Backlog 2025

[greensara]

Rolled the credits on Fantasy Life i yesterday. Loved it! There's still missions and ranking up jobs to do since I only got Alchemist to Master, everything else is at Expert, and I honestly don't know if I even needed that since my helpers were great for the end-of-story portion. I will probably take a break from it though since I have already sank so much time into it.

I may go back and work on Xenoblade X or one of the other games I have already started, or start one of the "unstarted" ones from my backlog. Not really sure what genre I feel like playing next. I actually am kind of in a reading mood, which is a little ironic with summer classes going on, so I may try working on some of my book backlog.

[Kikki]

Overworked yesterday. Too many new hires is dramatically reducing hours, but even these diminished ones are hard to deal with. Stupid new meds side effects...stupid defective body...stupid defective brain.

Okay. I've been playing some Tears of the Kingdom, which is even more fun with Zelda Notes running concurrently, though I wish it was just integrated into the game rather than on the phone. Why does Nintendo have to stick with their stupid app? No one likes it!

I do like the content it adds, but it could just have been created as an update to the GAME.

Haven't been playing Azuma. I love it, but fell out of the mood for it. I think I got sick of managing villages? I'll get back to it eventually.

Mostly been playing FLi most recently. I've still got to level Cook up from Expert to Master, and my other combat lives are lower level, too, but every other life is Mastered, and four are at Hero (maxed.) Going from Expert to Master is harder than going from Master to Hero, in my experience so far. Maybe because now I can make some legendary-level tools.

I have every region community board complete except my own island, which is on level 9 because I haven't been focusing on my Gallery or on raising the level of my Treasure Groves. I have most of the mysterious slate recipes and I've lifted every seal.

I just want to 'Hero' every life, now, I think. I'm not sure if there's anything left to complete, other than getting my island from 9 to 10, and the final rank of the shop. I COULD keep raising my Ginormosia levels...I've got one to level 4 and everything else at 3 (because that's the level at which legendaries can begin to appear.) but other than the couple of missing items out of my Encyclopedia, I'm pretty close to completing everything I'm interested in. Mind you, it's these upper levels that are the toughest to finish.

Having trouble with my neck again. Wanted to keep playing this afternoon/evening, but it doesn't look like I can. Hopefully tomorrow...

Or possibly something less button-mashy than FLi. TotK might be okay for a bit. Meanwhile, time to go make western sandwiches. Don't want my bell peppers to get elderly before I get around to it!

[Bluie]

Summer workload + mood swing strikes again for me. I'm SO physically exhausted after work this time of year. June was more or less fine until the final week. Now we're on the cusp of July 4th and « Cow Poopoo » just does not slow down until the new years. I spent most of my free time last year writing as it added less to my pile of exhaustion than picking up an controller. This year, I haven't been writing nearly as much and playing more games, but even with the shiny Switch 2, I defaulted back to FFXIV.

Despite spending close to 2000 hours in this game... I miss it. That probably sounds like insanity, but it's true. I miss the world, I miss the areas I no longer visit any more on my endgame character, watching the characters grow, and so on. Back when I was playing Xenoblade 3, one of the items you could pick up in the forest area was called a 'Squeezy Lime' - and that tickled me so much I made a FFXIV alt with that name. She's a lime green female hrothgar who's been sitting on my account untouched until yesterday. After a very frustrating day at work, I started playing through A Realm Reborn with her... and it's fun! No need to fuss about endgame gear or making sure you're up to date on side quests to progress certain plots - just pure exploration and revisiting the story. For fun, I changed the VA to Japanese too, to give it a little fresh feel. It's funny, a lot is standing out to me now that I know the 10-year-in-the-making plot. Simple lines that felt like a villain being mustache-twisty evil or small hints in little side quest are having me go "Oh... that was on PURPOSE! SNEAKY LITTLE DEVS!"

I replayed A Realm Reborn and Heavensward once each, but never beyond that. Hell, I've wanted to replay Endwalker for some time now, but haven't gotten around to it. Stormblood is a lull in the plot I'm not overly fond of, BUT, it still has great characters I wouldn't mind seeing again. Regardless, I'm working on Squeezy Lime's journey right now. Honestly, the only game at this very moment that could divert my attention is the Grand Bazaar remake, but it's not out yet, so ehhhhh. There is a mobile version of FFXIV now, but it's only available in China... for now. I am tentatively interested in it, but right here, right now, I don't have the patience to wait for it.

[Kikki]

Despite spending close to 2000 hours in this game... I miss it. That probably sounds like insanity, but it's true.

There's nothing weird about that! I crave XCX badly when I haven't played it in a while. DQB2, too. I tend to want to play them again a couple times a year, in spite already spending hundreds, maybe pushing a thousand hours in each (they are finite games after all, not like FFXIV where the content has been growing for 10 years.) Those games are my HOME. Part of me lives there forever. Home is the comfort place.

~

They ruined some parts of XCX with the 'definitive' edition and I'm scared to see the new added-on ending since Monosoft always botches this up, so I don't want to go back into that game right now, lol. (That was a very ingenuine 'lol' there...I ain't laughing, I'm sad-scared.) They always make GREAT gameplay for the add-on stuff, but they ruin the story.

Fantasy Life i has been making me crave DQB2 desperately...for some reason, every time I craft. I'm left with question marks floating all around my had as I play the mini game, wondering why, every time, it makes me want to get off FLi and get onto DQB2...but...I think it might be the sound effects? Something about the busy crafting sounds reminds me of DQB2, I think. I need to go back into it to remind myself and find out if that's true.

(I also once had to go back to XCX because I craved the picking-up-collectibles sound effect that badly, especially the picking-up-a-quest-collectible sound. They made that effect less satisfying in the definitive version, sadly. WHY???)

I'm still working on filling the last bits of my encyclopedia and picking up more slates, as I have 82 of 103 possible recipes, and I need the remaining ones, though they're just variants of existing ones, like a supreme version of the apocalypse armor or a legendary version of the arcanite sword...I have the other quality levels already. (That doesn't include the 4 base remodel items. I don't know if I have those. I think not?) I'm trying to get them all, anyway.

~

Other than that, my Switch 2. It's glorious in handheld, though HORRIBLE to hold. I need to get a grip for it, stat. But the screen is just so big and crisp and glossy. I have a protector on it now since it is apparently EXTREMELY easy to scratch up, thanks to the film cover that you're not allowed to remove, under threat of voiding your warranty.

It's fun to have and the switching over (pun not intended) process was pretty painless. I had to manually cancel the download of EVERY GAME I OWN...they won't even come close to fitting on the internal memory of the Switch 2 anyway...but that took ten minutes. A pain, but not a big one. I only have BotW, TotK, FLi, Animal Crossing and DQB2 loaded onto this Switch, not including my physical games, of course. I need to pop XCX into this to see what it does with a physical game. Is it gonna make me install it, like PS4 does? (Physical games feel so pointless on Playstation. It makes you store the entire game on the freaking system anyway!)

Animal Crossing looks TERRIBLE on Switch 2. The loading times are much better, but that seems to be the only improvement, as far as I can tell. Honestly the game looks super washed-out on Switch 2, and no crisper (though it probably looks pretty good in handheld, I haven't checked.) I have to put the HDR on the darkest setting, nearly, to get it to look decent.

Haven't tried DQB2, yet. Will, though. I will forgive Nintendo for shafting Animal Crossing so badly ONLY if the rumor that a NEW AC is coming out in 2026 turns out to be true. Though it probably isn't. So no forgiveness for Nintendo.

I like my Switch 2, anyway. The battery runs out pretty quick in handheld, sadly, since it's just SO shiny. I swear it looks better than my Steam Deck, though I'd have to run the same game side by side to have a better comparison. I expect to have tons of fun on this system, since Nintendo still makes the best first party games, for me, and the only exclusives I care about. (I can now get the PS games I care about on Steam pretty reliably...Tales and Trails and so on. I bet I'll have the option to get them on Switch 2 as well, going forward.) I look forward to enjoying this system for the next 5-8 years, as I did with my little old original, launch-era Switch.

[Bluie]

Despite spending close to 2000 hours in this game... I miss it. That probably sounds like insanity, but it's true.

There's nothing weird about that! I crave XCX badly when I haven't played it in a while. DQB2, too. I tend to want to play them again a couple times a year, in spite already spending hundreds, maybe pushing a thousand hours in each (they are finite games after all, not like FFXIV where the content has been growing for 10 years.) Those games are my HOME. Part of me lives there forever. Home is the comfort place.

You're right, haha. Even Genshin is starting to be fun again, especially with them finally moving away from focusing on the newest nation that I (and half of the fanbase) hated. I felt the need to do the newest quest and popped on yesterday, expecting to get right off after finishing it and nnnope; I stayed on the whole day. I ended up doing some character quests and timed events... for fun. I was having fun lol. I'm was so surprised that I was happy to be back in Inazuma of all places, my number one hate target when I had grievances. ...Now it's nostalgic and I'm actually quite taken with the little Baku yokai (to the point I'm eyeing a plushie...). Guess gamers eventually wander 'home'.

Though I am sticking to not playing Star Rail seriously again until they release the character I like. I'm logging on to grab the Fate Collab, then cold turkey-ing it immediately.

[Kikki]

The battery runs out pretty quick in handheld, sadly, since it's just SO shiny.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Um...what? I know I'm the one that said this, but...what? It runs out quickly because it's shiny? NO IT DOESN'T. What on earth was I trying to say, here? Did I edit out a sentence or phrase and forget to correct it?

Seeing that I wrote that makes me feel like I've, I don't know, had a stroke or something. Like I glitched from one scene to another in the middle and the mash-up slid in there without being noticed, but when I look back, it makes NO SENSE.

The Switch 2 doesn't run out quickly because it's shiny. I assume it runs out of battery power quickly because it's very powerful (for a handheld), so it's using a lot of juice, and the battery is small.

So, the Switch 2 DOES run out of battery power quickly, and it IS very shiny. But the former is not because of the latter. What on earth was I saying? Well, ignore it, anyway, it is not true.

Well, I have to get ready to go to work soon, since they extended my hours for today. I need the money, but I am adjusting one prescription and quitting another right now, and I am in constant body pain every day, for the time being. I don't know how long this is going to last, but I feel terrible, lol. Well, I won't feel any worse at work than at home! Granted, I will have to feel bad in responsible-human clothing, whereas at home I could lounge around in slob-human pyjamas and stuff, and I can go for a stretch any time my muscles get to feel like they'll straight-up snap and I can't do that at work, but...other than that, there's not much difference. Feels bad no matter where I am. Might as well make some munny, right?

I want to stay home and colour, though. I feel better when I'm colouring. (I don't know why. Focuses my mind elsewhere, maybe?) I'd say 'and play FLi', because it's really fun doing all this post-game clean-up and completion, but it doesn't actually take my mind off the pain at all, tbh. It distracts me a bit but I still feel it pretty strongly. I wonder why colouring seems to get rid of the pain temporarily. It comes back within ten minutes of stopping, but for a little while it is GONE, which doesn't happen with gaming. That actually makes no sense, right? Isn't colouring just a different form of distraction?

Well gotta go, I've left this post sitting for two hours already, gotta hit Submit, now. Oh, and I now have 88 of 103 recipes, yay. It's very hard to get them, now. I once turned in 10 slates and got NO new recipes in spite of having 15 left to find.

[Kikki]

Well, I have 102 of 107 possible mysterious slate recipes. (107 includes the four base remodel items. I wasn't including them before since they aren't actual RECIPES that you can craft, but I was able to check via the base customization options and I have 2 of the 4, right now.)

Anyway, it was going pretty well. It got quite slow after I had unlocked about 85 recipes. I was only unlocking 1, occasionally 2 recipes per batch of 10 slates given. As a rarity, once or twice I got NO recipes in a batch of ten slates.

However, I've now hit the final 5. Recipe #102, for me...guess how many slates I had to turn in before I got it?

90.

Freaking 80 slates turned in and NOTHING, they were garbage! Somewhere in the 9th batch, I got one more recipe. And I still have 5 more recipes to find! Will they get even MORE rare? If fight and fight shadow monsters to grind out 450 more slates, will I actually finally have ALL the recipes? Or will it have gotten even worse?

I can turn out almost 50 slates in three clear-outs of a monster house because I've added 160% to the base drop rate. It takes 2-5 minutes each time. At this rate, to get the last 5 things I am missing, it will take somewhere between an hour and 2.5 hours of non-stop respawning of the same Monster House over and over and clearing out all but one monster each time, then quitting, restarting, going back in. The 2-5 minutes doesn't include the time it takes to quit and restart the Treasure Grove, either, which adds another minute each time, so that's another half hour in all. So actually, 1 hour to 3 hours, it'll take at this rate, and I'm pretty sure I'm actually underestimating the time it takes me to do this, tbh. It's probably more like 5-10 minutes for each clearing of a monster house. (Not to mention the time it takes to get a monster house to spawn in the first place, since they're rare!) AND I hate to grind my entire island and multiple Lives to get the shop to level 5, just to be able to get the Trip applique thing that I increased my drop rate with. And it's BORING. It's like work.

Ugh. The whole mysterious slates recipes thing is very tedious, gang. I hate RNG. It shouldn't work like this. This is not fun. And it's a GAME, so it is supposed to be fun!

I want to move on with my Treasure Groves so that I can complete my encyclopedia and get the monster drop I need to do the very last Blacksmith quest so I can get my Hero ranking and unlock the really good top-tier skills on the skill tree! I need all the benefits I can get, to craft the turbo weapons and tools (tools especially.)

This is tiresome. Do they really think this level of grinding is fun? If you just played casually, without exploiting Monster Houses, you'd have to play the game for about ten thousand hours to get enough slates to unlock all the recipes.

I wish there was a stat to tell me how many slates I've turned in already, but I'm going to keep track on my own of how many I have to use to get the last 5. I already know it took me 90 slates to unlock my #102. Here we go a-counting...

[Bluie]

I gave away two of my shifts this week because I cannot STAND IT right now. I need a freaking second to BREATHE. And I'm not miserable or anything, I just need a break that lasts longer than two days off several days apart. My coworker's hours got cut anyways, so it works out, but geez louise, I hate summer. At least the Fall/Winter has the excitement of the downtime afterwards, but Summer feels like I'm dragging a ball&chain everywhere.

But yeah, defs going to get some gaming done. FFXIV has its Moogle event again and I'll probably get some Genshin stuff done too. Not quite in the mood to tackle XCX yet, because it'll dominate my free time once I do. Funnily enough, I'm feeling an urge to do my second playthrough of Guardians of Azuma but NO, I WILL RESIST. I'm also feeling like picking up Cattails Wildwood Story again... which I might not resist? I did have every intention to get back to that one, so maybe I will.

[Bluie]

Welp, ended up taking back one of those shifts as my employer begged me to come in. It was actually my scheduled day off. The floods in Texas have contaminated our water source, therefore making it a little more difficult to do my job. Our fresh made juices didn't get done for two days so they asked me to come in and do 8 hours of only juice. I did it on my terms(my chosen hours), but RIP one of my leisure days. Making juice all day isn't the worst, and I'm good at it, so whatever, money made.

However, gaming-wise, something unexpected happened. I've been absolutely sucked into Uma Musume. I've known about this game for years (ever since it released in Japan) but never cared enough to try it (which would require a VPN to even play). It's finally been released globally in late June and there are horse girls all over my feeds. People are not only obsessed with their favorite character, but the actual racing horses they're based off of too. Honestly, I found it a pretty funny trend and decided to give the game a try, ya'know, for fun. ...As it turns out, this game scratches a very specifc part of my brain; that being the 'Princess Maker' itch. When I was in highschool in the early 2000s, I imported Princess Maker 4 on DS and played the absolute hell out of it. I'm not usually into the 'stat raising' games, but IDK, when it came to raising this little girl and getting all these different endings, it was a ton of fun. Uma Musume does the exact same thing, except this time you have TONS of different 'daughters' to choose from and you're trying to get them all to the same goal. It's VERY addicting and I'm already growing attached to some characters I've been training. Man, when Cygames gets it right, they really get it. Gacha be damned, it's still wildly fun to play on its own. ...I still miss Dragalia Lost though...

[Scuttlefish]

Hades, Signalis, Fallout: New Vegas, Deltarune, Death Stranding, Lies of P, and Sekiro are the ones at the top of my list of games I really wanna play or finish playing. I do remember messing around a bit in New Vegas and watching my brother play a lot when we were kids, but I really need to experience it again.

[PSI_Nightshade]

I've been busy. Still playing the games I've been playing but I also got a Switch 2 since for I added Mario Kart World in there. I completed the cups and rallies though so I don't need to go ham on it at the moment and just pulls it out when friends want to play.

I also got Raidou Remastered. I played the second Raidou game back on PS2 and I enjoyed it. I eventually got the first one but never got around to play it. However, Raidou Remastered took the second game's gameplay and remade the 1st game with it and added extra bells a whistles to it. So far, I'm liking the result. I'll be alternating between this and Xenoblade Chronicles X chapter by chapter.

I'm almost done with Mega Man Battle Network 2. It had been a long time since I done everything I could with the original but I had forgotten just how long and how difficult that was when I came back to do it on the Legacy Collection. I just need the chips of the Superboss left and the final Style change. Well, I also need the 10 secret chips but no one plays the Legacy Collection's multiplayer on BN2 today so gonna have to miss out on this one yet again. Anyway, it's almost time for Battle Network 3 again.

And then there's Donkey Kong Bananza coming out next week. It just never stops.

[Kikki]

For no good reason, I am playing Harvest Moon: A New Beginning, again. And I just realized that there is no reason to own a pet. NO REASON, unless you just think they're cute. (Which I don't. It's not like they have cute interactions or fun functions.)

Just get Neil up to 15,000 FP and own 10 adult animals of any kind (including chickens) and boom, you've got yourself a farm bell, which will bring in and take out EVERY animal in that region of your farm. No need for herding pets AT ALL. It's not like there are any festivals for them, after all. Which means there's an entire building that is useless: the Pet House or Pet Barn or whatever it's called. I may try to see if I can put down the pet house, put a feeder in my own house, then move a pet in and get rid of the pet house. (I'm betting you can't get rid of the pet house once you own a pet, though, even if it's indoors, because that gets rid of the pet notebook.) I wouldn't mind having ONE pet just for the look of things, but I also don't really care. But I'm curious how it works.

Silly that I'm playing this, though, when I've still got to finish Azuma and was also pretty deep into FLi post-game content. Which is a dream for those with completionist tendencies. AND I still have to finish XCX Definitive. But I'm scared to. I don't wanna...it's GONNA hurt! And I was replaying Tears, too.

I have too many great games. Howz THAT for a contender for 1st World Problem of the Year?

[Milo]

However, gaming-wise, something unexpected happened. I've been absolutely sucked into Uma Musume.

Having watched My Little Pony has kind of spoiled my ability to appreciate anthropomorphic horses. Like, other types of "human with animal ears and tail" characters you often see in anime, like catgirls or bunnygirls, at least feel like they capture an important part of what makes those animals so cute. But who looks at horses and thinks that their ears are the most interesting thing about them?

Yes, none of this has anything to do with the actual quality of the game (or the anime series it's based on).

[Bluie]

However, gaming-wise, something unexpected happened. I've been absolutely sucked into Uma Musume.

Having watched My Little Pony has kind of spoiled my ability to appreciate anthropomorphic horses. Like, other types of "human with animal ears and tail" characters you often see in anime, like catgirls or bunnygirls, at least feel like they capture an important part of what makes those animals so cute. But who looks at horses and thinks that their ears are the most interesting thing about them?

Yes, none of this has anything to do with the actual quality of the game (or the anime series it's based on).

Funnily enough, their ears (and tail) have a ton of care put into them on how they're animated. If I didn't know any better, they probably mo-capped to have them mimic real horse's movements. They twitch and flick through their idles, which feels like an extra little bit of care.

And most of the game's charm comes from the faithful reenactments of horse racing tracks. You really feel like a spectator at the tracks pinning all your hopes on your chosen 'horse' that you've raised (instead of betting on). I think one of the main reasons the game blew up so wildly this past few weeks is because of that. It's great streaming material and having the horses be actual people with personalities and stories only amps up the care people have. Hell, Haru Urara is so freaking popular in the global release that people have been paying for her real life counterpart (who is now retired) to eat premium grass every day (you can do so via a website - and it's not cheap!). Both her caretaker and the Japanese fanbase have been blown away by the global community's response.

It also probably helps that the horse girls themselves are literally forbidden to be sexualized, as Cygames had to get permission from all their owners (who are 99% Yakuza) to use them - and they were very strict about it. There's also no relationship imbalance in the story mode where you or them have power over one another. It's pure partnership and wholesomeness, which is probably a nice welcome change for those who are tired of anime tiddy and gooner bait. Some of the racing outfits are two pieces and track suits vary, but none of them scream 'WE DESIGNED THIS HORSE GIRL AS WANK MATERIAL AND IT'S OBVIOUS AF'.

So yeah, that's my two cents on why people are so enamored.

Edit: This official video welcoming the global trainers shows a lot of the charms of the 'horse girls' via Japan's favorite; Gold Ship

[Kikki]

Stupid lovable little brother-in-law! >{

He's insisting I finish XCX (DE). I really, reeeeally don't want to. I know they're going to ruin it. Monolith Software just doesn't do good revamped/expanded stories. They do SO good with the base story, and then botch up anything additional they add (though they make fantastic gameplay in whatever they add on. Geez.)

Darn it, but I said I would. Of course, I would have eventually anyway, this just means...I feel like I need to pick it up again sooner rather than later. Boo.

I have too much good stuff to play as it is! I'm still having fun cleaning up the tidbits still remaining in Fantasy Life i (not enjoying grinding up the alternate combat lives, though; getting through all the kill quests is over and over is really tedious.) Also having fun with my Harvest Moon: A New Beginning replay, and my Tears of the Kingdom replay with all the little added bits from the Switch 2 upgrade + Nintendo Switch app. They're all fighting for my pitiful scraps of energy right now, as is house and garden care (including installing some new herb & spice shelves and cleaning the freaking kitchen AND freezer out.) and errand shopping and a bit of personal maintenance and trying to figure out what kind of cardio I can actually afford to do regularly. And colouring. There's a lot of things I want to try with colouring, and it seems to be like yoga for the...er, mind? Emotions? Overall better for me than gaming, probably, and definitely better than surfing the net or watching reruns on Prime or etc. And writing. I should be doing more of that, and I have plenty in mind, it's just...I can't organize my thoughts, any more. (Seriously, it's freaking me out more and more as time goes by, how unable I am to put my thoughts in order, or even remember what they ARE.)

I just don't feel like I have enough of me to spread across these games. And they're not even new. And ack, I forgot Azuma! I haven't even FINISHED that one, yet. And it's a great game, it's just...I have too many great options right now and not enough to dedicate to any of them. Honestly, I should probably prioritize XCXde and Azuma, to fully finish them (well, the new ending to 'de', that is, since I've played XCX maaaaaaany times already.) For some reason, they're the ones I least want to get back to, though. Well, I know why in XCXde's case. Less so for Azuma. I think I got tired of village maintenance but was at a point where the combat was starting to get more difficult, so I couldn't just charge through the story. I need to get back in there, though, before I forget everything.

I guess Azuma really should come first. Then...sigh...XCXde.

EDIT: I wonder what the best Pokemon game would be for someone to start with in 2025. Not what one person would say it is but, if the opinions of all Pokemon players could somehow be condensed...what one would REALLY be the best introduction to it. As a game, rather than the franchise as whole. Maybe it's just whatever one is newest, but honestly it seems like Pokemon's quality with new games is going down rather than up.

Not that I need any new games, right now. Especially not with Grand Bazaar speeding my way in only a month. Hmm, I wonder...can I get myself to finish at least Azuma and XCXde by the time SoS: GB comes out?

EDIT 2: Oh yeah, yesterday I finally found my first Dragontail Tree in FLi. Yay! Was able to make the Pegasus armor at last, and now I'm a 'Hero' Blacksmith as well. (Now I just have to track down all the legendary-level materials left to 'Hero' Carpenter, ugh.)