TobbRobb

The concept sounds like it'll weaken the things I enjoy about Diablo and double down on the things I don't care much about. Can't say I'm too excited by the news.

Persona is still kind of it's own unique thing that you won't really get anywhere else. I also think 5 made some significant changes and improvements for the better overall already. The formula definitely has a lot of room to grow still. If they improve at the same rate as the jump from 4 to 5 I think it's more than fine to stick to the general flow and design of the game. I will definitely play more persona in the future.

That said too though, if they were to revamp the combat system, I wouldn't personally be opposed to it. I think the combat is fine, but it's not my favorite turn based system by any stretch. That's maybe the area I would appreciate huge changes the most as far as my own enjoyment goes.

If the Randy collection is considered one big feature I could've seen it as a sure winner. But MAN Blizzard is really not letting anyone else compete here huh.

It's definitely not the same. You can't get the exact same experience when one is passive and one is interactive.

However I think it's just as valid a thing to do. It really just comes down to what you want out of the game. I do also think however that watching something can lessen the experience to an extent where I question if it's worth it.

Devil May Cry 5 is possibly the best game of it's type ever made. So much variety in combat options, tight controls and just a great look overall.

Resident Evil 2 Remake is absolutely fantastic in both modern and throwback contexts. It's in the running for my favorite RE. The design of the map, pacing and polish really makes it shine.

Fire Emblem: Three Houses is a great game in it's own right and sparked my interest in going back to beat a lot of the older games in the franchise. I'm also looking to do replays of it for different routes and to try goofy character builds. Super fun.

Sekiro has a really niche appeal to it. But if you enjoy the parry style gameplay and the kick you get out of having the perfect clutch defense, then it's incredibly enjoyable. It can be hard for sure, but the timings are sort of forgiving and even if you struggle with parry at first, you can get used to it.

I haven't held the controls during play of Outer Wilds. But that game is absolutely worth checking out. It's kind of a brain teaser mixed with exploration along the lines of the Witness. But less up its own ass. Very cool.

I'd definitely say those are the standouts of the year.

I've had a ton of small instances of me going just that little bit too far in trying to solve an issue in playing a game. Arguably I enjoyed the troubleshooting more than playing, but that's not all that relevant.

The first two that come to mind however is that I bought a high end CPU, specifically because I couldn't run Monster Hunter Tri on an emulator. I spent hours doing configuration to try and make i playable but in the end, money solved it.

I "had to" use a hex editor to fix a bug in vampire the masquerade bloodlines. It couldn't understand what 8gb of RAM was and looped back to thinking I had -1 memory. So it put all the UI at the worst possible resolution it could manage. It was unfixable with regular patches or even by having my PC pretend it had a lower amount of RAM, the only way I found to fix it was opening the .exe in a hex editor and locating the "feature" so I could disable it.... God that took a while.

Most games no. I will generally just look at the biggest pieces of news or announcements, then it'll just eventually show up finished as I keep on living my life. Ain't got the hours in the day to bother anymore.

However, for games I'm VERY excited for and have pretty solid release schedules for their info, I will keep up. I looked at pretty much everything they had to say about DMC 5 before release, inluding panels. I did the same for Monster Hunter World (not iceborne though). And I tend to keep up with fighting game trailers to some extent like watching all the Guilty Gear 2020 stuff as it gets released.

@liquiddragon: The jagens exist to be used. so i wouldn't worry too much about it. just as long as other units get their share too its ok to use them a lot. Titania is too cool not to level.

I think the most divisive aspect of radiant Dawn is that they sort of shoehorn you into not sticking to a core team of favorites. Characters leave and come back all the time so its hard to focus on just a few, you end up playing with your B and C team characters a lot. But on the other hand it has a huge roster so you generally always have a few cool people. i dont mind it personally.

@liquiddragon: That's great! I think that's the exact reason this archetype exists. I call her overpowered, but I think that is by design. I still think that game can be difficult in spots, and you have to be smart and strategic to beat missions even though Titania just mauled half the map on her own. The "Jagen" types exist in most FE games and are pretty much always fun to use. Titania is probably my favorite though.

I'm currently making my way through Binding Blade, and I really don't know if some of the boss enemies are even beatable without using Marcus (Titania equivalent). That game has some savage encounters in it lol.

You gonna play any of the other ones? Radiant Dawn, Sacred Stones or Awakening would be my suggestions if you want to tackle another. There's a bunch of other good ones, but I think Sacred Stones and Awakening are just solid overall, and Radiant Dawn is the followup to Path of Radiance.

I bet I have a more fitting answer in the back of my head somewhere. But since I've been on a journey through several fire emblems recently, the first one that comes to mind is Titania.

Titania is a unit you get in FE: Path of Radiance's first mission. She is already promoted which makes her 10-20 levels stronger than every other unit you have available. She is a mounted paladin with insane stats and good skill with multiple weapon types. She's so absurdly overpowered that you can literally drop her alone against a swarm of 10+ enemies and she will kill all of them in one turn on counterattacks alone and will most likely not even take enough damage to drop under half health.

Her archetype is supposed to fall off towards the later parts of the game and mostly be a buff unit to help you through the early parts. But if you let her get experience and have her keep up in levels, she will STILL be an above average unit in the last few missions. She's basically just a god for 70% of the game and a demi-god for the last 30% when other units start overleveling her. Fucking love Titania man.