Video Game #36: Wild ARMs 2 This game's pretty average as far as PS1-era JRPGs go. Slow animations drag combat out, combat itself is pretty simple, and the story and characters are very basic. That said, the puzzle-heavy dungeons, soundtrack, and visuals are all great!

Saw American Football at First Avenue in Minneapolis tonight.

Felt the sudden urge to read some nonfiction about writing this week, so I read through The Forest for the Trees by Betsy Lerner. Solid read! Very interesting editorial perspective.

Video Game #35: Demon's Souls Yeah, I just hate this subgenre. I've tried Dark Souls, Bloodborne, and Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice before (put about 10 hours into each of them), and didn't enjoy any of them. This was no different. Really didn't enjoy playing this.

I've been meaning to go through some of my backlogged games and figured to give Demon's Souls (2020) a try, and...man, I still can't get into these games at all. I've given Dark Souls, Bloodborne, and Sekiro a chance and they all just leave me feeling like I'm wasting my time.

Just watched the Fire Emblem: Fortune's Weave Direct. Man, this game looks fantastic! Really looks like it's Three Houses 2 in just about every way, plus it's adding dungeons and world map stuff from Echoes. And TURN-BASED JRPG COMBAT?! What?! I'm really excited to play this!!

Video Game #34: The Legend of Heroes: Trails into Reverie This is a special game to me, because it's actually my first localization editing credit, as I've discussed before. Now I've finally gotten around to playing this game after slowly working through the series. And...it's great!

Video Game #33: Rhythm Heaven Groove I LOVED this game. Growing up with Rhythm Heaven on DS, I've always admired this franchise and how true to itself is. There's nothing else quite like Rhythm Heaven and this game makes it like the series never stopped at all.

Video Game #32: Star Fox This is a great remake! Despite all the visual and presentation flourishes this version makes, it all highlights how timeless the core gameplay is. I think the Challenge Mode and especially the Multiplayer are great additions!

Hell yeah! Best of luck! I'll be chilling in the streams as much as I can. You got this, Lydia!!

Played the open beta for Marvel Tokon: Fighting Souls a bit over the weekend. While I love the game's aesthetic, I don't think this game's for me unfortunately. The auto combos just aren't fun to play around, and I think the 4v4 tag system is just not super fun for me.

Had a very humbling and special experience tonight. I've been playing through Trails into Reverie over the last two weeks - and this was the very first localization project I worked on! I got to play through scenes that I wrote. It was...really bizarre. Weird. Embarrassing. But special.

Saw The Odyssey today. It really is That Movie. Go see it.

Video Game #31: Donkey Kong 64 This game isn't bad, y'all are just mean. I really appreciate this game's approach to level design - most levels are separated into chunks that feature activities for each Kong to do. It's fun and has lots of variety.

Video Game #30: Ghost of Yotei. Really, really enjoyed this. There isn't much groundbreaking or different here, but as a follow-up to Ghost of Tsushima's framework, this is about as solid of a sequel as you could ask for.

I really don't understand why or how Grant Theft Auto is still using the same Price is Right logo/font. They've been using this logo/font since GTA 3, and haven't changed it since. I've always just found the logo really dated and in need of a refresh. Surprised they didn't change it for GTA 6.

Circled games I'm interested in picking up and...it's like over half the games they showed, lol. This Direct and overall SGF season was filled with games I'm looking forward to. Incredible time to love video games.

Started playing through Ghost of Yotei this week, about 10 hours in so far. So far, it's basically more Ghost of Tsushima - which is not a bad thing at all! Super immersive, really polished, fun gameplay...just haven't seen anything that feels completely new or different.

I can't believe this is real. - ALL 4 Xenoblade games will have Switch 2 Editions by the end of 2026, running at full HD, 60 FPS - A BRAND NEW Xenoblade game, Xenoblade Genesis, is coming out in 2027. Being a Xenoblade fan is the easiest thing to possibly be.

At long last, my Kingdom Hearts retrospective is finished and will go live on Monday, June 8 at 8:00 AM CST. This morphed into being one of my largest projects to date, and I'm really proud of how it turned out. Looking forward to seeing peoples' reactions to it!

Video Game #29: Kirby & The Amazing Mirror I can see this game getting better and better with additional playthroughs and using co-op, but as is, this is a solid game. The actual gameplay feel and speed is fantastic, but the map design isn't my cup of tea.

Just realized that Nintendo Directs turn 15 years old later this year. The first Nintendo Direct was on October 21, 2011 Very crazy that Directs turned into the norm for all major video game presentations and effectively replaced the traditional E3 press conference.

Video Game #28: Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards I have a TON of nostalgia for this game. Looking past my own nostalgia, I think this is an excellent game! My only issue is that the Crystal Shards that require certain combinations are a little annoying to get sometimes. Other than that, this is great!

Video Game #27: Kirby's Dream Land 3 This game rocks. May very well be the best-looking SNES game ever made. Music's solid, level design's solid. I think this is definitely the best Kirby game up to this point in the series. Really enjoyed playing this for the first time!

Video Game #26: Kirby Super Star While I've played this game before, this was my first full playthrough of every mode. Copy abilities are overpowered but fun, level design is solid but never super memorable. Just an all-around solid time!

Bro, Dragon Quest XII looks FANTASTIC! Stellar art design and character design. Really can't wait to see more! Kind of a shame that it had to restart development a la Metroid Prime 4, but this looks really promising!

My brain insists that someone using academic language to say "Nintendo is for babies lol" looks like this:

Video Game #25: Kirby's Adventure Really solid time! My first time playing this in a LONG time, and it holds up pretty well. Looks so good that the NES cracks under the pressure, which unfortunately leads to lots of slowdown and controls that can feel unresponsive as a result.

Watched Godzilla Minus One over the weekend in prep for the sequel coming out later this year and...MAN. This is truly a modern classic.

I unfortunately am unable to attend Combo Breaker this year due to conflicts I have this weekend, but that doesn't mean we can't have a stream to compensate! I'll be streaming Smash Ultimate tonight at ~ 6:30 PM CST tonight on Twitch. See y'all then! twitch.tv/derek_ex_machina