October
04/10 - Uh oh...#61
Tags
Misc - Random Topics
Okay so-
My website turned 4 years old exactly today... last week...
I completely forgot about that...
Well, I don't really have any sappy story share or anything like that today. Nor do I have any teasers because all the things I'm doing are still very early in progress.
Well, I do have a small fun thing that is close to completion related to the mascot trio, I just need to make a couple of assets for the page.
so look forward to that!
Sorry for not having anything prepared for the anniversary... and missing it... kinda of recurring theme with my creations I suppose.
Thanks for visiting this silly place I call home! Here's hope for many more years to come!
02/10 - Bizarre Turn (SBR Episode 3)# 60
Tags
Series - Jojo's Bizzare Adventure.
Turn To The Bizarre!
Episode 3 is the first fight with the Boomboom Family, who were the shadowy people from last episode, appearance of mysterious ghosts and hints to an interesting place!
We are officially out of the early section of SBR that I thought was a bit slow in the Manga, the pacing so far has been immaculate.
The animation in this episode was great, some nice gore and body horror. The last scene after Johnny and Gyro run away from Benjamin morphing his face was great and horrific!
The way Mountain Tim’s abilities were portrayed at the end was also equally cool.
Funny, I noticed Benjamin was called “Benny” in the Anime and the English dub, but the Japanese Va still calls him Benjamin despite the paper in the Anime showing “Benny”.
Great VA work for both sides by the way!
I got nothing to criticize on this one (aside from the ending song, which I learned terrible things about its singer since last week…), another solid episode with some great action!
Also, I guess I’m doing these short, weekly SBR blogs now? Let’s see if I can keep up to the end.
September
September Features: Mina The Hollower, Sonic Journey and Goodbye, Lara!
31/09 - Goodbye, Sara!# 59
Tags
Series - Goodbye Lara.
(Yes, I invented a new day for this month. I wanted to put this on the website yesterday, but I was omega busy the entire day. So I decided to invent a new day so I can still include this one in September!)
(Yes, I know that typoed the title of the blog. I wrote "Lara" as "Sara" multiple times in my notes without knowing, the title is a reference to that. A reference that… only I’m capable of knowing…)
Boxer!!
It's funny, I became aware of this show when the art of “Boxer!!” appeared on my Drawbox out of nowhere. I sent it to Miya and she said that was from “Goodbye, Sara”.
(Editor’s Note [Pudding a day later after writing this.]: I did not notice this typo until I was porting my doc to the blog. This typo will stay now. The name of the Anime is “Goodbye, Lara” NOT SARA!)
The image in question.
This was another of those Anime I was held at gun point by Miya to watch, but unlike all the previous ones, I was actually going to check it out eventually because the art style got me interested.
Beautiful Looking!
This is Anime is that! Beautiful!
You can screenshot any part of this show and just be amazed at the sheer artistry at display.
It's this super cool old Anime inspired look with all the cool enhancements of the modern age, that somehow still retains the old look!
I don’t know, I'm terrible at describing this, but the point is that it looks great and is animated very well. Lots of good camera angles, they put a lot of effort on the visual aspect.
The story is very intriguing to me.
It takes place in this world where merfolk and humans exist but the latter lives in secrecy and hates the former for reasons I can't spoil.
Lara, our protagonist, is not one that deeply hates humans, she yearns to see the “Land” above the water. She's at odds with her family for said desires, they REALLY hate humans.
I won’t say more than this very basic (literally the first 3-5 minutes of the first episode.) synopsis because the joy of this Anime is uncovering the history of this world.
They throw a lot of imagery and scenes that you won't understand what it means at first but are explained later when the story moves forward. It's was pretty cool to see what the big fish in the sky was after seeing it do some many questionable things.
My Favorite Part.
I gotta say that my favorite part of this Anime's story is that nothing goes as you expect them to be.
Here's an example, Lara is introduced to the concept of School, and I was expecting this to follow the usual trope of “super natural entity becoming a high schooler" that I find a bit annoying with Anime. It limits what type of stories you can tell to what has been done to death already…
Yes, Lara becomes a high schooler for a short period, but this is a vehicle to tell a story with another character instead of being the focus of the show.
Actually, that whole episode was amazing in so many ways. A prime example of what I described earlier or breaking the norm.
It's probably my favorite episode, with the second to last one being my second. They were the ones that got me really emotional.
Roa turned to mermaid!
So Close To Perfection.
This anime reaches so close to perfection, like SO CLOSE!
The only thing that it misses is… the second half of the final episode. They stumble right at the epilogue of the story…
My Thoughts On The Ending (SPOILERS)
I’m very mixed on the ending.
The first half of the last episode was perfect, Mari pushing forward to see Lara despite all the warnings was so in-character and awesome, the shock of the dagger killing her and then the scene of Lara crawling through the it and making her light- chef's kiss 👌
Sure, we sacrificed Lara's family (I wrote “Sara” in my notes.) to villainous roles which felt weird, but it’s understandable since they hate humans. That’s one misstep I could justify… the second half of the episode though…
It was so rushed and weird.
They flash forward 6 months later for an epilogue to tie some loose ends… but that didn’t go well.
We barely get any closure on other stuff and the things we DO get feel very rushed. That moment Luca felt so freaking odd.
Lara's character kind of regressed now? She acts distant to everyone she knows and is actively distancing herself from them by taking a train to god knows where??
I get that the whole point is to not rush love and stuff but this is just weird. These scenes accomplished the opposite of what Lara has been building up to all this time!
She found what she truly wanted, she found her true love and she found her own light for all the merfolk and now she’s… distancing herself from that? Doesn’t make sense to me.
IDK, I’m just a bit sad. This Anime was so perfect up to that point.
Heck, Mari doesn’t even say THE THING! THAT LAST SCENE, SHE COULD'VE TITLE DROPPED AND IT WOULD'VE BEEN GREAT!
But no, she just awkwardly stares at the camera and then it ends AAAAAAAAAAAAAA-
I enjoyed this Anime a lot.
I loved the artstyle, the story was great and avoided a lot of the common Anime tropes and the soundtrack was phenomenal.
Voice acted really well too. (I watched in Japanese, the English VA didn’t do it for me unfortunately. If it did, I would've watched it again in English!)
I recommend it to anyone who is reading to watch it as well. The whole journey was genuinely beautiful, even it tumbles at the end.
25/09 - Off To The Races! (SBR Episode 2)# 58
Tags
Series - Jojo's Bizzare Adventure.
Go! Go!
Steel Ball Run has finally begun!
Still wild to me that we are here with an official adaptation!
I don't usually follow anime weekly, I prefer to watch them when they're done airing, but I made an exception for this one because Jojo Fridays!!!
I'm also going to essentially watch every episode twice, to experience both the English and Japanese dubs. They are somewhat different from each other, but both are good.
The Sheriff’s Request To Mountain Tim
In this one we see the aftermath of the first stage, Gyro and Johnny starting to become full bros, the introduction to Mountain Tim and some of the mystery with a strange murder no racer saw.
It was a pretty good follow up to the first episode!
I liked the animation and art here, looks a little different from episode one but it’s good. The CGI moments were barely noticeable for me, I only saw most on the second rewatch.
Gyro using his weird glasses on the episode is so funny.
It's a well paced episode, no scene drags for too long here and the introduction of Mountain Tim was great. I hope we get to see a little more of him than we saw in the manga. His lasso techniques are so cool. He sounds really good in both languages as well.
The lighting changes to dusk every time something unnatural or, dare I say, Bizarre was pretty fun. I hope they do lots of lighting and color changes. They do some of that in this episode already!
I think that’s all my thoughts for the episode contents, solid one!
The opening however…
I Love It!
Openings are one of my favorite parts of the franchise, they are always crafted with so much meticulous care and attention to detail. They also sometimes evolve throughout a season, which is one of my favorite things from Anime!
Openings that evolve or change are really fun.
Steel Ball Run’s doesn’t disappoint in any regard!
Chaotic, constantly moving and full of incredible shots that mix both 2D & 3D that I sometimes didn’t know which was which.
Okay that last part is a little bit too much glaze, but my point is that it’s really good!
It must have been so difficult to have the camera spin around the place so much while also making these scenes look good.
Of course, it also has spoilers hidden in plain sight with clever visuals and symbolism.
Like the scene on the chorus after Gyro throughs his ball that shows the reflection of future enemies (this entire part is sooooo good too.), it shows the a place called “Devil’s Palm” that will appear later in the season and this scene is faded into Diego’s palm (the rock spikes being the fingers!) to which he briefly poses like Dio and then HE is the one to spin to the camera while covering his mouth, which foreshadows a scene later- IF YOU READ THE MANGA, THIS IS INSANE! AND IF YOU ARE WATCHING THE ANIME, THIS WILL BE INSANE!
The scene towards the end with the ball hitting the top of the net and at the apex of the ball’s height there’s a split shot between Gyro and Johnny with THE statue in the middle as the ball falls, turning to other various important ball shaped objects in the process. It’s just cinema that I can’t explain to you because I don’t want to spoil!
I was expecting a lot of parallels and references to the first ever opening, this being like “Steel Ball Run’s version of Sono Chi No Sadame” but it decided to do something different and unique. The only reference I caught on was the statue in that last scene.
The song is fire by the way, I have been listening to it nonstop since it dropped! (It’s in the Song of the Day section up there!
Thoughts Over!
The Ending I don’t have much to talk about, Jojo Eds are either love or indifference for me.
The song is okay, the visuals are cool but it’s something I’m not gonna stick around to watch every time.
This adaptation is living up to my expectations and I can’t wait to see what’s for next week!
21/09 - Do You Talk To Yourself While Playing?# 57
Tags
Misc - Random Topics.
Let’s Player Brainrot!
(you may consider a warning for what happens when you watch Let’s Players and Streamers play video games all your life.)
I noticed recently that I’m not as silent as I used to be while playing games.
A long time back, I used to be completely stoic while I played single-player games, but nowadays, I find myself sometimes narrating my gameplay/ speaking to a non existing audience. Explaining some of my thoughts processes and even proposing questions to a mysterious collective called “we” that doesn’t exist but also I’m a part of.
Basically, I’m talking to myself and engaging in rhetorical questions.
This has become the kind of roleplay I do now… It’s quite strange, isn't it?
More Free = More Talking
This didn’t come out of nowhere, it’s a result of letting myself be more free in recent years.
I went from barely reacting to stuff to now purposefully letting my guard down. In other words, letting myself be absorbed by the game I’m playing.
Emitting gasp when something surprising happens, be taken by back when I’m shocked and even have goosebumps while something cool happens…
Y’know, the more I describe the things I feel sometimes, the more I realize that like… this is completely normal human beheavior…
Well, point is, this indeed make games fun to me (obviously),
Not that I wasn’t having fun back then, I still did! Now it 's just more!
Makes the hobby a lot more enjoyable when I engage with it and sometimes talk to myself about it.
Why Not Become Let’s Player/ Streamer?
I’ve been asked this question before many times and the answer I usually give is that “I’m not cut out for that life…”
I streamed a long time in the past for just a short period and the experience itself was fine because I usually only streamed while playing with friends. Doing like that helps you ease into streaming. It didn’t last long because I was a kid that had to go to school and a summer vacation can only last you so long.
I stopped streaming forever that summer.
As time passes, the prospect of an audience watching my gameplay just seems wrong to me. I don’t play games necessarily right, I make mistakes often, do stupid stuff and sometimes miss crucial things that everyone gets.
These are qualities that most streamers possess, but the way I do them would just make for a frustrating experience.
Plus having to entertain an audience makes my brain melt, I’m not cut out to be social all the time. I need those times where I just be by myself with the thoughts in my head…
(Of course, this is all assuming I get to the very low % of streamers that do get more than 0 viewers concurrently on a stream LMAO!)
Retro Pudd pretends to play Tetris. (she's bad and never played it.)
Heck, even when I’m on a Discord call with friends, I can’t keep the attention of my friends after 5 minutes of them watching my screen.
If I don’t have an entertaining enough personality to do that, I’m basically hopeless on the outside world!
… well, thinking about this example a little more… streaming to friends on a call and to a platform aren’t the same.
Most of the time my failure to keep attention on a call is less from my abilities and more that my friends don’t share the exact same interests as me, which is fair…
I Don’t Know Where To Go With This…
A-Anyway, I’m going to avoid the urge to do livestreams again.
I wanna throw the question back to you, Do you talk to yourself while playing games?
Does that make games more fun to you?
If you never tried or thought about this, do you think I lost my sanity?
Well, maybe I have. Maybe.
That last one was also a rhetorical questions. Well, all of them are because there's no way for you to answer them, but anyway-
I spent an entire week horrifically sick from a cold and had 5 days in a row where I got close to no sleep, I just started recovering from that.
So yeah, enjoy these ramblings from a recovering Pudding!
17/09 - Sonic Journey - After Middle Nostalgia!# 56
Tags
Series - Sonic The Hedgehog (Series).
The Weird Period
We are back with the Sonic Journey, this time covering what I like to call the “Weird” period of the franchise.
Right off the heels of Sonic 06, this franchise would need to find a way to redeem itself in the home console market… and they did it in a very strange way…?
SONIC UNLEASHED
This is a game I have a lot of nostalgia for, because it was one of the few Sonic games I ever played as a child (I played the PS2 version back then, but later I got a XBOX 360 and I played that version a ton.), and perhaps the game I was most looking forward to revisit with the Recomp that released last year.
Post Disaster
The story of the game goes as follows: Eggman manages to harness the power of the chaos emeralds from Sonic and releases a being called “Dark Gaia” from the depths of Earth, which causes the entire planet to split into multiple pieces.
Dark Gaia also does something to Sonic that turns him into the “Werehog” (Werewolf hedgehog) during the night.
It’s up to Sonic and his new companion named Chip to restore the power of the emeralds and stop Eggman from fully awakening Dark Gaia.
Chip is the creature on the right. Sonic is to the left, in case you don't who he is.
Unlike Sonic 06, this game’s plot is very simple and easy to follow along. It’s just a world-wide adventure that doesn’t evolve much beyond that.
Actually, they REALLY tried to avoid creating another disaster.
For example, one of the big complaints from people at the time was that the games were that you played as Sonic’s friends more than actually playing as Sonic. So they decided to remove 90% of the characters we knew and it’s all just Sonic, with Tails on the side.
Heck, NOT EVEN KNUCKLES appear in this game! The game has been in this franchise since the third game!
Eggman is still around though, he's too important to remove. (Tails and Amy to.)
I find this decision silly, because the problems I experienced during the Adventure Era was not necessarily having multiple characters = bad, no, my problem was that EVERYONE BUT SONIC SUCKED TO PLAY.
So I find this a bit of an overreaction, but whatever.
The game’s plot being super simple is not a bad thing though, there’s stakes to what's going on! It has mostly comedic moments, but it does take time to have some chill moments and develop characters!
Why am I putting such a big spotlight on this specifically? Well, you will see in later games.
Day & Night
This game is divided into two types of stages, daytime where you control Sonic and it’s all about going as fast as possible, and nighttime where you control the “werehog” version of Sonic which uh, I’ll address later.
Sonic has received a major overhaul in his gameplay, this is the “Modern Sonic” formula!
You control Sonic in a 3D environment and you gotta reach the end as fast as possible, the usual. Levels are less puzzle and open ended in design and more focused on branching paths and quick reactions.
We have a new core game mechanic, Sonic now has the boost meter: with the press of a button, you can gain massive amounts of speed! (I assume they took inspiration from the Rush series for this.)
It’s not an insta-win button however, going really fast has its drawbacks. You need to be extra fast in reacting to stage obstacles and try your best to maintain the gauge so you can keep boosting throughout most of a level.
Here's me failing.
During the adventure, you unlock some new abilities such as the stomp, light speed dash and all that. They work pretty well, it’s one of the first games where the light speed dash works correctly and doesn’t kill you!
This version of the Modern Sonic formula is ALMOST perfect. The boost and gameplay loop works really well and all the levels were designed to take advantage of that, the only thing that sucked is boosting drowns out and the stomp is very unreliable as a form of halting momentum. Oh, and also some of the control scheme was weird, like the holming attack being on the boost button instead of the jump button, which can cause problems sometimes.
But for a first attempt on a new playstyle, this is pretty solid!
I also should clarify my bias here, I do prefer Boost gameplay more than the other styles this franchise attempted.
Super speed action.
Oh yeah, there’s a secret in-between playstyle if you play the XBOX 360 version!
“What is it?” you may ask.
Hahaha, it’s only the most fun you will ever have!
Here’s the premise: You play as Sonic & Tails on the Tornado plane, it’s an auto scroller, so you do nothing!
And if enemies show up, just press the QTE button displayed to blow them up!
Repeat that for like, 5 minutes and done!
How fun!
(This is the most pointless thing ever, just a waste of time that doesn’t add anything. Thankfully, you only do this twice.)
Now for the second half of this game… the night stages…
During nighttime, Sonic turns to the Werehog, he gets much more fur and has big stretchy arms, for some reason. This is… a pretty weird playstyle.
Werehog stages are MUCH slower paced, the focused is also shifted from getting to the end as fast possible to puzzles, combat and exploration.
It’s a big whiplash, which isn’t something exactly new for this franchise but…
Let’s start with the good, you have a good amount of moves you can utilize in combat, many options to choose while in combat. Plataforming is also fun because Sonic can utilize his stretch powers to grab ledges and poles from a good distance.
Now for the bad, something you will catch on quickly is that… there’s very little depth in the combat.
Sure, you have a bunch of combos and moves you can pull off, but you are never forced to use all of them. There’s a huge lack of enemy variety, and the enemies that DO exist, don’t force you to do stuff other than just punching them. You have a block button, but you can go the entire game without using it! + A lot of things require QTEs, this game loves to spam QTEs at you.
This problem becomes even worse when you realize that fighting is the bulk of all nighttime stages. You will fight A LOT!
It gets exhausting real quick. The battle music constantly interrupting OST also doesn’t help.
Oh yeah, these stages are also very LOOOOOOOONG too. Don’t be surprised if you spend upwards of 15+ minutes in any single stage, they are designed to be this way.
You trade the hyper speed of daytime stages for the more slow paced nighttime stages.
Again, this type of gameplay shift is not something new, but I think the Werehog is too far…
Werehog Problem
The Werehog stages suffer from a lot of problems, but I think the main factor at play is that they don’t feel like Sonic.
If you look at previous playstyles in the franchise, one thing was still consistent between them and Sonic is that they are fast paced. They are designed with Sonic as a base with whatever gimmick placed on top of them. (Let’s ignore the big purple cat in the room.)
The Werehog is a huge departure from this. He’s deliberately designed to be the opposite of Sonic.
And that’s the issue!
They got the intended effect of feeling distinct from “Sonic”, but lost the feel of a “Sonic Game”.
I think this problem would’ve been mitigated a bit if combat was fast paced, to have some aspect of speed preserved. Even if the idea was to make something different than Sonic.
At least the boss fights are kinda cool.
Not even my nostalgia googles were able to protect me from this truth…
Don’t get the wrong impression though, this is not a “bad” part of the game. You will have fun playing as the Werehog, it just might get boring or feel weird by the end.
More Positives
The graphics are kind of impressive for an XBOX 360 game, the art direction is great too! Each region Sonic visits feel distinct and OMG- HUMANS THAT LOOK NATURAL TO THE SONIC WORLD???
It took this long for them to realize that realistic humans contrasted with cartoony hedgehogs don’t mesh well…
The music, MAN THE MUSIC!
MUSIC HIJACK
The OST of this game is artistically rich!
Being a world-wide adventure, each area has their own style and instrumentation, which is pretty cool!
Day & Night also have their own styles, day using a more happy, upbeat approach while night has a more slow, jazzy feel.
Now combine those two artistic decisions together and imagine the kind of songs this would create!
-Actually, you don't need to! Just listen to the day & night version of Rooftop Run and tell me what you think.
Not Rooftop Run but still cool!
If you listen to the day version and tell me you don’t see Sonic running from rooftop to rooftop in the bustling city of bootleg Italy on a bright sunny day, I'll tell you that you are a LIAR!
If you listen to the night version and tell me you don’t see Sonic sneakily walking through the empty streets of bootleg Italy late at night, I'll tell you that you are a LIAR! AGAIN!
It's such a SHAME the OST is sabotaged by audio design decisions…
Paradox
Taking out the rose tinted glasses for a second, this game suffers from a lot more problems that I didn’t talk about here, like the forced grind to progress the story.
But this is not a bad game!
With everything summed up, it’s a solid 7/10 game! That’s a good score!
It has great Sonic stages, with some killer tracks & graphics!
This shot is so raw!
To me, I can’t help but love it despite the many flaws I saw during this playthrough.
(Puts the glasses back on)
Mostly because of the impression it left me with back when I beat it for the first on the XBOX 360.
The Egg Dragoon fight as a whole is awesome. This is the best robot ever created by Eggman. This is a fact, no one can dispute it!
You even fight hand to hand as the Werehog! How cool is that!
But nothing comes close to topping turning Super Sonic alongside Light Gaia to stop this eldritch monster that is Dark Gaia.
And then having the orchestral version of Endless Possibilities (the main theme) blasting on the background of the final fight- ITS PEAK!
That shit got me so hyped back then… and it STILL DOES TODAY!
EVEN IF THE FIGHT KINDA SUCKS TO PLAY, LMAO!
More raw shots from the game.
Rambling's End
To end this section that is starting to become an endless ramble, this is a good game.
If you want the best experience, get the Unleashed Recomp and look for mods for it!
There’s a lot of mods that outright fixes a lot of the minor issues I brought up here, such as the audio ones.
Oooooor alternatively, you can replace Chip with Miku!
Unleashed might not be the best the franchise has to offer, but as the game to course correct after the colossal failure that was 06… I think they did a good job at it!
SONIC AND THE BLACK KNIGHT
These next two entries will go by faster, I have far less to say about them.
Sequel to the series that started with Secret Rings that features the same style of gameplay… but not quite!
It’s the same vibe as the previous game, linear level design where Sonic has to do an objective/ get to the end while you deal with motion controls. Unlike its predecessor though, Sonic doesn’t auto run! You have to hold forward for him to run!!!!!!
Most, if not all, motion control gimmick is not focused on the new sword Sonic has- oh yeah, he got a sword now!
He also talks.
Sonic is transported to a book universe by a mysterious girl and now he has to defeat the guy, who is immortal King Arthur, or more commonly known as Black Knight.
Sonic teams up with that girl, this new talking sword called Calibur and faces many of the characters from the book, now being cosplayed by other Sonic characters.
It’s a relatively simple story that follows a lot of the same beats of the previous game, but at least there’s a cool twist at the end where the girl is the real villain this time!
But I think the art direction is weaker in this game.
The story cutscenes lacked a little bit of something to make them visually interesting and the setting of the story, being a medieval theme, wasn’t anything special. There was no place where I was like “woah!” by the visuals and themes, it was just your standard medieval stuff like villages, grass plains and caves.
Not even the OST did it, the only songs I remember are the main theme (Knight of the Wind
) and Fight The Knight. (“final” boss theme.)
Fighting A Knight.
Better With Swords
Like I said previously, the controls were improved a lot and actually feel kind of fun to play with my setup!
Hacking and slashing through a bunch of enemies was pretty fun! For once in my life, I actually felt like a game would be more fun to play with a Wii Remote!
They decided to heavily simplify the level up system into a simple equipment menu where you can only have 2 effects active at a time. I feel mixed about this, on one hand, having to build out your abilities was cool… but Secret Rings was REALLY reliant on it, while this one you can beat the game without caring about them.
Oh yeah, there’s also multiple playable characters that feature different movesets from Sonic! I didn’t play much with them though, the prospect of learning a new character with my messed up controls was not very appealing.
They look cool though!
Very Okay Series
This game is a very fine game.
I think I would have more appreciation for it if I played with intended controls, but I can’t be bothered to get a Wii Remote. I don't have motion controls!!!
It’s a good step in the right direction for this series, big improvements over the previous game!
But I guess SEGA wasn’t confident in it, because this is the last game of this Story Book series.
Oh well, I wonder what's next on my list for this franchi-
SONIC THE HEGDEHOG 4: EPISODE 1
SONIC 4??? THE NEXT GAME TO THE LEGENDARY TRILOGY???
This HAS to be a banger!
Right…?
This… does not look good…
Okay, apparently, in SEGA's endless wisdom, they took a mobile game they were developing and just… slapped the number 4 on it!?
According to Miya, the local Sonic Expert and Sponsor of this tor- I mean journey, this was originally a mobile game, but I don’t think I needed to specify that, you can see how ugly the game looks.
Sonic looks like plastic, she contrasts really poorly with the environment.
But nevermind that, let’s take the contents of the game and compare it to the original trilogy.
Every new game in the series introduced a new area for Sonic to explore, y’know, some creativity so the games didn’t feel like they were retreading old ground. Even if they were modifications of familiar locations, E.I. Green Hill - Emerald Hill - Angel Island.
So, what NEW and Unique zones do we have for this game- huh? What do you mean it’s all the same stuff we saw before??
The same greens...
I think this was the start of the zone fatigue we are going to see a bit in the future. I remember from back then that a lot of people were getting tired of seeing the same, and this is the first time I felt this with this franchise… which is a bit odd, but at lass that’s what I felt. I guess having 3 stages and a boss instead of 2 per act makes it more fatiguing?
The OST is also very “fine”, it exists and it didn’t leave any sort of impression on me.
There IS Good
One good and fun innovation from this otherwise by the books Sonic game is the new additions to his moveset! Sonic now has the holming attack, and he tries to use it with no enemies to holm to, he will just dash forward a bit in the air. These two new additions were kinda cool, I got a lot of use of the mid air dash to course correct my movement through a stage or to just get to places I wouldn’t be able to previously.
Props to the team for actually adding more depth to the gameplay!
Sonic controls a little differently than original trilogy, he for some reason loses momentum when going into ball form, but that’s okay. I never noticed he went fast in ball form anyway. (Until Miya mildly explained that to me one day.)
The final zone was probably the one I had most fun with, it features some cool and original gimmicks such as steam pipes that send to a direction they come out from and hydraulic presses that have two ways to go through them that offer the same risks. (before the press and after it.)
Okay, it’s exactly “new” gimmicks, but it’s something!
While the one I really disliked was the second to last one, because of all the puzzly level design that doesn’t fit Sonic at all.
But that doesn’t a single candle to what the final boss stage does to people…
You have to beat all the bosses in a row and then fight the true final boss, which is the Death Egg Robot again, but somehow it’s an even longer boss fight AND it has a final attack on the last phase that insta kills you if you don’t react quickly enough!
It’s not as terrible as the original fight, because you do get rings, but still… so bad…
Why 4
It continues to baffle me why they put the number 4 on the title, this does close to nothing new and looks incredibly ugly.
Screams “simple mobile game” instead of “sequel to a legendary sequel”.
Miya put it best when she described this game to me, “It’s like if Nintendo named Super Mario Run as ‘Super Mario Bros. 4’”
This is just a mediocre game with some small innovations in Sonic moveset, it’s not bad or good. Just fine.
I felt hollow playing it.
Modern Era Starts Now
And that sums up all the progress on my journey so far!
Here’s the list:
Gold means beaten since last time.
I alluded to this before, but most of the games going forward I am somewhat familiar with them.
Kind of.
I played Generations, Lost Worlds, Forces and actually hated Mania on launch. I didn’t understand the appeal of Classic Sonic back then, but my thoughts have changed nowadays, so I wonder how I will react to these games.
The rest I never touched BUT I heard that the only bad game going forward is Forces, which I know why, and maybe Superstars. That’s exciting!
I’m finally out of the hell of bad-mediocre games…
08/09 - Website Update Catch up!# 55
Tags
Website - Website Changes.
Catching Up!
Not much has changed in the past few weeks.
I added a new blog theme, which is probably the most ambitious one I have ever done: The Binding Of Isaac Theme!
I had to delve into some custom border coding that is still a mystery to me, but I think it looks cool enough for now.
I mostly made the paper assets myself, but I should've used the game one instead… I would’ve done that if I understood what I was doing better but here we are.
Worth noting that I also published this blog and blog 54# since last time, which has one of my most proud accomplishments artistically. I really like how that Lolo art turned out.
My art will only go down from here! (I have been telling myself that everytime I get to a milestone like this to cope...)
Oh yeah, here’s an unrelated Pudd art which is kind of a reference to the dialogue expressions I used to have for blogs. This one has more ambitious expressions.
Aside from that, I fixed a couple of small issues with the dream theme image borders, but unfortunately I was not able to fix other themes' borders. At least in a way that doesn’t need a restructure of each page.
I also updated the Game Shelf page to have Archipelago and Retroachivements posters.
A way to consolidate all the games I engaged with one of these systems active, to avoid clogging up the page with a bunch of games related to those 2, because I feel that the main focus when I play with one of those active are them and less the game.
I don't like the way it is right now, so I might change how these 2 entries in the page work.
Caught Up!
And that’s it!
Totally nothing else that has been happening hahahaha…
…
Oh, would you look at this comic I found originally made by Miya that I edited to fit this situation:
(Phoenix Club stuff is being worked on, just gonna take a while before I can share/ post stuff.)
04/09 - Mina The Hollower!# 54
Tags
Games - Yacht Club Games.
It’s PREABLIN’ Time!
There’s not much of a story to why I picked up this game.
I was looking for a game to play and remembered that Mina The Hollower released recently. So I picked up and played!
I’m not a stranger to Yacht Club’s games, I played Shovel Knight Treasure Trove (all 4 campaigns) many years ago and enjoyed it, they know how to make a fun game.
And Mina The Hollower is exactly that, a very fun game!
Lolo as A Mice Hollower!
It’s HOLLOWIN’ Time!
This game is a 2D Zelda-like, with a top down view and all that good stuff.
You control a mouse named Mina and the main draw is that she can burrow underground!
There’s plenty of uses for this feature, but before we get to that, I wanna talk about the story first.
As established before, you are mouse gaming as Mina, she is part of a Hollower guild and creator of the Spark Generators, which are massive towers that uh… I don't exactly remember what they do but they are important for the regions.
Lionel, king/ mayor of Ossex asks for Mina's help to repair them, since she’s the only one that can do this. They help Tenebrous Isle prosper and thrive.
The Marshal of Ossex, the one who is damaging the generators, claims they are the cause of all the monsters who have been infesting the isles as of recently.
Both are correct, and this is the main conflict you have to think about as you repair the towers in each region.
Sounds like a cool story, which it is, but the plot mostly takes a backseat for the gameplay to shine.
It only progresses when you finish repairing a tower.
If you want to know my thoughts on the ending, they are in the spoiler section below:
SPOILERS FOR MINA THE HOLLOWER!
I was a bit bummed out by the ending, but in retrospect, this is the only “good” ending that could’ve worked.
Lionel had the entire population hook, line and sinker on his lie and ruling, Mina having to kill him also didn’t help things.
Everything is in chaos right now, but it’s better to let people figure things out then to let them all turn to monsters over time.
The dinner sequence was really cool though! I laughed a lot during that.
The raid at the castle and the song, The Brilliant Truth, was fantastic. Listen to it, link is at the top of the blog!
It’s a fine story, it does the job of getting you along and giving purpose to your journey, but the most important part here is the gameplay… and that part absolutely rocks!
It’s GAMIN’ Time!
Mina is a Hollower™, so she can burrow underground! While burrowing, she moves faster and is invincible to most attacks. You are going to do a lot of burrowing in this game.
There are many puzzles and sections where you can utilize the burrow feature, for example:
Spark on the ground? go dig up something! A wall in the way? Maybe try burrowing under the gap at the bottom! Want to take something? Why not burrow under it and then grab it while leaving the ground!
The combat implications of the ability are so cool, because burrow is not an insta-win button. I found myself a lot of the time having to predict when an enemy or boss would attack and having to preemptively time my burrow for it, because there's like a half second-full second from Mina jumping to being underground.
It’s a simple mechanic that is just really fun to do!
Mina has an arsenal of trinkets, sidearms and weapons she can utilize during exploration.
I decided to stick with the Nightstar for most of my playthrough, which is like this whip with a spike at the end, real Castlevania style. It’s THE weapon in the cover art, really cool! But I also used the Battery Buster for some time too!
Actually, I think I used both a good amount of time.
Either way, there’s 5 weapons in total that you can get and they all have different playstyles. For the ones I used, Nightstar was pretty good at dealing with enemies from a distance while the Battery Buster has this cool mechanic of hitting enemies giving you charges, which then you can switch to shooting mode and use charges to shoot at enemies from a distance!
The more I think about it now, I might’ve used the buster more than Nightstar… that gameplay loop of hitting enemies and then backing off to unleash a barrage of bullets was too fun.
The other 3 weapons I tried for a bit but they didn’t click as much unfortunately. Whisper and Vesper are close range daggers that attack really fast, Blaststrike Maul is this big hammer that requires some wind up to attack but is very strong and Guardian Casket is the shield-parry weapon.
Their gameplay loop didn’t click with me, but I saw many people who absolutely love these weapons, which is very cool! It’s fun that you can use any of the five weapons and have a blast!
Good thing too, because the game is pretty difficult.
(That last sentence implies that you can’t switch weapons, but no, you can at any save point!)
Weapons are cool, but the real star of the show for me was the arsenal of trinkets Mina can find throughout her journey and they have a lot of unique effects!
Let me talk about my absolute favorite one: Wallower’s Gauntlets.
Get this, this trinket allows you to burrow ON WALLS!
You heard me right, WALLS!
Want to get across a massive gap? Just burrow into the wall and go to the other side! Simple and really cool!
The really awesome part is that the game is not designed with any trinkets in mind, instead, you are encouraged to find your own solutions to problems and puzzles with the many combinations of trinkets.
I watched a couple of playthroughs of this game and there’s this cave with a long gap with a treasure at the end. To solve this challenge, I utilized the wall burrow to cross the gap.
But when I watched others do it, they were utilizing all kinds of trinkets, sidearms and even weapons to do it!
If were to put into better words how this game is designed, I would say this:
Mina The Hollower provides you with a bunch of tools to tackle a tough challenge. There’s no correct answer ever, any solution you find to the challenge is fair game.
Oh yeah, I forgot to talk about sidearms… to be honest, I didn’t utilize them that much.
They are secondary weapons you can find in candles and they can be utilized alongside your weapon, but they cost joules (mana) to use.
They also provide you with many tools to do challenges, but I personally rarely used them.
Except for the Fishing Rod! That sidearm has a unique interaction, if you land your hook on a grounded enemy, you will be pulled towards that enemy. You can basically tear this game in half and go to many places way before you are supposed to, it’s awesome! We love fishing rods around here.
It’s EXPLORIN’ Time!
Exploration is a joy in this game.
The main currency of the game and the thing you use to level up stats is called “Bones” and there’s MILLIONS of them to collect around the environment, a lot of them being rewarded for paying attention, doing something risky or getting to hard to reach places.
But of course, there’s many other collectibles to find. Trinkets, weapon upgrades, stat level ups and many more things.
I found this secret island!
You need to pay a lot of attention to the environment and hints the NPCs of the game tell.
My brain was constantly being tickled by the amount of puzzles and secret breakable walls, had lots of fun finding those.
There’s one elaborate secret I’m sure you heard about, which is the fabled “ladder”.
Early on in a specific area, a NPC tells you that a ladder is very useful and can get you to many impossible to reach places. They are correct, many places in this area have high areas you just can't reach.
Later on, you find a shopkeeper that, if you buy something from them, they will actually get on a ladder and get that item for you. The animation is a bit long but it’s whatever…
I think you can connect the dots here.
The NPC was talking about this shopkeeper’s ladder and you are supposed to go behind the shop, take the ladder and then go wild collecting stuff!
The animation of the shopkeeper climbing the ladder and getting your item is intentionally long BECAUSE it’s meant for you to realize that!
It’s super clever…
Unfortunately I didn’t have that eureka moment, because I had completely forgotten about the ladder and hint and just assumed the high to reach places was a trinket/ sidearm I didn’t have… But I was still mind blown when I looked up the answer for this puzzle!
It’s FAVORITIN’ Time!
My favorite area of the game is definitely Septemburg- I mean, JUST LOOK AT THIS:
Every major area has an artwork like this when you first enter it, very charming!
Each area is themed around some kind of horror I believe, the pixel art and music really makes them feel truly unique! I really love the artwork and OST of this game.
This one is themed around an old creepy halloween slasher film on a farm aesthetic. So there’s crows tied to crosses to… resemble scare…crows… (I just realized that joke while writing this…)
Anyway, the big thing about this area! Many campfire stories tell of a horrific creature living in this area called The Carving Man! AND HE'S REAL!
He is a Mr. X style enemy that will hunt you viciously through the area and you can’t stop, you just gotta run!
Yacht Club plays with this concept a lot, it’s super fun the various unique ways he basically jumpscares the player by showing up.
My favorite was one towards the end when you find a save point.
Save points are X spots on the ground that you can burrow into and access a safe underground spot where you can restock supplies, change equipment and all that good stuff.
When I got to this save point, I restocked my stuff and then noticed that some dirt was falling from the top of the screen. I start to wonder if that’s something that was always there and I just never noticed… but before I could ponder any longer- BAMN!
CHASE MUSIC STARTS BLASTING AS THE CARVING MAN FALLS FROM THE TOP, LADING RIGHT IN THE MIDDLE OF MY SAFE ROOM AND READY TO KILL!
This was such a FUN jumpscare!
Actually, this game has a lot of good jumpscares, funnily enough. Like, something really unexpected happens when you don’t expect and suddenly you have to go fight or flight.
Lots of fun!
It’s HARD-TO-COMPLAIN’ Time!
The game is so good that I barely have anything to point out!
I guess the difficulty in some particular areas did give me trouble, but nothing I couldn’t overcome.
Oh, I know!
As established earlier, bones are the main currency, but you can actually lose them if you die… Well, the game gives you chances before you lose them.
When you die, you lose one spark orb, if you die when you have zero, you lose all non stored bones. You have to travel back to where you died to get the spark orb back.
I could compare it to Silksong, but I don’t think it’s all that fair…
Unlike that game, Mina The Hollower has plenty of save points where you go back to upon death and you automatically get all spark orbs when you level up. Plus don’t lose all of them on the first death, so you have A LOT of leeway to not fuck up, which 90% pf the time means you are not losing bones.
The only times I lost my unstored bones were on purpose, when I was already planning on bashing my skull against a boss I wasn’t supposed to fight early.
Is that... a friend... smilling?
Aside from those VERY small nitpicks, I got nothing else in the mind tank.
The game has a killer everything and even has tons of replayability just by nature oh how it’s designed and the many modifiers you can toggle to spice things up.
Heck, I didn’t even encounter a SINGLE BUG OR GRAPHICAL GLITCH! (At least that I noticed.)
It's THAT polished.
It's ENDIN’ Time!
I'm not much of a TLOZ gamer, my only experience with it was using a guide to playthrough A Link To The Past, which was fun.
But unlike that game, I felt most things intuitive to discover on my own. I saw some people struggle with finding new areas to go to, but to me, I just looked at the fountain in Ossex and went in the vague direction where the lightbulbs were at. After some exploration, I would eventually find where I wanted to go…
The only exception to this was Coltrane Peak, I had to look up where that was because it never occurred in my head to USE THE TRAIN to go there…
Anyway, you read this far in the blog, so that means the game interested you a bit, right?
Go play it!
I beat the game 100% and I STILL wanted to play more! (Which I will!)
The game is so good that I don't know what my game of the year will be now…
