Jade has been gaming since the fateful day she was given a Sega Master System II. She'll now play anything for a chance at a platinum trophy, and is partial to a JRPG or several.
If you had the misfortune of following me on Twitter in January, you would have seen me have meltdown over meltdown about the ending of Final Fantasy XV.
Honestly, I don’t think I’ve ever been so affected by a game in recent years, and I can’t remember a time when I’ve ever cried so much. It’s hard to pinpoint a specific scene which I would call “the saddest”, as I spent pretty much the last third of the game having just finished crying, actually crying, or just about to cry.
Pretty much everything after the game ends just destroyed me, but I’m not sure I’ll ever get the image of the four empty camping chairs around the campfire out of my head. I can no longer listen to any version of Stand By Me without welling up (or actually crying, in the case of during the Power Rangers movie).
I’m not really one for soundtracks to games. I tend to get really absorbed and sort of block all sounds apart from dialogue out. I’ve never finished a game, then found an urge to listen to the songs from it, but I’ve never given myself the chance to do that either. Maybe that’s something I should do more in the future.
Having said that, I do own two game soundtracks on physical CD (Persona 4: Dancing All Night, and Persona 5) and another on vinyl (Persona 4 Arena). I’m not sure this is necessarily because I like the soundtracks to the games, or more because of an obsession with the Persona series, but either way, the songs are really catchy (especially in Persona 4: Dancing All Night) and good to have on whilst travelling.
Long time no write. I’ve neglected this challenge thing (theme of my blog), so on bank holiday Monday, what better time to get back at it?
I’ll be honest, part of the reason I’ve not updated 30 Days Of is because I really struggled with this question. Most of the games I play don’t have ‘couples’, and if there’s a romance option, it’s up to you who you date rather than having a preassigned partner *coughPersonacough*.
After a lot of thought, I’ve opted for Snow and Bigby from The Wolf Among Us. I know in the game they’re not strictly a couple, but I think they’ve got a really great dynamic and they’re part of the reason I started reading Fables (which everyone else should totally do, especially if you enjoyed TWAU). Also, Bigby is a babe, and Snow isn’t taking any shit from anyone. They’re both great individually as well as together, and that’s what being a great couple is about!
Rogue-like role-playing release Touhou Genso Wanderer follows the story of adorable protagonist Reimu Harukei. Reimu becomes entranced by the ‘golden sphere’ that soon-to-be antagonist Rinnosuke Morichika is holding, and tries to steal it from him. Clearly under the sphere’s spell, Rinnosuke fights back, and Reimu soon finds herself away from her home, trying to find her way back and battling the clones which have been borne of the sphere’s dark power. The whole thing feels a little trope-y, and starting the game feels like setting off down a well-worn path, so it’s a good job that it has a lot to throw at you to try and keep you interested.
I’m sure you’re all dying to know how things are going for the 2017 challenges, so let’s crack on with my shame.
Make 10 new cosplays (including one entirely from scratch) It feels like con season has well and truly started now! Only March and I’ve already got two conventions under my belt, MCM Telford and MCM Birmingham. I wore new cosplays to each of these conventions, both from Yuri On Ice!!. A photo of my Phichit is below, but I haven’t got any photos back of my drunk Yuri yet – when I do, I will share!
Phichit from Yuri On Ice!!
This weekend, I started the work on my ‘from scratch’ cosplay; Kubo from Kubo and the Two Strings. I’ve got the kimono base done, so now I just need to weather it, and add the detail on. I also started making the guitar, but I feel like that’s going to be a much slower process!
Watch 30 anime series I’m totally powering through this one now, with four series under my belt! I’ve watched Voltron: Legendary Defender (s01), Love Live! (so1), and Vampire Knight (s01 and s02). I’m still planning on doing reviews of each series, so stay tuned for those! As I’m apparently obsessed with social media, I’ve also made a MyAnimeList profile, so feel free to add me on there.
Watch 30 new ‘old’ films The less said about this the better… I’ve still only watched one, and that was E.T. Moving swiftly on….
Watch 60 films at the cinema As always, you can track the progress on this challenge by following me on Twitter (more social media plugging) or checking out the hashtag #cs2017challenge. I’m well on schedule, with 16 films under my belt. I won’t list them, so check out that hashtag!
Clear the gaming backlog Look, I don’t think I even made the list for this did I? Probably not. And by ‘clear’ do we mean ‘continue to add more games until it’s totally out of hand’? Because if so, I’m way ahead of you…. Persona 5 comes out in two days, so there’s absolutely no chance this is getting done this year. Hooray!
Some eleven years after its original Japanese release, Ys Origin has been brought to PlayStation 4 by publisher DotEmu (via a PC localisation by XSEED back in 2006). Set 700 years before the events of the main Ys series, Origin steers away from the series’ familiar protagonist Adol Christin in order to focus on the background of the series’ story by exploring the world through the eyes of new characters.
No character has annoyed me so much in recent years than Duck from season 1 of TellTale’s The Walking Dead. I’m not sure if he’s made to be purposefully irritating, but I spent the entire time he was alive blaming him for everything bad that happened to Lee and Clem, and wishing for him to be gone.
You bet I left him hanging, and I didn’t hesitate to offer to shoot him when the time came.
Day 5: Game character you feel you are most like (or wish you were)
I’ve kind of hinted at feeling an affinity with Chiaki Nanami from Danganronpa 2 on a previous 30 Days Of entry, but my pick for today is Yosuke Hanamura from Persona 4.
Like me, Yosuke spends most of his time trying to fit in. His high school years are not great until he finds Yu, the person who makes him accept himself. I can relate a lot to this. Until I found the right group of friends, I spent a lot of my time in secondary school closing away parts of myself and pretending I wasn’t interested in certain things (mostly video games, but see also comics, movies, music).
Yosuke is also a huge nerd, catastrophically clumsy and a total failure with the opposite sex. This resonates far more than I’d like it to. He has a great sense of humour and doesn’t take things too seriously, unless that’s what the situation calls for, then he’s your guy! I would like to think I share those traits too.
He is also, in case you were wondering, best guy in Persona 4.
I spent a lot of time in secondary school feeling guilty about the things I liked because I didn’t fit in with the other girls in my class, so as an adult I’ve taught myself there’s no point in feeling guilty about the things that you like. You either like them, and that’s great, or you don’t, and that’s great too. You should never let anyone make you feel bad for the things you like, and if I’d learnt that at school, I’d probably have been a lot happier!
That said, my entry for my guilty pleasure game does make me feel guilty every time I play it. Not because I feel guilty for liking it, but because every time I play it I lose track of hours of my life.
No game makes me as unproductive as The Sims does. I play a lot of games, obviously, but I can always find time to get up, go for a walk, make dinner and generally be a functioning human being. But with The Sims, I’m just rendered useless. I can spend hours on there not even doing anything, just creating families and building houses and before you know it, I’ve been on the computer for 14 hours.
So, I really struggled with this one. I don’t have a very good grasp on how things are received by a wider audience, purely because I have such a variety of people in my life (in real life, and on Twitter etc. too), that at any given time there’s a whole combination of people talking about games, so between them they seem to cover most genres.
Rather than picking out a game, I’ve gone for a whole genre. Visual novels. I love visual novels, but I often get the impression when talking to others that they’re viewed as slightly inferior.
Sure, they’re not the most action-heavy, but a great game isn’t reliant on action alone. Some of the best stories I’ve played have been through visual novels, and they work particular well as a mystery story which I’m very fond of.
If you’ve never played a visual novel, please change this as soon as possible! Not only is it a great experience, you can unlock a whole genre of games to enjoy. Also, if you’re hella weeby like me, then you sure are in for a treat….
Culture Shack 