Backlog 2021

[Panda Parfait]

I made it to Shadowbringers in FFXIV \o/ The praise for this expansion is basically the entire reason I picked up this game so I'm super excited! I've only done a bit of it so far, but the intro was amazing. I really like that you can bring NPCs into dungeons now and they'll have unique dialogue. They're really slow, but it's nice to be able to go into a dungeon blind and learn mechanics naturally instead of feeling like a burden on a party of real people if I don't watch a guide beforehand. And no sitting around and waiting in the loooong DPS queues.

Also, I did really enjoy the patch content for Stormblood. The Castrum Fluminis trial was beautiful. Not my favorite expansion, but overall still great and had some amazing moments.

[Harvest Moon kawaii]

So, should probably mention that this week or within a week, I bought 15 games. 10 on Steam and 5 on Switch. The ones on Switch were all on sale, and the ones on Steam were all low-priced.

Yesterday, I played more Animal Crossing: New Leaf (3DS) and spent more time on the Island.

Also yesterday, I played about 2 or 3 hours of Pokemon Shield participating in the special-timed Cromarant event, but was also looking for a shiny Cromarant in the dens and couldn't find one.

I bought the 5 Switch games yesterday, and played about an hour of Wordherd. That game is difficult, even on the easiest setting.

Today, I played about an hour of Game Dev Story (by Kairosoft). I remember playing the demo and liking it, and I still liked the full game. I got it on sale for 14% off or $2 US off.

Also, today I input the special code to get the item to evolve Galaraian Slowpoke into Galarian Slowking in Pokemon Shield. It's a special one-day event, so those that want or need this item better hurry.

I didn't play Animal Crossing: New Leaf (3DS) this morning. It felt like a relief to change my morning routine a little.

As for games I'm excited for that are coming, here's this list for February for games I want:

Super Mario 3D World + Bowser's Fury (Switch) - Releasing next Friday (February 12, 2021) ($60, getting/pre-ordered)

Code Realize: -Wintertide Miracles- (Switch) (Releasing: February 25, 2021) ($40)

Steam Prison (Switch) (Releasing February 25, 2021) ($65.49)

Littlewood (Switch) (Releasing on February 25, 2021) (No price for Switch version yet, but the Steam version is $15)

I really want Littlewood and one of the two Otome games. I have both Code Realize games already on the Switch, but I'm only in the second route of the first game with the second game completely unplayed. And as for steam Prison, I'm really enjoying the demo so far, but I want to finish the demo first before making my decision.

I also have the Pokemon Home Subscription to renew on February 10th, and that's about $20.

[Kikki]

Glad you FFXIV lovers have something new to get excited about. A game I love receiving major content updates is not really something I've experienced, but it must be cool.

~

Why did I never realize how adorable this Teebo kid in Hateno Village is? Also, why did I never look up parrying a guardian's laser before? I found a video that explains EXACTLY when to hit A in order to perfectly reflect the beam right back into the guardian's face (though you do have to be standing pretty close for it to work), and now I need fear no guardian, ever again. I had already gotten pretty good at hacking the legs off of the stalker guardians in previous play-throughs, but this negates the one last issue that made guardians so dangerous when you don't have a full set of upgraded ancient armor.

This game is so big... I always vow I'm going to go sloooowly, explore every nook and cranny and grab every korok seed (well, not any of the ones that have the types of test I hate, like the fast-moving targets) and treasure chest, scan all my amiibos at every opportunity, do every single side quest (I do most of them, but some are irritating!)...and then I get overwhelmed by the size and detail and I just run to the next story point, lol. In the beginning it's so hard to prioritize! You so badly need more hearts and more stamina, and you need to hurry and get the camera (I like being able to take pictures as I go along, not have to return back later to catalogue a million things I've already seen but had to pass by because I didn't have the camera yet.), you need to get a few sets of armor, you need to make money to buy certain sets, you need to pay to free at least two fairies so that you can upgrade your armor to the bonus stage...there's just so much, and it's all about equally important. It's overwhelming, in the beginning, and Link is just so very soft and squishy with only 3 hearts.

...

This makes me want to play XCX again, lol. I'm really just jumping from game to game at the drop of a hat, this month. Meh, whatever makes winter go faster. Speeding my way into what is going to be another insane spring!

[Mikodesu]

@Kikki: Congrats on getting perfect parries down! They're pretty satisfying when you can knock out more than one in a row. Iirc you can execute them at different distances, but the timing is judged based on distance so I would definitely say to stick with what feels comfortable.


--
Just more Genshin for now. I've retooled Zhongli as my carry now. He's not SUPPOSED to be a carry but he's the strongest character I've got for the moment, so...whatcha gonna do. If nothing else his attack animations are really pretty. It's hard to get used to my new combo order, but I'm doing a fair bit more damage. Worth?

I got a book for my first 5 star on the permanent banner - it's the crit rate book, though. So if I ever get more constellations on one of the 4 star mages (except for Barbara...poor Babs) I'll have a great book for her.

I also finished the Dainsleif quest. Mihoyo is really pulling out all the stops with the sad boys thing. This one looks like a two-bit Marvel villain, but the Japanese VA sold it pretty well.

[Daikon boy]

I've got 100+ games on my backlog which works well for me honestly.

I'm trying to level up in ever oasis so I don't die and thinking of popping little town hero back in again. I figured out the battle system for that one but haven't picked it back up in awhile so it'll need to do a little bit of refreshing. I was playing okami too a long time ago but got stuck trying to figure out how to make bombs and never kept playing. I'm not in the mood to try that one again yet, but I really do need to go and look it up when i do.

I also want to boot crossing souls up again and finish that. I was really enjoying it, but the game glitched out on a part after I finished it and I had to close it, which means I have to redo it again which i really don't want to do.


I really want to buy tales of abyss and like a dragon, and I also want to get my hands on sakura wars (even though I think the main point of that is dating girls and I don't care about that aspect at all) and also some older games like ghost trick, rf2, rf3 (which will probably cost me 100$ and is unfortunately the one I want most) and stella glow (I didn't know it was a strategy game and now I think I'll really like the gameplay) solatorobo (also over 100$) and rhapsody a musical adventure. all three have some aspects that I don't really care for, but I'm really interested in some of the stuff some of them are doing anyways and they look fun. (Rhapsody, for example, is a musical and an rpg and I'm really curious about that.) I won't be able to get a lot of these soon, but the less expensive ones are higher up on my list of possible next purchases.

I'm also really hoping for some good golden week sales. I'm hoping a lot of the games I really want or want to try will go on sale for a good price so I can play through them all. I want to try a ys game, but I'm not sure how much story there is in those games, and I'm waiting on a good sale. I really like at least a halfway decent amount of story and dialogue in my games, and I'm not sure how good ys is on that so I haven't gone for any of the games yet.

[Kikki]

I want to try a ys game, but I'm not sure how much story there is in those games, and I'm waiting on a good sale. I really like at least a halfway decent amount of story and dialogue in my games, and I'm not sure how good ys is on that so I haven't gone for any of the games yet.

Hello; I think this is the first time I've seen you.

Most Ys games are not plot heavy, they're more about the gameplay, but that did begin to shift in Ys VIII: Lacrimosa of Dana, which revolved around a central story much more heavily, and people loved it, so they're going the same direction (story-centric) with Ys IX: Montrum Nox. If you ever want to play a Ys game and don't know where to start because they are already 9 of them, Digital Emelas is a nice fan site that gives you several options for what order the games can best be played in and which games make a good starting point. The two most recent games (VIII and IX) are both good to jump in on, though almost any Ys game can be your starting point except the one that's a direct sequel to the one before it...I can't remember which, since I didn't play the early games. (I only really like the series once it became more story-centric. Gameplay-based games usually don't do the trick, for me.)

Most Ys games can stand alone because the premise of the protagonist of most of the games, Adol, is that he's an explorer who keeps logs of his adventures, and each game is one recounting one of those adventures. So they don't really need to line up. But Digital Emelas can explain in more detail, since it's already set up to introduce new people to the series.

My personal recommendation is that if you're interested in Ys because Lacrimosa of Dana or Monstrum Nox caught your attention, just go ahead and play the game you got interested in, and if you like it enough to go back and play others, you can consider the order then. Each game basically stands alone, though it may have cameos from other games, and the world has lore, which gives them a sort of connection. But I just think of it as seeing the stories of Adol's different adventures. Which one you see first is not that important, to me. (Plus I'm only interested in the more story-driven entries anyway.)

~

Dunno what I'm doing today. Probably going to try to clear some more shrines in BotW (again) since I only have two each of health and stamina extensions. I really keep meaning to pick Trio back up where I stopped, ready to begin Winter 8 Year 1, but...not motivated. Even though I was about to finish the game's 'plot' and get my final reward for that, too. Well, February is about playing whatever I want, whenever I want, so...*shrug*

EDIT: I have the snowball bowling game down, so I can now make 300 rupees (minus the 20 rupee participation fee) at the drop of a hat. I can't stand to do this for an hour like some people suggest to pull in an easy 10,000 rupees in a session...tooooooo tedious. But if I need an armour set, like I do now, I can spend 5-10 minutes at it to make one or two thousand rupees to buy the set with. So it'll be an as-needed money maker. Way faster than anything else, though. The next fastest method would be hunting those rhino things not far from where Pondo has his snowbowling, but it takes time to find them, effort to kill them, and then you have to cook 5 of them into a skewer, and then you've gotta go sell them. Much slower and more effort-filled. I didn't try the snow-bowling even ONCE in my previous 3 playthroughs. Hmm. Once you know the exact position to stand in, it's really easy to get a strike every time.

Though I do wonder just how rich this Pondo guy is. He hands out gold rupees like they're gumballs he bought in bulk to hand out to cute kids. (Since he calls Link 'kiddums'. And Link IS very cute. Particularly compared to all the other Hylians, lol, except Zelda.) Also, I actually totally love the wooden moose pins and the sound they make when you bowl them all down, and the way they bounce slightly when they hit the ground, and then sliiiiide a little bit on the slipper snow. I just love that animation, I guess.

[Bluie]

I made it to Shadowbringers in FFXIV \o/ The praise for this expansion is basically the entire reason I picked up this game so I'm super excited! I've only done a bit of it so far, but the intro was amazing. I really like that you can bring NPCs into dungeons now and they'll have unique dialogue. They're really slow, but it's nice to be able to go into a dungeon blind and learn mechanics naturally instead of feeling like a burden on a party of real people if I don't watch a guide beforehand. And no sitting around and waiting in the loooong DPS queues.

Also, I did really enjoy the patch content for Stormblood. The Castrum Fluminis trial was beautiful. Not my favorite expansion, but overall still great and had some amazing moments.

The Trust system is really great for people who just want to mostly solo the game. Outside of Trials, you can basically do it all yourself starting in Shadowbringers. It also gives the Scions some much needed characterization instead of just talking and following them everywhere. Be aware though that they'll be unavailable to do dungeons with you again unless you level them up. For the first time going through storyline dungeons, they'll be synced to your level, but if you want to keep running it again for gear, you'll have to do it with other players OR level up your Trust party by redoing the dungeon they're leveled for. It's actually a decent way to level up your lvl 70 jobs as there's no Palace of the Dead or Heaven on High in Shadowbringers.

I have little qualms with Stormblood as I really liked a lot of the characters that were focused on or introduced. Raubahn is such a bro and I easily would risk my neck for him. Hien is also great total bro material - especially in the patch material. Sadu and wittle sun were a riot, and let's not forget the hilarity that are the Namazu. A lot of the fandom likes to « Cow Poopoo » on Lyse and that she's the reason why the expansion is 'bad', but IDK, I have little to no problem with her? The firey kicking girl wants to liberate her country, how dare she gain a personality of her own and fight for what she believes in! Girl had to watch her friend (and basically only family left) sacrifice themselves for the greater good, finally pushing her away from her façade, and a big part of the fandom won't shut up about how 'I liked her better when she was 'X'. Like, frick off, you missed the whole point of the narrative!

Anyways, Shadowbringers. I think you'll really enjoy it as it's 100% where the game's story and action start to peak. I don't wanna say too much for fear of maybe tipping you off to plot points, so ima' just zip my lips for now~
It still isn't my favorite expansion, that still belongs to Heavensward for various reasons of my own, but I will not deny that Shadowbringers really raised the bar, extremely high.

For now, I'm leveling Dancer because I realized I'm going to have to level a ranged non magical DPS it if I want access to something in Endwalker. More on that later.

Just more Genshin for now. I've retooled Zhongli as my carry now. He's not SUPPOSED to be a carry but he's the strongest character I've got for the moment, so...whatcha gonna do. If nothing else his attack animations are really pretty. It's hard to get used to my new combo order, but I'm doing a fair bit more damage. Worth?

I got a book for my first 5 star on the permanent banner - it's the crit rate book, though. So if I ever get more constellations on one of the 4 star mages (except for Barbara...poor Babs) I'll have a great book for her.

I also finished the Dainsleif quest. Mihoyo is really pulling out all the stops with the sad boys thing. This one looks like a two-bit Marvel villain, but the Japanese VA sold it pretty well.

Dainsleif is literally Dimitri from Fire Emblem lmao.

I reached AR40 and I just wanna lie down for a little while. I thought I could maybe take my time and advance the world level when I felt like it, but nah, it did it automatically. RIP. The enemies are still killable, but the time trial challenges are freaking impossible, until I get my main party all to level 80 and level their talents more. Thing is that I'm just not in the mood right now. I got the Traveler to level 80 and then started doing the calculations of how many times I'd have to kill the world bosses to get what I need and ugh, just not right noooow...! I'm looking forward to the upcoming festivities for Chinese New Years, but I may be taking a small break before I get back into the meat of the game.

----

I got myself a new controller for both Switch and PC. I have been meaning to for awhile mainly for two reasons. The first being that my husband and I share a controller between our two Switches, and it's really annoying having to re-sync it every time one of us has taken a turn. The other being that with the small amount of games I DO have on my PC, I hate using the keyboard and keep forgetting what keys do what. I ended up getting this one and it's just my size! I'm gonna try it out today and see how well it works.

[Panda Parfait]

^ Oh, I didn't know you have to level up the trusts to redo dungeons with them. Thanks for letting me know! I'm not sure I'll reuse them too much, I'm very used to the pace of real players who just floor it through the dungeons. Maybe to level jobs with long queues. Being able to use them for the first time through is lovely, though. I'm loving the extra dialogue and it makes the Scions feel more like a regular Final Fantasy cast. It always seemed like the game could never decide whether the WoL is a one man army or has a bunch of mysterious powerful pals, so I'm glad they just decided that canonically the actual story characters are usually fighting with you now.

I really liked a lot of the Stormblood characters as well! Hien is so great, as are most of the characters in the Steppe. Zenos was a fun villian. Lyse isn't one of my favorites, but I was surprised to see that a lot of people straight up hate her. Gyr Abania was generally my least liked part of the expansion, but it wasn't because of her. I'm glad she finally got some characterization besides being someone's sidekick.

I'm enjoying what I've played so far of Shadowbringers, excited to see more! I have been spoiled on one plot point about the Crystal Exarch that I kind of wish I'd been able to find out myself (because people are weirdly flippant about this specific spoiler and just post it without warning like it's just common knowledge???), but at least I otherwise have no idea what's going to happen.

I have not watched anything regarding Endwalker because I don't want to risk being spoiled, but I'm intrigued. Enjoy Dancer! I've been using it for the MSQ for a while now and it's super fun. I'm also lazy and love that the gameplay is essentially "press the shiny button" instead of having to remember a rotation. I still play Astrologian on occasion, but balancing cards/healing/doing damage on a controller can be... a lot. Probably should have leveled White Mage instead lol.

[Mikodesu]

Dainsleif is literally Dimitri from Fire Emblem lmao.

I reached AR40 and I just wanna lie down for a little while. I thought I could maybe take my time and advance the world level when I felt like it, but nah, it did it automatically. RIP. The enemies are still killable, but the time trial challenges are freaking impossible, until I get my main party all to level 80 and level their talents more. Thing is that I'm just not in the mood right now. I got the Traveler to level 80 and then started doing the calculations of how many times I'd have to kill the world bosses to get what I need and ugh, just not right noooow...! I'm looking forward to the upcoming festivities for Chinese New Years, but I may be taking a small break before I get back into the meat of the game.

(Side note...Dainsleif makes sense now? )

:/ I'm sorry Bluie - that's how I felt when I hit AR30. I just barely got the hang of the game as it was and SURPRISE MFER! Like a kick in the gut. If it helps I think you should be able to do time trials in co-op, which should make them significantly easier. (I'm also fairly sure now that the world rolls over automatically on all adventure ranks ending in 0, and there are trials for the 5's...they could have been more clear about that, though. Kind of freaking important.)

Also, if you're planning on using Xiao...lemmie recommend TSoul's build guide for him. If you get used to using him he's apparently pretty cheap to build, which might be helpful. (And Sucrose is the best character to run with him.)

[iLoveSprites75]

I suck. I haven't been back on Mystery Dungeon, but I finally went back to Animal Crossing so I'll finish up my town. Ugh. I'm thinking of hopping over to a 3DS game as far as story goes so that way I don't have to worry about swapping cartridges if I'm working on my AC town and all that on the Switch. It'll just be grab & go on 3DS and it'll be a bit easier to travel with, and pick up/put down. Now to decide which.

[Daikon boy]

@kikki

I'm new to the forums, yeah. Thanks for the advice! It's hard to find information about how much story the games have. I've heard what people think are the best games, and maybe that some of them I should save for when I can play them handheld on a vita if I like the series, but not enough about the story. I was thinking I'd probably be better off trying one of the newer games first, so I'm glad to know I was on the right track there.
I'm definitely way more story driven over gameplay driven too. There are some games I've played that people don't like because they're 'too repetitive' but that doesn't bother me, or at least not with those games, so I ended up really liking them because of the story and characters. There are some games I love the gameplay in, but if there's not at least a decent story going on I'm probably not gonna be interested enough to finish it.

[Kikki]

Welcome to the forums, then, Daikon boy.

Prior to Ys VIII and Ys IX, Ys SEVEN seems to have been considered the most story-driven of the series, though it's story-lite compared to many other series. (This opinion of SEVEN is not unanimous, of course, but most people I asked about it back when I was first looking into the series seemed to think it was one of the more story-driven of Ys games.) I am going to get Ys IX when it comes out on Switch this summer (hopefully I can find a camera setting that doesn't make my head lurch so much!) but I did complete Lacrimosa of Dana, and it was definitely story-driven. Not on the level of a game like Trails of Cold Steel, of course, but still centred around its plot and the characters, whereas most other Ys games have a plot, but it's not really the driving factor of the game, it's more just a framework for the gameplay to be built on.

Digital Emelas is a great resource if you have any Ys-related confusion. Better than me, since I decided I wasn't interested in the older games and am sticking with the newer ones.

~

Got all the towers in this third or fourth replay of BotW. I'm playing extremely ineffectively. It makes me so uncomfortable! (lol) But I don't have the brainage to organize this huge world into an efficient playthrough, this time, so I'm doing everything a little bit randomly. I'm so very thorough on the Great Plateau. I even wipe out every single enemy before I leave, so that it's cleared before the first blood moon can happen and it feels so safe and empty. But as soon as I leave that confined area, the game becomes too BIG to know what I should do next.

[Harvest Moon kawaii]

So, played more of the Steam Prison demo. I'm finally past the Common route (

Spoiler:

Now in the Underworld Route.

) I wonder how close I am to finishing the demo now? Still really enjoying it.

So, bought the sequel/second story to Half-Past Fate already (Half Past Fate: Romantic Distancing). Since it was $5 on sale.

So, I started the first game, Half Past Fate, which I bought some time ago. I'm really enjoying it so far. I'm on Chapter 3 with 7 out of 42 or so achievements unlocked.

[Daikon boy]

@ kikki

I think I'll probably go with viii then, and if I like it enough I'll look at vii and ix as my next ys games before I think about hopping into some of the older ones. ix is probably going to be a little expensive for awhile, so I think it'd be great if I could grab viii on a sale, and then by the time I'd be ready for ix (if I want to grab it too) it would probably be a lot cheaper for me than it will be just released. I hope you can enjoy it and can make the camera work good for you. (I was in the museum in animal crossing the other day myself, but it made my eye feel funny, because I was trying to focus on...something. the character? The background? Either way the way it was moving made my eye feel funny trying to lock onto something but it's usually good most of the game. I dunno if it was just a weird day and my eyes were tired or something or if I just need to be a little slower or something in the museum.

I've been playing my ps4 games more lately too. normally my eyes don't like having to wear my glasses for too long and I need to take a break sooner except a few select games, so usually handheld games are easier for that because I don't need my glasses, but it's not been so much of a problem lately so. Maybe my eyes are just doing weird things?)

I'll have to check that out too! I think you're a pretty good source for a starting point for me though, since you like the story driven newer games more which is kind of what I want. It's good to know about if I want to delve into the older stuff though.



I'm not sure if I want to play something right now or if I want to finish up the last episode of the show I've been working through for months.

[Mikodesu]

Pointless aside (probably)...I don't think I'm going to end up finishing the adventure mode in Ring Fit. Haven't been back to it this year. I don't hate it, but it's just so tedious compared to exercise, exercise, done. To be fair it served its purpose for me. The reward system from the adventure mode isn't nearly as prominent in any other mode. But that's kinda the point.


The only other thing I have is a Genshin complaint. Got another drop in multiplayer person. « Harvest Goddess » damn it, Mihoyo, not everyone can/wants to play your game with others! I'd be more willing if I had any way to communicate with these strangers? I'm playing on PC, with a Switch pro controller, and I have pressed all the buttons and none of them take me to the keyboard. And what good is having some stranger running around in your world when they can't really DO anything and you have no way to communicate? Skree. I don't THINK Genshin has voice chat - haven't combed through the settings for it though. And I'm...not sure I want to.

I am very much loving the touch of Mihoyo SLOWLY decorating Liyue Harbor for the lantern festival, though. It's simple, but it's interesting.