How's your backlog?

[Ronin19]

I beat Dragon Age Origins in its entirety, and I got the Varterral achievement, beating it on hard. I tried doing the same with Harvester, but it's such a difficult fight compared to the Varterral. I'll probably try again at another time. Time for Dragon Age 2 canon file!

[Bluie]

I picked up Mana Khemia Student Alliance for $5 on my Vita. It says it's the fourth entry, but as it's the ONLY one available on the PSN, I figured eh, why not. It's cute; the academy music drives me and my husband a little nuts, but otherwise I find it to be enjoyable. The leveling up system is a bit odd, but I guess if you're an alchemist, it sort of makes sense to have stat increases linked to crafting a specific item. The battle system also reminded me a lot of Grandia. I'm only a couple hours in, but even if I don't finish, it was $5 well spent if it's anything like an intro to the Atelier franchise overall.

Haha, oh NIS. It's only labeled as the '4th' entry because it was the 4th localized (after the Iris Trilogy). It's actually 9th entry in the main series. It is a good entry point in the series though, introducing a lot of mechanics that are a series staple. Once the games hit PS3, the leveling system went back to normal JRPG and they put more of the 'strangeness' into the alchemy system (pretty much trying to make results are variable as possible). And I agree with the academy music being a bit grating lol. The Workshop theme though, it's one of my favourite tracks in the franchise. I always change the workshop music to it in the other games when i'm replaying them or doing second playthroughs.

[ryume]

Thanks for the input, Bluie! I am enjoying it in short bursts for now - my ability to concentrate on a game longer than an hour is not possible lately lol. But, if all goes well, I can see myself buying non-handheld entries in the future for sure.

[Ronin19]

Well, I decided to play and beat Omensight first instead of Dragon Age 2; I guess I needed a break. I managed to beat Omensight today and I liked it just as I did Stories: The Path of Destinies. Back to Dragon Age 2 I go!

[Katgirl]

There's more information on the Cattstails update ^^ here's a link It's coming out on PC on December 28 and on Switch late January or early February. So I'll probably wait until then to get it.

In gaming news: I'm playing through Hakuoki Kyoto Winds and Edo Blossom. It's nice having both of them so I can go straight through a route. I've only done Okita so far since he was a favorite in the original so I want to use him to get through the common route. They definitely changed up the script. For the better most of the time, like he's not as... mean in the beginning (but it makes some of the later stuff where MC's like "...he... Said thank you... He's never said thank you." ring hollow) They did change one of the bits towards the end that I liked :/

Purposely vague spoiler that I hid just in case:

Spoiler:

In the original when they're making their decision, he says something like "well do you want to be evil? 'Cause I'd totally be evil for you, babe" and he makes a similar comment during the final battle. In this one he doesn't suggest it.

[seachel]

Finally cleared off Danganronpa V3 from my backlog last month. Took me about 1-2 months to finish it with some gaps in between. That ending though... I didn’t like the ending tbh but I did enjoy the game itself overall. Probably the last game I play on the PS Vita too. Next I might take on Professor Layton vs Phoenix Wright which I’ve been sitting on forever. Still have a number of 3DS game I want to finish before I move on completely to the Switch.

[Kikki]

London Detective Mysteria is SO cute. Barely through chapter 1 and already laughed so hard I cried a little. The characters are super lovable and interesting; it's great. I already really want to see more games by Karin; I'll have to look them up after this.

I hope everyone even a little interested in otoges picks this up, as I want it to be a big success for Xseed so that they'll want to do more Aksys seems to have dropped the otome ball, at this point, and I'd like to see more diversity in what's localized in the otome field anyway.

EDIT: I'm only finished Chapter 2, but I think this may be my favourite otoge ever. LOVE. I swear I've giggled so much while playing, I've gotten one of those giddy too-much-laughter highs off of it

[Bluie]

About 30ish hours into Ys8 now. I completely missed a castaway from chapter 4, so I went back and got em' and surprisingly got their approval to max despite missing one of their quests. Nice! I'm about to take on the infamous sheet music quest (that everyone needs a guide for because it's confusing af).

Haven't been playing too much else. I have Hyper Light Drifter and Phantasy Star on the backburner still, but I have this insatiable desire to play Rain World (released on the eShop last week and my friends highly recommend it) and i'm starting to be more and more tempted by Labyrinth of Refrain (a game I skipped over this year just like Ys8). I kinda hope there's some eshop cards or fun money under the tree this year, because work is so sloooooow (which I actually don't mind, but less money ya'know).

I also have been kinda disinterested in playing anything for more than a few hours in the morning lately, because i've been spending most of my free time exercising my artistic hobbies. While i'm enjoying Ys8 quite a bit, it isn't demanding my time + I know i'm close to the end, so I don't wanna rush it either.

[Pachi]

Kikki, you're already making me want to try the game haha! Unfortunately, I can't find it on Steam yet. I'm getting it if it doesn't need much space and if my PC meets the game requirements ^^


On backlog, I'm progressing through ANB and having fun! Currently waiting for bees to produce honey for town plan #2. The amount of required materials overwhelmed me at first but it's gotten better now since I read up on how to make money

[Kikki]

Ahh, sad to say, but the PC version of London Detective Mysteria won't be available for a while, yet. They don't have a projected release date for it, at this point, though I suspect it's not super far in the future, I also don't think it'll come out before next year...not in the next few weeks. I'm thinking a month or more. I'll certainly pass along any news as soon as I see it, though! I have all the relevant sources on Twitter so I wouldn't miss seeing it as soon as it was coming up

I really enjoyed the common route, but I've got to say...it's going to be hard in future playthroughs, as it is THE LONGEST COMMON ROUTE I HAVE EVER PLAYED. Really fun meeting all the characters for the first time (each person basically gets a chapter to themselves, within the common route) but it's going to be very lengthy if we have to go through it each time. Not sure yet if there's a short cut past the common route, or not.

[RopeMaidenKirie]

I also have been kinda disinterested in playing anything for more than a few hours in the morning lately, because i've been spending most of my free time exercising my artistic hobbies.

Came to post almost this exact thing, lol. I've been doing a ton of knitting in my spare time and getting ready for the holidays and our trip, so I really haven't played too many games, and nothing is really grabbing me at the moment. Might be end of the year burnout which I tend to get typically, then come January I'm back on the train.

I did beat Battle Chef Brigade though so that's something I guess!

[Kikki]

Mysteria came out, so I'm playing a new game right now, but it'll only take 2-3 days in all. Otherwise when I finished Tides of Destiny, I gave up on gaming for the rest of the year...just didn't feel like trying to pack in one or two more games, even though I could have. I spend a bit of time playing around in XCX if I want to have a controller in my hands and some nice stuff to look at, but not seriously. Actually, I won't have anything to play until January 11th, as far as I remember, so basically I've taken a month off of anything backlog oriented

Replaying known favourites is more soothing and cozy than playing anything new, ime...not so much to think about. Kind of like meeting up with old friends rather than going out to meet new ones. I don't think I can make as much backlog progress in 2019 because I've whittled down the pile to games I may just abandon rather than try to complete. So as long as my backlog doesn't GROW in 2019, I'll be satisfied; I don't think I'll be aiming for as many completions as I can, the way I did this year. I only had ONE game get added to my backlog in 2018 that will carry into 2019, and lots of old backlog games completed, and that's a huge success, imo.

December is sort of a busy month, anyway, irl.

[Blue Rose]

Almost done with Divinity: Original Sin 2. Been busy with irl lately so hadn't had too much time past couple weeks, but ive made some good progress. Sometimes i gotta give myself a day break in between cause some of these battles take me forever to do. This one i was struggling with took me HOURS. I hated that fight.

[Kikki]

So, I currently have one last neutral type of ending to finish in Mysteria, but basically, I've completed all the routes. And Jack's route...well... (I don't think any of this is spoilers, but I'll put it behind a cut anyway. Also to make this comment shorter.)

Spoiler:

I was afraid it would just leave me disgusted or disdainful. I can't stand when otome games attempt to make a murderer (or even just a complete jerk/bully) into a desirable romantic figure and expect us to just swallow that simply because he looks good in his CGs. But that is not the case in Mysteria. Jack's route is wow. I didn't know how they were planning to spin the whole Ripper situation into the story and was apprehensive about how they were going to include it as soon as I heard he'd be in (way back when it was first announced and I was looking up info to see what kind of game it was), but I was really impressed with it.

Surprisingly liked Lupin's route a great deal, too, though in a totally different way. Only route I was completely indifferent to was Watson's. It's not bad, but I find it super ordinary, personally. I think everyone would have a somewhat different preference for route order, but mine is Watson, Akechi, Homes, Lupin, Jack.

EDIT: Hmm. Finished the neutral 'charmed' end, and yet, the 6th epilogue has not unlocked. I have one more thing I can try, but if that doesn't work, I REALLY don't know what I need to do to get that last epilogue. Maybe do EVERY ending? But I'm not interested in the sad endings. :/

If anyone likes to read opposing views, then Breadmaster Lee has a review of this game and I'd say she basically doesn't like Mysteria (VERY spoilerific, so don't actually read the summaries if you're gonna play, just hit the link for where she jumps to her final thoughts, past all the route summaries) but I pretty much disagree with her in every way on this one. Emily is, in my opinion, actually one of the MORE independent heroines. (She does get rescued a lot but also does more of her own volition and doesn't just let others tell her what to do. My biggest peeve in heroines is when they let the guys do their thinking for them, more than them getting rescued.) Obviously opinions shall vary quite a lot. I found it way more fun than any of the other otoges I've played this year, for sure.

[Bluie]

I received a gift card I didn't really want, but my mother wanted it so she swapped it for cash... so I had enough to buy Rain World.

Spoiler:

Pretty sure i'm almost to chapter 6 in Ys 8.

Edit: Chapter 6 reached. A lot of this is what I got spoiled for me when it released on PS4. I was watching my friend play it thinking 'i'll probs never play this so eh'. Guess the twist factor is out, but I never did see how the game ended, so i'm looking forward to that.