Mento

@imunbeatable80: The story as a whole is decent, and if anything the planets are different parts in the tale of what happened told out of order. For instance the first area of the game, Xenophon, is also the last chapter as far as the fate of the expedition is concerned and the game works slowly backwards from there. Then there's everything happening in the present and how that's linked, so it's layered without ever being too difficult to follow.

They're very different games in most respects, but there's a connection you could make to Return of the Obra Dinn. In both cases you've got a pile of bodies and need to use the clues to work backwards and figure out what happened.

@arbitrarywater: Dubious might be pushing it for Operencia, but certainly a little mean-spirited in spots. I guess that's just being truer to the spirit of old Wizardry and Might & Magic than a lot of these throwbacks. There's other reasons to play besides the combat too, but I'd perhaps caution against playing on the harder settings all the same.

I'm not sure I can help with other dubious RPGs, at least on PC. The only one I've bounced from in the past few years is Arcanum, and many regard that as a classic. There's this one called Legrand Legacy that may or may not be too dull to be dubious; I'm almost curious enough to pick it up on Switch since it's heavily discounted on the eShop right now.

Say... have you heard of a little game called Descent to Undermountain?

@cbake76: I'm never quite sure how to respond to developers who take the time to read these reviews of mine, so... thank you? For both the game and for not feeling too slighted by my criticism.

I'm in the Copper Forest now so no more spawners, just mana-sapping enemies around every corner. It's been a real trip so far.

@mightyduck: I haven't heard much about Origami King since it came out. I doubt it'll make GB's final ten, but I hope they consider it for best writing/moment (if they have a category like that this year).

@sparky_buzzsaw: Thanks. And yes it was. I was hoping to pick up the Trails in the Sky the 3rd in the recent sales, but...

...they do not seem to want to discount it any lower than 25%, ever. I'll bite the bullet eventually.

They should probably just stop the series now, and then resume the playthrough months later in the spring with the title Welcome Back, KOTOR.

Force Kin.

I'll see myself out.

Glad to see Nioh 2 getting more love. It's not perfect but it's my second favorite Souls game that isn't Souls and does everything a good sequel should. (I'll admit to being late in the game when I discovered Sloth, despite going heavy on Onmyo from the outset, but man what a lifesaver.)

Have fun with obscure PS2 JRPGs this year. Hopefully that PS2 feature I did a few years back gave you plenty of inspiration, though I've no idea how rare most of that stuff is. Shadow Hearts is definitely number one with a bullet (from Mata Hari's gun) on my list of trilogies that should get a HD remaster.

@arbitrarywater: I look forward to playing it. The game you gifted me, I mean, not more CrossCode.

@nodima: I've had little luck with the gachas, and the resources to make them happen are starting to get thin on the ground. I've just hit AR25 myself, since I wanted to get to the casual playstyle you're talking about - drop in briefly every so often for dailies and weeklies until I feel like focusing on it again and/or a big new content update hits - and unlocking the whole bounty/request/reputation system seemed like a good destination to hit. Plus I've noticed you get a bunch of collectible-hunter gizmos that way and I'm weirdly into running around open-world maps looking for icons. I've already found all the Anemoculi, so I'm about ready to hit Liyue when I have time.

My draws so far (besides story characters, and Noelle since she's a freebie): Xiangling, who I was almost about ready to go fetch from the Spiral Pit anyway; Bennett; Sucrose; and Ningguang. The problem with those four is that they're fire, fire, wind, and earth respectively, and I'm good for all of those: Amber's my only archer so she's stuck in my party, the Traveller is Anemo (and will eventually be Geo), and Noelle's Geo too and my only claymore user for those pesky ores. Haven't really used any of these random draws much as a result, but I might boost them to 20ish (should do that anyway for the free wish materials) and take them out on the commissions to see what they're like. At least Bennett's good for expeditions?

@spiketail: Yeah, I underestimated the size of the content they were about to add (like you said, I didn't want to spoil myself with too many emerging details). Then again, there's so much in Genshin already and I've yet to hit the major part of the game (Liyue) so I'm not exactly lacking for anything to do.

@atheistpreacher: @arbitrarywater: I don't think I'll be playing through this multiple times or bother with any DLC - I've got like 70 hours clocked in and I'm only in the fifth chapter - but the Platinum grind is within reach so I'm going to go for that. I recently switched weapons and it's been building proficiency like crazy so grinding them all shouldn't take too long, and I wanted to give them all a serious trial (and defeat their respective Dojo challenges) regardless.

The Nioh 2 PC/PS5 news was auspicious timing. Happened mere days after this went up. I'm definitely taking credit.