off the site. I haven't been this stressed trying to get my hands on something since the Fire Emblem Fates Limited Edition fiasco. It was worth it, though - now I don't have to worry about my PS4 exploding in my face. That might sound hyperbolic, but the fan really was THAT loud.

I'll try and keep this updated moving forward with progress as I make it - I'll construct another post with what I am currently playing over the weekend, perhaps - but I am having a rare good moment right now and they never last longer than a couple of days, so...eh, yeah. Gotta take advantage of it whilst I can.

Anyways, this is my progress for the year thus far, with a VERY short summary of what I thought! I don't feel like putting it all in spoilers, though =P

Hue
A fun puzzle game I wasn't expecting to enjoy but got a lot more out than what I put into it...considering it cost me 99p. But the narrative was minimalistic, pretentious rubbish that didn't deliver on the emotional experience it promised. Sometimes less is not more.

Immortals Fenyx Rising
I wanted to like this a lot more than I did...I just didn't like the tone of it. But I loved everything else! I think I was hoping for another Assassin's Creed Odyssey, and what I got was..a bit more diluted.

Children of Morta
Another one of those pixel indie games that is nowhere near as good as advertised. Or at least, nowhere near as good as Hades.

The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening
Just a replay of the remake of my favourite Zelda game. Because I need downtime sometimes. Also replays are good.

Umineko No Naku Koro Ni: Ep 1 Legend of the Golden Witch
Was engaging enough to keep me reading, although god the introduction was tedious as hell. Also, Maria's very existence is cursed. I hate children in video games.

Dragon Quest II: Luminaries of the Legendary Line
This game was fucking AWFUL. It was a frustratingly unbalanced, status-effect happy, generally broken mess. Square Enix sequels are cursed. I'd sooner forget I played this.

Grimvalor
A very mediocre Metroidvania that left me wanting more but at the same time being very glad it didn't drag on for longer...and it's designed for NG+ and speedruns. After the first miserable playthrough, why on earth would I endure a second?

Hatsune Miku: Project DIVA Mega Mix
I finally cleared every Normal song with an E or above and I am never looking back. Unless they add more songs. Then I'll be downloading it again.

Umineko No Naku Koro Ni: Ep 2 Turn of the Golden Witch
Focusing on the least interesting characters, yet still a rather good read. Mostly. I'm not a huge fan of romance in video games, really.

Langrisser II
This was fucking spectacular and I wish I lived in an AU where this was the pre-eminent SRPG instead of Fire Emblem, because it bloody well deserves to be with such fantastic writing. I really hope the other games get the remaster treatment, because I would love to play more like this.

Sonic Advance
Not sure if I finished this before, but if I hadn't, then I have now. Fuck timers in stages.

Resident Evil 0 HD
Extremely threadbare in places but still quite enjoyable...but definitely showing its age.

Final Fantasy
A replay, but with different characters this time. My appreciation of Red Mages has now gone up quite a bit.

Umineko No Naku Koro Ni: Ep 3 Banquet of the Golden Witch
Probably the best "Just kidding!" I've ever read. Pay-off was definitely worth sticking through this.

Resident Evil HD
*screams in terror as four zombies come bursting through the window*

Resident Evil 2
Leon's side of this, at least, thoroughly deserves the critical acclaim it has received. Claire's...not so much. Not at all, in fact. Ugh.

Resident Evil 3
A colossal disappointment coming off of Resident Evil 2. In fact, this might be the biggest disappointment I've had from this series since I played Resi 5 for the first time.

Super Mario 3D World
I loved almost every second I spent with this, but I think if I had continued on to do the postgame worlds my enjoyment would have ended rather abruptly, so I'm a little unsatisfied. But my masochism has its limits...and so does my patience.

Umineko No Naku Koro Ni: Ep 4 Alliance of the Golden Witch
Finished this last night and I'm still sorting through my thoughts on it.

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Someone send help - I have an overwhelming desire to replay Xenoblade Chronicles 2 right now, and I HATED that game. The plot and characterisation were both utter garbage, and that gacha system for Blades...ugh. Why would you do this. But I played it before any of the updates it received, and I'm wondering if time will have softened my perspective on it, after Future Connected...annoyed me. A lot. I also enjoyed Torna more than I thought I would, considering Malos is literally the worst villain I have ever seen in any video game, ever. What even is my life, that I want to put myself through this again? I'd probably enjoy it as well, knowing me. Sometimes I just get in the mood for things I shouldn't. This is what I get for rediscovering this...and this. Welp.

I'm also debating picking up Yakuza 0 in the near future and giving that a try. I have a weird desire to play series right now. There's just something very satisfying about playing things sequentially. I have Judgment though, so I might give that a try first. This. This right here is how my backlog grows...and grows...and grows. I have a lot to buy between now and June and I just got a PS5, I shouldn't be making frivolous impulse purchses. Sigh.

Anyway, that title would be funnier if I was playing five games that were the fifth instalment, but I don't feel like playing Persona 5 Royal, FFV, or Disgaea 5...and I am definitely not dipping my toe into Star Ocean 5 again. Farcry 5 also bored me to tears. I think that's all the fives I have...I think. Except for the three I am currently playing, as detailed below!


RESIDENT EVIL 5
I. Hate. This. Game. I've been going through the Resident Evil series in order - this has nothing to do with Lady Dimitrescu, btw, nope - and I finished 4 yesterday, which is game 20/50 for the year and was pretty damn enjoyable, awkward controls aside. I don't think I could ever get tired of Resi 4. But 5...5 is where my interest in the franchise died completely. But it's the next one to play, so here I go. I hate Sheva. She uses up her ammo within a few seconds then starts whining that she needs ammo. Just...let me do it. You stand in the corner and heal me if I need it or something. The controls are also quite unwieldy - although not as much as Resi 4, in fairness - and could have used a touch-up for the PS4 re-release. But it's early days yet! I'm only on Chapter 2. If nothing else, Wesker will put on a good show...before he gets killed off, ending the only decent villain the franchise has had. At least before a certain giant vampire lady entered the picture...

Also Chris' array of punches and kicks, whilst they might be more realistic - to a certain degree - aren't as cool as Leon spin kicking and suplexing people's heads off. Jesus Christ. I'm reminded of nothing so much as Goku and Vegeta when I think of these two and their displays of physical prowess...which would make Wesker Frieza in this analogy. Now that's a scary thought.

UMINEKO EPISODE 5
FINALLY got through the slog that was Episode 4 and diving into the infinitely more interesting Answers Arcs! But...god, do I wish Bernkastel and Lambdadelta didn't exist. It's nice to have some new characters introduced into the game to keep things interesting, but...well, Beatrice could have done that herself. I just...don't like children. Maria was bad enough, now there are two more little girl witches, and they're more than just casual spectators now? Siiiigh. Persevere with it, Dawn...it'll pay off. Hopefully.

PERSONA 5 STRIKERS
Despite getting this early and being kinda excited for it, I haven't been playing it much yet. My initial first impressions are positive, though - it's more Persona with Warriors gameplay than it is Warriors with Persona characters, and unlike Age of Calamity (which was disgracefully bad) this works in its favour, because P5 had a pretty good cast. I'm a little disappointed it's not a sequel to Royal, but eh...I've not finished Royal, I got to the third palace after 30 hours and burned out. Maybe I'll come back to it somewhen...in a year or two. Honestly playing through P5 once was enough for me, it's not like it's Xenoblade or Berseria quality or something. But anyway! I'm enjoying the gameplay twists in this, the narrative is interesting enough to keep me engaged - and it's still fully dubbed, thank god - and the music is just SO. MUCH. BETTER. This is very much a Warriors spinoff thing, though. Both Hyrule Warriors games had better music, and even Fire Emblem Warriors had some amazing remixes. Heavy rock just makes everything better. I'm looking forward to seeing where this will take me, but...it's going to be a slow playthrough for the time being, probably. I might try and devote some time to it on Wednesday morning though.


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So I finished Resi 5 today...thank god. That's 21/50! I really don't want to type out another review of it - god knows I've wasted enough time - so if you want to know why this game is bad, click here!

Anyway, this is an Intermission because I am presently playing two games I probably shouldn't be playing:

MEDIEVIL
So it turns out you can't disable rumble in Resi 6, which is...shit. I loathe rumble features. I think there is an option to in the console menu, but tbh I'm burned out of Resi at the moment - I've played six of the damn things back-to-back, and I'd like to use my PS5 for something else, haha. I'll pick up VII before Village is released, but I think for now I'm going to take a breather. So I am playing Medievil! I loved this on Playstation, and I loved the PSP remake, so I'm excited to be playing an enhanced version. So far, so good!

THE LIAR PRINCESS AND THE BLIND PRINCE
Persona 5 Strikers requires concentration and time to get through cutscenes, so it's a slow burn. This is a nice little pick-up-and-play title I grabbed in the sales last year. The visuals are stunning; I love the storybook motif, it's not something I see often in video games so it's refreshing. The premise is quite cute as well, and I'm interested to see how it's going to turn out, although I think I have an idea. My only complaint is that they couldn't be bothered to dub it...and I mean, really. It doesn't have THAT much dialogue. It wouldn't have killed them to hire someone to narrate. Such laziness...

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OK, so I'm not dropping *everything* but I AM splitting my focus a bit too much and things are kinda...falling by the wayside a bit. A lot. Awaaay we go.

Marvel's Spider-Man Remastered
Got this with my PS5 and finally decided to give it a whirl. I have heard many things about this game. So far, so good! One thing I want to praise is the accessibility options in this game - it feels like it was designed to be as anti-frustration as possible, and considering my state of mind right now, and what my life has been like this year so far, I NEED a game that holds my hand without actually holding my hand. Skip puzzles. Skip QTEs. Toggle auto-aim, increase dodge window, and the easiest difficulty basically makes you invincible in combat. No, I am not using all of these. But god knows do I appreciate them being there, because it means I can play this on even my worst day and just put it down if it bothers me. Puzzles regularly bother me, so that's a thing. It's fantastic that this game caters to all player skill levels without being patronising about it - the devs clearly want it to be enjoyable first. Which is what games should be above all else. I got some very good vibes from this menu alone, and this was before I'd even started playing.

What I have played so far has been pretty great, although a little less responsive than I was expecting. I've already had my Spiderman 2 gameplay physics successor - it's called Attack on Titan: Wings of Freedom. Web-swinging in this feels a little less precise than using the movement gear did in that, and I've found myself hitting the ground unintentionally a few times, which is aggravating. But it still feels pretty good. Combat is great although there are times when I can't always do what I want to in it either - webbing up people seems to be very hit-and-miss, as I tap R1 - with my web shooters full, might I add - and nothing happens...and sometimes it does. Hm. When it works, it's fun. When it doesn't, I just revert to button mashing. Maybe I just need to get used to it? I hope so.

But - and it's a big but - Peter is voiced by Yuri Lowenthal in this game. And he is very...Yuri Lowenthal. By which I mean I want to close my ears off because it feels like my eardrums are about to punch their way out of the back of my skull. This man's voice is AWFUL. He uses the exact same voice for every damn character, which means all I can hear is Luke Bloody Fon Sodding Fabre, Suzaku Hypocrisy Kururugi, and Yosuke Homophobic Piece of Trash Hanamura. Yuri Lowenthal only has one voice, and it has been applied to some of my most reviled characters in both gaming and anime. No matter how good this game might turn out to be, it's going to be a trial at times because of this...

Bravely Default 2
I should be playing this more than I am, but it's not really motivating me to play it. It's fine - the gameplay is fun, and the visuals are appealing. But the characters and the narrative are both so bloody BORING. I get it, Square Enix. Magical elemental crystals. For crying out loud, that trope is older than I am by this point, do something new with it. Or at least something interesting. This feels like a comfort game that I'm playing just for something to do, and whilst there's nothing wrong with that, I want to feel more engaged right now and this game is not giving me that. I'll perservere, because I don't really have anything else to play on Switch that is calling out to me, but...mehhhh. For a game that is even slightly more interesting I'd drop it. I'm not feeling "more of the same" right now.

Umineko Episode 5
God, can this please just...end, already. Please.

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Now, there is something I don't get to claim very often. I am unreservedly enjoying myself for once! I seem to have found my motivation again and, whilst I feel a teensy bit bad about not playing The Liar Princess and the Blind Prince at all over the last few days - perhaps I should put some time into it tomorrow morning - for me to be wanting to play games as soon as I put them down is...very rare. Very rare indeed. This is also a sign that my health is improving a bit, I hope.

I'm also debating picking up a Pokemon game again...I'm in that kind of mood. It was going to be Ultra Moon, but my whole living dex is on there and I don't feel like paying for Bank right now. So it's a choice of starting up my Gen VI living dex again (which would actually need 6 playthroughs to get everything by myself), Platinum, or the spinoffs...probably Conquest followed by the Ranger games if I felt like it after. idk.

Anyways, progress reports!

Marvel's Spider-Man Remastered
OK, my estimation of this game has gone up and up. People go on about how Nintendo have the best quality titles, but I'm beginning to think Sony can more than give them a run for their money - I'd rather play this, God of War, and Ghost of Tsushima than I would Mario Odyssey, Breath of the Wild, and Pokemon Shield, at least. Although Mario Odyssey was rather good. But yes! I have faced off against Shocker for the first time and, rather than going to stop him from robbing a bank, I'm doing the new research labs that just opened up everywhere. I'm quite impressed that the tasks for these have all been surprisingly mundane yet varied, from cleaning up the bay to ground pounding to stop underground steam explosions. I've even started to tune out Yuri Lowenthal's insufferably bad voice a bit.

I get the feeling once I unlock the Taskmaster Challenges (which I only found out about because I wondered if you could unlock everything or if I'd need to prioritise) my completion streak will stop, because I do NOT like trials in video games. Especially if they're timed. Which these probably will be I suppose. But for the time being, I'm enjoying everything this game has to offer, and I'm quite excited to see where it'll take me next. It's been a very long time since I could sit and play a game on a home console to the point that I have to remind myself to take a break.

Bravely Default 2
Just unlocked Berserker Asterisk, which I imagine puts me behind a few people on the forums, but...ehh, this isn't really holding my interest. It's a nice distraction, but it's not a super engaging high quality JRPG...but then, neither were the other two. At least, the first wasn't after that godawful groundhog day cycle. I really hope this game's second half isn't like that. I also cannot stand Truff as a character and want to murder him. Or at least capture him with my Beastmaster so he can make himself useful. On my way to the third city now and wondering if or when the plot for this will get exciting and if any of the characters will suddenly become likeable. Hm.

Umineko Episode 6
FINALLY finished Episode 5, and the first thing I see in Episode 6 is...Ange. With another new character. Sigh. It's going to be like THAT, is it. This is turning into the exact opposite experience I had with Higurashi, where the more I read, the more I wanted to read. The more I read of this, the more I wish I hadn't started it...

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Productive weekend! I finished Marvel's Spider-Man Remastered and the DLC and, asides from the challenges utterly killing my 100% completion drive and Yuri Lowenthal's voice, I absolutely adored it. Full thoughts are here on my blog if anyone wants to read me gushing over it in greater detail! I very much hope they take this in the right direction moving forward. The "right direction" being Venom and Carnage as major antagonists, Harry Osborn becoming Kindred - because that was absolutely set up in that final scene, unless they're conspiring to have Harry be Venom, which I would also be OK with because it could mean Red Goblin Norman Osborn - and maybe a Ghost Spider focused game in the near future. I'd also love to see the Peter/Otto dynamic explored more. What I DON'T want to see more of is C-list villains and Yuri Watanabe. I've never been overly keen on Wraith as a character.

I still have Miles Morales to play through, but I'm going to take a break for now and save that for later. Too much of a good thing can lead to burnout after all, and if it's anything like this game has been, I want to enjoy it to the fullest. So! This is where I'm at:

Dragon Star Varnir
I was going to play Neptunia Virtual Stars next, but I don't think I have the patience to go through a game without English dubs right now. So I've picked up this again! I got quite a ways through it I think, but stopped playing because of...something. It came out in June 2019, so I probably dropped it because of Dragon Quest Builders 2...now, there's something I'd love to go back to somewhen. Anyways, since my save files are all gone with my PS4, I've started again. Can't remember what I was doing in it anyway. But since there's nothing coming out on PS4/PS5 until the end of April/beginning of May (at which point I'll be hit by NieR Replicant, Resident Evil VIII, and Mass Effect Remastered) I should actually finish it this time!

Bravely Default 2
I've somehow managed to still stick with this, although recent events have made me wish I hadn't - it's frustratingly unbalanced, to say the least. I don't like difficulty spikes - the idea is that it gets gradually harder as you go on, not that it throws you into "that one boss" when you least expect it. The game had basically been an exercise of "Body Slam to win" up to this point...then I fought Marla. Who evaded 90% of my attacks and countered them. Painfully so. So I had to change up my strategy to actually exploit more than one move (I put Counter Savvy from Ranger, Bloody Minded from Berserker, and Sub-Job BP Saver from Pictomancer onto Adelle and Elvis, made Monk their secondary class, and Pressure Pointed my way through it, whilst Gloria healed off any damage and Seth took everything as a Shieldmaster behind 2 shields) and THEN I fought Adam earlier...bloody hell. That was a nasty curveball. Although it was considerably easier when I remembered that if I made White Mage Gloria's primary job and Spiritmaster her second, the second speciality would let me apply Reraise to everyone at once, rather than one at a time. It made his cheap critical HP nuke at the end of the fight a lot less threatening.

But I am now in Chapter 5, and it's time to grind a bit...a lot. I'm only Level 41 and I have 23 jobs to max out. I'd like to be a little bit more powerful before I move on, if Adam is any indicator of what the latter half of the game is going to be like. Plus there are some very nice-looking abilities from some of the newer jobs I've gotten that I'd like to unlock for my characters. Plus I've been completely neglecting sidequests and should probably do those. 30 hours thus far and I expect it'll take me another 30 at least to do everything I want to do. Which is fine. Although I did get Saviour of Sapphire Wings/Stranger of Sword City Revisited in the post yesterday, and have Kingdoms of Amalur Re-reckoning coming...Dawn, you've got to stop buying so many bloody games.

Umineko Episode 6
This has kinda taken a back seat lately...it's been difficult to concentrate. Basically there are two Beatrice now for some reason, and it's focusing on the extremely boring Kanon/Jessica and Shannon/George pairings. I can only read about how people are furniture for so long before I get bored...and there are now three more unnecessary new characters. And Ange has been resurrected, because of course she has. FFS.

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Gotta stop leaving such massive gaps between updates...or maybe finishing less games in between updates so I don't have so much to type. Yeah. Well, it's not QUITE as bad as last time, but here are my thoughts in brief on the games I've finished between my last update and now. Go read my blog for full thoughts...or just ask me in here I guess, I'm not averse to typing lots. xD

So, what I've finished since my last update, with quick single sentence summaries!



And as for right now, I am playing...

Pokemon Sword
No, that isn't a typo. God, do I wish it was. I just woke up one morning the other day and said to myself "I want a shiny living dex" and...yeah. I traded in a bunch of old games (mostly stuff I bought again on Switch at a later date) for copies of Sword, Sun, and Ultra Sun, and...off I go. Plus I am inherently a masochist - I keep revisiting games I didn't like a few years later to see if my perspective changes. Sometimes it does! Other times it doesn't - I still fucking hate Persona 4 and I keep trying to play that garbage every couple of years. This time...well, I still stand by all my criticisms of Gen VIII (the short version of this being that it's poorly designed and phenomenally low quality when compared to basically everything that came before it, the long version being something you can easily find if you look back through my old posts if you care to, although why you would want to do that is beyond me) but I...really don't care anymore, honestly. It's something that doesn't require a lot of thought to play, and right now I don't really want to think about much. Plus I want that shiny living dex I will probably get bored of trying to get when something I actually want to play comes out on Switch. So, that'd be the end of next month when Disgaea 6 comes out, then.

The Legend of Heroes: Trails of Cold Steel
I buy games when I'm depressed, and I've been very depressed recently. I bought all the Trails of Cold Steel titles on PS4. I...might have jumped the gun a bit. 20 hours in and I'm halfway through Chapter 4, and whilst I don't hate it or anything, I don't see what the fuss is about with this series. It's just...a lot of nothing. Nothing really going on, nothing standout in the gameplay, no noteworthy soundtrack. Just a JRPG I'm playing on my PS5 to fill the hours whilst I have fucking Biomutant and Mass Effect Legendary Edition sitting on my shelf, tormenting me. I'm going to finish this sodding game. But it might be a while before I pick up the second.

Dragon Quest VII
Honestly I am probably going to drop this, I've had enough bullshit from it. I've unlocked jobs - and that was a miserable trial, let me tell you - and I have a ways to go until I get a fourth party member again, so there's no point in grinding them out just yet. I'll need to fight 879 battles to master a higher class job, and I just...can't be arsed. The episodice nature of the game is delightful, but it's just so damn BORING. I shouldn't drop it after 25 hours of play, but I need to learn that it's OK to drop bad video games. Maybe it's something I could revisit in 4-5 years when I've played every other Dragon Quest. Just 3, 6, and 9 left now!

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